"That is all, good-by. I wish now to be alone with our chaplain," said Colonel Le Noir, extending his hand. Herbert pressed that wasted hand; silently sent up a prayer for the dying wrong-doer, bowed gravely and withdrew. It was almost eight o'clock, and Herbert thought that he would scarcely have time to find Traverse before the drum should beat to quarters. He was more fortunate than he had anticipated, for he had scarcely turned the Grand Cathedral when he came full upon the young ensign. "Ah! Traverse, I am very glad to meet you! I was just going to look for you. Come immediately to my rooms, for I have a very important communication to make to you. Colonel Le Noir is supposed to be dying. He has given me a parcel to be handed to you, which I shrewdly suspect to contain your intercepted correspondence for the last two years," said Herbert. Traverse started and gazed upon his friend in amazement, and was about to express his astonishment, when Herbert, seeing others approach, drew the arm of his friend within his own, and they hurried silently on toward Major Greyson's quarters. They had scarcely got in and closed the door and stricken a light before Traverse exclaimed impatiently: "Give it me!" and almost snatched the parcel from Herbert's hands. "Whist! don't be impatient! I dare say it is all stale news!" said Herbert, as he yielded up the prize. They sat down together on each side of a little stand supporting a light. Herbert watched with sympathetic interest while Traverse tore open the envelope and examined its contents. They were, as Herbert had anticipated, letters from the mother and the betrothed of Traverse--letters that had arrived and been intercepted, from time to time, for the preceding two years. There were blanks, also, directed in a hand strange to Traverse, but familiar to Herbert as that of Old Hurricane, and those blanks inclosed drafts upon a New Orleans bank, payable to the order of Traverse Rocke. Traverse pushed all these latter aside with scarcely a glance and not a word of inquiry, and began eagerly to examine the long-desired, long-withheld letters from the dear ones at home. His cheek flamed to see that every seal was broken, and the fresh aroma of every heart-breathed word inhaled by others, before they reached himself. "Look here, Herbert! look here! Is not this insufferable? Every fond word of my mother, every delicate and sacred expression of--of regard from Clara, all read by the profane eyes of that man!" "That man is on his deathbed, Traverse, and you must forgive him! He has restored your letters." "Yes, after their sacred privacy has been profaned! Oh!" Traverse handed his mother's letters over to Herbert, that his foster brother might read them, but Clara's "sacred epistles" were kept to himself. "What are you laughing at?" inquired Traverse, looking up from his page, and detecting Herbert with a smile upon his face.