gained a reputation for its social good cing, and eager clamor of welcoming tone, jollity, and swarms of pretty girls. tongues, and the whole is overlooked by So strongly does the feminine element the calmer phalanx of philosophic elders predominate, and so iron has this law of on the piazza, who look up from newsnatural selection become, that its queer papers or knitting to glance over at the little crannies of rooms are regularly sleepy steadfastness of the sea, gently handed down, by a sort of anti-salic washing in on the pebbles just across the law, in the line of female succession, and road, and think, no doubt with a trace of it has been proposed to set up as a sign- hidden heart-ache, how strong the conboard the title of the clever little Ger- trast between the awful permanence of man comediette, Zehn Mädchen und kein the one and the bright, ephemeral gayety Mann. The same strictness of inherit- of the others. Still prettier is the scene ance prevails at Taylor's, and to some ex- on a 'fine night, when the moon, rising tent at the Elmwood. Both, in spite of full over the ocean, floods the Pier front their small, dark, cramped, and inconven- with a tide of strong yet mellow radiient rooms, have yet acquired a certain ance, turning the whole eastern horizon social cachet which makes a foot-hold to one sheet of shimmering silver, gleamthere a thing of value. The Matthew-ing white and cold on the long façades of son, Metatoxet, Delavan, and others are all comfortable houses, but of less specific character, and more accessible to general patronage. Exclusive or otherwise, they make altogether a cheery picture on a pleasant afternoon, when the drive along the shore is alive with carriages and promenaders returning from the after-dinner airing. The lawns in front of the houses are dotted with pretty figures in still prettier toilets, intent on croquet, lawn tennis, or battledoor, assisted by an occasional languid dandy, irreproachable in dazzling linen, white flannel, or fashionable tweed. The children are scampering, romping, and squalling in every one's way, yet too pleasant to be dispensed with. The train has just come puffing into the station-a little way down the beach-from which crowds of new arrivals come pouring out, with much effusive hand-shaking, embra the hotels, blending yet contrasting with the ruddy glare from countless windows and hall doors, and gently touching the soft draperies of the happy groups as they come straying homeward from the evening's social meetings, and fill the balmy night air with girlish merriment and "resounding laughter sweet." And speaking of social gayeties, here may be the place to remark that Narragansett has a specific character among summer resorts. It has not the adventurous solitude of the Adirondacks, nor the frank, gypsy-like abandon of Mount Desert. Equally little has it of the noisy whirl of Saratoga, or the plutocratic grandeur of Newport. There is no Long Branch Corso of jingling "turn-outs" and petroleum splendor, no dazzling ball-room brilliancy of Cape May or New London. The Pier is certainly not shoddy, but equally not athletic. The white umbrella and sketching stool of the in the Pierian mind with the boatmen at | bends beyond the possibility of recovery the fish-house or the lads at the lumberyard. But he was so severely "sat on" by the Narragansett upper classes, and became such a social pariah among all right-feeling people, that his life grew a burden. Even the few friends who clung to him in his degradation inquired anxiously of his health at eventide, as of one recklessly rushing to destruction, blindly throwing away youth, health, and a once unspotted name. No one ever followed his baleful example. No one in this tropic zone ever did or does any thing to seriously interfere with personal appearance or habits. The Pierian world is metropolitan society on a basis of light but graceful négligé. Its prominent feature is quiet good tone, with a perceptible shade of exclusiveness which never un at a moment's notice, yields to no enthusiasm which would shake the placid nil admirari of the select. A gentle and patronizing approbation of nature claims occasional indulgence, but never beyond the requirements of crêpes de Chine and kid boots. Pierians commune with the eternal verities on Sunday afternoons from the rocks below the railway station. Sooth to say, there is a very pleasant Watteauish charm in the scene when the great bowlder-like mass of Indian Rock is studded with its groups of picturesque human barnacles, "camping down" in every phase of comfortable lounging except the ungraceful, the ladies duly fortified with sun-shades and novels, the gentlemen patiently attendant with wraps and mantles, or daintily recumbent in mascu line seclusion with the sundry forms of nicotine that comport with feminine neighborhood. It is the social exchange, the pump-room, Kursaal, and Corso of the beach, only second in its easy idleness to the grand event of the day-the morning bath-of which more anon. You may circulate freely, chatting and exchanging greetings with friends from the different houses, only observing due regard for circumstance and situation. Don't peer too curiously under the shade of that great sun-umbrella as you pass, for