"That bank gives no interest," said John Jack, with a quiet chuckle, as he superintended the deposit, "but we shall always have the interest of knowing that it is there."

Long afterwards Mr Wilkins sought to combat Mr Jack's objection to invest in another Scotch bank. "This disaster," he said, "ought not to be called a bank failure; it is a bank robbery committed by its own directors, as has been clearly proved, and no more touches the credit of Scotch banks in general than the failure of a commercial house, through the dishonesty of its principals, affects the other commercial houses of the kingdom."

"It may be as you say, sir," replied John Jack, gravely, "an' if it was my own money I might act on your advice. But I intend to take care of what's left of the dear boy's money myself."

So saying, the stout farmer threw his shepherd's plaid over his shoulder, and went off to his cottage on the Border.

But we must pass from this subject. Space forbids our going deeper into it, or touching on the terrible consequences of dishonesty coupled with unlimited liability. Fortunes were wrecked; the rich and the poor, the innocent and guilty, the confiding and the ignorant as well as the knowing and wise, fell in the general crash. Many homes were desolated, and many hearts were broken. May we not believe, also, that many hearts were purified in passing through the furnace of affliction!

"All is not evil that brings sorrow," may be quite as true as the proverb, "All is not gold that glitters." Some have been glad to say with the Psalmist, "It was good for me that I was afflicted." This truth, however, while it might strengthen some hearts to bear, did not lighten the load to be borne. The great Bank failure produced heart-rending and widespread distress. It also called forth deep and general sympathy.

Out among the mountain gorges of California the gold-hunters knew nothing of all this for many a day, and our adventurers continued to dig, and wash, and pile up the superstructure of their fortunes, all ignorant of the event which had crumbled away the entire foundations.

At last there came a day when these fortunate gold-miners cried, "Hold! enough!" an unwonted cry—not often uttered by human beings.

Standing beside the camp fire one evening, while some of the party were cooking and others were arranging things inside the tent Captain Samson looked around him with an unusually heavy sigh.

"It's a grand country, and I'll be sorry to leave it," he said.

"Troth, and so will meself," responded O'Rook.

It was indeed a grand country. They had lately changed the position of their tent to an elevated plateau near a huge mass of rock where a little mountain stream fell conveniently into a small basin. From this spot they could see the valley where it widened into a plain, and again narrowed as it entered the gloomy defile of the mountains, whose tops mingled magnificently with the clouds.

"You see, my lads," continued the captain, "it's of no use goin' on wastin' our lives here, diggin' away like navvies, when we've got more gold than we know what to do with. Besides, I'm not sure that we ain't gettin' into a covetous frame of mind, and if we go on devotin' our lives to the gettin' of gold that we don't need, it's not unlikely that it may be taken away from us. Moreover, many a man has dug his grave in California and bin buried, so to speak, in gold-dust, which is a fate that no sensible man ought to court—a fate, let me add, that seems to await Ben Trench if he continues at this sort o' thing much longer. And, lastly, it's not fair that my Polly should spend her prime in acting the part of cook and mender of old clothes to a set of rough miners. For all of which reasons I vote that we now break up our partnership, pack up the gold-dust that we've got, and return home."

To this speech Polly Samson replied, promptly, that nothing pleased her more than to be a cook and mender of old clothes to rough miners, and that she was willing to continue in that capacity as long as her father chose. Philosopher Jack also declared himself willing to remain, but added that he was equally willing to leave if the rest of the firm should decide to do so, as he was quite content with the fortune that had been sent him. Simon O'Rook, however, did not at first agree to the proposal.

"It's rich enough that I am already, no doubt," he said, "but sure, there's no harm in bein' richer. I may be able to kape me carriage an' pair at present, but why shudn't I kape me town house an' country house an' me carriage an four, if I can?"

"Because we won't stay to keep you company," answered Watty Wilkins, "and surely you wouldn't have the heart to remain here digging holes by yourself? Besides, my friend Ben is bound to go home. The work is evidently too hard for him, and he's so fond of gold that he won't give up digging."

"Ah! Watty," returned Ben with a sad smile, "you know it is not my fondness for gold that makes me dig. But I can't bear to be a burden on you, and you know well enough that what I do accomplish does little more than enable me to pay my expenses. Besides, a little digging does me good. It occupies my mind and exercises my muscles, an' prevents moping. Doesn't it, Polly?"

In this estimate of his case Ben Trench was wrong. The labour which he undertook and the exposure to damp, despite the remonstrances of his companions, were too much for a constitution already weakened by disease. It was plain to every one—even to himself—that a change was necessary. He therefore gladly agreed to the captain's proposal.

Baldwin Burr, however, dissented. He did not, indeed, object to the dissolution of the partnership of Samson and Company, but he refused to quit the gold-fields, saying that he had no one in the Old Country whom he cared for, and that he meant to settle in California.

It was finally agreed that the captain, Philosopher Jack, Watty Wilkins, Ben Trench, Simon O'Rook, and Polly should return home, while Baldwin Burr and Jacob Buckley should enter into a new partnership and remain at the fields.

Although, as we have said, most of our adventurers had sent their gold home in the form of bills of exchange for investment, they all had goodly sums on hand in dust and nuggets—the result of their more recent labours—for which strong boxes were made at Higgins's store. Simon O'Rook, in particular,—who, as we have said, did not send home any of his gold,—had made such a huge "pile" that several strong boxes were required to hold all his wealth. The packing of these treasure-chests occupied but a short time. Each man cut his name on the lid of his box inside, and printed it outside, and nailed and roped it tight, and took every means to make it secure. Then, mounting their mules and travelling in company with a trader and a considerable party of miners, they returned to San Francisco, having previously secured berths in a ship which was about to sail for England via Cape Horn.

Baldwin Burr and Buckley convoyed them a day's journey on the way.

"I'm sorry you're goin', Miss Polly," said Baldwin, riding up alongside of our little heroine, who ambled along on a glossy black mule.

"I am not sorry that we're going," replied Polly, "but I'm sorry—very sorry—that we are leaving you behind us, Baldwin. You're such a dear old goose, and I'm so fond of teaching you. I don't know how I shall be able to get on without you."

"Yes, that's it, Miss Polly," returned the bluff seaman, with a look of perplexity. "You're so cram full of knowledge, an' I'm sitch an empty cask, that it's bin quite a pleasure to let you run over into me, so to speak."

"Come, Baldwin, don't joke," said Polly, with a quick glance.

"I'm far from jokin', Miss Polly," returned the seaman; "I'm in downright earnest. An' then, to lose Philosopher Jack on the selfsame day. It comes hard on an old salt. The way that young man has strove to drive jogriffy, an' 'rithmetic, an navigation into my head is wonderful; an' all in vain too! It's a'most broke his heart—to say nothin' of my own. It's quite clear that I'll never make a good seaman. Howsever, it's a comfort to know that I've got edication enough for a landsman—ain't it, Miss Polly?"

Polly laughed, and admitted that that was indeed a consoling reflection.

While these two were conversing thus, Jack and Jacob Buckley were riding together in the rear of the party. They had been talking as if under some sort of restraint. At last Jack turned to his companion with a kind, straightforward look.

"It's of no use, Buckley, my beating about the bush longer. This is likely to be the last time that you and I shall meet on earth, and I can't part without saying how anxious I am that you should persevere in the course of temperance which you have begun."

"Thank you, Jack, thank you," said the miner heartily, "for the interest you take in me. I do intend to persevere."

"I know that, Jacob, I know it; but I want you to believe that you have no chance of success unless you first become a follower of Jesus Christ. He is the only Saviour from sin. Your resolutions, without Him, cannot succeed. I have found that out, and I want you to believe it, Jacob."

"I do believe it," said the miner earnestly. "Dear Dan used to tell me that—often—often. Dear Dan!"

"Now," added Jack, "we shall have to part soon. There is another thing I want to mention. There is a bag of gold with my name on it, worth some few hundred pounds, more or less. I want you to accept it, for I know that you have not been so successful as we have during our short—"

"But I won't take it, Jack," interrupted Buckley.

"Yes you will, Jacob, from an old friend and comrade. It may tide you over a difficulty, who knows? Luck does not always last, as the saying goes."

Still Buckley shook his head.

"Well, then," continued Jack, "you can't help yourself, for I've left the bag under your own pillow in the tent!"

