ever,--

"If all the dangers you appear to apprehend existed in reality, the
passage would not be made daily or even hourly, in safety. You have often,
Madam, come from the Carolinas by sea, in company with Admiral de Lacey?"

"Never," the widow promptly and a little drily remarked. "The water has
not agreed with my constitution, and I have never neglected to journey by
land. But then you know, Wyllys, as the consort and relict of a
flag-officer, it was not seemly that I should be ignorant of naval
science. I believe there are few ladies in the British empire who are more
familiar with ships, either singly or in squadron particularly the latter,
than myself. This in formation I have naturally acquired, as the companion
of an officer, whose fortune it was to lead fleets. I presume these are
matters of which you are profoundly ignorant."

The calm, dignified countenance of Wyllys, on which it would seem as if
long cherished and painful recollections had left a settled, but mild
expression of sorrow, that rather tempered than destroyed the traces of
character which were still remarkable in her firm collected eye, became
clouded, for a moment, with a deeper shade of melancholy. After
hesitating, as if willing to change the subject, she replied,--

"I have not been altogether a stranger to the sea. It has been my lot to
have made many long, and some perilous voyages."

"As a mere passenger. But we wives of sailors only, among our sex, can lay
claim to any real knowledge of the noble profession! What natural object
is there, or can there be," exclaimed the nautical dowager, in a burst of
professional enthusiasm, "finer than a stately ship breasting the billows,