ot at all, uncle; only I thought there was a degree of irony in the
manner in which you spoke."

"None at all, my boy. I never was more serious in all my life."

"Very good. Then you will remember that I leave my honour in this affair
completely in your hands."

"Depend upon me, my boy."

"I will, and do."

"I'll be off and see the fellow at once."

The admiral bustled out of the room, and in a few moments Charles heard
him calling loudly,--

"Jack--Jack Pringle, you lubber, where are you?--Jack Pringle, I say."

"Ay, ay, sir," said Jack, emerging from the kitchen, where he had been
making himself generally useful in assisting Mrs. Bannerworth, there
being no servant in the house, to cook some dinner for the family.

"Come on, you rascal, we are going for a walk."

"The rations will be served out soon," growled Jack.

"We shall be back in time, you cormorant, never fear. You are always
thinking of eating and drinking, you are, Jack; and I'll be hanged if I
think you ever think of anything else. Come on, will you; I'm going on
rather a particular cruise just now, so mind what you are about."

"Aye, aye, sir," said the tar, and these two originals, who so perfectly
understood each other, walked away, conversing as they went, and their
different voices coming upon the ear of Charles, until distance
obliterated all impression of the sound.

Charles paced to and fro in the room where he had held this brief and
conclusive conversation with his uncle. He was thoughtful, as any one
might well be who knew not but that the next four-and-twenty hours would
be the limit of his sojourn in this world.

"Oh, Flora--Flora!" he at length said, "how happy we might to have been
together--how happy we might have been! but all is past now, and there
seems nothing left us but to endure. There it but one chance, and that
is in my killing this fearful man who is invested with so dreadful an
existence. And if I do kill him in fair and in open fight, I will take
care that his mortal frame has no power again to revisit the glimpses of
the moon."

It was strange to imagine that such was the force of many concurrent
circumstances, that a young man like Charles Holland, of first-rate
abilities and education, should find it necessary to give in so far to a
belief which was repugnant to all his best feelings and habits of
thought, as to be reasoning with himself upon the best means of
preventing the resuscitation of the corpse of a v