HAS A VISITOR.

The boys who have read the first volume of this series of books, in
which we followed the fortunes of our Union hero, Marcy Gray, and
described the persevering but unsuccessful efforts he made to be true to
his colors in deed as well as in spirit, will remember that we left him
at his home near Nashville, North Carolina, enjoying a brief respite
from the work he so heartily detested, that of privateering. He had made
one voyage in the _Osprey_ under Captain Beardsley, during which he
assisted in capturing the schooner _Mary Hollins_, bound from Havana to
Boston with an assorted cargo. When the prize was brought into the port
of Newbern the whole town went wild with excitement, Captain Beardsley's
agent being so highly elated that he urged the master of the _Osprey_ to
run out at once and try his luck again, before the capture of the
_Hollins_ became known at the North. But Beardsley, who was afraid to
trust landsharks any farther than he could see them, declared with a
good deal of earnestness that he would not budge an inch until the
legality of the capture had been settled by the courts, the vessel and
cargo sold, and the dollars that belonged to him and his crew were
planked down in their two hands. Knowing that it would take time to go
through all these formalities, Marcy Gray asked for a leave of absence,
which Beardsley granted according to promise, and in less than half an
hour after the _Osprey_ was hauled alongside the wharf, her disgusted
young pilot, wishing from the bottom of his heart that she might sink
out of sight before he ever saw her again, left her and went home as
fast as the cars could take him. When we last saw him he had reached his
mother's house, and was reading a letter from his cousin, _Rodney the
Partisan_ a portion of which we gave to the reader at the close of the
first volume of this series.

"Rodney is full of enthusiasm, isn't he?" exclaimed Marcy, when he had
finished reading the letter. "He says he looks for 'high old times'
running the Yankees out of Missouri, but I am afraid he'll not enjoy
them as much as he thinks he will. Perhaps the Yankees are not good
runners. But Rodney has been true to his colors and I have not. I said I
never would fight against the Union, but I have stood by and seen a gun
fired at the old flag; and I have no doubt that the skipper of the
_Hollins_ when he saw me aboard the privateer, took me for as good a
rebel as there was in the crew.