what should be done, I happened to say, that if ill befell my first-born, it would bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.

"Ah, Mr. Todd," said that wise and good man, "it is too soon for you yet to talk of old age, and long may you be spared from the anguish which is in the first taste of its condition. It is a grief of death, deeper and sadder than the sorrow that is felt for the loss of children."

"You have not been a parent, Mr. Herbert," was my reply. "True, I have not been a parent, but I yet know the reason that is in life and in nature for the truth of what I say. Our first friends are all our seniors; we never meet again with such kind hearts and fond embraces as those amid which our childhood nestled. Our parents, protectors, and patrons, all who feel for us interestedly, are those who knew us in the innocency of our childhood: contemporaries and schoolfellows may be faithful friends, but their friendship lacks the tenderness of that of the friends of the elder race. Our juniors regard us as beings of a different sphere. They cannot feel towards us any of the interests so essential to the enjoyment of life; it is when our parents and their contemporaries die, and can no more be traced on the scene, that we receive the first visitation of age. The race that looked upon us with indulgence is then no more, the world is poorer in the means of help and kindness. There are then none who will interfere merely from affection to avert misfortune. I have heard you say that your father still lives; unless Nature were awry, while that is the case, you have still a friend, you have not yet reached the wide lone moor, over which lies the pilgrimage of needful age."

While we were thus pensively ruminating aloud to each other, Mr. Hoskins came towards us; something in his manner was unusual, and he sat down at a distance from me on the bench. "I guess," said he, after being seated some time, "the Squire ha'n't had no letters from York-town this evening.” "No, none; none since Mr. Ferret's epistle."

"Well, I have got one from that ere Mr. Primly," and taking off his hat, in which he commonly carried his handkerchief, he took a letter from under the handkerchief, and turning aside from me, held it out at arm's-length. I seized it eagerly, and at the same moment the old man rose and walked away.

There was still light enough to enable me to read the letter, which I saw by the first sentence was an answer to some inquiries which Mr. Hoskins had, unknown to me, made re

specting Robin. The tears came into my eyes at this unbidden and secret tender-heartedness, and not being able in consequence to read farther, I gave the letter to Mr. Herbert, requesting him to cast his eyes over it, and let me know the contents. He did so, for about as long as one might take to count thirty, when he sighed, as if his bosom had been pierced with a cold weapon.

"Truly Mr. Hoskins has a right warm heart," was his observation, as he sorrowfully refolded the letter, of which he retained possession.

"What says it of my boy, my erring and misguided Robin ?" Mr. Herbert made me no answer for some time, and when he did speak, it was in a broken and troubled voice, the exact purport of which I could not distinctly hear. It was a suffocating murmur of the words "horrible, and murder, and death."

"Is he dead?" was my wild inquiry, for my throat was so parched with horror, that I could not articulate without an effort.

"No, he is not dead," was the emphatic answer. “What has he done,” cried I, somewhat relieved.

"It could not be premeditated," said Mr. Herbert, thoughtfully: it was not in the poor boy's nature to have imagined such a crime."

"Crime! Oh, trifle not with me-is he accused crime?"

of any

"Yes; and of murder!" In uttering these hideous words, Mr. Herbert, for the space of a minute, became so agitated, that he could not proceed.

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Yes, poor boy! he fell into a quarrel with some of his companions; a duel was the consequence, and his adversary was left for dead on the field; Robin and his second have fled. It is supposed they have gone to England in a ship which sailed that morning."

"Oh! Rebecca, he was thy son! he could not have committed murder!" was the first utterance I could give to the earthquake in my heart. I was then enabled to add, "I think he has not fled to England; I have ever been a kind father. Oh! pennyless in England! his doom is sealed."

Mr. Herbert, with many gentle remonstrances, endeavoured to assuage the violent grief which now overwhelmed mé; but his endeavours were for a long time unavailing; nor was it until, in reply to my repining, he reminded me how often. I had said evil was, in my life, the forecoming shadow of good, that I became in some degree calm.

We then consulted on what should be done. As the port to which the vessel was destined, was of course known at NewYork, Mr. Herbert proposed that a letter should be written, by the first ship for England, to some person, to look after the fugitive on his arrival; but there was only my aged father whom I could address, and he was old, and ill able to endure the fatigue of any journey or agitation.

"I had once many associates," said Mr. Herbert; ́“ we shall to-morrow morning ascertain from the Cockspurs who among them are still alive, and I will write to some of them, though my letters will be as from the grave."

It is thus that Providence ever mitigates the east wind of adversity. Had the tidings of that night come a week sooner, how much keener would have been the blast? for then Mr. Herbert would not have thought of writing to any one in England; but now he could do so without repugnance, and speak of his own resuscitated condition and prospects. When I look back on my intercourse with that excellent man, and retrace, step by step, the course of our connexion, from the day when I saw him first caressing his little dog in the solitude of the forest, I am bound to say, had our acquaintance ended with the interest he took in my unfortunate son, that he was an appointed instrument to bring about some of the most extraordinary events in my destiny.

