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