University of Virginia Library

2. BOOK II.

1. CHAPTER I.

AMONG the innumerable little tin signs that dot the surface
of every building in Wall street, there might have
been seen at the period whereof we write, one emblazoned in
copperish looking gilding with the names of “Brothers Tuck,”
fastened against the basement office of a very high granite
building. This was the place of business of the two young
gentlemen of that name who have already been presented to
the reader. When we last parted company with them they
were boys; they are now men. They were then called
simply Tom and Fred; they are now known as T. Jefferson
Tuck and F. Augustus Tuck; but we shall continue to apply
to them the appellation by which we first knew them, because
we have a fondness for old-fashioned names. In the neighborhood
of Wall street, and at the Board of Brokers, they were
known by at least a dozen different appellations. Some called
them simply the Tucks; others Guss. and Jeff., others
the two Tucks, while some merely called them the Brothers,
and some coarse people, for there are coarse people even in
Wall street, called them the Tuckses.

The Brothers Tuck were in good credit in Wall street, for
it was universally known that their bachelor uncle was rich
and old, and they never troubled themselves to contradict the
rumor that he was going to leave them a large portion of his

estate. Tom was the managing partner. He had a great
financial reputation, which in those days was equal to a fortune,
and he was consequently a very important personage
on the side-walk of Wall street, where he was rarely seen
without a knot of billious-looking, care-worn faces, clustered
around him, as though he were the sun of their centre from
whose beams they all imbibed light and heat. But the meaning
of words is continually changing and a great financier in
these days is looked upon as signifying very nearly a great
rogue. Whenever anybody called upon Fred. in relation to
business, he always referred them to his brother, contenting
himself mainly with spending his share of the profits, and
reading all the new novels as fast as they came out. The
particular nature of their business no one ever rightly understood:
they talked mysteriously of their operations and transactions,
and they were supposed to be shrewd calculators
—devilish close fellows who continued to keep their business
to themselves. They lived, with their mother, at the
genteelest extremity of the city, and drove down to their office
every morning in a drab-colored phaeton of an indescribable
shape. They dealt some in stocks, talked knowingly about
the currency and exchanges, and dined at a French “restorateurs.”
They frequented political meetings and subscribed to
benevolent societies without number; they signed all the
petitions that were brought to them, let the object of them be
what it might: they worshipped in a fashionable church, and
entertained a truly orthodox and conservative hatred of
abolitionists and fanatics; and they were, of course, universally
respected.

“Have you seen that rascal Jacobs?” said Tom Tuck to
his brother, as he entered their office one morning.

“Not yet,” replied Fred. “I will directly. I am in the
middle of a capital story, don't disturb me.”

“Fred you're a fool!” said Tom, as he jerked off his gloves
and threw them spitefully upon his desk, “throw away
those cursed books and attend to your business.”

“Presently, presently,” replied Fred, “let me finish this
chapter first, or I shall lose the thread of the story.”

“You will lose your neck by your folly,” returned his brother,
“but I will see that you do me no harm. I'll dissolve
with you, and you shall starve, as you would without me.
You must see Jacobs this morning. Come!”

“Hush, hush,” replied Fred, “don't get excited; here
comes William.”

“Did you see young Tremlett?” enquired the senior brother
addressing a dwarfish looking boy who now entered the
office.

“Yes sir, I just seen him, and he sent you this note,” replied
the boy.

“Let me have it Sir,” said Tom, “and the next time I
send you on an errand sir, do you move yourself quicker sir,
do you hear, sir?”

The boy made no reply, because he was afraid.

“Read it, read,” said Fred.

“Dear T. I cannot send you the money this morning.
Your uncle is confined to his room, and my father is out of
town. You know I cannot sign a check.

Truly Yours, John Tremlett.

P. S. Tell Julia I shall not be able to see her this evening.”

“First rate!” exclaimed Fred. throwing down his book
“I'll go and find Jac—”

He was cut short by a glance from his brother's eye, who
turned to the boy and told him pleasantly to go to Skamps
and Company and ask them if they were a couple of
thousand over. “Now,” he said, turning to Fred as soon as
they had left the office; “start and don't let me see you
again 'til you have found him. But don't bring him here, tell
him I'll meet him at the old place.”

Notwithstanding the great anxiety of the elder Tuck to get
his brother off, the junior stopped to brush his whiskers and

adjust his Madras cravat, which caused him to swear most
profanely. And even after Fred, had left the office, he returned
again for his cane, and remarked to Tom that “that
story was one of thrilling interest.”

