Lieutenant Thornton was very thoughtful as he broke the seal of Madame Coulancourt’s letter. We shall merely touch upon certain points that deeply interested and strongly affected himself. The part that he felt most keenly was Madame Coulancourt’s explanation having reference to the death of her beloved brother, Sir Oscar de Bracy, whom she felt quite satisfied was his father. For a time he could scarcely proceed. This intelligence, though he had not the happiness of remembering his parents, made him feel acutely this cruel disappointment, for he had hoped that he would have lived to reach England, and acknowledge him as his son. It was some balm to his grieved heart to learn that Sir Oscar had received Mr. Stanmore’s letters, and fully acknowledged him and his niece Mabel in his will, and before witnesses. Madame Coulancourt begged him not to grieve over the loss of the papers in the casket, as she was fully confident of being able, through the agency of Monsieur Jean Plessis, to obtain duplicates of them, which would do equally as well. She also stated that she had every reason to hope that her son Julian had not perished at the time of his separation from her at Lyons, but was, with many others, forced to serve the Republic, in either the army or the navy, and that she was exerting herself to trace him. She also entreated him not to attempt an escape from the country till he had seen Jean Plessis, who, with his wife and daughter, and a young friend, were, in a week or so, to leave Paris for Coulancourt. There was a slight rumour of peace with Great Britain, which she ardently prayed for, as she longed to return to her native land. The intelligence she was able to give him was told her by a Madame de Fenuille, a great friend of Madame Volney’s, who had lately returned to France from England, viâ Hamburg. She also sincerely congratulated him upon the singular discovery of his birth, and consequent connection with her by ties of blood, and this unexpected discovery accounted for the affection she had so unaccountably felt for him from the very first and only interview they ever had. She was at the time struck with his features, which seemed to recall the long past, though she could not, so troubled as she then was, tax her memory; but now she felt satisfied it was his resemblance to a beloved brother. Our hero read the kind and affectionate letter of his aunt with deep emotion; it contained much besides, bearing proof the writer was depressed at the death of a brother she had fondly hoped to have seen once more. That night the young sailor slept but little. He felt deeply grieved at his father’s death; for, like Madame Coulancourt, he had looked forward to Sir Oscar’s return to Europe, and that any mystery yet attached to his birth would be cleared up; he was of course not acquainted with the ample details in Sir Oscar’s will and papers, all of which Mr. Stanmore possessed, and which awaited his return to England.