On the amicable basis thus established, Miss Lee and her guardian resumed their travels; and, excepting only Mr. Port’s personal misery incident to the alimentary exigencies of railway transportation, their journey from the central region of New York to the seaboard of Rhode Island was accomplished without misadventure. IV. In regard to Narragansett Pier, Miss Lee’s opinions, the which she was neither slow in forming nor unduly cautious in expressing, at first were unfavorable. “And so _this_ is ‘the Pier,’ is it?” she observed in a tone by no means expressive of approval as she stood on the hotel veranda on the day of her arrival, and contemplated the rather limited prospect that was bounded at one end by the Casino and at the other by the coal-elevator. “If those smelly little stones out there are ‘the Rocks’ that people talk about at such a rate I must confess that I am disappointed in them”--Mr. Port hastened to assure her that the Rocks were in quite a different direction--“and if that is the Casino, while it seems a nice sort of a place, I really think that they might have managed the arch so as not to have that horrid green house showing under it. And what little poor affairs the hotels are! Really, Uncle Hutchinson, I don’t see what there is in this little place to make such a fuss about.” “Dorothy,” replied Mr. Port, with much solemnity, “you evidently forget--though I certainly have mentioned the fact to you repeatedly--that the climate of this portion of Rhode Island is the most distinctively antibilious climate to be found upon the whole coast of North America. For persons possessing delicate livers--” “Oh, bother delicate livers--at least, I beg your pardon, Uncle Hutchinson,” for an expression of such positive pain had come into Mr. Port’s face at this irreverent reference to an organ that he regarded as sacred that even Dorothy was forced to make some sort of an apology. “Of course I don’t want to bother your poor liver more than it is bothered anyway; but, you know, I haven’t got a liver, and I don’t care for climates a bit. What I mean is: what do people do here to have a good time?” “In the morning,” replied Mr. Port, “they bathe, and in the afternoon they drive to the Point. This morning we shall bathe, Dorothy--bathing is an admirable liver tonic--and this afternoon we shall drive to the Point.” “Good heavens! Is that all?” exclaimed Miss Lee. “Why, it’s worse than Saratoga. Do you mean to say, Uncle Hutchinson, that people don’t dance here, and don’t go yachting, and don’t have lunch-parties, and don’t play tennis, and don’t even have afternoon teas?”