e me time to redeem it. Of course it
is too early to decide upon any plans. I must hire some tenement to move
into when I have to leave here. It will be hard upon us all to give up
the old farm. Walter, who has a taste for farming, and whom I look to be
my successor, feels very sad. Don't let this news depress you too much,
Tom. We shall not suffer. Thanks to you, I have some money ahead, and we
shall not lack for comfort."

Tom looked up when he had finished reading the letter.

"John," he said, quickly, "when does the next steamer start for New
York?"

"Day after to-morrow."

"Where can I engage passage?"

"Are you going home?"

"Yes, John, it is absolutely necessary. Squire Hudson is about to
foreclose the mortgage on my father's farm. I must be there to stop it."

"Have you money enough?"

"Three times over. He shall be defeated in his wicked purpose, or my
name isn't Tom Nelson."

Tom spoke in a quick, indignant tone, and his voice had a manly ring.

"Wait, John, let me read you the letter."

"The man's a mean rascal!" said Miles. "A rich man who will take
advantage of a poor man's necessity to deprive him of his home deserves
to be horsewhipped."

"I shan't attempt that," said Tom, smiling; "but I will disappoint him.
He little thinks I have it in my power to defeat his plans."

That very evening Tom engaged passage to New York, and two days later he
sailed out of the Golden Gate.

"I don't know how long I shall be gone, John," he said. "You need send
me no remittances, for I have money enough with me. You will hear from
me as soon as I have reached home, and transacted my business with
Squire Hudson."

"You will come out here again, Tom, won't you?"

"Yes, and before long. I have been so busily occupied making money that
I have seen almost nothing of San Francisco."

Tom did not journey alone. Ferguson, having thriven beyond his
expectations, decided to sail to New York, and thence to Scotland, on a
visit to his relatives, though he thought it probable he should come
back within a year. Dick Russell also was now in a position to study law
at home, and gave up the business of gold-mining forever.

"I owe all my present prosperity to you two," he said. "But for you I
should have blown my brains out five months since."

"We owe our prosperity to you also," said Tom. "You guided us to the
mines from which we gathered a golden harvest."

"We have worked together, and been mutual helpers," sai