"Now if this is n't mean!" exclaimed Emma. "Father Brighthopes was so particular not to keep them waiting, and now he has got to wait for them!"

"Don't be too eager to blame them," said the old clergyman, "for we do not know by what accident they may have been detained. Perhaps they could not get the boat."

"O yes, they could!" cried Kate Orley. "They have gone down the river with it already. Laura and I were the first ones here, and we saw them. It was before the time; and they asked if Miss Thorley had come, and when I said no, they said they were going to have a little fun, and they would be back in a few minutes. That was over an hour ago, and we have n't seen anything of them since."

"O, I'm as vexed as I can be!" and Emma wrung her hands, while she stood on the bank and strained her eyes to catch a glimpse of the returning boat. "If I don't give it to those boys when they do come! The idea of treating Father Brighthopes in this way! After their promise to me, too, repeated over and over!"

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"My child, my dear Emma," said the old clergyman, in gentle, persuasive tones, are we to be vexed at such a trifle as this? Have we forgotten all our good resolutions? I am contented to wait here under this shady tree. Come, let us all sit on the ground, and — what shall we do, Grant? for I see you have an idea."

"I think it's a good chance to practise one of your lessons, sir," said Grant, who had just arrived, having been to town that morning, and got leave of absence from his employers. "If a thing can't be helped, we must make the best of it."

The bright and cheerful way in which he said this delighted the old clergyman, and put everybody in good humor except Emma, who was covered with shame and blushes.

"How silly it was in me to get out of patience! I hope you can forgive me," throwing herself on the grass by her old friend's side.

"Most sincerely, my child, since it was not on your own account, but for my sake, that you so wished the boat was here." And he stroked her hair. "Yes, but it was partly on my own account, for my own credit," Emma frankly confessed. "It was I that made the arrangement, and brought you here, and I felt a pride in having everything go off nicely, and it seemed to me that I was somehow to blame if anything went wrong. But I don't care now. We'll make the best of it, as Grant says. And the way to do that is for us all to be as happy as we can, and sit around while you talk to us a little." "The tide is turning," said Grant, watching the river. "If they don't come up with the boat pretty soon, they 'll find it hard rowing against the current. I tried it once."

"Fortunately we have our baskets with us, and, if they don't come," said Miss Thorley, "we can have a little picnic of our own here under the tree."

"And I am sure," Father Brighthopes added, "we shall all learn another useful lesson from this circumstance, and so have occasion, perhaps, to be thankful that it occurred.

"If Grant had not reminded us that we were to make the best of things, we might have found it very unpleasant to be kept waiting here. And what if we had urgent business, and could not afford to lose the time? We can imagine a hundred circumstances which would make our situation extremely disagreeable. And you cannot live many years in the world, my children, without seeing how much suffering is occasioned by the failure of people to keep their appointments.

"I talked to you lately about politeness; and I might have told you that there is no greater impoliteness than this. A friend sends you word that he is coming to visit you. Your heart beats with joyous expectation, as you prepare a welcome for him. Perhaps you had other plans in view for that day, but you postpone them for his sake. You were going away, maybe, but you will stay at home gladly to receive him. You stay at home; you watch the clock and the gate, how anxiously! all the forenoon and half the afternoon; and then what bitterness of disappointment succeeds to your happy anticipations, if the friend who raised your hopes and gave you so much trouble does not come."

"What if he could n't?" said Emma. "What if some accident happened to prevent him from coming, when it was too late to send you word?"

"Why, then, nobody will be so ready to excuse him as you, my dear child, and to regret that you for a moment felt vexed with him. But if, when you next see him, he says, carelessly, 'O, that day? did you expect me? I quite forgot about it; I could n't come very well; I thought of something else I had to do,'- the fact being that some other pleasure drew him away,what, then, do you think of that person's friendship?"

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"I know just such people, and I hate to have anything to do with them," cried Emma.

"There was a man going to hire me once," said Grant, "and he kept me running to his office to see him, telling me that such and such a day he would be ready to talk with me and decide; but he was never ready; and he made me lose more time, and wear out more shoe-leather, than the place was worth,— thinking, I suppose, that a poor boy's time and trouble were of no consequence."

"I hope you made a good thing out of it in the end, my son. You saw how wrong it was to trifle with people in this way, and resolved, I hope. never to injure another as that selfish, thoughtless man injured you.

"O my children, we must be thoughtful of others, and do to them as we would have them do to us. It is for our own interest to do so; for no person ever got on well in life, and acquired solid prosperity and happiness and friends, who kept his promises only when he found it convenient to keep them. Many a lad is set on the high-road to fortune by his conscientions punctuality in all matters of business and friendship; and many another with fine talents, but lacking this golden trait, has found life but a succes sion of disappointments and failures. For how can one who is untrustworthy expect to be trusted? And after you have lightly broken your word. how can you hope that others will value it?

"But, my children, you are not to keep your engagements merely because it is for your interest to do so. That is a base motive. But let the love of truth, and a sincere regard for the welfare and rights of others, inspire all your actions. Then you can never do wrong; then, my dear young friends, you will have within yourselves that integrity of heart and peace of mind which are of more value to the possessor than all the honors and riches the world can give."

At this moment a frantic-looking creature, with loosened hair and dress, came running towards the willow-tree from the road. It was Mrs. Thorley in search of her son,—that excellent woman having just heard from a passer-by that he was lost in the river.

