His words, and this amicable settlement of matters between my darling and myself, awoke a new life in me. I did not despair any longer. I felt that God had at last heard not only my prayers, but also those of her, who, I knew, was praying for me at home; and that, if He had not appeared to grant my former petitions, the answer to them had been withheld for the all-wise purpose of making me look to Him more earnestly than I might have done, if prosperity had rewarded my first effort! Before, I had trusted entirely to myself, never thinking of appealing to His aid. Now, I assure you, I could have struggled on to the death--even had Fortune still gone against me even in America; but, the fickle goddess alike altered her expression _there_, as circumstances improved for me _here_, so that, I was not called upon to exercise any further endurance in adversity. My temporal troubles ended as my more serious difficulties disappeared-- all being in due accordance with the old adage which tells us that "it never rains but it pours." One morning, soon after hearing from England, as I was conning over the advertisement columns of the _New York Herald_, I chanced on a notice which immediately caught my eye. An "editor" was wanted, without delay, at the office of one of the other leading-journals of the city, where applications were requested from all desirous of taking the "situation vacant." Who could this have reference to, but me? I thought so, at all events, and "exploited" the supposition. I did not allow the grass to grow under my feet, I can assure you. I hurried off instanter to the address mentioned; and, although newspaper men of the New World, unlike ours, are uncommonly early birds, getting up matutinally betimes so as to catch the typical worm--in which respect they resemble the entire business population of Transatlantica-- I found, on my arrival, that I was the first candidate who had appeared on the scene. It was a good omen, for your "live Yankee" likes "smartness;" consequently, I was sanguine of success. You may, peradventure, be "surprised to hear" of my thinking myself fit for such a post, having had such a slight acquaintance with literature at home? That did not dissuade me, however, in the least. I have so great a confidence in myself, that I would really take the command of the Channel fleet to-morrow if it were offered to me--as Earl Russell proposed to do, when he was simple "Lord John;" and, as a civilian First Lord of the Admirality has since done, although he possessed so little nautical knowledge that he might not have been able to tell you the difference between a cathead and a capstan bar, or, how to distinguish a "dinghy" from the "second cutter." I suppose he thought, like Mr Toots, that, "it didn't matter!" Conceit, you say?