Page:Ballinger Price--Fortune of the Indies.djvu/20

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4
THE FORTUNE OF THE INDIES

tradition. So, because of these few stout survivors, Resthaven is not altogether bare, even to-day, of square yards and gray canvas.

But many of the low wharves are unused now; their great piles are rotting oozily below tide-water mark. On the jetties, grass grows in rough patches where once rich cargoes were piled; silence hangs across the water that once tingled to the lift of anchor chanteys. Up from the waterfront the narrow, shaded streets climb steeply; some of them are paved still with cobbles, stretching in gray, uneven slopes beneath ancient elms. The houses that border these streets have changed little in the hundred years. Time has dignified and not deteriorated them; they seem to gaze serenely, each from the delicate fanlight above its fine doorway, where honeysuckle, or clematis, or swinging wisteria half hides the white, fluted door-posts.

Perhaps least changed of all is the old Ingram mansion, which stands proudly, as it should, on the highest ground in all Resthaven, fronting the wide harbor view with its pillared portico and curved stone steps. It is approached up a neat flagged pathway, and enclosed by a