LOIS. 43

never did; instead, they appeared to melt away into the sand
as soon as the water touched them.

Then there were beautiful pebbles and shells all along the
shore, bits of sea-weed too,—the ragged pieces lying along the
sand looking dark and uninteresting till they were wet, when,
if picked carefully out and laid upon paper, they would show
beautiful colors, and were as fine as those other earth-weeds in
form,—these flowers of the sea.

Lois used to think no one could have more playthings
than she, and yet it was not all play-time to her, for her father
was a fisherman, and the little hut in which they lived, though
it had strange ornaments from the great deep hanging upon
the walls, yet it many a time had a very bare larder ; for, even
if one gets tired of fish and potatoes, they are much better
than nothing at all.

Besides, when storms came up, and all the fishermen were
out in their boats, it was a very anxious time to those left at
home, and little Lois would sit with her head in her mother’s
lap, listening to the roar of the waves and hiding her eyes
from the sharp flashes of lightning, that showed only the more
plainly how dark and terrible it must be out on the water.

But it was not always stormy, and when the sunlight
danced on the water, and everything looked fresh and lovely,
Lois forgot about the storms, and scampered about the beach ~
and over the rocks in high glee.

She was a helpful little girl, this fisherman’s maiden, and