Buckley's reply was checked by a shout from Captain Samson. They had reached the parting point—a clump of trees on an eminence that overlooked a long stretch of undulating park-like region. Here they dismounted to shake hands and say farewell. Little was said at the time, but moistened eyes and the long grasp of hard muscular hands told something of feelings to which the lips could give no utterance.

The party could see that knoll for miles after leaving it, and whenever Polly reined up and looked back, she saw the sturdy forms of Baldwin Burr and Jacob Buckley waving a kerchief or a hat, standing side by side and gazing after them. At last they appeared like mere specks on the landscape, and the knoll itself finally faded from their view.

At San Francisco they found their vessel, the Rainbow, a large full-rigged ship, ready for sea. Embarking with their boxes of gold-dust they bade farewell to the golden shore, where so many young and vigorous men have landed in hopeful enthusiasm, to meet, too often, with disappointment, if not with death.

Our friends, being among the fortunate few, left it with joy.

The Rainbow shook out her sails to a favouring breeze, and, sweeping out upon the great Pacific, was soon bowling along the western coast of South America, in the direction of Cape Horn.



CHAPTER TEN.

CHANGE OF SCENE AND FORTUNE.

The fair wind that swept the good ship Rainbow away from California's golden shores carried her quickly into a fresh and purer atmosphere, moral as well as physical. It seemed to most, if not all, of the gold-finders as if their brains had been cleared of golden cobwebs. They felt like convalescents from whom a low fever had suddenly departed, leaving them subdued, restful, calm, and happy.

"It's more like a dream than a reality," observed Ben Trench one day, as he and Polly sat on the after part of the vessel, gazing out upon the tranquil sea.

"What seems like a dream?" asked Philosopher Jack, coming aft at the moment with Watty Wilkins, and sitting down beside them.

"Our recent life in California," replied Ben. "There was such constant bustle and toil, and restless, feverish activity, both of mind and body; and now everything is so calm and peaceful, and we are so delightfully idle. I can hardly persuade myself that it is not all a dream."

"Perhaps it is," said Philosopher Jack. "There are men, you know, who hold that everything is a dream; that matter is a mere fancy or conception, and that there is nothing real or actually in existence but mind."

"Bah!" exclaimed Watty with contempt; "what would these philosophers say if matter, in the shape of a fist, were to hit them on their ridiculous noses?"

"They'd say that they only imagined a fist and fancied a blow, I suppose," returned Jack.

"And would they say that the pain and the blood were imagination also?"

"I suppose they would."

"But what if I were to come on them slily behind and hit them on their pates before they had a chance to see or to exert their terribly real and powerful minds?" demanded Watty.

"You must ask one of themselves, Watty, for I don't know much about their views; indeed, I'm not sure that I have represented them correctly, though it's very likely I have, for there is no species of nonsense under the sun that men have not been found to hold and defend with more or less vigour."

"Would you not call that a proof of the Creator's intention that man should exercise the investigative powers of his mind?" asked Ben.

"I would call it a proof of man's depravity," said Wilkins.

"What does Polly think?" asked Jack, with an amused look at the child, whose fair brow wore an anxious little frown as she tried to understand.

"I think it's a proof of both," replied Polly, with a blush and a laugh; "we have got the power to think and speak and reason, and we are sometimes very naughty."

"Well said, Polly; we must call you the philosopher in future," cried Watty. "But Jack," he added, with a perplexed air, "it seems to me that we live in such a world of confusion, both as to the limited amount of our knowledge, and the extent of our differences of opinion, while presumptuous incapacity attempts to teach us on the one hand, and designing iniquity, or pure prejudice, seeks to mislead us on the other, and misconception of one's meaning and motives all round makes such a muddle of the whole that—that—it seems to me the search after truth is almost hopeless, at least to ordinary minds."

"I admit it to be a great difficulty," replied Jack, "but it is by no means hopeless. We must not forget that the world is well supplied with extraordinary minds to keep the ordinary minds right."

"True, but when the extraordinary minds differ, what are the poor ordinary ones to do?" asked Watty.

"Use their brains, Watty, use their brains," said Captain Samson, who had come aft, and been listening to the conversation. "Your brains, whether good or bad, were given to be used, not to be sold. The power to reason is a gift that is not bestowed only on extraordinary minds. The unlearned are sometimes better reasoners than the learned, though, of course, they haven't got so many tools to work with. Still, they are sufficiently furnished with all that's needful to run the race that is set before them. God has given to every man—civilised and savage—a brain to think with, a heart to feel with, a frame to work with, a conscience to guide him, and a world, with all its wonderful stores, in which to do what he will. Conscience—which, I think, is well named the voice of God in man—tells him to do right, and forbids him to do wrong; his heart glows with a certain degree of pleasure when he does well, and sinks, more or less, when he does ill; his reason tells him, more or less correctly, what is right, and what is wrong. The Word of God is the great chart given to enlighten our understandings and guide us heavenward. As my reason tells me to go to my charts for safe direction at sea, so every man's reason will tell him to go to God's revealed Word, when he believes he has got it. There he will find that Jesus Christ is the centre of the Word, the sum and substance of it, that he cannot believe in or accept the Saviour except by the power of the Holy Spirit. He will also find the blessed truth that God has promised the Spirit to those who simply 'ask' for Him. There is no difficulty in all this. The great and numberless difficulties by which we are undoubtedly surrounded are difficulties of detail, which we may be more or less successful in solving, according to our powers of mind, coupled with our submission to the revealed will of God. To some extent we fail and get into trouble because we lazily, or carelessly, let other men think for us, instead of making use of other men's thoughts to help us to think for ourselves. Depend upon it, Watty, we won't be able to justify ourselves at the judgment day by saying that things were too deep for us, that things seemed to be in such a muddle that it was of no use trying to clear 'em up. Why, what would you say of the mainspring of a watch if it were suddenly to exclaim, 'I'll give up trying! Here am I—so powerful and energetic, and so well able to spin round— checked, and hindered, and harassed by wheels and pinions and levers, some going this way, and some going that way, all at sixes and sevens, and all for no good end that I can see, buried as I am in this dark hole and scarcely allowed to move at all?' Would it be right or reasonable to charge the watchmaker with having made the watch in vain, or made it wrong? Of this I at least am convinced, that God is perfect, and that all things are working towards a good end, God's sovereignty, our mysterious free-will and personal responsibility being among these 'all things.'"

While Captain Samson was discoursing on these important subjects, the look-out on the forecastle reported a sail on the weather-bow.

"She's a whaler, I do believe, and her boats are after a sperm whale," said Simon O'Rook, who stood by the mizzen shrouds looking intently at her through his double glass. Simon, being now a rich man, had not only taken a cabin passage, but had bought for himself one of the best binocular telescopes to be had in San Francisco.

It was soon seen that O'Rook was right for the whale rose to blow, and swam towards the Rainbow, while the boats of the whaler immediately followed in pursuit.

Great was the excitement on board the Rainbow as the men clustered on the forecastle, or ran up the rigging, to watch the chase, while the officers and passengers got out their telescopes.

"Come here, Polly," cried Jack; "look through my glass. It's a rare chance you've got of seeing what men have to go through in order to send oil to market."

Polly at once accepted the invitation. Jack assisted her to mount on the top of the capstan, and arranged the glass.

"There she blows!" shouted one of the men who had been an old whaler; "there she breaches!"

As he spoke the whale rose about three miles to windward of them, not far from the boat that led the chase. The men in the boat were seen to bend to their oars, as Captain Samson said, "with a will." Another moment and the harpooneer stood up in the bow. The spectators were too far off to see the weapon used, but they could perceive the man's action, and there was no possibility of mistake as to the result, when the tail of the enormous creature was suddenly flourished in the air, and came down on the sea like a clap of distant thunder.

"Oh! oh!!" shrieked the horrified Polly, "the boat is gone!"

But the boat was not gone. It had been quickly backed out of danger when the harpoon was thrown, and reappeared when the cataract of spray sent up had dispersed.

"He's pouring water on the rope now," said Jack, in a low excited voice, "to prevent its catching fire as it runs out. They're fast to the fish."

"Yes, I see," exclaimed Polly, squeezing her right eye against the glass and shutting the other with her hand.

But in a few minutes there was no need for telescopes, as the whale came straight towards the Rainbow, dragging the boat after it, while the other boats followed as fast as the men could pull. The whale-ship steered in the same direction, but there was scarcely wind enough to fill her top-sails.

