drawing, and
assigning the control of all the assets of said firm to said Hallet and
Cragin, and releasing to said Hallet any portion of its capital and
profits to which he might be entitled.

I read the document, and quietly handed it back. 'That will not do, Mr.
Hallet. Thirty thousand dollars settles with _you_, his father. I have
not, and _shall_ not make any settlement with the firm. David must pay
Frank what is his due--no more, no less.'

'But,' began Mr. Hallet.

'I have nothing more to say on the subject, sir.'

He drew a deep sigh. The parting with an only son, and with thirty
thousand dollars, at one and the same time, affected him deeply. He
might have borne the loss of the son; but the loss of so much money rent
his small, black soul into fragments. However, he rewrote the paper, and
passed it to me. It was all right; and when he had signed and David had
witnessed it, I placed it in my pocket-book. Then, with a trembling
hand, he handed me the check. It was drawn to my order; and I remarked,
as I took it: 'This is not what I require, sir. I want your check,
indorsed by David.'

'This is most unaccountable, Mr. Kirke. Do you question my check for
thirty thousand dollars?' he asked, his face flushing with anger.

'Oh! no, sir, not at all; but you might stop its payment. With David's
indorsement, you would not _dare_ to do it.'

'I will indorse it,' said David; and he quietly proceeded to write
another.

That cold, hard, soulless man had a wife and children; but that old
book-keeper was the only being in all this wide world that he loved!

Placing the check with the other paper, I shook David by the hand, and
bidding him 'good-night', passed down the old stairway.

As Frank is the hero of my history, I will, in another chapter, go back
some seventeen years, and tell the reader how he came to be under my
control, and how he rose to be a partner in the great house of Russell,
Rollins & Co.

CORN IS KING.

Up among the Granite mountains,
By the Bay State strand,
Hark! the paean cry is sounding
Through all Yankee land.
'Wave the stars and stripes high o'er us,
Let every freeman sing,
In a loud and joyful chorus:
Brave young Corn is King!
Join, join, for God and freedom! Sing, Northmen, sing:
Old King Cotton's dead and buried: brave young Corn is King.'

Southward rolls the cry of gladness,