a toast to please all, which, she explained, a toast to love would not by any means.

“And surely that is easy for you,” she added sweetly, “who of your proper self please all who ever knew you.”

“Write us a patriotic toast!” suggested Captain Simpson, “ — — A jolly toast that all true Americans can drink under the nose of the British King himself.”

“That’s it!” cried Captain Franklin. “A toast so cunningly devised that our poor fellows in the Provost below, and on that floating hell, the ‘Jersey,’ may offer it boldly and unrebuked in the very teeth of their jailors! Lord! But that would be a rare bit o’ verse — if it could be accomplished,” he added dubiously.