the confidential attitude and murmured conversation of the pair it shelters show that one of the "events" of the seasonthe old, old story-is running its roseate course, and we shall hear more of it next December on Madison Square or at the Rev. Dr.'s. Bow to that group of stylish girls, or drop a passing word, if Gauche Boozy, or Gunny bags Junior may saunter this way at any moment; farseeing beauty is armed for conquest in all her terrors, and has no spare fascination for chance or ineligible cavaliers. Do not suppose, however, because the upas shade of Newport fashion stretches over to this quiet coast, that it stupefies all alike. Down in that cool crevice close on the water you will find a little knot of genial women and good fellows in whose company you may light your cigarette, stretch yourself at ease, and talk or be silent, while with the keen enjoyment of a cultivated sympathy you watch the panorama before you. Confess, with me, that it is a lovely spot, a very dreamer's paradise. We are sheltered from the slant rays of the sun by the rock behind us, and the shelf we are lodged on is so fashioned that while the waves foam and dash right you choose, but be shy of subsiding under their lee and hinting a design to join the party. They are on the watch for higher game than you, my poor friend. Even the lively little Chicago belle who smiled so confidingly in your eyes last night on the Elmwood piazza will be apt to show an embarrassed chill of manner, as painful as unfathomable to your guileless soul. For does not the Proserpine, just from Newport, swing at her anchor in front of the Continental ? Young Croesus, below us, within reach of our hands almost, we are safe from any thing worse than an occasional puff of spray. In its wintry rage, however, the surf can do dire work; witness the great schooner taken up bodily and planted on an even keel on the shingle upon the little beach just north of us. Now, as we lie here, they play idly in and out, pouring in miniature cataracts over the little reefs beneath us, and lifting those dark blood-red, weed-draped masses of kelp just below high water with a wet INDIAN ROCK. glitter of emerald and ruby which almost dazzles the eye, while the great lazy frondage of bladder-weed "goes to and back, lackeying the varying tide, to rot itself with motion.' Next a little pleasure-boat comes drifting by, her boom swinging free, and the light breeze dead aft. A larger yacht is just firing her pop-gun and rounding to her anchorage in front of the hotels on the beach, and the little Florence, on her last trip from Newport, comes sputtering and wheezing toward her wharf down by the railway station. As the sun sinks behind us, and the long streaks of alternate cloud-shadow and light stretch from the sunset in great curved bands of blue and purple and rosy gray toward their converging point on the opposite horizon, the mist banks in the offing begin to blush like the after-glow on Alpine summits, while the sea lies glimmering beneath them cold steely gray by contrast. Overhead the flecked and dappled masses of fleecy cloud gleam in flame-color and gold, setting sharply off against the cool deep azure beyond. The Newport headlands stand out transparent, dusky red, shadowy, yet illuminated in the magical light. The distant sails stud the horizon with spots of pink and crimson, like jewels of amethyst on a ring of purple enamel, varied with the diamond flashes from the Newport casements as one after an | other catches the sinking rays. It is a picture we might be excused for lingering over, but the lights are beginning to gleam from the cottages on the bluff behind us, and parents and chaperons on the bank are growing impatient. My imagination scents a faint savor of hot biscuit and broiled blue-fish from distant kitchens, and supper is clearly more in order than scenery. So fold the plaids, help the ladies carefully over the steep ledges and slippery bowlders till we can gain the bank. Notice Dr. Houghton's pretty little cottage at the top of the path. They had a garden party there last week, and there was music and dancing on the lawn. and pretty toilets, and "Punch and Judy" for the children, and refreshment table, and much flirtation all along the line. The proceeds went, I believe, to the support of "St. Peter's by the Sea," the pretty little brown-roofed Episcopal chapel back of the Continental. The comfortable plank sidewalk on which we are now sauntering homeward through the huckleberry bushes was paid for from the proceeds of the private dramatic entertainments at the "Academy" (!), in which young Kerbstone and Bella La Mode so dazzled their sympathetic friends just at the close of last season. Tea over, and the week-day machinery cleared away from the parlors and piazzas in all the houses, the piano is opened, the Carmina Sacra got out, and for an hour or two the whole village is vocal with the sober strains of "Hamburg" and "Mear," or the lilting inspiration of "Hold the Fort" and "Pull for the Shore." As music it doesn't touch the highest artistic mark, certainly, but it is soothing and sympathetic. Thoughtless misses and stalwart young swells, who for six days a week know little melody but "Conosci il suol" or Madame Angot, feel the gentle |