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To Bellister there came one night at the gloaming a wandering harper, begging for shelter from the bitter northerly blast that gripped his rheumatic old joints, and sported with his failing strength. He was a man past middle age, with hair thin and grey, and a face worn and lined; his tattered clothes gave scant protection from inclement weather.

He had taken his enemy's measure; or, to quote the French historian again, "il comprit l'etat moral de son adversaire." He maintained his formation during the night, keeping blue lights burning on the four ships which sported the blue ensign, to enforce the illusion that they were the naval escort of the convoy, and were eager for battle.

Until now the child had been very quiet, but the rich golden corn-tassels, entangled with bright daisies, red poppies, and hollyhocks, and the humming concert of myriads of flies-blue, yellow, and reddishbrownwhich sported amid the sweets, excited her beyond self-control.

It toyed and sported with its ghastly freight, now bruising it against the slimy piles, now hiding it in mud or long rank grass, now dragging it heavily over rough stones and gravel, now feigning to yield it to its own element, and in the same action luring it away, until, tired of the ugly plaything, it flung it on a swamp a dismal place where pirates had swung in chains through many a wintry night and left it there to bleach.

An antique temple of exotic architecture had thrown open its bronze doors, and out there surged and rustled a throng of Bacchanalian beings who sported and shouted around a terminal god, which, with smiling, ironic lips, accepted their delirious homage. White nymphs and brown displayed in choric rhythms the dance of the Seven Deadly Sins, and their goat-hoofed mates gave vertiginous pursuit.

The bridegroom might pass, in his manly prime and his scarlet coat, although a dowf gallant; but who would have thought that Nelly Carnegie in the white brocade which was her grandmother's the day that made her sib to Rothes Nelly Carnegie who flouted at love and lovers, and sported a free, light, brave heart, would have made so dowie a bride?

He felt the fragrance of her breath, and longed, yet feared, to touch the lips from which it issued; spirits of purity seemed to guard them, while all the enchanting graces of love sported on her cheeks, and languished in her eyes.

Helen was very wretched during the pleasant May days she usually enjoyed so much, but over which now a dark pall was spread, shutting out all the brightness and leaving only the terrible certainty that Katy was lost to her forever bright, frolicsome Katy, who, without a shadow on her heart sported amid the bridal finery, unmindful of the anguish tugging at the hearts of both the patient women, Marian and Helen, who worked on so silently, reserving their tears for the night time, when Katy lay sweetly sleeping and dreaming of Wilford Cameron.

Honour's a sacred tie, the law of kings, The noble mind's distinguishing perfection, That aids and strengthens virtue where it meets her, And imitates her actions where she is not. It ought not to be sported with.

"And all dressed up," said Trask, smiling, as he observed that Dinshaw wore a white suit and sported an official-looking cap with a white top. "The old man shore thinks he's the skipper," remarked Doc Bird. "How's that?" asked Locke. "He's a-bossin' everybody," replied the steward. "Thinks he's in his old brig what he lost on his island." "The old dear!" said Marjorie. "Isn't he pathetic?