raid.

"Kiss me, mother," said the girl. Her flower-like lips touched the
withered cheek, and warmed its frost.

"My child! my child!" cried Mrs. Vane, looking up to the ceiling in
search of an imaginary gallery.

"Come, Sibyl," said her brother, impatiently. He hated his mother's
affectations.

They went out into the flickering wind-blown sunlight, and strolled down
the dreary Euston Road. The passers-by glanced in wonder at the sullen,
heavy youth, who, in coarse, ill-fitting clothes, was in the company of
such a graceful, refined-looking girl. He was like a common gardener
walking with a rose.

Jim frowned from time to time when he caught the inquisitive glance of
some stranger. He had that dislike of being stared at which comes on
geniuses late in life, and never leaves the commonplace. Sibyl, however,
was quite unconscious of the effect she was producing. Her love was
trembling in laughter on her lips. She was thinking of Prince Charming,
and, that she might think of him all the more, she did not talk of him
but prattled on about the ship in which Jim was going to sail, about
the gold he was certain to find, about the wonderful heiress whose life
he was to save from the wicked, red-shirted bushrangers. For he was not
to remain a sailor, or a super-cargo, or whatever he was going to be.
Oh, no! A sailor's existence was dreadful. Fancy being cooped up in a
horrid ship, with the hoarse, hump-backed waves trying to get in, and a
black wind blowing the masts down, and tearing the sails into long
screaming ribands! He was to leave the vessel at Melbourne, bid a polite
good-bye to the captain, and go off at once to the gold-fields. Before a
week was over he was to come across a large nugget of pure gold, the
largest nugget that had ever been discovered, and bring it down to the
coast in a waggon guarded by six mounted policemen. The bushrangers were
to attack them three times, and be defeated with immense slaughter. Or,
no. He was not to go to the gold-fields at all. They were horrid places,
where men got intoxicated, and shot each other in bar-rooms, and used
bad language. He was to be a nice sheep-farmer, and one evening, as he
was riding home, he was to see the beautiful heiress being carried off
by a robber on a black horse, and give chase, and rescue her. Of course
she would fall in love with him, and he with her, and they would get
married, and come home, and live in an immense house in London. Yes,
there were