"Sawdust!" shouted Ford.

"Fis.h.!.+" said Dabney. "Clams, oysters, crabs, lobsters."

d.i.c.k Lee had gazed in absolute silence up to that very moment; and all he could say now was,--

"Ah-h-h! O-h-h-h! Jes' ain't dey fine!"

"Boys," said Dab, with a sort of loving look at the contents of that box, "do you suppose we can eat those fellows?"

"Eat 'em!" exclaimed Ford. "Why, after they're cooked!"

"Well, I s'pose we can; but I feel more like shaking hands with 'em all around, just now. They're old friends and neighbors of mine, you know."

"Yes; but I guess we'd better eat them."

"Cap'n Dab," said d.i.c.k, "dey jes' knock all de correck p.r.o.nounciation out ob me, dey does."

"Ford, Frank, I'll ask Mrs. Myers and Almira up here right away. Those oysters and clams have got to be eaten this very evening."

They did not need twice asking; and there was a thoughtful expression on the face of Mrs. Myers when she looked from one box into the other. It was fairly on her tongue's end to suggest what share of those luxuries should be taken at once to Deacon Short's or Mrs. Sunderland's; but she stopped in time, for that thought was followed by another,--

"What could the boys have been writing home about her cooking and her table?"

There might be something serious in it; for boarders were people who came and went, boys or no boys, and Dab and his friends were just the kind of boys to "come and go." At all events, she could not object to their having such a supply as that sent them; and she took up the responsibility of all the cookery required, at once.

It was a feast while it lasted, and the effects of it upon the character of Mrs. Myers's table were permanent.

There was no further danger that Dab's growth would be checked in any such manner as his mother had feared.

Nor was there any great doubt remaining as to the steadiness of his growth in other ways, during his school days at Grantley; for he and his friends were now "settled;" and they had made that most important success in life,--a Good Beginning.

THE END.