So wide an interval having occurred since the close of our
last chapter, it may be proper to state that the firm of Tremlett
and Tuck was still in existence, although, in consequence of
the advanced age of the partners, their business had greatly
fallen off, but their wealth was supposed to be greater than
ever. John Tremlett had reached his twenty-first year, and
his manhood had more than fulfilled the promise of his youth,
the fondness of his father had increased as the one grew in
manliness and strength, and the other gradually gave way to
the encroachments of Time. They had never been parted
for a longer time than a day since their unlucky journey towards
Willow-mead, and the presence of the young man had
become almost essential to the existence of the feeble old
merchant, who had often been heard to declare that he could
not die happy if his darling boy should not be present to close
his eyes when death should summon him away, and he made
no secret of his intentions to leave the young man his entire
property. Mr. Tuck was still called the junior partner; but
the infirmities of age pressed more heavily upon him than
upon Mr. Tremlett. He was often confined to his room by
illness, and his friends all agreed that he was not long for
this world, a conclusion that required no great wisdom to
arrive at, seeing that he was turned of seventy. But notwithstanding
the perfect freedom with which his friends canvassed
the probabilities of his death, he would not listen to a word
on the subject himself, and whoever spoke to him about dying
once, incurred no risk of repeating the offence, for he would
not allow such people to enter his room. His enmity to his
two nephews and their mother continued unchanged, but
Julia Tuck was a constant, and welcome visitant at his bedside;
and although he was cross and quarrelsome to every

body else, he always received her with apparent pleasure,
and her presence soothed him like a charm even in his most
fretful moods. Of course, the old gentleman's last will and
testament was a theme which his relations were never tired
of discussing, for no one, but his lawyer, knew in what manner
he intended to bequeath his great wealth. It was believed
by some that he would give a large part of it to his niece
who became therefor an object of their envy and calumny. It
was confidently asserted by others that he had appropriated
the bulk of his property to build a church; an assertion that
had no better foundation than the fact that he had never contributed
a copper in aid of such an object during his long
life. Others as confidently maintained that he was going to
found a magnificent public library, a supposition based upon
the same kind of grounds, since he was an acknowledged
hater of all books, excepting only cash-books and bank-books.
The feelings of his two nephews, however, were perfectly
serene on the subject, for they were well satisfied that their
uncle would not bequeath his money to them, let him remember
whomsoever he might in his will, and therefore it
would be improper, at this stage of our narrative, to impute
any sinister motives to the brothers because they manifested
great anxiety on learning that he was confined to his room
by illness.

The old gentleman sat in his rocking chair, wondering that
his niece had not called to see him, but afraid to send for her
lest it should be thought he was sick, and trying to drive his
thoughts away from himself by sending them on 'change
where they would not remain, but kept returning and hovering
about his heart which throbbed violently as though it
were trying to escape from his breast, when a tap was heard
at his chamber door, and the tapper being invited to come in,
the apparition of his nephew T. Jefferson Tuck presented itself
to his astonished eyes. The appearance, for Mr. Tuck

thought for a moment that it was an unreal personage before
him, was accompanied by a middle aged gentleman in a
black bombazine suit, and a pair of gold mounted spectacles.
As soon as Mr. Tuck recovered the use of his tongue, the
functions of which were suspended for a while by astonishment,
he ordered the intruders to quit his sight without ceremony.
But his nephew meekly replied that he would if his
uncle would allow him to say one word first.

“Say on, and then go!” replied the old gentleman.

“It is a long time since I have had this pleasure,” said
Tom, “and I am grieved at heart that our first meeting after
so long an estrangement, should be in a sick room.”

“If you came here to talk about sick rooms stop there,”
said his uncle.

“Well, then, it shall not be about sickness, but about health
and happiness,” said his nephew, assuming a cheerful tone,
“I heard you were not well, and not knowing who your medical
attendant might be, my brother and I determined, even
at the risk of your displeasure, to recommend a very skillful
physician to you who has lately performed some very remarkable
cures. This is the gentleman. Allow me to introduce
Doctor Healman. Doctor this is my uncle; he will
no doubt be always happy to see you, because I am persuaded
that after this visit he will rarely have occasion for your
services. The gentleman in the black suit made a low bow,
and Mr. Tuck told him to sit down.

“And now, uncle,” said his nephew, “I will leave you,
and to show you how much more I respect your will than
my own wishes, this shall be the last time I will ever intrude
myself upon your presence,” and with these words this dutiful
nephew retired from his uncle's chamber with his face
buried in his white cambric pocket handkerchief.

“I don't know what to make of that fellow,” said Mr. Tuck
as his nephew closed the door.

“Make of him!” repeated the doctor, “he don't wequire

anything to be made out on him at all. He is one of the
most wemarkable pious young men of the age. He is up to
all sorts of goodness.”

“But his brother Fred. is a confirmed rogue,” continued
the old gentleman.

“Pwehaps so,” said the doctor, “it is easily accounted for,
he weads too much.”

“Yes, yes, that is it. When I see him strutting through
the streets with one of those blue covered books under his
arm, I can hardly keep from beating him with my cane, doctor.
But, young men are different new, doctor, to what they
were when you and I were boys.”

“You may well say that,” replied the doctor.

“Did you ever have a case of beating of the heart in your
practice, doctor?” asked Mr. Tuck.

“I have made some wemarkable cures in that line,” replied
the doctor. “Are you affected after that sort?”

“Sometimes I feel such a terrible throbbing here,” said the
old man putting his hand to his heart; “and then I have such
a choking in my throat! O, Doctor, I would pay a good
round price to be cured of it. I don't mind expense, doctor.
I suppose it is not dangerous, but it is very annoying, because
it keeps me from my business.”

“Let me see your tongue, sir,” said the doctor. “O, ah!
it is nothing but a dewangement of the seckweting vessels. I
can cure it at wonst.”

“Do you really think that's it?” asked Mr. Tuck.