Suddenly the leviathan came to the surface for breath, not far off, and sent up a grand spout of water on the Rainbow's starboard bows. The boat pulled quickly up, and another harpoon was sent deep into the whale's side. It dived immediately, and, turning at an angle, darted off in an other direction. This time the excited onlookers could hear the cheer given by the whalers as the second "iron" was fixed, and replied to it with enthusiasm. Soon the boat was carried far away, and the telescopes became again necessary, but ere long the fish turned, and once more made for the ship. It could not have been more than five hundred yards distant when it came to the surface for the third time, and the harpooneer was distinctly seen to drive a lance deep into its side, from which fountains of blood flowed. He had struck its "life," as whalemen express it, and the whale soon went into its dying struggles, in the course of which it hit the boat, stove in its side, and overturned it.

There was a cry of consternation on board the Rainbow at this. Instantly the order was given to lower the boats. Philosopher Jack and O'Rook sprang to obey, by an irresistible impulse, as if they had been part of the ship's crew. In a few seconds two boats were rowing at full speed to the rescue, while the boats belonging to the whale-ship—still far distant—made for the scene of disaster.

Ere long the rescue party had the great satisfaction of picking up the wrecked whalers, and found that not a man among them had received greater injury than a bruise or two and a ducking. Their boat, however, was completely destroyed. They were therefore taken on board the Rainbow, while the whaler's boats came up and secured their prize.

That night, while the stars twinkled at their own reflections in the sleeping sea, the crew of the whale-ship had a "gam" on board the Rainbow.

A "gam," good reader, may be described as a "small tea-party" on the sea. But it differs in many respects from such gatherings on shore, inasmuch as the revellers are not "a few friends", male and female, but are usually absolute strangers to each other, and of the male sex only. But the circumstances of their meeting—on the lone ocean, far from home and friends—have a marvellous effect in opening up the fountains of the human heart. The men and officers fraternised at once. The whalers were chiefly American, the Rainbowers principally English, with a slight mixture of Irish and Scotch. They all spoke the same language; that was enough. Soon after the arrival of their guests, powerful friendships were formed. While tea, or rather supper, was being discussed, these were cemented; and, when pipes were lit, confidences of the most touching nature were interchanged. Anecdotes and stories naturally followed the confidences, broke up the separate parties, and drew the company more together. The union was finally and effectually concentrated by one of the whalers' crew making a demand for a song.

"Come, O'Rook," cried one of the Rainbow men, "let's have 'The poor little pig wi' the purple nose.'"

O'Rook began at once, and sang with such fervour and pathos, that his auditors became quite uproarious in their admiration. But when the Irishman called on the whalers for a ditty, a fine-looking youth sang a song of the "Homeward Bound," in a voice so sweet and true, that the spirit of the men was changed, and many a moistened eye told that deep chords of sympathy had been touched.

"Can you play the fiddle?" asked one of the men of O'Rook, when the song was finished.

"Sure it's myself can do that same," he replied, with a modest air, which drew forth a peal of laughter. When the fiddle was produced and O'Rook struck up reels, and strathspeys, and hornpipes, with a precision of touch and time and perfection of tune that was far above the average of amateurs, the joy of the party could no longer find vent through eye and mouth. They were forced to open the safety-valves of heel and toe. For this purpose the quarter-deck was cleared, and flags were festooned round it; the officers joined, and Polly Samson was placed on the capstan, like the presiding angel of the scene.

Ah! reader, if you have not been for many months on the ocean, or in the lone wilderness, without seeing a new face, or hearing a sweet sound, or feeling the power of female influence, you cannot fully appreciate what we describe. There was no drink save coffee and tea at that feast. The Rainbow was a temperance ship. But the men required no spirits. Each one had more than sufficient within himself. The presence of Polly, too, had a powerful effect. Every man there saw his own particular Polly or Susan or Nancy in her pretty laughing face and sparkling eyes.

"Your men are powerful fellows," said the captain of the Rainbow to the captain of the whaler; "I've no doubt they'll be quite game for work to-morrow, though they should keep it up all night."

"They certainly would," replied the latter, "if called on to do duty; but they won't be required to work to-morrow, for we keep the Sabbath on board of our ship as a duty we owe to God, and we find that we are great gainers in health and strength, while we are no losers of fish by doing so."

"Ha! the great Captain Scoresby tried that before you, and said that he found keeping the Sabbath to be good both for body and soul," said the captain of the Rainbow.

"I know he did," replied the other, "and I am trying to follow in Scoresby's wake."

It was pretty late in the evening before the whalers could tear themselves away, and when at last they did so, they expressed a unanimous opinion that it had been the most successful gam they had ever had in their lives.

Not long after parting company from the whale-ship the Rainbow sailed into the cold and variable regions south of Cape Horn. Here they experienced what the men styled "very dirty weather." The skies were seldom blue, and the decks were never dry, while it became necessary to keep the stove burning constantly in the cabin, and the berth-ports almost always shut.

The effect of all this on poor Ben Trench was to injure his health severely. His cough increased, and it soon became evident that his complaint, which at first had only threatened to grow worse, had now become chronic and serious.

"Watty," he said one day, while his friend sat beside his cot reading to him, "it's of no use shutting one's eyes to facts. I fear that I am now hopelessly ill, and that I shall never see father or mother or Susan again in this world."

"O Ben! don't speak like that," said Watty, laying down the book, and gently taking his friend's thin hand in both of his. "You mustn't do it. It will only make you worse. When we get out of this horrible region into the trade winds and the sunshine near the Line, you'll be a new man. Come now, cheer up, Ben, and don't let your good little nurse see you with such a sad face."

Polly's step was heard at the moment. She entered with a bowl of soup.

"Here, Ben, this will do you good," she said, handing him the bowl. "The cook says it's the stuff to stick to your ribs. There now, I can't stop to give it you, for father wants me, but you're all right when Watty's by. Are you better?"

"Well, not much," replied Ben with a smile; "but I'm always the better of seeing your little face. Don't be long of returning, Poll."

When she had left, Ben drank the soup, and then lay down with a sigh.

"It may be that the warm latitudes will do me good, Watty," he said, "but I don't feel as if they would. Still I'm resigned to God's will, though it seems sad to die so young, and just when I've come to know my dear Redeemer, and might, perhaps, have done some little work for Him. It seems so strange to be saved and not allowed time to do anything."

"You have done something," returned his friend with an earnest look; "if I have really turned to Jesus at all, it has been through your influence, Ben, and I'm sure that Jack would say the same of himself; and if he and I are spared to do any good work for our Lord, it will be all owing to you."

"Not to me, Watty, not to me," rejoined Ben, with a glad look; "but if God's holy Spirit has used me as an instrument in this, I shall have cause to praise Him for it throughout eternity. Oh! is it not strange that in a region where there is so little godliness, and while we were in the eager pursuit of gold, our eyes should have been opened to see and appreciate the true gold? But now, Watty," he added in a lower tone, "I want to ask you to do me a favour. I want you to go yourself to our house, without delay, and break it to mother."

He paused. Watty laid his face in the bedclothes, and wept silently.

"They are very fond of you," continued Ben, "and I should not like them to hear of it from any one but you. Be very tender to Susan, Watty. Poor Susan, she will need comfort, and you know how to direct her."

For some time Ben Trench continued talking, and then fell into a quiet slumber, in which his friend left him, while Polly watched by his side.

The warm latitudes did no good to the invalid. On the contrary, he suffered much from the heat, and became visibly weaker.

At last the shores of Old England drew nigh. A few days more and they should sight land. They sought to cheer him with this, but there was no answering sparkle in Ben's eyes.

"Yes," he said, faintly, "I shall see them all again, but not here."

Ben was dying when the Rainbow approached the British Channel. The whole of the previous day a stiff gale had blown, and this had not much abated when night drew on. Liverpool was their port, and the captain carried on full sail—more than the good ship could well bear. It is not known whether he felt so sure of his course that he did not think it necessary to shorten sail on nearing the Land's End, or that he was anxious, at all hazards, to reach port before Ben Trench should die, but he held on recklessly, and, in the dead of night, ran the Rainbow straight against the high cliffs not far from the Cornish town of Saint Just.

