PEOVINCETOWN. 
201 
This Monday morning was beautifully mild and calm, , 
both on land and water, promising us a smooth passage 
across the Bay, and the fishermen feared that it would 
not be so good a drying day as the cold and windy one 
which preceded it. There could hardly have been a 
greater contrast. This was the first of the Indian sum 
mer days, though at a late hour in the morning we found 
the wells in the sand behind the town still covered with 
ice, wdiich had formed in the night. What with wind 
and sun my most prominent feature fairly cast its slough. 
But I assure you it will take more than two good drying 
days to cure me of rambling. After making an excur¬ 
sion among the hills in the neighborhood of the Shank- 
Painter Swamp, and getting a little work done in its line, 
we took our seat upon the highest sand-hill overlooking 
the town, in mid air, on a long plank stretched across 
between two hillocks of sand, where some boys were en¬ 
deavoring in vain to fiy their kite ; and there we 
remained the rest of that forenoon looking out over the 
placid harbor, and watching for the first appearance of 
the steamer from Wellfleet, that we might be in readiness 
to go on board when we heard the whistle off Long 
Point. 
We got what we could out of the boys in the mean¬ 
while. Provincetown boys are of course all sailors and 
have sailors’ eyes. When we were at the Highland 
Light the last summer, seven or eight miles from Prov¬ 
incetown Harbor, and wished to know one Sunday morn¬ 
ing if the Olata, a well-known yacht, had got in from 
Boston, so that we could return in her, a Provincetown 
boy about ten years old, who chanced to be at the table, 
remarked that she had. I asked him how he knew. 
I just saw her come in,” said he. When I expressed 
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