ugh, want faith and go
back?"

"I _do_ wish you wouldn't ask me such things, Ned, my boy," cried Aunt
Georgie, taking out her handkerchief to wipe her glasses. "Give up, now
we are all so settled and comfortable and happy, all for the sake of a
pack of savages? I'll learn how to shoot first. I say, no! boy, no!"

"Brother Jack," continued the captain, "I have dragged you from your
club fireside, from your London friends, and made you little better than
a labourer here, tell me what shall I do?"

"Your duty, Ned," said Uncle Jack, warmly. "The nip has been terrible,
but I was never better nor happier in my life.--Don't look at me
reproachfully, Marian, dear; don't turn away, girls.--Ned, lad, when I
took the other handle of the plough, I said I wouldn't look back, and I
will not. If you ask me, I say fight it out as an Englishman should,
and as Englishmen have for hundreds of years."

"Hurrah!" shouted the three boys together. "Three cheers for Uncle
Jack!"

"Then I need not ask you, boys?"

"No, father," said Norman. "You've taught us how to fight, and we shall
be better able to meet the niggers if they come again."

"Hear, hear!" cried Rifle and Tim, emphatically; and they went behind
Mrs Bedford's chair, as if to show how they would defend her.

"One more," said the captain. "Sam German, you have shared our
sufferings; and it is due to you, our faithful servant of many years,
that I should not leave you out. What do you say?"

"What do I say, sir?" cried the gardener, fiercely; as he strode forward
and brought his fist down heavily on the table. "I say, go and leave
that there garden, with all them young trees and plants just a-beginning
to laugh at us and say what they're a-going to do? No, sir; no: not for
all the black fellows in the world."

Sam scowled round at everybody, and went back to the kitchen door.

"That settles it, gentlemen," said the captain, quietly. "After a life
of disappointment and loss, I seem to have come into the promised land.
I am here, and with God's help, and the help of my brother, my servant,
and my three brave boys, I'll stay."

"And Shanter, father," shouted Rifle.

"Yes, and the trusty black whom I so unjustly doubted."

"Marmi want Shanter?" said the black, thrusting in his head.

"Yes: that settles it, captain," said the doctor. "I don't wonder at
it. I wouldn't give up in your place.--Will you speak now, Henley?"

"No, no, go on. I can't talk," sai