The wreck of the ship was complete in a few seconds. All her masts went over the side, and the waves overwhelmed her. She would have gone down in deep water if she had not been dashed between two rocks and held there. Time was thus given for one of the boats to be got out, but utter confusion reigned, for the captain had disappeared. No wonder that several of the men leaped into her, crying, "Every man for himself," and endeavoured to cast off.

"Have you got Polly?" cried Jack, as he dimly saw a figure staggering through the turmoil of wind and whirling spray.

"All safe!" gasped Captain Samson.

Jack instantly jumped into the boat and found O'Rook struggling to prevent one of the men from cutting the hawser. Jack knocked the man down, and, hauling the boat close alongside, shouted, "Jump, Captain, jump!" The captain did so at the right moment, and alighted safely, though with great violence. Just then Watty Wilkins was seen striving to lift Ben Trench over the bulwark of the ship. It was impossible to render him assistance, though Jack tried to do so, for at the moment a towering billow fell on the deck and tore the invalid from his grasp. With a shriek of despair Watty fell back into the sea, but was caught by one of the men and hauled into the boat which was then cut adrift. It was not a moment too soon, for the next wave dashed their ship to pieces.

As it was impossible to effect a landing among perpendicular cliffs which were lashed by roaring breakers, they were obliged to push out to sea, where they rowed till daylight, and succeeded in reaching Penzance harbour.

Leaving the others to report the news, Jack and Wilkins started off along the coast to the scene of the wreck. They found the spot, but not a vestige was to be seen of what had so long been their home, save a few broken spars, here and there far down in the clefts of inaccessible rocks. A fisherman, however, told them that several bodies had been thrown into a little bay, and were then lying in a shed near the spot. Hastening thither, they found five lying side by side. Among them were those of poor Ben Trench and the captain of the ship—the one strong, stalwart and still ruddy in the face, the other attenuated and ghastly, as might have been expected of one who had, as it were, died a double death.

We will not dwell on the terrible scene. While Jack and Captain Samson remained to attend to the dead, Wilkins set off, without delay, to be first, if possible, in breaking the sad news to his friend's family, according to promise.

In regard to the wreck, it is sufficient to say that she, with all her precious freight was scattered on the rugged coasts of Cornwall, and our adventurers stood once more on their native shores without even the means of paying their travelling expenses home. They did not like to speak of their invested wealth, fearing that their statements might be disbelieved. They therefore stood literally in the position of beggars.

In this extremity they found the hospitable men of Cornwall to be friends indeed and full of sympathy.



CHAPTER ELEVEN.

RETURN OF THE WANDERER.

Great was the anxiety of Edwin Jack as he walked, with light foot and fluttering heart, over the Border hills and drew near to the old home. He had not heard from his father for nearly a year. Were they all well? had they struggled out of their difficulties with the funds he had sent them. Was there no empty chair? Such and similar thoughts hurried through his mind as he went along, until he was forced to run for relief. There was a rocky ridge of land in front of him. From the top of this he knew the cottage could be seen. Panting with exertion when he gained the top, he sat down on a mass of rock and gazed at the old place till tears disturbed his vision. There it stood as of yore—no change in the general aspect of things, though there did seem one or two improvements about the cottage. But he did not gaze long. Starting up again he hurried on.

At last he stood in the midst of the old home-circle—all well, and, thank God, not one absent!

Philosopher though he was, he could not reason down the tears of joy that blinded, and the lump in his throat that well-nigh choked him. After the first wild miscellaneous embrace all round was over, Jack (or Teddie, as the home-circle called him) found relief by catching up Dobbin and burying his face in his neck and curls, regardless of the treacle with which that gentleman was plentifully besmeared.

"I've got bad news for you, Teddie, my boy," said his father, after they had moderated a little.

"Nobody ill or—dead?" asked Jack, with a look of anxiety.

"No, nobody."

"Then I'm prepared for any other kind of bad news," said our philosopher with a quiet smile.

"The Blankow Bank," said his father, laying a hand impressively on his shoulder, "has failed, and every penny of your gold is gone!"

The family had become very grave. Jack looked from one to the other with a bewildered air.

"You are jesting, father."

"No, my boy; I would that it were not true. The distress that is abroad in the land because of this calamity is very great. Not only is all your fortune gone, Ted, but anything that you may have brought home with you will be taken to pay the creditors of the bank; and they require so much money that it would ruin you, though you had thousands upon thousands of pounds."

A strange smile flitted across the youth's face as he replied—

"What I brought home with me won't benefit them much, for it lies with the wreck of the Rainbow at the bottom of the sea."

This was indeed a surprise to the old couple, who now learned, for the first time, that the wrecked ship, about which a rumour had just reached them, was that in which their son had come home.

"But, father," continued Jack, with a look of deepening anxiety, "if this be as you say, then my comrades must also be ruined, for their gold was all invested by Mr Wilkins in the same bank."

"All ruined," replied the old man in a sad tone. "Mr Wilkins himself is bankrupt—the first call brought him and many others down."

"And yourself father; I hope you had no shares in it."

"None, my boy, thank God. Prosperity has attended me ever since I got the first money you sent home. That saved me, Teddie."

A gleam of joy overspread Philosopher Jack's countenance as he started to his feet.

"Then am I well and undeservedly rewarded, daddy," he exclaimed; "but all this news is pretty tough. I must go out to tackle it. I'll be back in a few minutes."

He sprang through the cottage door and sped away over the moor like a greyhound. Reaching the top of a rising ground—from which he could see a boundless stretch of border-land, with the sea in the far distance and the sun setting in a flood of golden light—he drew himself up, and pushing back the hair from his temples with both hands, stood gazing wistfully into the radiant glory.

"So like a dream—so like a dream!" he murmured. "It was God who gave; surely it is He who has taken away. Can there be anything but good in all this?"

His hands dropped to his side as he spoke, and he sauntered slowly down the slope on which he stood. Entering a small plantation of fir-trees at the foot of it, he disappeared.

When he returned to the cottage all trace of strong feeling was gone. "We won't talk of the bank to-night," he said, "let's be jolly," and jolly he was accordingly. Not only so, but he made Dobbin jolly too, by supplying him with such a number of treacle-pieces that the child could hardly gasp his refusal of the last slice offered, and was made sticky from the ends of his filthy fingers to the crown of his curly head.

It is not necessary, nor would it be pleasant to describe minutely the effect of the "bad news" on the other members of our gold-digging party. Captain Samson and Watty Wilkins took it well, but Polly and Simon O'Rook could not easily reconcile themselves to their fate. The former, it is true, sorrowed not for herself, but for her father. O'Rook, however, was more selfish, and came down very heavily on what he called his "luck."

"Sure it's a misfortunate pig I've been iver since I left Owld Ireland," he remarked to his pipe one day after dinner, being alone with that implement at the time; "an no sooner does the first stroke of good luck befall me, an me fortune's made intirely, than whoop! down goes the whole consarn to the bottom of the say. It's well, hows'ever, that ye didn't go down yerself along with it, Simon. Ye've raison to be thankful for that, anyhow."

If O'Rook's pipe did not offer him a comforting reply it appeared to console him with its fumes, for after a pause, during which the smoke played voluminously about his nose, he wrinkled his visage into a smile of good humour.

"Now, Simon," he said, rising and putting the black little implement in his pocket, "you're in a fit state to go an' comfort the widdy."

Saying which he went out of the cheap refreshment room in which he had dined, and betook himself to the principal street of the city, whose name we have already declined to mention.

To explain his remark, we may state here that after the most diligent inquiry without success, the Irishman had, by the merest chance, discovered the widow of David Ban—in this very city, to which he had accompanied Philosopher Jack and Captain Samson, after clearly ascertaining that every vestige of the wreck of the Rainbow had disappeared, and that all his gold was irrevocably gone. Walking along the principal street one day, he had been attracted by a temperance eating-house named the "Holly Tree." Entering it for the purpose of, as he said, "revictualling the ship," he was rooted to the spot by hearing a customer call out, "Another cup of coffee, please, Mrs Bancroft," while at the same moment an assistant at the counter addressed the comely woman, who replied, "Yes, sir," by the name of "Lucy." Could proof be more conclusive? Upon inquiry "Lucy" turned out in very truth to be the widow of David Bancroft, and the lock of hair corresponded. Of course O'Rook revealed to her the sad circumstances connected with her husband's end. To say that Mrs Bancroft was overwhelmed with grief would not be true. She had long mourned him as dead, and although the information, corroborated as it afterwards was by Edwin Jack and Captain Samson, did re-open the old wound to some extent, she nevertheless bore it heroically, and took Simon O'Rook's comforting observations in good part. But we must not anticipate. Let us return to Watty Wilkins.

