“’Tis in vain to struggle with my fate. My lot in life is cast, and I must stand the hazard of the die. Ada, farewell forever, I must take a step now which will sever us for ever—a step which, while it takes from me my freedom of action, places me in a situation that will separate me from you, Ada. There is a regiment ordered, I am told, to the West Indies. It wants recruits—with it will I go, and bid adieu to England, hope, and Ada.” With a saddened heart, and yet a fixed and determined aspect, he now proceeded to collect and pack into a small compass such few papers and small cherished articles as were in themselves valueless, but dear to him as the words of his father. There was one book, too, in the inside of the cover of which Ada, when quite young, had written the name of “Harry”—and underneath “Albert.” This one word of her whom he loved so well he placed next his heart, with a determination that death should alone part him and it. He then destroyed a number of letters which would have encumbered him, and which possessed no very peculiar features of interest. For a moment he paused over one of those notes, as he was about to tear it across, and as he read it it suggested one last hope to his mind. The reader will recollect that previous to his long and dangerous illness, Albert Seyton had applied to Learmont, whom he knew but as the reported richest commoner in the kingdom, for the situation of secretary to him, and had received not a distinct, but certainly an encouraging reply. Before, however, Albert could follow up the application his illness had placed so long an interval between the first proceeding and that which would have been the second, that not doubting Learmont was long since suited, he had taken no further steps in the matter. It was Learmont’s note dated far back which now caught his eye, and made him in the present desperate state of his fortunes adopt the sudden notion of calling with it in his hand and explaining the cause of the long delay, which might interest the rich and powerful squire to give him a recommendation to some one else, if he could not himself employ him. “A drowning man,” exclaimed Albert, “they say, will catch at a straw, and upon the same principle I will cling to this one slender hope.” He read the letter carefully, which ran thus:— If Mr. Seyton will call upon Mr. Learmont at his house any morning before eleven he will oblige him, and they will converse on Mr. Seyton’s application. This was very brief, but still amply sufficient to found a call upon, and Albert placing it in his pocket, and trimming up as well as he could his faded apparel, donned his hat, and with a quick active step proceeded towards Learmont’s house. What an estimable thing to youth is hope, and from what a small tiny plant will it grow in the human breast to wondrous size and beauty.