My nurse was also from the Island, of a Huguenot family, which
descending from father to son had been with us for a long time; and she
would say: "At home, on the Island," in such a way that with a wave of
emotion I understood her great homesickness for it.

We had about us a number of little articles that had come from there,
and which had places of honor in our home. We had some black pebbles
large as cannon-balls, that had been chosen from the thousands lying
on the Long-Beach because centuries of washing had polished and rounded
them exquisitely. These pebbles always played an important part every
winter evening, for with the greatest regularity the old people would
put them into the chimney-place where a wood fire blazed and crackled;
afterwards they slipped them into calico bags of a flowered pattern,
also brought from the Island, and took them to bed where they served to
keep their feet warm during the night.

In our cellar we had wooden props and firkins, and also a number of
straight elm poles for holding the washing which had been cut from the
choicest young trees in my grandmother's forest. I had the greatest
veneration for all these things. I knew that my grandmother no longer
owned the forests, nor the salt marshes, nor the vineyards; for I had
heard them say that she had sold them one at a time to put the money
into investments upon the mainland; and that an incompetent notary by
his bad investments had greatly reduced her income.

When I went to the Island and the old salt makers and vine dressers, who
had at one time worked for our family, still loyal and respectful called
me "our little master," I knew they did so out of pure politeness and
altogether in deference to our past grandeur.