Having broken the news of Ben Trench's death to the Bailie and his family—and a terrible duty he found it to be,—Watty went straight to his father's house. We drop the curtain on the meeting. The joy of the elder Wilkins can only be fully understood by those who can say of an only son, "He was lost and is found."

"Now, Watty, dear boy," said Mr Wilkins when they came to talk of ordinary matters, "God has mingled mercy with my sorrows. My business has indeed been ruined, and I have passed through the bankruptcy court; but I am by no means so unfortunate as hundreds of people who have been reduced to absolute poverty by this crash. You remember my brother James—Uncle Jimmy? well, he has got a flourishing business in the West Indies. For some years past he had been meditating the establishment of an agency in connection with it in this city. The moment he heard of my failure he offered to make me his agent here, with a good salary. Of course I was only too glad and thankful to accept the offer, and after my affairs were wound up, entered upon the office. So now, you see, here I am, through God's goodness, still inhabiting the old house, which I now rent from the person who purchased it. Of course I can no longer keep a carriage, and it will cost me some calculation and economy to make the two ends meet, but these are small matters."

"Oh, father, I'm so glad and thankful!" said Watty with sparkling eyes.

"But," continued Mr Wilkins, with a look of profound gravity, "at present I happen to be troubled with a great difficulty."

"What's that?" asked his little son, with a ready sympathy that was natural to him, and which his recent experiences had rendered much more powerful.

"I find the nature of my duties too much for me," replied Mr Wilkins with a peculiar smile, "and it is almost impossible that I can get along without a clever, honest, intelligent clerk, or, shall we say, secretary—a character that is not easily found in these degenerate days. Can you recommend one, Watty?"

"O yes," cried the youth, springing up and seizing his father's hand in both of his; "you mean me! Don't you, now? You can't get on without me."

Watty felt inclined to dance a hornpipe, but he sat down instead, and, covering his face with his hands, burst into tears of joy. Being a tender-hearted man, Mr Wilkins could not help joining him, but in a moderate degree. We will leave them thus engaged, merely remarking that if the act was a weakness, it nevertheless seemed to do them a world of good.

After a considerable time had elapsed, Philosopher Jack left the Border cottage one day, went up to town, and presented himself at his old lodgings to Mrs Niven. That lady's feelings, under the influence of surprise, had a tendency, as we have shown, to lay her flat on the floor. But the faithful Peggy had come to understand her tendencies, and was usually too much for her. When her old lodger made his appearance in her parlour, Mrs Niven exhibited symptoms which caused Peggy to glide swiftly forward and receive her in her arms, whence she was transferred to an easy-chair.

Recovering, she gave Jack what, in the circumstances, was a hearty welcome.

"Losh me, laddie, ye'll be the death o' me!"

"I hope not, Mrs Niven," said Jack, laughing, as he shook her hand heartily and sat down, "for my own sake as well as yours; because I have come to take my old room if it is vacant."

"Yer auld room, Maister Jack!" exclaimed the bewildered woman.

"Yes, if it is not already occupied."

"The yin wi' the reeky lum and the view o' chimbley-pots frae the wundy?"

"The same. I hope I can have it, for I'm going to college again, and I've an affection for the old place, despite the smoky chimney and the cans on the cats' parade."

"Yer jokin', Maister Jack."

"Indeed I am not, Mrs Niven."

"They telt me ye was in Callyforny, an had made 'eer fortin there by howkin' gold."

"Well, they told the truth, my good woman, but I happened to invest all in Blankow Bank shares, and—"

"Wow! wow!" exclaimed Mrs Niven, whimpering, for she understood full well the meaning of that, "an' 'ee've been ruined! Oh dear! Weel, weel, ay, ay, an it's come to that. Jist like my kind freen' Maister Black. Losh me! man," she added in a sudden burst of indignation, "what for disna the Government order a penny subscription ower the hail kingdom to git the puir guiltless shareholders oot o' their diffeeculties?"

Philosopher Jack declined to enter upon so subtle a question, but after finding that his old room was vacant, retook it, and then went out to the region of the docks to pay a visit to Captain Samson. He found that old salt in possession of his old lodging, but it was wonderfully changed, and, perhaps, not for the better. Polly was there, however, and her presence would have made any place charming.

"Sit down. There is an empty keg to offer a friend," said the captain, looking round the almost empty room. "You see they've cleared me out. Had to sell everything a'most."

This was true. The marine stores, coils of rope, kegs, charts, telescopes, log-lines, sextants, foreign shells, model ships, Chinese idols—all were gone, excepting a table, a chair, a child's crib in a corner, and the hammock, which latter looked more like an overwhelmingly heavy cloud than ever, as it hung over the clean but desolate scene.

"But we're going to have such a nice tea," said Polly, "and you shall stay and have some."

She bustled about the fire, but it had so little heart that even her coaxing nearly failed to make it burn. Jack offered to assist.

"Take care," said Polly with some anxiety; "if you cough or sneeze you'll put it out."

"But I promise neither to cough nor sneeze," said Jack.

Under their united efforts the fire blazed, and tea with buttered toast ere long smoked on the board.

"Polly's going to London," said the captain suddenly—almost fiercely.

"Yes," said Polly, hastening to explain; "you see, my aunt Maria has been so good as to offer to take me to live with her and put me to school."

"Ha!" said the captain, almost blowing the buttered toast out of his mouth with contempt, "and Aunt Maria says she'll make a lady of Polly! Think o' that, Jack; make a lady out of an angel!"

The captain was so tickled with the idea that he went off into a roar of sarcastic laughter.

"I'll tell 'ee what it is, Jack," he continued on recovering, "I shouldn't wonder it in the course of a few months' residence with her, Polly was to make a lady out of Aunt Maria—supposin' that to be possible."

"Oh! father," remonstrated Polly.

"Come," cried the captain savagely, "give us a nor'-wester—that's it; another—thank 'ee. The fact is, I'm goin' in for nor'-westers durin' the next fortnight—goin' to have it blow a regular hurricane of 'em."

Philosopher Jack hoped, if at all allowable, that he might be permitted to come under the influence of the gale, and then asked why Polly was leaving her father.

"She's not leavin' me, bless you," said the captain, "it's me that's leavin' her. The fact is, I've got a ship. What's left of me is not over young, but it's uncommon tough, so I mean to use it up as long as it lasts for Polly. I'm off to the East Indies in two or three weeks. If it hadn't been for this Aunt Maria I shouldn't have known what to do for Polly, so I've no call to abuse the stupid old thing. A lady, indeed—ha!"

"You might have been quite sure that my father's house would have been open to Polly," said Jack quite warmly, "or Mr Wilkins's, for the matter of that."

"I know it lad, I know it" returned the captain, slapping his friend on the shoulder, "but after all, this Aunt Maria—this lady-like individual—is the most natural protector. But now, tell me, what of O'Rook?"

"I know nothing of him. Haven't seen him for several days. When I last met him he seemed to be much depressed, poor fellow. I don't wonder, considering the fortune he has lost. However, Wilkins's father is sure to do the best he can for him. He feels so deeply having led him and the rest of us into this—though it was no fault of his, and he went in and suffered along with us. I couldn't understand, however, what O'Rook meant by some wild remarks he made the other day about taking to the temperance line and going in for coffee and mutton chops up a holly-tree. I hope it hasn't unseated his reason, poor fellow."

While the trio were thus discussing O'Rook over a cup of tea, that bold Irishman was busily engaged "comforting the widdy" over a cup of coffee in Mrs Bancroft's private parlour.

It is only just to O'Rook to say that he originally sought the widow from a simple desire to tell her of her husband's sad end, which, as we have seen, had made a deep impression on his sympathetic heart. When, however, he found that the widow was young, cheery, and good-looking, his sympathy was naturally increased, and the feeling was not unnaturally intensified when he found her engaged in the management of so excellent an institution as the "Holly Tree Public House without Drink." At first O'Rook confined his visits to pure sympathy; then, when he had allowed a "raisonable" time to elapse, he made somewhat warmer approaches, and finally laid siege to the widow's heart. But the widow was obdurate.