CHAPTER XI.

"Such stuff

As dreams are made of, and their little life
Is rounded by a sleep."

Ar an early hour next morning Mr. Herbert came to see me, and found me very ill; my anxieties had brought on a fit of the ague: I had passed the night in dismal dreams; sleep I had none: the spell of an incantation was upon me; my bed was surrounded with auguries and omens, and I beheld dreadful apparitions flashing athwart the gloom.

My intention was to have gone with him to Judiville, to ascertain from the Cockspurs which of his old associates was yet living to whom he could write on behalf of my son; but

the residue of the ague fit was still upon me, and I could not quit the blankets, so that he was obliged to go alone.

In the course of the afternoon, having enjoyed some refreshing sleep, I rose, anxiously looking for Mr. Herbert; but he did not return till it was almost sunset. His mission was, however, satisfactory; he found that many of his oldest and most intimate acquaintances were still living, and he wrote to several of them from Judiville, that a post should not be lost. Although it could not be said that this attentive kindness made any difference in my situation, it yet, in some measure, relieved my mind,-if that can be accounted relief, which merely provided that the fugitive, in the event of reaching England, should not find himself utterly destitute.

By the next post I wrote to my father. It was a heartbreaking thing to address that pious old man on such a subject, and to entreat him to receive with compassionate affection, if ever the rash lad reached his dwelling, one who was stained with blood. It is true, we had not heard that the victim of the duel was dead; but the hopes of his recovery were slender, and I prepared my mind for the worst. Alas! that the felicity of parents should so often be limited to the childhood of their children!

It was on this occasion that I first began to reflect seriously on the pain I had given to my kind father, when, intoxicated with the democratic vapours of the French Revolution, I was art and part in those, projects of perfectibility, which brought me, and so many of my young companions, under the tawse of the Lord Advocate. I discerned then the truth of what Mr. Herbert had observed on the difference of feeling, between the regard which the young entertain for their seniors, and the tender affection of the old for those whom they have seen growing up from merry schoolboys into sober visaged men ; and the thought of my own recklessness made me suffer the heart-burn of remorse. Strange! that I should have lived, insensible to the grief I had inflicted on my father, until the errors of my own son made me to feel the sting.

I was in no heart to talk to Mr. Herbert of the reception he had met with from the Cockspurs, particularly of his meeting with the lady; nor, indeed, though I had been in a gayer mood, would the time, so immediately after it, have been fitting for jocularity: but I requested him to spare me half an hour at his earliest convenience to consider of his own affairs. "It is a duty I owe you, Mr. Herbert, for your friendship in the misfortune that has befallen me." He made no reply, but pressed "He

my hand, as he said "Good night," and shook his head thoughtfully.

In the mean time, the story of the duel had spread through the settlement, and I was, during the greater part of the day, in dread of a sympathizing visit from John Waft, but he was not without delicacy, when a solemn occasion called for it. He knew that I was apt to fash at him, and he discreetly kept out of my way.

In the afternoon, Mr. Bell came from Judiville, and I would have been as well content had he not. The austerity with which, on a former occasion, he spoke of the faults of inexperience, I had not forgotten; nor the sternness of his sentiments respecting the errors of young men. Moreover, I had

rejected his advice, and taken a more lenient course; I was therefore afraid at his appearance, lest he should chide me, and my heart was too sore to bear rough handling. But he came in the Samaritan spirit of consolation, and his holy admonitions pacified my wildest apprehensions: still, I must confess that Nature continued strong; for, when he retired, I was far from being resigned, and more than once dared to question the rectitude of Providence, not in afflicting me, but in allowing my callow young to fall so early into the fowler's snare. At last, I endeavoured to master these irreverent murmurs, and to stifle an impiety that was worse than the folly of the fool's foolishness in the struggle, Divine hope came to my assistance.

Soon after the departure of the Minister, I found myself so weary in mind and body, that, upon the advice of Mrs. Hos kins, I went to bed, and a happy sleep was shed upon my pillow. In the morning I was more myself again; and, to the surprise of Mr. Herbert when he came to inquire for me, he learned I had gone to the store; where, as I have been always of opinion that earnest employment is the best mandragora for an aching heart, he found me busy with Charles, taking an inventory of the goods, preparatory to our removal to Judiville.

Instead of renewing the melancholy conversation, broken by his departure the preceding evening, I began immediately to speak of his own case; remarking, that I hoped he had met with nothing to disappoint him, but I did not like that head-shaking with which he had left me.

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I have not yet seen Mrs. Cockspur," was his reply; "I was not sufficiently prepared to meet her, so I made my business to be with the young men; and I cannot but say that their altered appearance darkened my hopes-it made me feel as if