“Of course it is: I should wather guess I havn't dissected
a dead body evwy day for twenty years to be mistaken about
a disorder like yours.”

“Don't talk about dead bodies,” said Mr. Tuck, “it makes
me feel unpleasant, doctor, and I won't have it.”

“Don't be alarmed about that, the corpses that I cut up are
all poor people that couldn't afford to pay for a physician to
save their lives; paupers and such like that ain't of no consequence.”

“Ah! its a great thing to be able to pay for a first rate physician.”
said Mr. Tuck, “I suppose, doctor, you have stu
died a good deal in your time?”

“O, a gwate deal, all the ancient authors.”

“And, pray, doctor, how long did you ever know a man to
live?” asked Mr. Tuck.

“Some one hundwed, and some a hundwed and fifty,” replied
the doctor; “it differs according to families. Some
families all die young, and some live to enormous ages.”

“If I could have my way,” said Mr. Tuck, “I would either
die very young, or live to about a hundred. I think that is a
very good age, and a man ought to be all ready to go then.
But to die at my age is dreadful. It is terrible to think of,
doctor, and I don't see why one could not live to a good old
age now, as well as in the time of Methusaleh.”

“So he might,” replied the doctor, “with pwoper tweatment,
if he was willing to live on woots, and other wight kinds of
food.”

“Ah, but, doctor,” said Mr. Tuck, “you know that physicians
themslves do not live longer than other men.”

“Of course not,” replied the doctor, “it's all according to
wule; don't blacksmith's horses always go unshod?”

“That's true, that's true,” said Mr. Tuck, “but pray tell
me, doctor, what is the right kind of food. I would live on
anything for the sake of living to a good old age.”

“Why, esckwlent woots, such as sassafawilla, and other
things. But I must go, I can't neglect my other patients.”

“Do you charge by the hour, or only so much for a visit?”
asked Mr. Tuck.

“Only two dollars a call, long or short; it's all the same to
me.”

“Of course you don't charge as much for a simple case
like mine as you do for a dangerous one?” said Mr.
Tuck.

“It's all one,” replied the doctor, “I suppose it would make

no odds to you whether you died of a simple cold or of the
most invetwate complication of disordwes. It cost me as
much for a diploma to cure the measles as for the vewy worst
kind of cholewa.”

“Ah, that's very true, very true,” replied Mr. Tuck,
“if there were any real danger of dying, of course I shouldn't
object to the price.”

“Well Sir,” said the doctor, “I will go upon the pwinciple
of no cure no pay, like the quacks and patent doctors. But
it would be a shocking bad pwecedent for the wegular faculty
I must allow, for some patients will die on purpose under the
best tweatment. Here then,” continued the doctor, taking a
phial from his coat pocket, “is a bottle of my celebrated
elixir, the elixir of juvenility; Doctor Healman's cure for
disorders of the heart. It will cure you at wonst if you only
take enough of it.”

“Never fear, but I'll take enough of it,” said Mr. Tuck, as
he reached out his hand for the bottle.

“But stop,” said the doctor, putting the elixir back into his
coat pocket; “before I can pwescribe for you I must have a
solemn pwomise that you won't call in another physician, or
I'm o-p-h, I don't want anybody's botching laid at my door.”

“What do you mean by botching?” inquired Mr. Tuck.

“I mean, of course, if anybody should happen to kill you
by a wong pwescwiption it might injure my pwactice.”

“That's very true, very true,” said Mr. Tuck, “I pledge
you my word I will not call in another physician without
your permission.”

“Then, sir, I'll pwescribe for you with pleasure. Take
this bottle of elixir, stand it in a dark closet until nine o'clock
be careful not to let the light shine upon it, then take it, shake
the bottle thwee times up and down, and then swallow as much
of it as ever you can.”

“And do you really think I shall be well enough to attend
to business tomorrow?” asked Mr. Tuck.

“Of course you will, but if you ain't I won't make no
charge to you.” The doctor stood for a moment and glanced
round the room, and then shook hands with his patient and
withdrew.

“That Tom is a good boy, after all,” said Mr. Tuck to himself,
“if I hadn't made my will I don't know but I would
leave him something. But it will be time enough for that
when I'm going to die. The doctor is rather a strange man
for a physician, but Tom is no fool, let him be what he may;
and I am very certain he wouldn't employ any but the very
best physicians—”

As the old man sat mumbling to himself, and rocking
gently in his chair, another rap was heard at the door and
Jeremiah Jernegan made his appearance.

“Ah, Jeremiah, is that you?” said Mr. Tuck, “come in,
come in, Jeremiah, and sit down, I am glad to see you, I want
to ask you a question. I thought it was Julia at first, I wonder
where she can be?”

“Are you well enough to sign a check?” asked Jeremiah,
sitting down by the old man's side. “Mr. Tremlett has not
come in town to day.”

“What do you mean, what do you mean?” replied the old
gentleman, “well enough, well enough, don't you see I am
not sick? You, are stupid Jeremiah!”

“I am very glad to hear you are not sick,” replied Jeremiah,
“but really you do not look well. Perhaps it's owing
to these dark curtains. I am glad you are well.”