"Why won't ye have me, now?" asked the poor man one evening, with a perplexed look; "sure it's not bad-lookin' I am, though I've no occasion to boast of gud looks neither."

"No, it's not your looks," said Mrs Bancroft with a laugh, as she raised her eyes from her knitting and looked at her sister Flo, who sat opposite, also knitting, and who took a smiling but comparatively indifferent view of the matter.

"Then it must be because I'm not owld enough. Sure if ye wait a year or two I'll be as owld as yourself, every bit," said O'Rook.

"No, it's not that either," said the widow.

"Ah, then, it can't be because I'm poor," persisted O'Rook, "for with this good business you don't want money, an' I'm great at cookin', besides havin' the willin' hands that can turn to a'most anything. If ye'd seen me diggin' for goold, bad luck to it, ye'd belaive what I tell ye. Ah!" he added with a sigh, "it's a rich man I'd have been this day if that ship had only kep' afloat a few hours longer. Well, well, I needn't grumble, when me own comrades, that thought it so safe in the Blankow Bank, are about as badly off as me. When was it they began to suspec' the bank was shaky?"

"Oh, long ago," said Mrs Bancroft, "soon after the disappearance of Mr Luke, the cashier—"

"Mr who?" demanded O'Rook with a start.

"Mr Luke. Did you know him?"

"I've heard of such a man," replied O'Rook with assumed carelessness; "what about him?"

"Well, it was supposed that he was goin' deranged, poor fellow, and at last he suddenly disappeared, no one could tell why; but it's clear enough now, for he was made to put the accounts all wrong, and I suppose the struggle in his mind drove him to suicide, for he was a long, thin, weakly sort of man, without much brains except for figures."

Hereupon O'Rook told the widow all he knew about the strange passenger of that name with whom he had sailed to the Southern Seas and worked at the gold fields. The conclusion which they came to was that the gold-digging passenger was the absconded cashier. Having settled this, O'Rook renewed the siege on the widow's heart but without success, though she did not cast him off altogether. The poor man, however, lost patience, and, finally, giving it up in despair, went off to sea.

"I've been too hard on him," remarked the widow, sadly, to her sister Flo, after he was gone.

"You have," was Flo's comforting reply, as she rose to serve a clamorous customer of the Holly Tree.

Philosopher Jack from that time forth devoted himself heartily to study, and gradually ceased to think of the golden dreams which had for so long a time beset him by night and by day. He had now found the gold which cannot perish, and while he studied medicine and surgery to enable him to cure the bodies of men, he devoted much of his time to the study of the Book which would enable him to cure their souls.

The captain came and went across the seas in the course of his rough calling, and he never came without a heart full of love and hands full of foreign nick-nacks, which he conveyed to Polly in London, and never went away without a rousing nor'-wester.

Watty and his father worked on together in vigorous contentment and many a visit did the former pay to Bailie Trench, attracted by the strong resemblance in Susan to the bosom friend who had reached the "Better Land" before him.

Thus time rolled quietly on, until an event occurred which modified the career of more than one of those whose fortunes we have followed so long.



CHAPTER TWELVE.

CONCLUSION OF THE WHOLE MATTER.

If it be true that there is "many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip"— which we have no reason to doubt—it is not less true that many a cup of good fortune is, unexpectedly and unsought, raised to the lips of thankless man.

Captain Samson was seated one fine summer evening in his shore-going cabin, that used to be the abode of fishy smells, marine-stores, Polly, and bliss, but which now presented an unfurnished and desolate aspect. He had just returned from a voyage. Little "kickshaws" for Polly lay on the table before him, and a small fire burned in the grate, with a huge kettle thereon. A stormy sigh escaped the captain as he glanced round the old room.

"Come, come, Samson," he exclaimed, apostrophising himself, "this will never do. You mustn't give way to the blues. It's true you haven't got as much to leave to Polly when you slip your cable as you once had; but you have scraped together a little these few years past, and there's lots of work in you yet, old boy. Besides, it's His way of ordering events, and that way must be right, whatever it appears to me. Why, Samson, for all your preaching to others, your own faith isn't as big as a grain of mustard seed. Ah! Polly, you're a woman now a'most—and a beauty, I'll be bound. I wish you'd come though. You're not up to time, young 'ooman. It's as well you've got one or two faults, just to keep you in sympathy with other mortals. Ah, here you come."

He hastened to answer a double knock at the door, and checked himself, not a moment too soon, from giving a warm embrace to the postman. Under a strong impulse to knock the man down he took a letter from him, flung it on the table, and shut the door. After pacing the room for some time impatiently he sat down, opened the letter, and read it aloud. It ran thus:—

"Sir—Having been for some years past engaged in diving operations at the wreck of the Rainbow—lost off the coast of Cornwall in 18 hundred and something, I write to say that I have recovered a large chest of gold with your name on the inside of it, and that of a man named Simon O'Rook. Most of the gold recovered from the Rainbow has been scattered about, but in all cases when ownership could be proved, I have handed over the property. If you can give such an account of the contents of the chest referred to as shall satisfy me that it is yours, the part of its contents which belongs to you shall be restored.

"I would feel obliged if you could give me any clew to the whereabouts of O'Rook.—I am, etcetera."

"The whereabouts of O'Rook!" cried the captain, starting up and gazing at the letter; "why, he's my own first mate, an' close alongside at this good hour!"

"True for ye," cried a man outside the window, as he flattened his nose against the glass, "an is it polite to kape yer own first mate rappin' the skin off his knuckles at the door?"

The captain at once let in his follower, and showed him the letter. His surprise may be better imagined than described.

"But d'ee think it's true, cap'n?"

"I haven't a doubt of it, but we can settle that to-morrow by a visit to the writer of the letter."

"That's true," said O'Rook; "which o' the boxes, now, that belonged to us d'ee think it is?"

"It can only be one," replied the captain, "that box of mine in which you asked me to stuff the remnant of the gold-dust that you hadn't room for in your own boxes. It was the strongest box o' the lot, which accounts for its not breakin' up like the others."

"It must be that. I rowled it up in an owld leather coat bought from an Injin the day before we left the diggin's. It's but a small remainder o' me fortune—a thousand pounds, more or less,—but sure, it's found money an comes handy this good day, which reminds me I've got some noose for 'ee. What d'ee think, cap'n?" continued O'Rook, with a very conscious look.

"How can I think if ye don't give me somethin' to think about?"

"The widdy's tuk me after all!" said O'Rook.

"What! widow Bancroft?"

O'Rook nodded impressively. "Moreover," he said, "she's tuk me as a poor beggar with nothin' but his pay, for better and for worse, an', sure now, it's better I'll be than she tuk me for."

The captain was interrupted in his congratulations of the mate by another knock at the door. He opened it, and next moment was seized round the neck by a tall, graceful, beautiful, exquisite—oh! reader, you know who we mean.

"Why didn't you come up to time, old girl?" demanded the captain, while O'Rook looked on in admiration.

"Oh, father," gasped Polly, "don't crush me so and I'll tell you."

When she had explained that delay in the train had caused her want of punctuality, she shook hands with O'Rook, with whom she had renewed acquaintance at the time of his being appointed first mate to her father's ship. Then she was bid stand up in a corner to be "overhauled." The captain retired to an opposite corner, and gazed at his daughter critically, as though she had been a fine portrait.

"Yes, Polly, you'll do," he said, while an approving smile wrinkled his vast countenance. "Fit for a queen any day. A lady—ha! ha! Have you done your duty to Aunt Maria, Polly, eh? Have you made a lady of her, eh? Have you infused into her something allied to the angelic, eh? Come, now, a rousing nor'-wester!"

With a laugh worthy of her girlhood, Polly ran out of her corner and obeyed orders.

"Now, my pet" said the captain, seating her on his knee, "here are some kickshaws from foreign parts for you; but before letting you look at 'em, I must explain why I asked you to meet me here instead of going to see you as usual in London. The fact is, I had bin longing to take you with me my next voyage, and it would have been handier to have you by me here when we're getting ready for sea, but—but, the fact is, things have taken a sudden turn, and—and—in short, circumstances have come about that I can't speak of just now; only I'm not quite so sure about going to sea as I was an hour ago. But you don't seem to jump at the notion, Polly. Surely you'd have liked to go—wouldn't you?"

