Hoops and driving had gone out, and cricket and marbles were in, and the days were getting long and warm, when I received a letter from Mary, saying that Captain Frankland had come home, and had written to our father, but she did not know what had passed between them. I always told Mary all I thought and wished; and though she cried very much at the thoughts of my going away, yet she promised to help me as best she could. How she was to help, I did not exactly know. I tried to console her by promising to bring her back parrots without end from Africa, and shawls from India, and fans and carved ivory bones from China, and poisoned arrows, and darts, and tomahawks, and all sorts of dreadful weapons, from America and the islands of the Pacific. Indeed, had I fulfilled my promises to the letter, I could pretty well have loaded a ship with my intended gifts. My father said nothing, and we all went home together at the usual time. At the end of this half, a very complimentary letter had preceded me. "I am glad to hear that Dr Summers is pleased with you, my dear boy," said my father, and I thought his countenance wore a graver expression than usual. "Tell me, are your wishes the same as when you last left home?" I replied that I was as anxious as ever to go to sea. "I will not, then, thwart your inclination, Harry," he answered. "Your mother and I would rather you had selected a profession which would have kept you nearer to us. But you have chosen a fine line of life, and may Heaven protect you in your career! I should have been glad, for some reasons, to have had the power of sending you into the Royal Navy; but I have no interest to get you in, and still less any to advance you in it. The merchant-service should not be looked on as less noble and less creditable a profession. It is one of the chief means by which England's greatness and prosperity is maintained. In it your progress and success will depend almost entirely on your own exertions. You must also so conduct yourself that you may sustain to the utmost the credit of the service, and, I doubt not, you will have no cause to regret entering it. I might have wished to keep you longer at home, but I am unwilling to miss the opportunity of sending you to sea under charge of a commander of the high character and attainments possessed by Captain Frankland. He, in the kindest way, tells me that he is ready to take you; and he also informs me that a relative of mine is one of the officers appointed to his ship, Silas Brand by name. You have heard as speak of my good Cousin Martha, Mrs Brand; Silas is her only son. He was a steady, good lad when I last heard of him before he went to sea, and I daresay that you will find him a firm friend. At all events, I am sure, from Captain Frankland's remarks, that he will prove a profitable one. He tells me also that his proposed voyage will be one of very great interest; that the owners of the ship have a variety of objects in