“Yes, yes, it's the curtains, I'll have them taken down
when the weather gets warmer,” said Mr. Tuck, “tell me,
Jeremiah, did you ever hear of anybody's living so long that
they didn't care about living any longer?”

“All good men are willing to die when they are called,”
replied Jeremiah.

“Do you think it makes them more willing if they are
good? Who was it, Jeremiah, in the Bible, who went up to

Heaven without dying at all? was it your namesake or
was it Isaiah? I forget about it.”

“Neither,” replied Jeremiah. “It was Elijah the Tishbite;
he was taken up into Heaven in a chariot of fire.”

“The Tishbite was a lucky fellow. I should like that way
myself.”

“If you would die like the Tishbite you must live like him,”
said Jeremiah. “But why would you ascend up into the
clouds, like the prophet, when the privilege is granted to you
of lying down in the grave with our Savior, who will himself
summon you when you are called to Judgment. Think,
could your soul endure the terrors of the whirl-wind and fire,
the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof? Would
you not rather part from this life in the way appointed for all
flesh?”

“Ah, Jeremiah, you have read the Bible until you are used
to it, but I cannot think of dying without a shudder, I feel
the worms creeping over me.”

“If we thought aright on the subject,” replied Jeremiah,
“death would never cause us to shudder. If we can bear
up under the load of life, we ought not to be dismayed at the
prospect of death, for one, we know, is heavy and grievous to
bear, while the other, we are assured, is calm, and pleasant
and unchangeable. Here we are banished from the presence
of God, there we shall stand before his throne. If the infant
were capable of thought and reflection there would be greater
cause for apprehension and dread when entering upon this
changeful life, than when leaving it for the next world which
is unchangeable and eternal. Who that knew of the afflictions
of this life, but would shudder at the thought af encountering
them? and yet we make merry when a child is
born into the world, but we follow him with tears when he is
taken from it.”

“Stop, stop,” exclaimed Mr. Tuck, “say no more about
dying, but tell me about business. Don't tell any body that I

am sick. I shall be on 'change to-morrow. I don't like to be
questioned about my health, but I will tell you, Jeremiah, because
you don't ask questions, I have got a terrible beating of
my heart; it almost chokes me at times; but you don't think
it's dangerous, Jeremiah?”

“Indeed, I have but little knowledge of diseases,” replied
Jeremiah, “but I supposed that diseases of the heart were
dangerous.”

“Yes, yes,” replied Mr. Tuck, “diseases of the heart may
be, but mine Jeremiah, is only a beating. If the heart didn't
beat you know a man would die.”

“Very true,” replied Jeremiah, “perhaps I am wrong.
but—never mind, never mind, Jeremiah, I know what you
are going to say. You needn't say it. I understand. Are
there any arrivals this morning, and what's the news?”

“The Susan has arrived from Rio, and coffee has advanced
half a cent,” replied Jeremiah.

“Good, good!” ejaculated the old gentleman. “A half a
cent, that's good. Is she full? Has she got in an entire
cargo?”

“Yes sir,” said Jeremiah, “an entire cargo of hides.”

“Hides!” exclaimed the merchant, “and coffee advanced
half a cent; that's bad, Jeremiah, very bad. Reach me my
port folio and let me sign the check. There go, go. Don't
say anything more, you make me nervous. My heart beats
worse than ever.”

“Jeremiah folded the check and left the chamber slowly.
He would gladly have remained to talk to the old gentleman
about the great concern of his soul, but he was afraid of
defeating his object by too much zeal. Once he turned
back, hesitated for a moment, and then returned to the
counting room. His indecision was ever after a source of
great grief to him.

No sooner was the old gentleman again left alone than he
wished that somebody was near him. His niece had more

before neglected him so long, and he listened eagerly for the
sound of her step on the stairs. But the day wore heavily
away, and she came not. He wondered at her absence, but
was afraid to send for her. He could expect no one beside
her to visit him; and he tried to divert his mind by thinking of
his business, but thoughts of death would rise up in his mind.
Gaunt spectres that only appeared more terrifying and distinct
when he closed his eyes, trying in vain to shut them out of
his mind. What could he do! Even his bed looked to him
like a grave; it had a green coverlid, and the back of the
chairs were in shape like tombstones. It was strange that he
had never noticed these things before, but they now appeared to
him with a terrible distinctness. His mother's portrait was
hung in the room and every time he glanced at it he remembered
that she was lying in her grave, and that he must soon
be buried by her side. He walked to his book-case and took
up a volume hoping to amuse himself with its contents. He
turned to the title page; it was the “Holy Living and Dying,”
and it fell like lead from his hands. But another lay near
it. It was Julia's album that she had left there the day before.
He opened it, and seeing young Tremlett's writing,
curiosity tempted him to read: it was a little poem:

He could read no more, and he closed the book. He knew
that the Bible was full of passages to remind him of death
and he would not open it although it, almost seemed to invite

him to do so. He turned from the book-case and walked to
the window to beguile his thoughts by watching the passers
by; but he had not stood there a minute, when two men came
along bearing an empty coffin upon their shoulders. He
turned his head quickly away but not until he had discerned
that it was about his own measure. To add to his gloomy
feelings it was a dull, dark day, and the wind moaned drearily
through the blinds of his windows. His heart beat violently
and he sank down in his chair and tried to compose his
thoughts, but in vain. When his housekeeper came into the
room he detained her in conversation as long as he could, but
she seemed in a hurry to leave him.

