y, we should get on
splendidly, and--tut, tut, tut! what an idiot am I! Hold your tongue,
sir, it is impossible!"

"Uncle!"

"Here have I been encouraging the boy, instead of crushing the idea at
once," he cried impatiently. "No, no, no, Nat, my boy. It was very
foolish of me to speak as I did. You must not think of it any more."

"Oh! uncle, don't talk to me like that," I cried. "Pray, pray take me
with you."

"I tell you no, boy," he said impatiently. "It would be unjust to you
to encourage you to lead such a vagabond life as mine. Say no more
about it, sir," he added harshly. "It is impossible!"

A deep sigh escaped my lips, and then I was silent, for my uncle turned
to his writing again, and for the next week he was cold and distant to
me, while I went on with my task in a dull, spiritless manner, feeling
so miserable that I was always glad to go and hide myself away, to sit
and think, and wonder what I should do when my uncle had gone.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

UNCLE DICK SAYS "YES!"

It was about a fortnight after this conversation, during the whole of
which time Uncle Dick seemed to have kept me so at arm's-length that my
very life had become wretched in the extreme, when, being in the
drawing-room one evening, my aunt, who had been talking to him about his
preparations for going away in three weeks' time, suddenly drew his
attention to me.

"Do you see how ill and white this boy has turned, Richard? Now it's of
no use you denying it; he's quite upset with your nasty birds and
stuff."

"No, he is not," cried Uncle Dick suddenly; and his whole manner
changed. "The boy is fretting."

"Fretting!" cried my aunt; "with plenty to eat and drink, and a good bed
to sleep on! What has he to fret about?"

"He is fretting because he has taken it into his head that he would like
to go with me."

"Like to go with you, Dick?" cried Uncle Joe, laying hold of the arms of
his easy-chair.

"Yes, Joe, I'm afraid I have turned his head with my descriptions of
collecting abroad."

To my utter astonishment, as I sat there with my face burning, and my
hands hot and damp, Aunt Sophy did not say a word.

"But--but you wouldn't like to go with your Uncle Richard, Nat, would
you?" said Uncle Joe.

"I can't help it, uncle," I said, as I went to him; "but I should like
to go. I don't want to leave you, but I'd give anything to go
collecting with Uncle Dick, anywhere, all over the world."

Uncle Joe took out h