These were concomitants of a nature to bring great pain to the mind of one like Ned Wilcom; and it was with a severe struggle that he shut out despair, and encouraged himself to believe that, though so grievously frustrated in his commencing hopes of independence, the prospect of success would again bud, and finally blossom. After ascertaining from his physician that his state would bear a removal to a less expensive lodging, Ned wrote home to his father, and informed him of his unfortunate condition, and of what had led to it. Mr. Wilcom, senior, was a little surprised to receive a second letter from his son so soon, for "he had no notion," as he used to say, "of lads perpetually writing home, like unweaned babies that wanted pap;" and he, therefore, broke the seal of poor Ned's letter with no remarkable degree of good humour. The length of the letter, when opened, caused the money-getting father to throw it aside with an indescribable curl of the lip and nose, and a loud "Pshaw!"--and that was all the attention the poor youth's epistle received for the five next succeeding days, that is to say, until Sunday came, and the merchant thought he had time to look at it. The next morning Ned Wilcom received his father's answer: it was simply-- "Sir, "Yours came to hand last Monday. If your illness was brought on by want of caution, it ought to teach you prudence. If you have been unlucky, you are only like many more; and, as your grandfather used to say, the best way and the manliest, with troubles, is to grin and abide by them. Wish you better. "Your humble servant, "EDWARD WILCOM, senior. The letter dropped from Ned's hand like a lump of lead too heavy to hold. With all his knowledge of his father's nature and habits, he had not expected this. Indeed, Ned's uninterrupted good health, through the whole of his brief space of life, had prevented the possibility of his testing his father's tenderness before. For some hours, the youth experienced misery he had never known till then; and was so completely paralysed with the sense of his wretched and deserted state, that the physician, who made his usual call in the afternoon, could obtain no intelligent answer to his questions; and though by no means one whose heart overflowed with the milk of human kindness, felt constrained, in a sympathising tone, to ask if any thing extraordinary had occurred to his patient. Ned pointed to the letter which lay on the floor, and in spite of the hardness of feeling into which he had trained himself, burst into a flood of tears.