At last it was dark, and he ordered his shutters to be closed
and a bright light placed upon his table. But it cast fearful
shadows on the wall. His servant brought in the evening
paper. He opened it and the first item of intelligence that
met his eye, was the death of an old acquaintance from a
disease of the heart. He threw down the paper and involuntarily
applied his hand to his left side. His heart throbbed as
though it would burst. He was alarmed and yet he was
afraid to send for a physician, remembering his promise to
Doctor Healman. Wearied and exhausted at last he fell into
a slight doze, but he was soon aroused from it by the hail
driving against his windows. It had a strange sound to him;
like stones rattling on a coffin when the first shovel full is
thrown in to fill up a grave. A cold sweat stood upon his
forehead, and the blood rushed furiously into his heart. He
tried to reason himself out of his fears. What could they
mean? Why had not the same sights and sounds produced
such an effect on him before? He had seen and heard them
a thousand times. He was in the daily habit of passing an
undertaker's shop where coffins stood round like boxes of merchandise,
but they had never awakened a gloomy thought in
his mind. His mother's picture had been hanging many
years in his chamber; and, although he had often times

dropped a tear when gazing upon her mild countenance, it
had never before suggested a thought of death, and why
should it now? Scarcely conscious of what he was doing
he opened his writing desk and took out his will. He remembered
all the revengeful thoughts that were warring in
his mind when he wrote it, and how he anticipated the disappointment
and chagrin of his relatives when they should
know its terms; and how he chuckled over the imaginary
anger of his brother's widow and her two sons, and be wondered
that he should have been moved by such feelings while
engaged in such a solemn duty. But he soon grew weary
of his will, and he tried to get rid of the load that oppressed
him by pacing the chamber floor. Slowly and heavily the
hours dropped along, but scarcely were they gone than they
seemed to have flown like lightning. By and by the clock
struck nine. It was the appointed hour for taking the elixir.
He drew the phial from the dark corner in which he had
placed it, and remembering the injunction of the doctor shook
it three times, placed it to his mouth with trembling hands,
and swallowed its entire contents.

2. CHAPTER II.

MRS. TUCK and her daughter were quietly sipping their
first cup of tea when Mr. F. Augustus entered the parlor
and after depositing a couple of damp volumes on the
mantel piece by the side of his cigar case, seated himself at
the tea-table, and nodding significantly to his mother, said to
his sister,

“You will not have the pleasure of Mr. Jack Tremlett's
company this evening, Miss.”

“My son!” exclaimed his mother, with a reproving frown,
“how can you!”

“Indeed, I did not know that you were Mr. Tremlett's
guardian,” replied his sister in a tone meant to provoke a
reply.

“His guardian! O, certainly not. But I am his friend,
Miss, and I beg you to understand he treats me with less reserve
than you do. He will not be here this evening I can
assure you, he sent me a note to that effect and requested me
to communicate the fact to you. It takes me.”

“And pray,” said the mother, folding her arms in a queenly
manner, “why did he not send his note to Julia, or come
himself and inform her of his intentions. Does the young
man know who my daughter is, pray?”

“I am satisfied,” said the young lady in a trembling voice,
“doubtless he had sufficient reasons.”

“But I am not satisfied,” said the proud mother, “neither
with him for daring to treat my daughter with such contempt
nor with you for tamely submitting to it. O, if you had your
father's or your mother's spirit you would never see him
again.”

“My dear mother,” said Julia, “do not compel me to act
contrary to your wishes. It is useless to talk to me on this
subject; I have a thousand times expressed my determination
and I can never, never, alter! I have no pride, no ambition
but to appear well in his eyes. Do not reproach me; your
words kill me!”

“I will never reproach you again,” replied her mother,
“but I have too much love for you, and too much respect for
your father's memory to see you humble yourself to a man
who shows no regard for you, without reminding you of your
duty to yourself and your father's family.”

“That's a little too strong,” said Fred.

“Perhaps your ambition will be gratified when you have
followed me to my grave,” said Julia, and she rose sobbing
convulsively from the table and threw herself upon the sofa.

“Now mother,” said Fred you have done it. Look at her.”
Mrs. Tuck turned towards her daughter with a severe frown
but it was instantly succeeded by an expression of terror, and
she ran to the sofa and clasping the young lady in her arms
exclaimed in the tenderest accents, “Julia, my dear, dear
Julia, my darling, darling daughter, speak to me! O, darling
darling, speak to your mother.”

But her daughter was insensible to her lamentations; she
lay cold and rigid as death.

“It is too late to cry now,” said Fred. “you should have
thought of that sooner. Some hartshorn and brandy will do
more good than all your agony. Let me hold her while you
get the medicine.” Hereupon he took his sister in in his
arms, and after chafing her temples, and rubbing her hands,

he made out with the assistance of the servants who had come
to his aid, to pour a spoonful of hartshorn and brandy into
her mouth, after which she began to revive, although it was
a long time before she was fully restored to consciousness.

