"Ye mean Agatha? Ay, surely, that she is, heaven bless her! She was always that. A tiny bit of a lass, I remember her, not so long as my arm; as pretty a baby she was then as she's a woman now." "Has she any thought of getting married soon? Such a face and character must have suitors enough." "Well, as touching that, sir," said Poyntz, taking his pipe out of his mouth and looking at it carefully, "ye mustn't think of Agatha just the same as of the fishermen's girls you meet round about. Good, honest girls they all are, I'm saying naught against that; but Agatha, d'ye see, is a bit different. Ye'll maybe think it queer I should say it, sir; but say it I will that Agatha is a lady. She may live in our house, and put up with our ways--nay, and love us too, which sure I am she does; but all the same, if ye notice, she don't speak the same as me and the old woman do, nor she don't think the same neither. She's built on other lines, as I may say--a clipper yacht, while we're but fishing smacks, or trading schooners at best. And that being so as it is, the young fellows of our neighbourhood don't find they've got much show alongside of her somehow. They're afraid of her, that's the long and short of it. Not but she treats 'em kind enough, ye understand, as a lady should; but 'tis the kindness of a lady, and not of an equal, and there's not one of 'em staunch enough to hold out against it. And how be they're fine lads, many of them, I can't truly say as I'm sorry for it, if so as Agatha is content." "Nor can I," I echoed to myself, with devout earnestness. "She does seem of a different stock from most I see here," I said aloud. "I have seen women somewhat like her at Copenhagen; though I don't know whether I should have thought of that if I hadn't happened to say something in Danish, yesterday, and she answered me in the same language." "Did she now!" said Poyntz, tipping forward his hat and scratching the back of his head. "And if I might ask it, sir, how came ye to speak Danish your own self?" "My family was Danish before I was born; and I was taught the language almost before I knew English. Our name used to be Feuerberg; but we've translated it since we've emigrated, you see." "Ay, surely--Feuerberg," said Poyntz, puffing his pipe preoccupiedly. We walked on for awhile in silence. So great was my desire that the evidence I had been arranging in my mind should be borne out by the facts, that I was almost afraid to put the matter definitely to the proof; while Poyntz, on the other hand, was evidently taken by surprise, and had not got his ideas quite settled. At length, however, I thought I would hazard one hint more. "I've been thinking of that yarn you were spinning yesterday afternoon--in fact, I believe I dreamt of it last night; and I should imagine that the little yellow-haired girl, if she grew up, would have looked enough like Agatha to be her sister--or her mother, at any rate."