Jonathan Adams’ ship the _West Wind_ sailed on many voyages and was the model for other vessels of her class, bigger and swifter even than herself—the great race of American clippers that once ruled the seas. They gave our country the highest place in the world’s shipping, and they brought her, even as Humphrey had said, a thousand miles nearer to her neighbors across the Atlantic. But that is not all of the story of this famous voyage. The real end came seven years later, when Humphrey had risen to be Commodore Reynolds and when, between two cruises, he was spending a holiday at home. One summer afternoon, a small, bent figure toiled up the driveway of the big house above the Susquehanna. Humphrey, with Miranda, was sitting in the shade of the high-columned veranda and for a moment did not recognize the strange face, so covered with dust that the yellow skin and slanting eyes were scarcely visible. But the old Chinaman walked straight to Miranda and laid his offering on her lap. “For you,” he said. “He wanted to bring it to you from the very first!” It was not the real pine tree, but the one that you see here, made of jade and enamel with tiny jewels set around the top of the pot. Humphrey and his wife exclaimed and admired and examined it on every side. “But I do not understand,” Humphrey kept saying. “How did you come to make it, and to bring it to us after seven years?” “After seven years!” The old Chinaman smiled patiently. “You Americans are ever in such haste. How long, think you, it takes a true craftsman to carve a tree of jade?” CHAPTER VIII HOBGOBLINS Betsey and David were frankly gossiping, but with the most intent and serious purpose in the world. The days were growing so long that they could do their studying out of doors in the evenings, and the place of their choosing, where they struggled with dates and angles and difficult lines of Virgil, was the stretch of grass around the pool. When the first stars began to show in the water, it was a signal for discussion of lessons to be put aside. Later they would walk back to the cottage, where Betsey would help Miss Miranda in the kitchen or would stroll with her in the garden while David would go into the workshop, take off his coat, arm himself with an oil can in one hand and a wrench in the other and would say to Mr. Reynolds, who usually did not even hear him come in— “All ready, sir.” To-night they were delaying a little, after having mastered the subject of extreme and mean ratio, and were piecing together such bits of knowledge as each one had concerning their friends in the white cottage, trying to come to some conclusion as to what was the matter and what could be done. Michael’s doleful face seemed to give warning every day that the “feeling in his bones” was in no way diminished, and Miss Miranda appeared more and more concerned and weary.