The place in the mail, just in time, was taken. Lord Colambre sent a servant in search of his father, with a note, explaining the necessity of his sudden departure. All the business which remained to be done in town he knew Lord Clonbrony could accomplish without his assistance. Then he wrote a few lines to his mother, on the very sheet of paper on which, a few hours before, he had sorrowfully and slowly begun, “_My dear mother--Miss Nugent._” He now joyfully and rapidly went on, “My dear mother and Miss Nugent, “I hope to be with you on Wednesday se’nnight; but if unforeseen circumstances should delay me, I will certainly write to you again. Dear mother, believe me, “Your obliged and grateful son, “Colambre.” The count, in the mean time, wrote a letter for him to Sir James Brooke, describing the packet which he had given to the ambassador, and relating all the circumstances that could lead to its recovery. Lord Colambre, almost before the wax was hard, seized the letter; the count seeming almost as eager to hurry him off as he was to set out. He thanked the count with few words, but with strong feeling. Joy and love returned in full tide upon our hero’s soul; all the military ideas, which but an hour before filled his imagination, were put to flight: Spain vanished, and green Ireland reappeared. Just as they shook hands at parting, the good old general, with a smile, said to him, “I believe I had better not stir in the matter of Benson’s commission till I hear more from you. My harangue, in favour of the military profession, will, I fancy, prove, like most other harangues, a waste of words.” CHAPTER XVI. In what words of polite circumlocution, or of cautious diplomacy, shall we say, or hint, that the deceased ambassador’s papers were found in shameful disorder. His excellency’s executor, Sir James Brooke, however, was indefatigable in his researches. He and Lord Colambre spent two whole days in looking over portfolios of letters, and memorials, and manifestoes, and bundles of paper of the most heterogeneous sorts; some of them without any docket or direction to lead to a knowledge of their contents; others written upon in such a manner as to give an erroneous notion of their nature; so that it was necessary to untie every paper separately. At last, when they had opened, as they thought, every paper, and, wearied and in despair, were just on the point of giving up the search, Lord Colambre spied a bundle of old newspapers at the bottom of a trunk. “They are only old Vienna Gazettes; I looked at them,” said Sir James.