The little girl says that she approves of my doings, but complains that I write rather flippantly, at times.  Considering that she has bidden me to avoid carefully all matters relating to the tender passion what else can I do?  She says that if I persevere I shall realize that I am doing good work.  We are all seeking achievement, she tells me, and she is sure I am accomplishing great things.

Poor little Dora!  I wish I were as sure of this as she seems to be.  As a matter of fact I am constantly disgruntled at the lack of facilities.  How can a man do big work in surgery with no assistants?  The least I should have is a nurse.  I have written to tell her so.

Day before yesterday I took Miss Jelliffe over to Will’s Island.  I really think she had lost a little of her color in her assiduous care of her father, and I was pleased to see the roses return to her cheeks on her way there.  I would have thought that a young woman of her class would require a great deal of attention, but this young lady appears to be just as independent in her way as Dora is in hers.  She was very much at home in the boat, and old Sammy just eats out of her hand.  She has long ago gathered him into the fold of her adorers.  Ten minutes after we left she was running our little ship and handling the tiller understandingly.

She is a young woman whose life will be cast in pleasant places, and she awaits the future cheerfully, secure in the belief that it can bring but happiness.  Dora, on the other hand, is prospecting with shovel and pick, and I’m afraid they may blister her little hands.

When we arrived at Will’s Island the young woman followed me into the house.  I noticed that she shuddered just a little at the sight of Dick’s arm.  It was a novel thing to her, and I must say she met it bravely.  Indeed it was rather fine to see how quickly she adapted herself to those surroundings.  She held bandages for me and handed me the solutions with quick intuition.  Also she was delightfully simple and kind in her treatment of poor Dick’s bewildered wife.

I decided to bring the man to the Cove.  He insisted that he was perfectly able to walk down to the boat, but staggered as soon as he tried to stand up and would have fallen had I not been prepared for him.  Sammy and Frenchy carried him down to the boat and lifted him on board, where they stretched him on the foot-boards which we had taken the precaution to upholster luxuriously with dried seaweed.  An old sack, stuffed with the same material, constituted a pillow.

Dick’s wife and her brother, with the children, waved their hands at us as we left the little bay and started on the long run close-hauled to the mainland.

For a short time Miss Jelliffe remained near Sammy.  She was peering at the retiring cliffs.

“Who would ever have thought that men would cling to such places?” she said.  “I don’t know whether I am glad or sorry that I came.”