Very valiantly Virginia attempted a word picture of Joe. "He is a big fellow. His eyes are black--and large--and dreamy." She mused for a moment and resumed with animation. "His eyes are bright--and snapping--and brave--" again she paused and then she concluded very softly--"and sweet. He has a smile which tears your heart." "How wonderful he must be!" sighed Helen. She shook her head emphatically. "If I had met him, I should have remembered him until the last hour of my life." There followed a dreamy silence devoted to maidenly meditation concerning the manifold charms of Joe Curtis until an idea caused Helen to cry, "Virginia, you should go fishing in the place Joe wrote about. I know where it is. Think of it, you would fish in the same place, in the same water and by the same lily pads where he has been. We couldn't catch the same fish but we might catch relatives." "Let's go now," agreed Virginia, moved greatly by Helen's sentimental suggestion. It was a long pull in the row boat to the head of the pond; but they took turns at the oars and at last arrived at their destination. The day was warm and the exercise at the oars did not cool the girls. Helen noted the position of the sun which yet hung high. "Nothing will bite, now 'V.,'" she objected. "We came hours too soon. He said to fish at sundown. We had better go ashore and wait." Glad to get out of the burning sun, they rowed to the shore and, clambering up the bank, dropped down in a shady spot. Suddenly Helen became restless. "I hear a strange humming noise," she worried. Virginia was likewise nervously alert. "I hear it, too. It's a low buzzing--much louder than mosquitoes," she agreed. "What can it be?" Helen troubled. "It's my hornets' nest," cried a childish voice behind them. With startled exclamations, the girls turned their heads. Looking over the top of a granite bowlder a short distance away was a small boy. He was a very thin and delicate child about five years old, wearing a pair of faded khaki rompers and a shirt of the same material. "Don't you know any better than to sit under a hornets' nest?" he exclaimed in disgust. "Do you want to get yourselves stung to death?" The two girls raised their eyes. Partially concealed by the lower branches of the tree, a great cone of clay hung above them. From it and the insects flying about it came the buzzing sound. "Crawl, Virginia, and don't you dare make a noise," whispered Helen. From the top of the rock the infant witnessed the ignominious retreat from dangerous territory. "Come over here," he urged. "Much hornets never come near me." Relying upon the superior judgment of the masculine mind, the girls turned and humbly crept towards this place of refuge. "I guess you might stand up, now," the boy told them. "If the hornets had wanted to sting you, they'd have done it before." They arose and forthwith began to dust their skirts.