sun-bonnet appeared. Natalie herself was discovered blushing in
its dainty depths. She was only a little Creole seaside girl,
you must know, and very shy of the city demoiselles. Natalie's
patois was quite as different from Annette's French as it was
from the postmaster's English.

"Mees Annette," she began, peony-hued all over at her own
boldness, "we will have one lil' hay-ride this night, and a
fish-fry at the end. Will you come?"

Annette sprang to her feet in delight. "Will I come? Certainly.
How delightful! You are so good to ask me. What shall--what
time--" But Natalie's pink bonnet had fled precipitately down
the shaded walk. Annette laughed joyously as Philip lounged down
the gallery.

"I frightened the child away," she told him.

You've never been for a hay-ride and fish-fry on the shores of
the Mississippi Sound, have you? When the summer boarders and
the Northern visitors undertake to give one, it is a
comparatively staid affair, where due regard is had for one's
wearing apparel, and where there are servants to do the hardest
work. Then it isn't enjoyable at all. But when the natives, the
boys and girls who live there, make up their minds to have fun,
you may depend upon its being just the best kind.

This time there were twenty boys and girls, a mamma or so,
several papas, and a grizzled fisherman to restrain the ardor of
the amateurs. The cart was vast and solid, and two comfortable,