fifty.

"Ever been in a life-saving station afore?" asked Captain Eri.

Elsie had not. Ralph had and so had Mrs. Snow, but not for years.

"This is where we keep the boat and the rest of the gear," said Captain
Davis, opening a door and leading the way into a large, low-studded
room. "Them's the spare oars on the wall. The reg'lar ones are in the
boat."

The boat itself was on its carriage in the middle of the room. Along the
walls on hooks hung the men's suits of oilskins and their sou'westers.
The Captain pointed out one thing after another, the cork jackets and
life-preservers, the gun for shooting the life line across a stranded
vessel, the life car hanging from the roof, and the "breeches buoy."

"I don't b'lieve you'd ever git me into that thing," said the Nantucket
lady decidedly, referring to the buoy. "I don't know but I'd 'bout as
liefs be drownded as make sech a show of myself."

"Took off a bigger woman than you one time," said Captain Davis. "Wife
of a Portland skipper, she was, and he was on his fust v'yage in a
brand-new schooner jest off the stocks. Struck on the Hog's Back off
here and then drifted close in and struck again. We got 'em all, the
woman fust. That was the only time we've used the buoy sence I've been
at the station. Most of the wrecks are too fur off shore and we have to
git out the boat."

He took them upstairs to the men's sleeping rooms and then up to the