Miss Millicent was not too old to have a birthday on the day before the race. Mr. Dulger was aware of this epoch and had written to Bridgeman for a barrel of flowers. Dulger’s clerkly salary--for his stern papa kept him on a salary much too exiguous for his exigencies--his salary hardly sufficed for his systematic floral tributes. He had been obliged to write to the bookkeeper in Front Street for another temporary loan. Billy had presentiments that the crisis of his fate was at hand. He would not fail at the last for want of sufficient investment. A flower barrel was a _grandiose_ gift. He was confident that no one else had thought of it. True love makes a Dulger a genius. If the wooed could not be won by a barrel of flowers, he would forever fly her false toleration and among the flour barrels toilsomely regain his wasted bouquet money. Poor Billy Dulger! So long a Tolerated, he was weary of this “longing much, hoping little, asking naught.” “How shall Milly’s birthday be honoured?” was, however, still a question for the generality. Each suggested other things and a picnic. “A picnic, of course,” said the masterly Mrs. Wilkes. “To the Dumplings, of course.” “Yes, of course.” “Why, yes; how could we think of anything else?” “With a band,” said Julia, “and dancing on the grass.” “With a boatload of champagne,” said Cloanthus. “No flirtations allowed,” suggested Peter Skerrett. “No? Well, then, flirtations compulsory; first, with Miss Milly, Queen of the Day, afterwards with our private Queens of Hearts,” and he chanted, “The Queen of Hearts she brought some Tarts Unto a Picnic gay; The King of Hearts he ate the Tarts And gave his Heart away.” It is not very important, but be it hereby known unto thee, O outsider of Kenosha, Stamboul, Fond du Lac, Paris, Natchez under the Hill, London, Lecompton, or Jerusalem! that the Dumplings of Newport _is_ an old stone fort, not _are_ certain apples enclosed in certain unwholesome strata of dough. Picnics go to the Dumplings as a shad to fresh water in spring, as a moth to a candle, as a swain to a nymph. They go there in boats over the smooth bay, across the strait, where a soft, lulling prolongation of the distant ocean swell reaches the navigator with sweet reminder motion. When picnics arrive at the Dumplings, they stroll about; their better halves are handed over the rocks by their worse halves; they view that crumbling, cheese-shaped object, the fort, and say sweet things of salt water and sunshine. They chat. They romp. Then comes the climax--to eat the picnic. Picnics are properly eaten with the fingers. The idea is to return to Arcadian manners.