Reuben staggers out,--staggers up the stairs into the dismal chamber. It looks out only upon a bald waste of common. Shortly after, a slatternly maid brings his prison fare, and, with a little kindly discretion, has added secretly a roll of gingerbread. Reuben thanks her, and says, "You're a good woman, Keziah; and I say, won't you fetch me my cap, there's a good un; it's cold here." The maid, with great show of caution, complies; a few minutes after, the parson comes, and, looking in warningly, closes and locks the door outside. A weary evening follows, in which thoughts of Adele, of nights at the Elderkins', of Phil, of Rose, flash upon him, and spend their richness, leaving him more madly disconsolate. Then come thoughts of the morning humiliation, of the boys pointing their fingers at him after school. "No, they sha'n't, by George!" And with this decision he dropped asleep; with this decision ripened in him, he woke at three in the morning,--waited for the hall clock to strike, that he might be sure of his hour,--tied together the two sheets of Mistress Brummem's bed, opened the window gently, dropped out his improvised cable, slid upon it safely to the ground, and before day had broken or any of the townsfolk were astir, had crossed all the more open portion of the village, and by sunrise had plunged into the wooded swamp-land which lay three miles westward toward the river. THE GREAT LAKES: THEIR OUTLETS AND DEFENCES. Four years ago there appeared in this magazine two articles upon the Great Lakes and their Harbors.[E] In these papers the commercial importance of the Lakes was set forth, and it was shown that their commerce was at that time nearly equal in amount to the whole foreign trade of the country. Within those four years the relative value of these two branches of commerce has greatly changed. The foreign trade, under the efforts of open foes and secret enemies, has fallen off very largely. A committee of the New York Board of Trade, in an appeal to the Secretary of the Navy for protection against British pirates, made the statement, that the imports into that port during the first quarter of 1860, in American vessels, were $62,598,326,--in foreign vessels, $30,918,051; and that in 1863, during the same period, the imports in American vessels were $23,403,830,--in foreign vessels, $65,889,853;--in other words, that in three years of war, our navigation on the ocean had declined more than one half, and that of foreign nations had increased in nearly the same proportion. The two great branches of internal trade before the war consisted of the trade of the Lakes and the canals leading from them to the seaboard, and the trade of the Mississippi and its tributaries. The latter branch being interrupted or destroyed by the Rebellion, it follows that at the present time the principal commerce left to the Atlantic cities is that of the Great Lakes and the States about them, usually known as the Northwest.