“They don't have 'em on sailin' vessels, Captain Jenness said; they only have 'em on steamers,” said Deacon Latham. “Have what?” asked Miss Maria, sharply. “Stewardesses. They've got a cabin-boy.” Miss Maria desisted a moment from her work; then she answered, with a gruff shortness peculiar to her, “Well, then, she can go to the cook, I suppose. It wouldn't matter which she went to, I presume.” Deacon Latham looked up with the air of confessing to sin before the whole congregation. “The cook's a man,--a black man,” he said. Miss Maria dropped a handful of pods into the pan, and sent a handful of peas rattling across the table on to the floor. “Well, who in Time”--the expression was strong, but she used it without hesitation, and was never known to repent it “_will_ she go to, then?” “I declare for't,” said her father, “I don't know. I d'know as I ever thought it out fairly before; but just now when I was pickin' the pease for you, my mind got to dwellin' on Lyddy, and then it come to me all at once: there she was, the only _one_ among a whole shipful, and I--I didn't know but what she might think it rather of a strange position for her.” “_Oh_!” exclaimed Miss Maria, petulantly. “I guess Lyddy'd know how to conduct herself wherever she was; she's a born lady, if ever there was one. But what I think is--” Miss Maria paused, and did not say what she thought; but it was evidently not the social aspect of the matter which was uppermost in her mind. In fact, she had never been at all afraid of men, whom she regarded as a more inefficient and feebler-minded kind of women. “The only thing't makes me feel easier is what the captain said about the young men,” said Deacon Latham. “What young men?” asked Miss Maria. “Why, I told you about 'em!” retorted the old man, with some exasperation. “You told me about two young men that stopped on the wharf and pitied Lyddy's worn-out looks.” “Didn't I tell you the rest? I declare for't, I don't believe I did; I be'n so put about. Well, as we was drivin' up to the depot, we met the same two young men, and the captain asked 'em, 'Are you goin' or not a-goin'?'--just that way; and they said, 'We're goin'.' And he said, 'When you comin' aboard?' and he told 'em he was goin' to haul out this mornin' at three o'clock. And they asked what tug, and he told 'em, and they fixed it up between 'em all then that they was to come aboard from the tug, when she'd got the ship outside; and that's what I suppose they did. The captain he said to me he hadn't mentioned it before, because he wa'n't sure't they'd go till that minute. He give 'em a first-rate of a character.” Miss Maria said nothing for a long while. The subject seemed one with which she did not feel herself able to grapple. She looked all about the kitchen for inspiration, and even cast a searching glance into the wood-shed. Suddenly she jumped from her chair, and ran to the open window: “Mr. Goodlow! Mr. Goodlow! I wish you'd come in here a minute.”