Three days later came a letter from New York, from William Barnes, reiterating what had been said personally, and accompanied by the indorsement of the arrangement by Mrs. Barnes. The last shadow of doubt, then, was removed out of the way, and the young girl's moderate preparations for removal went on with new vigor. One hundred dollars in money was all that she asked of her guardian for these preparations, and that sum was accorded without hesitation or comment. On the morning of the sailing of the steamer she left Philadelphia by the early train, the doctor himself bringing her down to the depot in his carriage, and bidding her good-bye with a word of kind regret, and a kiss which seemed chaste enough for that of a brother. Her small array of baggage had preceded her, and was no doubt already within the hold of the vessel that was to bear her to the Pacific, to a renewed life, and an opportunity of gathering up the broken threads of lost happiness. The steamer, the old Northern Light, of such varying fortunes, was to sail at two. At half-past twelve, the carriage containing Eleanor Hill dashed down to the foot of Warren Street, among all that crush of carriages, baggage-wagons, foot-people with valises and carpet-bags, idlers, policemen, pickpockets, United States Mail vans, weeping women, whining children, and insatiate shakers of human hands, that has attended the departure of every California steamer since the first ploughed her ocean way towards the land of gold. Mr. Barnes had promised to meet her at the gangway or on shipboard, but neither on the dock nor on deck could she discover him. One o'clock was long past, and Eleanor had grown sick at heart under the idea that some mistake as to the steamer must have been made, when from the gangway she saw a carriage drive up and her new protector alight from it. He was assisting out a lady who could be no other than his wife; and the young girl, fairly overjoyed, ran down the plank to meet and welcome them. The lady, who was just starting up the plank as Eleanor reached the foot of it, did not notice her, but continued her ascent: William Barnes did see her, and allowing his wife to proceed alone, he seized her arm and drew her hurriedly away down the pier, and beyond ear-shot. Eleanor noticed that his face seemed flushed, and his whole demeanor agitated; but she was far from being prepared for the startling intelligence that burst from his lips, interlarded with oaths and expressions of honest indignation. The generous-hearted Californian was, in truth, very nearly beside himself with shame and mortification. Eleanor could not accompany his wife and himself to California, after all! And the story of the disappointment, though a little mixed up with those energetic expressions and once interrupted by the necessity of the enraged man's pausing to throw into the dock a package of fruit which his wife had just been purchasing for her comfort on the voyage (the porter who brought it