That "Britons never will be slaves," or allow their fellow-countrymen to remain in captivity, is a remarkably comfortable axiom to hug to one's heart cannot be denied; and beyond the credit we have gained from the successful termination of the "war," and the kudos for the manner in which it was carried through from first to last, in spite of apparently insurmountable difficulties, the Abyssinian mission has done much to restore our old Continental reputation. Sadly tarnished has the latter been of late years by the "old womanish" policy of certain foreign secretaries of ours, in _re_ Denmark, and one or two other like matters, not to speak of the moral cowardice and practical stupidity we displayed in the non-recognition of the ill-fated Confederate party in America; but we have not heard the last of that question yet! _Vide_ Mr Sumner and the Alabama claims. It would be useless to the point of our story, as well as out of place here, to chronicle the different steps of the Abyssinian army, so ably detailed by the graphic author of "The March to Magdala." Suffice it to say that the expedition started and succeeded in its purpose; and our hero, Master Tom, as one of its component parts, may be said to have gone, and seen, and conquered like one of the rest, and was, after a time, on his way home again. Tom Hartshorne was ignorant of most that had occurred since he left home. He had read and grieved over the intelligence of his sister Susan's death, which he had come across in a stray copy of the _Times_ at Zoulla; but his grief was of very short duration, for the very next day after he read the announcement he received a letter from Mr Trump, telling him that it was all a mistake, and Susan was not dead at all, although his mother, the dowager, was seriously ill. Beyond this--and puzzled he was, too, with the conflicting accounts--Tom knew nothing of the chops and changes brought about at The Poplars and in its neighbourhood during his absence; he had no one to correspond with him, and although he had written frequently to his mother in the meanwhile, the lawyer's letter was the only communication he had received about home matters since he left England, and home, and Lizzie, the year before, for the far East. His means of information being thus so scant, you may be sure that Tom's imagination was additionally busy; and Tom had plenty to occupy his mind in thinking of a past most important episode in his life, which you may guess was connected with somebody--"you know who"--and allowing his thoughts to dwell on the future, his future, so pregnant for him of joy or sorrow. Which was it to be? Time alone could tell; and Time, that ill-featured old gentleman, who will persist in playing with edged tools, decided favourably, in spite of his usual malevolence. Tom came home at last, to find his way smooth, and his lot cast in pleasant places; but it was some time before he did so.