Mrs. Tuck wept, and raved, and hung upon her daughter's
neck, and called upon Heaven to bless her, and knelt to her
and did a thousand other wild and passionate things in
strange contrast to her proud and haughty demeanor but a
few moments before. But the tempest began to subside as the
young lady began to revive; it had not settled into a perfect calm,
however, before Mr. T. Jefferson Tuck made his appearance,
and perceiving at a glance what had occurred, he exclaimed,
“So you are amusing yourselves after the old fashion! come.
Shut up. It's time to be done with these follies, Do you
not know that Julia should have gone to her uncle this evening?
Remember, mother he can't bear a dissapointment, and
this evening's work may make an alteration in his will.”

“O, my children!” cried the distressed mother, “you know
I have no happiness but in seeing you happy; yet you will
afflict me with your cruel conduct.”

“You have told us that same thing a few times before, mother;
havn't you a feint recollection of it, Tom?” said Mr. F.
Augustus.

“Two fools in one family are enough,” replied Tom, “behave
yourself, Fred. and copy after me; let your mother and
sister do up all the nonsense, but let us act with a little decency.”

“There she goes again,” cried Fred, and Tom sprang to
the side of his sister who had relapsed into another convulsion
fit, from which she did not recover until she had been
carried to her chamber and had poultices applied to her feet
and temples.

The brothers were too much accustomed to scenes like
this to be moved by their occurrence; and Tom and his mother
had no sooner left the room bearing the unhappy and too

sensitive Julia in their arms, than Fred lighted a cigar, and
taking one of the volumes from the mantel piece that he had
placed there on entering the room, seated himself in an arm
chair which would have formed a fitting throne for the very
Genius of Indolence, and was directly lost in the golden haze
of fiction, where he forgot his sister, his business, himself
even, and everything appertaining to him, except his cigar,
which he continued to whiff until all the objects in the room
were dimmed by heavy clouds of smoke. But he was not
allowed to revel in this misty condition long, for his mother
and brother returned from his sister's room, and with their
hard realities shattered the slight forms that entranced him
into fragements finer than gossamer's shadow.

“Now, mother, you have fooled me all my life, and I'll
not put up with it any longer,” said Tom as he re-entered the
room.

“Nor I,” said her second son F. Augustus Tuck, lighting
another cigar, “if I do—confound the cigar—mother lend
me your scissors,—If I do—curse the thing it won't smoke—
ah, yes, there it goes—that's it—If I do I shall alter immensely
I give you my word.”

“O, my children,” cried their mother wringing her hands
“you will not have to bear the burden of your poor mother's
affection much longer. But when I am in my grave—”

“Then it will be time to cry,” said Tom as he looked in
the glass and fingered his whiskers.

“Yes,” said Fred, “it will be time enough then; but you
have told us that same thing so often, mother, it has got to be
an old story. If you would invent something a little more
touching I wouldn't mind giving way to it occasionally. But
I want to be left alone now, and I wish that you and Tom
would take to another room and leave me to my book.”

“Leave you to your book is it?” said his brother, “if it
were a book, a stock-book, a bill-book, a day-book, or anything
else that deserves the name of a book I would; but such

a heap of trash as that is a disgrace to the name of a book,”
and to show his contempt for the work he caught it out of his
brother's hand and threw it into the grate.

This was touching Fred upon a sensitive point; it was
his raw spot, so he jumped up from the purple morocco where
he seemed to be imbedded, and caught his brother by his collar
who immediately caught his brother Fred in a similar
manner, and thus being brought into very close contact they
began to force each other about the room in such a promiscuous
and hurry-scurry manner that the astral lamps, and
mirrors and chandeliers, seemed on the point of instant annihilation;
but they soon had the additional weight of their mother's
person, which was probably twice their own, to contend
with, she having thrown herself upon them to prevent
them from doing each other any injury; and by the help of
her voice tended to kick up a dust, that her tears were not
sufficiently copious to allay.

“You puppy!” said Tom as he darted a look of contempt
at his brother.

“You beast!” muttered Fred, “take that for your pains;”
and so saying he caught hold of his brother's gold headed
cane, and snapped it across his knee, and threw it into the
fire.

“Ah! indeed, I like that much,” said his brother Tom,
“here's to you,” and so saying he opened his pen-knife and
cut one of the eyes out of his brother Fred's portrait which
hung in the room, and threw it at him.

This brotherly act was immediately repaid by Fred who
caught hold of his brothers coat-tail and tore off just one half
of his new green coat, a feat which was reciprocated by Tom
without deliberation. They mutually paused, while they cast
their eyes around them for fresh objects to exercise their affections
upon, and their mother threw herself upon her knees
between them and begged them to destroy her next, as they
both had an equal interest in her.

“But for you,” said Tom, “this wouldn't have happened.
You always get us into difficulty.”

“That's true,” said Fred, “you know its all your own
fault, mother; if you hadn't disturbed me in my reading it
wouldn't have happened.”

“O, my poor husband,” sobbed Mrs. Tuck, “it is well for
you that the dead cannot see what is done by the living.”

“I think so too,” said the tender Fred, “he would be
ashamed of you if he saw how you carry on sometimes, I
dare believe. It takes me.”

