In the midst of this new life aboard ship, so novel and so beautiful, Mrs. Harris’s heart would have been happy had her over-worked husband and Gertrude sat beside her at the table.  Very little of this life is enjoyed without the unwelcomed flies that spoil the precious ointment.

After the lunch Alfonso and his friends had time to examine a little further the great steamer that was to float them to the Old World.  When his party hurriedly entered the dining-saloon, the grand staircase was entirely overlooked.  How wide and roomy it was, and how beautifully carved and finished, especially the balustrade and newel posts, the whole being built of selected white oak, which mellows with age, and will assume a richer hue like the wainscoting in the famous old English abbeys and manor houses.

Again the Harris party was on deck, final words hastily written were in the steamer’s mail bag, and a sailor stood ready to pass it over the ship’s side to the pilot’s little boat, waiting for orders to cut loose from the “Majestic.”

The engines slacked their speed, the pilot bade the officers good-bye, and accompanied the mail bag to his trusted schooner.  No. 66 was painted in black full length on the pilot’s big white sail.  All the passenger steamers which enter or leave New York must take these brave and alert pilots as guides in and out the ever-changing harbor channels.

The gong in the engine-rooms again signaled “full speed” and the live, escaping steam was turned through the triple-expansion engines, and the “Majestic” gathered her full strength for a powerful effort, a record-breaking passage to Queenstown.

The life on board the transatlantic ferry is decidedly English, and Mrs. Harris closely studied the courtesies and requirements.  She soon came to like the ship’s discipline and matter-of-fact customs.  The young people, some newly married, and some new acquaintances like Leo and Lucille, had moved their steamer chairs on the deck, that they might watch the return of the pilot’s boat.

Loving letters were read, the leaves of latest magazines were cut, and many words were exchanged before the big “66” disappeared entirely with the sun that set in gold and purple over the low New England shores.

Quite apart from the young people sat Mrs. Harris and Alfonso.  They talked earnestly about the ill-timed strike of the millmen at home.  “Why did the men strike at the very time when father wanted his mills to glow with activity?” queried Mrs. Harris.

“Oh, mother,” said Alfonso, “that is part of labor’s stock in trade.  Some labor organizations argue that the ‘end justifies the means.’  Our men were probably kept advised of father’s plans, and strikes often are timed so as to put capital at the greatest disadvantage, and force, if possible, a speedy surrender to labor’s demands.  ‘Like begets like,’ mother, so the college professor told us when he lectured on Darwin.  It was Darwin, I think, who emphasized this fundamental principle in nature.