storms we encountered on our way from Sitka."

He certainly looked the fairy godfather, and
quite impartial as he distributed his offerings with
a chosen word to each; his memory for little char-
acteristics was as remarkable as for names and faces.
He had taken off his cap on deck, and the breeze had
ruffled his thick fair hair, brought the blood to his
thin cheeks. The lines of his face, cut by privation
and anxiety and illness, had almost disappeared with
the renewed elasticity of the flesh, and his blue eyes
were wide open, and sparkling in sympathy with
the pleasure of his guests and the success of his own
strategy. These few insignificant Spaniards dis-
lodged, a half-dozen forts in this harbor, and the
combined navies of the world might be defied; while
a great chain of hungry settlements fattened and
prospered exceedingly on the beneficence of the most
fertile land in all the Americas.



XII

The eastern mountains looked very close from the
crest of La Bellissima and of a singular transpar-
ency and variety of hue. It was as if the white
masses of cloud sailing low overhead flung down
great splashes of color from prismatic stores stolen
from the sun. There was a vivid pale green on the