"Liked, father, of course. I should have been overjoyed to have gone with you, but—but—the truth is," she said, with a little laugh and a glance at O'Rook, "circumstances have come about that I can't speak of just now."

"Well, my pet," rejoined the captain, with a puzzled, anxious look, "we'll not talk about 'em. Now, you must know that I've got up a small party to meet you here to-night, and expect you to do me credit. The pastry-cook next door has undertaken to send in cakes, and tea, and hot sausages, and buns, at a moment's notice. I expect his man here every minute to lay out the spread. Now, who d'ee think are coming? You'll never guess. There's Mr and Mrs John Jack, the father and mother of Edwin Jack—you remember him, Polly? Philosopher Jack we used to call him."

"Yes," replied Polly, in a low tone.

"Well, they happen to be in town just now with their family, and they're all coming. Then there's my first mate, Simon O'Rook; he would be coming, only he's come already, a full hour before his time! Then there's a Mr Burr and a Mr Buckley, both returned from California with fortunes—"

"A-rowlin' in gold," muttered O'Rook, in a low tone.

"You don't really mean, father, that—"

"Yes I do, Polly. I mean that Baldwin Burr and Jacob Buckley are coming. I met 'em only two days ago in the streets, going about in chimney-pot hats and broadcloth like gentlemen—which they are, every inch of 'em, if worth and well-doing and wisdom make the gentleman. So, knowing you were to be here, I made 'em promise to come. Well, then, there's your old friend Watty Wilkins, who, by the way, is engaged to be married to Susan Trench. I tried to get Susan to come too, but she's shy, and won't. Besides these, there's a doctor of medicine, whom I think you have met before, a very rising young man—quite celebrated, I may say. Got an enormous practice, and—"

The captain was interrupted by the rattle of wheels outside, and the pulling up of a carriage at the door.

Polly rose quickly, with a half-frightened look.

"Don't be alarmed, Poll, it's only the doctor," he said, going out to the passage.

"Pardon my coming so much before the appointed time," said a familiar voice; "but I have something to communicate before she comes—something very important and—"

Philosopher Jack stopped short, for he had entered the room and saw that Polly had already come. With one spring he was at her side, seized her in his arms, and imprinted on her lips what her father afterwards called the "stiffest nor'wester he'd ever seen." At the time, however, the captain strode up to our philosopher with a frown.

"Come, come, doctor," he said, sternly, "there is a limit to familiarity even among—"

"Pardon me," said our hero, drawing Polly's unresisting hand through his arm; "I had no intention of doing it until I had your consent; but somehow—I can't tell how—it came upon me suddenly while I was paying my respects to her in London, not long ago, and before I knew where I was, it all came out, and she accepted me, on the understanding that I should consider it no engagement until I had obtained your consent. So now, I have to ask your forgiveness and your blessing—father."

Captain Samson stood there, bereft of speech, and O'Rook stood there, the picture of benignity, in a corner. What the former would have said it is impossible to tell, for at that moment there came an impatient rapping at the door.

"Hurrah! captain, I could not help looking in before the time," cried Watty Wilkins, "to tell you that Susan's coming after all. The dear girl—"

He stopped suddenly, and stared at Polly, as if he had applied the term of endearment to her.

"The ghost of Polly Samson!" he exclaimed, after a breathless pause.

"Nothing of the sort, my boy," said the captain, grasping his little friend's hand, "but an enlarged and improved edition of Polly Samson, not yet full-bound, but goin' to be, very soon, by Philosopher Jack."

At that auspicious moment the pastry-cook made his appearance, and compelled the party to quit the premises. They therefore went for a stroll while he put things in order. When they returned, it was found that his wonderful powers had made a change little short of miraculous. The floor was swept. Chairs had been introduced on the scene. The table groaned, being weak in the legs, under a surfeit of viands. The hammock had been removed. The fire leaped high, as if desirous of going up the chimney altogether, and the huge kettle sat thereon, leaning back, with its spout in the air, pouring its very heart out in a joyous domestic song.

Need we say that the united party made the most of their opportunity? They spoke of the golden land, of their toils and joys, their successes and losses, and of their Heavenly Father's guiding hand. The ex-gold-diggers, Baldwin Burr and Jacob Buckley, fought their battles over again, and sang the camp-fire songs. Philosopher Jack sat beside his mother, who was a little deaf, to explain the miners' slang and point the jokes. Watty Wilkins became involved in Susan, and was comparatively useless; but he laughed at the jokes, whether he saw them or not, and joined with telling effect in the choruses. Polly sang, in a voice that corresponded with her sweet face, two or three of the hymns with which they had been wont to make vocal the palm grove on the coral island in the southern seas, and Philosopher Jack related the story of the slaying of the bear at Grizzly Bear Gulch. All this was a rare treat to the family from the lonely cottage on the Border, the younger members of which had by that time ascended, through Christian example and improved education, to a high level in the social scale. Dobbin, in particular, had become a strapping youth of gentlemanly mien, and would as soon have thought of shoe-blacking as of treacle to his bread. He retained a sneaking fondness for it, however, especially when presented in the form of golden syrup.

But we must not prolong the scene. It is sufficient to say that they had a glorious night of it, on strictly temperance principles, which culminated and drew to a close when Captain Samson, opening his Bible, and reading therefrom many precious promises, drew his friends' minds from things seen and temporal to things unseen and eternal. Thereafter he prayed that neither he nor they should be permitted to forget that a loving Father holds the helm and guides the souls of his people, whether in joy or in sorrow, success or failure, through time into eternity.

And now it is incumbent on us to draw our story to a close.

On the day following the feast Captain Samson called with his chief mate on the writer of the important letter, and found that his principal chest of gold had indeed been fished up from the deep. He and O'Rook were able to give so correct an account of its contents that their claim was at once admitted, and thus the captain became possessor of gold to the value of about four thousand pounds sterling, while O'Rook recovered upwards of one thousand. This was only a fraction of their original fortune, but the interest of it was sufficient to supply their moderate wants.

Going straight off to the Holly Tree, of which a healthy shoot had been planted in the suburbs, O'Rook proceeded, according to use and wont, to "comfort the widdy."

"It's a rich man I am, darlin', after all," he said, on sitting down beside her.

"How so, Simon?"

Simon explained.

"An' would you consider yourself a poor man if you had only me?" asked the widow, with a hurt air.

"Ah! then, it's the women can twist their tongues, anyhow," cried O'Rook. "Sure it's about dirty goold I'm spakin', isn't it? I made no reference to the love of purty woman—did I, now? In regard of that I wouldn't change places with the Shah of Pershy."

"Well now, Simon, if it's the women that can twist their tongues, it's the Irishmen that can twist their consciences, so you an' I will be well matched."

"That's well said, anyhow," rejoined O'Rook. "An' now, darlin', will ye name the day?"

"No, Simon, I won't; but I'll think about it. There, now. Go home, it's gettin' late, and if ye happen to be passing this way to-morrow you may give us a call."

Thus Simon O'Rook prosecuted his courtship. In process of time he married the widow, and was finally installed as master of the juvenile Holly Tree in the suburbs, while his wife conducted the parent stem in town. Vegetables and other country produce had to be conveyed to the town Tree regularly. For this purpose a pony-cart was set up, which travelled daily between it and the country branch. Thus it came to pass that O'Rook's Californian dreams were realised, for "sure," he was wont to say, "haven't I got a house in the country an' a mansion in the town, an' if I don't drive my carriage and four, I can always drive me cart an' wan, anyhow, with a swate little widdy into the bargain."

It is, we suppose, almost superfluous to say that Doctor Jack and Polly Samson were united in due course, but it is necessary to record that, by special arrangement, Walter Wilkins, Esquire, and Susan Trench were married on the same day. More than that, the Doctor and Watty so contrived matters that they rented a double villa in the suburbs of the nameless city, one-half of which was occupied by Dr Jack's family, the other by that of Wilkins. Still further, it was so contrived by Philosopher Jack that a small cottage was built on an eminence in his garden, in which there was a room, precisely similar in all respects to that in which he had first met his father-in-law. There was a hammock in this room, slung as the original hammock had been, and although the old telescopes and sou'-westers and marine stores and charts had been sold and lost past redemption, a good many new things, bearing a strong resemblance to such articles, were purchased and placed on the walls and in the corners, so that almost the only difference between it and the old room was the absence of fishy smells. There was an improvement, also, in the view; for whereas, in the old room, the window commanded a prospect of about ten yards in extent, comprising a brick wall, a lamp-post, and a broken pump, the windows of the new room overlooked miles and miles of landscape, embracing villages, hamlets, fields, and forests, away to the horizon.

