"No. No apples to-day. But there's regiment soldiers at lower landing; whole steam-boat load; going to sail this evenin' to Florida. They'll eat whole barrel hard-boil' eggs."--And they did. When they sailed, the Italian's pocket was stuffed with small silver. Richling received his dollar and fifty cents. As he did so, "I would give, if I had it, a hundred dollars for half your art," he said, laughing unevenly. He was beaten, surpassed, humbled. Still he said, "Come, don't you want this again? You needn't pay me for the use of it." But the Italian refused. He had outgrown his patron. A week afterward Richling saw him at the Picayune Tier, superintending the unloading of a small schooner-load of bananas. He had bought the cargo, and was reselling to small fruiterers. "Make fifty dolla' to-day," said the Italian, marking his tally-board with a piece of chalk. Richling clapped him joyfully on the shoulder, but turned around with inward distress and hurried away. He had not found work. Events followed of which we have already taken knowledge. Mary, we have seen, fell sick and was taken to the hospital. "I shall go mad!" Richling would moan, with his dishevelled brows between his hands, and then start to his feet, exclaiming, "I must not! I must not! I must keep my senses!" And so to the commercial regions or to the hospital. Dr. Sevier, as we know, left word that Richling should call and see him; but when he called, a servant--very curtly, it seemed to him--said the Doctor was not well and didn't want to see anybody. This was enough for a young man who _hadn't_ his senses. The more he needed a helping hand the more unreasonably shy he became of those who might help him. "Will nobody come and find us?" Yet he would not cry "Whoop!" and how, then, was anybody to come? Mary returned to the house again (ah! what joys there are in the vale of tribulation!), and grew strong,--stronger, she averred, than ever she had been. "And now you'll _not_ be cast down, _will_ you?" she said, sliding into her husband's lap. She was in an uncommonly playful mood. "Not a bit of it," said John. "Every dog has his day. I'll come to the top. You'll see." "Don't I know that?" she responded, "Look here, now," she exclaimed, starting to her feet and facing him, "_I'll_ recommend you to anybody. _I've_ got confidence in you!" Richling thought she had never looked quite so pretty as at that moment. He leaped from his chair with a laughing ejaculation, caught and swung her an instant from her feet, and landed her again before she could cry out. If, in retort, she smote him so sturdily that she had to retreat backward to rearrange her shaken coil of hair, it need not go down on the record; such things will happen. The scuffle and suppressed laughter were detected even in Mrs. Riley's room. "Ah!" sighed the widow to herself, "wasn't it Kate Riley that used to get the sweet, haird knocks!" Her grief was mellowing.