“Come Fred,” said Tom, “I won't hear you abuse your
mother, in my presence,”

“O, let him, let him kill me,” said Mrs. Tuck.

“If he does I'll flog him,” said the virtuous Tom with an
indignant jerk of his head.

“You flog me!” said Fred, throwing down the remains of
his coat on the floor, and siding up to his brother who was
clearing himself of the two sleeves of his coat, the back part
of which his brother had eased him of.

“Now boys,” said their mother, suddenly suspending a
flood of tears, “I will have this no longer. I am ashamed
of you at your age to be acting like children.”

“Well, I am done,” said Fred, fumbling in his hat for a
cigar, “deuce take it there's none here. Tom give me a
cigar.”

“I'll give you a knock on the head,” replied his brother,
“look at my cane there.”

“And look at my picture there, you thief;” returned Fred.

“Tom, give your brother a cigar,” said Mrs. Tuck, “you
are the oldest and you should set a better example.”

“Take your cigar,” said Tom as he threw his cigar-case
at his brother's head, but Fred dodged and the cigar-case
cracked the shade of the astral lamp.

“There you go again,” said Fred, “never mind, you'll
have to pay for it yourself.” And he picked up the cigar
case and lighted his cigar.

“Now mother,” said Fred, “what good do you get by talking
to Julia about young Tremlett. She swears she'll have
him, and you know she is too much like you not to have her
own way about it.”

“It mortifies my pride, and kills me to think of it;” replied
Mrs. Tuck, “that my daughter should throw herself away
upon a son of nobody. He has no family, no connections,
and not even a name of his own; and besides, I hate him.”

“But the young fellow will be rich,” replied Fred, “he
will have an immense estate at old Tremlett's death, and I
dare believe he will have a family all in good time. For my
part I always liked him, and I don't blame Julia for liking
him too.”

“Well, then, I do,” said Tom, “Mother is right. I hate him
too. But you need give yourself no uneasiness about Julia.
He never wanted her, and I do not believe that he loves her
any more than I do, in the way of marriage. But he is amiable
and good natured and he has not the courage to tell her
so. It will all come out in the end. But we must let the
girl alone now, she is a great favorite with uncle Gris, and
if he should leave her anything we might whistle for our
share of it if we annoy her too much in this way.”

“Well, I dare believe there's truth in that, mother,” said
Fred, “now you have got your cue, don't throw her into
convulsions again by telling her he has no regard for her.”

“O, my children,” said Mrs. Tuck, “you little know the
strength of a mother's love; I could freely die for either of you
but I cannot see your sister disgrace herself.”

“O, I dare believe, you would die for us quite cheerfully,”
said Fred, “but you don't care a straw about our happiness.
Well, there's something a little too transcendental in that for
my philosophy.”

“A pull at the hall bell put an end to the conversation, and
the two brothers darted out of the parlor with the remnants of
their coats, while their mother began to snug up, and presently

the servant ushered in two fashionable gentlemen, who
had called for the double purpose of enquiring after the health
of Miss Tuck, and of playing a game of whist with her brothers.

Mrs. Tuck received them with a most gracious, but dignified
air, and informed them that her daughter was quite well,
but that she had gone out to spend the evening with a friend;
and in a few moments her two interesting sons walked in and
welcomed their visitors with the pleasantest and most delightful
manner conceivable. Never were two gentlemen happier
to meet two other gentlemen than were the two Tucks to meet
their friends, and the two friends were equally delighted to
find the brothers at home, although their happiness was in a
manner damped at the absence of their sister; and Mrs. Tuck
was happy to hear that the two young gentlemen were quite
well, and the two young gentlemen, together and separately,
were happy in being made acquainted with the pleasing fact
that Mrs. Tuck was well, and had been well since she had
the pleasure of seeing them the last time. It must not be
supposed by the reader that these two gentlemen were a pair
of Howards going about the world enquiring after the health
of its inhabitants, and making themselves extremely happy or
miserable in conformity with the feelings of those whom they
met; quite the contrary, for in their walk to Mrs. Tuck's
house they encountered several persons whose woe-begone
and wretched appearance might have brought tears from the
eyes, and shillings from the pockets, of seemingly less sensitive
persons; and yet they walked on quite happy and cheerful;
indeed they had made themselves rather merry at the
queer looks of a little bare-footed girl who asked them for
two pennies to buy her mother a loaf of bread, but never once
thought of complying with the little girl's request. As these
are a kind of people whose feelings and actions we are not
ambitious of incorporating into our history, we will introduce
them formally to the reader, merely as specimens for the benefit
of remote countries, and then leave them.