"O, he is drowned! he is drowned!" she exclaimed, rushing to the water's edge. "Why don't somebody go?- why don't you drag the river?"

Father Brighthopes endeavored to pacify her. Just then music was heard over the water.

"That's the band playing at the Grove!" cried Laura Follet. "The dancing will all be over before we ever get there. Why did n't we go in wagons?"

"That dreadful boat! that dreadful boat!" said Mrs. Thorley. "How cruel to send my poor boy off in it!"-for she could never think that any blame attached to her son.

Grant whispered to Emma that he was going down the river to look for the missing boys, and slipped away. We will also take advantage of the interruption to learn, if possible, what had become of them.

On arriving at the Grove, Burt and Jason ran at once for the boat. They were far more eager, I am sorry to say, to have a little sport on the water, than they were to bring Father Brighthopes and his companions to the picnic. They rowed down to the bend in high glee, and were delighted to learn that Miss Thorley was not there.

"We'll just have time," Burt said, "to go down to Fenno's flats and get some cat-o'-nine-tails."

It was high tide then. A gentle current was running up the river, however, and they had to row against it.

"It will be all the easier rowing back," said Jason.

On reaching the flats where the flags grew, Burt said, "How funny it is this water is never salt! The tide comes up from the sea, don't it?"

"Yes," replied Jason; "but the fresh water of the river is always running, and when the tide comes in it pushes back the fresh water, and, before the salt water gets up as far as here, the tide turns again."

"Would n't it be splendid to go down till we find the line where the salt and fresh water meet?" said Burt. "Let's try it; we 'll leave the cat-o'nine-tails till we come back."

"But Miss Thorley and the first boat-load will be waiting for us."

"Who cares? Let 'em wait! She's my aunt, and I don't mind her. We'll be back, anyway, in time for the old minister; then we can take 'em

all over at one load. Ha! there ain't no current now,"— Burt always said ain't no,—" and the water is just as smooth!"

Jason thought that, if Burt was willing to take the responsibility of keeping his aunt waiting, there was nothing more to be said. So the two boys rowed and rowed, stopping only to taste the water now and then, to see if they had found salt.

"We must go back now," said Jason, at length; "for the old minister will be there by the time we shall."

"'T won't hurt him none to wait a little, if we ain't there," replied Burt, dipping his fingers in the stream. "He'll want to rest after his walk. The salt water can't be much further, and I'm bound to strike it. It's such easy rowing now!"

"I should say easy!" cried Jason. "Look! the current is running the other way!"

Burt stoutly denied this assertion; but by resting on their oars, and watching the drooping grass on the water's edge, and the floating bubbles and specks, they discovered that the tide had not only turned, but that it was already flowing fast towards the sea.

"There ain't no salt-water line!" then said Burt. "Come to think, the salt and fresh water would mix, so a fellow could n't tell where one begun and where the other left off. I believe the water is some salt now!" tasting again. "Well, we 've done what we set out to, and now we'll go back like greased lightning."

Having thus flattered his pride with the idea that they had accomplished their object, he pulled the boat around, while Jason backed water, and then began to row with all his might up the stream.

"This ain't very much like greased lightning, though!" remarked Jason. "Anyhow, 't ain't my idea of greased lightning."

"What! don't you see how we cut through the water?"

"We go through the water pretty fast, but we move by the shores slow enough."

"That's 'cause the tide is running so. Who'd ever have thought it would turn so quick? Hold on!" cried Burt; "you 're pulling too hard for me! Don't you see we 're going right in shore?"

"There's less current near the shore," said Jason. "But you 're a smart one, to let my rowing pull you around!"

""T ain't you, it's the current!" grumbled Burt, growing angry. "Why don't the current swing me around?" retorted Jason.

"By sixty, it shall!" almost screamed his companion, red with rage and rowing.

Then the boys began to pull against each other furiously, so that the boat went from right to left, as one or the other got the advantage, making a wake like the sea-serpent's. Thus they wasted a great deal of strength, beTwice they ran aground, and finally Burt broke a thole-pin. The par came suddenly against his breast, and he fell over backwards into the bow of the boat.

sides losing their tempers.

"O, my shoulder! I've broke my shoulder!" he cried out.

"You're always killed if you get the least mite hurt! What did you break that thole-pin for? I would n't touch a boat if I did n't know better how to row."

At this taunt, Burt was so much enraged, that, standing up in the boat, and lifting his oar, he would have struck Jason on the head with it, if the latter had not thrown up his own oar to catch the blow. During this altercation, the boat was, of course, going swiftly down with the tide.

"Come!" said Jason; "'stead of picking a quarrel with me, you'd better be whittling down the broken end of that thole-pin."

"I won't, if we drift out to sea!" And Burt began to cry.

"Great baby!" said Jason.

He mended the thole-pin, and then pulled both oars, keeping near the shore, and making very slow progress indeed until they reached the bridge, under which the compressed current was rushing at a furious rate.

"There's no use of my trying to row up there without you'll help me," said Jason.

"Ye ain't quite so smart as ye thought ye was!" muttered Burt; and he sullenly took one of the oars.

But even with their united strength they were unable to make headway against the swift and dangerous flood, which seized the boat the moment it approached the narrow channel under the bridge, and hurled it back, and whirled it around, and swept it again and again down the stream.

"Hello!" said a voice from the bridge, after they had quite given up in despair. "What are you doing there?"