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.