In this cottage Captain Samson took up his abode, rent free, and the money which he was thus enabled to save, or which Jack insisted on his saving, was spent in helping the poor all round his dwelling. Here the captain spent many happy hours in converse with Polly and her husband. To this room, as time rolled on, he brought a small child, to which, although not its nurse, he devoted much of his spare time, and called it "Polly."

And oh! it was a wonderful sight to see Polly the second, with her heart in her mouth and her hair flying in the air, riding the captain's foot "in a storm!"

Here, too, as time continued to roll on, he fabricated innumerable boats and ships for little boys, whose names were Teddie, Watty, Ben, Baldwin, and such like. In this room, also, every Sunday morning early, the captain was to be found with a large, eager, attentive class of little boys and girls, to whom he expounded the Word of God, with many an illustrative anecdote, while he sought to lead them to that dear Lord who had saved his soul, and whose Holy Spirit had enabled him to face the battles of life, in prosperity and adversity, and had made him "more than conqueror." Here, also, in the evenings of the same holy day, he was wont to gather a meeting of old people, to whom he discanted on the same "old, old story." In all which works he was aided and abetted by the families of the double house close by.

Besides his constant visitors among the young, the aged, and the poor, the captain had a few occasional visitors at his residence, which, by the way, was named Harmony Hall.

Among these were Bailie Trench and his wife, who were naturally attracted to that region by the presence there of a slender, loving, sprightly boy, whose name was Benjamin Walter Wilkins, and who bore—at least they thought he bore—a striking resemblance to their loved and lost son Ben. The family from the cottage on the Border also paid annual visits to Number 1 of the double house (which was the Doctor's), and the various members of that family, being very fond of a chat with the old sailor, often found themselves of an evening in "the old store-room" (as the boys styled it) of Harmony Hall.

These visits were regularly returned, chiefly in the summer-time, by the captain and the families of the double house, on which occasions the cottage on the Border was taxed to such an extent that Philosopher Jack was obliged to purchase a neighbouring barn, which he had fitted up as a dormitory that could accommodate almost a battalion of infantry. During these visits the trouting streams of the neighbourhood were so severely whipped that the fish knew the difference between a real and an artificial fly as well as their tormentors, but they were captured for all that.

Baldwin Burr and Jacob Buckley were also among the occasional visitors at the Hall; but their visits were few and far between, because of their having taken up their permanent abode in California. Only when they came home on business, once in the two years, had they an opportunity of seeing their old comrade, but they never failed to take advantage of such opportunities. These men were not prone to speak about themselves, but from various remarks they made, and from their general appearance, it was easy to see that they were substantial and influential members of society in foreign parts.

From Baldwin the captain heard that Bob Corkey had, during his wanderings, fallen in with Bounce and Badger, and that these three had formed a partnership, in which they tried their luck at gold-digging, farming, fur-trading, and many other sources of livelihood, but, up to the last news of them, without success. There was hope of them yet, however, so thought Baldwin Burr, because of the latest remarks made by them in the hearing of credible witnesses. Bob Corkey, having attained to the lowest depths of destitution and despair, had, it was said, made to his comrades the following observation: "Mates, it strikes me that we are three great fools;" whereupon Bounce had replied, "We're more than that Bob, we're three great sinners;" to which Badger had added, with considerable emphasis, "That's a fact," and when men come to this, there is hope for them.

The only personage of our tale who now remains to be mentioned is Mrs Niven.

That steady-going female continued her vocation of ministering to the wants of young students, some of whom treated her well, while others—to their shame, be it said—took advantage of her amiability. In regard to this latter fact, however, it may be recorded that Peggy proved a sharp-witted, tight-handed, and zealous defender of her mistress. Among Mrs Niven's other boarders there was one who was neither young nor a student. He came to reside with her in the following manner:—

One evening Peggy was heard in altercation with a man in the passage who seemed bent on forcing his way into the house. The students who chanced to be in their rooms at the time cocked their ears, like war-steeds snuffing the battle from afar, and hoped for a row. Mrs Niven, after opening the parlour door softly, and listening, called out, "Let the gentleman come up, Peggy."

"Gentleman indeed!" cried the irate Peggy, who had the intruder by the throat, "he's only a dirty auld blagyird."

"Niver ye mind, Peggy," returned Mrs Niven peremptorily; "I ken him. Let him up."

Immediately after, there walked into the parlour a bowed, mean-looking, dirty little old man, who, as he sat down on a chair, paid some doubtful compliments to Peggy.

"Oh, Maister Black, is it you!" said Mrs Niven, sitting down beside him.

Besides being all that we have said, Mr Black was ragged, dishevelled, haggard, and in every way disreputable.

"Yes, it's me, Mrs Niven," he replied harshly, "and you see I'm in a sorry plight."

"I see, I see," said the good woman, taking his hand and shedding tears. "I kent ye had lost a' by that fearfu' bank failure, but I didna ken ye had come doon sae low. And oh! to think that it was a' through me, an your kindness in offerin' to tak the shares aff my hands. Oh! Maister Black, my heart is wae when I look at ye. Is there onything I can dae for ye?"

Now, it was quite a new light to Mr Black that his relative had not found him out. He had called in a fit of desperation, for the purpose of extorting money from her by any means. He now changed his tactics, and resolved to board and lodge with her gratuitously. The proposition rather startled the poor woman, for she found it difficult to make the two ends meet, even when her house was full of lodgers. She had not the heart to refuse him, however, and thus Mr Black was fairly installed in the old room whose window opened on the cats' parade.

In her difficulty Mrs Niven went, as she was in the habit of doing, to Philosopher Jack, to whom she represented Mr Black as such a suffering and self-sacrificing man, that his heart was quite melted.

"I'll tell you what I'll do, Mrs Niven," he said. "There is a sum of money in my father's possession, the interest of which enabled me to pay my way when I came back from the gold-fields. My father won't use that money himself and I won't accept it from him. We have therefore resolved to devote it to charitable purposes. Now, we will give Mr Black a small annuity out of it, for your sake, Mrs Niven."

Philosopher Jack was not, however, so easily deceived as Mrs Niven. He afterwards "found out" Mr Black, and told him so in very stern language. Nevertheless, he did not stop his allowance. Neither did he enlighten Mrs Niven as to the man's true character, though he kept a sharp eye on him.

Thus did Mr Black become a pensioner and a free boarder. There is no sinner on this side [of] the grave who is beyond redemption. That which prosperity and adversity had equally failed to accomplish, was finally brought about by unmerited kindness,—Mr Black's spirit was quietly and gradually, but surely, broken. The generous forbearance of Edwin Jack, and the loving Christian sympathy of his intended victim, proved too much for him. He confessed his sin to Jack, and offered to resign his pension; but Jack would not hear of it, as the pensioner was by that time too old and feeble to work. He also confessed to Mrs Niven, but that unsuspecting woman refused to believe that he ever did or could harbour so vile a design towards her, and she continued in that mind to her dying day.

Peggy, however, was made of sterner stuff. She not only believed his confession, but she refused to believe in his repentance, and continued to treat him with marked disrespect until her mistress died. After that however, she relented, and retired with him to a poorer residence, in the capacity of his servant. Peggy was eccentric in her behaviour. While she nursed him with the assiduous care and kindness of a rough but honest nature, she continued to call him a "dirty auld blagyird" to the last. The expression of this sentiment did not, however, prevent her from holding more polite intercourse. When his eyes grew dim, she read to him not only from the Bible, but from the Pilgrim's Progress and Robinson Crusoe, which were their favourites among the books of the little library furnished to them by Christian friends. And many sage and original remarks did Peggy make on those celebrated books. The topics of conversation which she broached with Mr Black from time to time were numerous, as a matter of course, for Peggy was loquacious; but that to which she most frequently recurred was the wonderful career of Philosopher Jack, for Peggy liked to sing his praises, and never tired of treating the old man to long-winded accounts of that hero's ever memorable voyage to the Southern Seas.

THE END.