The eldest of these two personages was named Barnsill;
“P. Ramsey Barnsill,” was printed upon the gentleman's
card; he was in stature something less than five feet; his
nose was exceedingly prominent and its high bridge seemed
to draw the skin tight over the gentleman's face, which was
thin in the extreme; his eyes were large and staring and his
teeth were set at every possible angle to his gums; his forehead
was low and narrow, but it was ornamented by two
bushy black eye-brows, that were counterbalanced by two
bushy black whiskers; the gentleman's dress it is not necessary
to notice, since there was nothing noticeable about it, it
being a style of costume which leaves one in doubt after having
parted with a gentleman whether he wore any covering
or not. If you had met Mr. Barnsill at Scuddor's Museum
you would have thought, as a matter of course, that he was
one of the five hundred thousand curiosities in that remarkable
collection; but meeting with him at Mrs. Tuck's you
would have concluded, very correctly, that there was a precious
good reason for his being included in the circle of her
acquaintance. The reason was this; Mr. Barnsill was the
nephew and confidential cash-keeper of Mr. Jeromus Barnsill
an old stock-broker of whom the brothers found it convenient
two or three times a week to borrow a thousand dollars, just
before three o'clock, to make their account good at the Bank.
The other gentleman was Mr. Ditchely; in what manner he
put his name upon his card, or whether he carried a card or
not we have never ascertained; he was in person not immensely
higher than Mr. Barnsill, but he had a regular set
of features and handsome teeth, and he tried very hard for a
beard, but a few scattering whitish hairs upon the extreme
end of his chin scarce afforded an apology for one; his
dress was very bright, very glossy, and very fine; he looked
like a petit courier just imported, and sent out for a pattern;
Mr. Ditchley, was a clerk in a jobbing store in Pearl street,
and he visited Mrs. Tuck's as the friend of Mr. Barnsill.

Shortly after these two gentlemen came in, whist was proposed,
and they sat down with the two brothers and began to
play for the trifling sum of two shillings a corner, just to keep
alive the interest of the game; and shortly after they sat down,
a pitcher of hot punch was introduced with four tumblers,
and Mrs. Tuck withdrew. So these four gentlemen continued
to shuffle, and deal, and cut, and sip, and smoke, and
talk of honors, suits, and lifts, and finessing, and Hoyle, until
it was past midnight, and the house was still, and there
were no echoes of tramping feet heard on the pavement, when
they were suddenly startled in their seats by a hasty ring at
the hall door. The two brothers looked at each other, and
Fred, who was dealing at the time, turned pale as ashes and let
his cards fall. The servants had gone to bed, and as the door
was not immediately opened, there was another violent pull at
the hall bell.

“Go to the door Fred;” said Tom.

“No, no, I can't,” gasped Fred, “go you; go.”

Tom took a deep draught of the punch and opened the hall
door, but immediately returned very pale and ghastly, with a
stranger behind him.

“What is it? what is it?” exclaimed Mr. Barnsill and Mr.
Ditchley together.

“Here's a gentleman come to inform us that our uncle
Gris, poor old man, has been found dead in his chair,” said
Tom.

“Dead!” ejaculated his brother, “dead! It's a mistake.”

“It's too true,” replied the stranger, “I saw the old gentleman
myself. He is dead, indeed.”

3. CHAPTER III.

“MY dear boy,” said old Mr. Tremlett, addressing his son
who sat by his bed-side; “it grieves me to see you
weep, I meant nothing by my remarks, but that the time is at
hand when you and I must part, on this earth, at least. This
sudden death of my partner cannot but remind me that I have
not long to remain with you, and the little time that we may
be allowed to live in each other's society must not be spent in
tears. Whenever I shall be called I will cheerfully go, and
when I close my eyes upon the world there will be no one
but you, for whom I would stay.”

“O, my father, my more than father,” replied the young
man, seizing the old merchant's hand and bathing it with his
tears, “how can I live when you are gone! There will be
none to care for me then, and I shall be more destitute than I
was when you took me from my loveless home, and taught
me the true worth of friendship and virtue. I have lived in
the hope that some opportunity would be allowed me of proving
to you that I have not been a thoughtless and ungrateful
recipient of your goodness.”

“You will offend me by such talk,” replied the old gentleman,
“I have never doubted your affection or your gratitude
and it is I and not you, who am the debtor. I bless God that
he gave you to me in my old age, in my helpless and decrepid

condition to sweeten my cup of life at a time when I was
least able to endure its biterness. You are young, and will,
I hope, see many years of happiness when I am gone. The
time may seem remote to you and long and weary to look
ahead to the period at which I am arrived; but you view it
through an inverted telescope. I look back to your age and it
seems scarce a moment of time since I occupied the spot where
you now stand. It matters not when we lie down to sleep our
last sleep how long we may have moved about upon the earth
nor whether we die, as I shall die, the nominal possessor of
wealth, or indebted to the charity of our neighbor for the pallet
on which we expire. I feel this now. Perhaps it would have
been better had I felt it sooner. I am not ashamed of my
wealth, for as far as I know it has been acquired without harm
to others. But I sometimes think I had no right to keep what
I could not use myself, yet it is a consolation to know, that
you will never know the cruel struggles and harrassing fears
which I endured in the early part of my life. To think of
this has long been one of my pleasures. With some trifling
exceptions, I shall leave you the whole of my property. It
will be sufficient for all your wants, and there will be small
inducements for you to enter into the tormenting pursuits of
business. But if it should be your desire to do so, I have no
wish to restrain you. I hope, however, that you will be
moved by higher aims in employing your time and your
money than a wish to increase your fortune.

“The life of a merchant must be at best unsatisfactory and
humiliating to a generous mind. It is the most purely selfish
and least ennobling of all human pursuits, because it is the
most mercenary. The lowest mechanic and the smallest cultivator
of the soil aim at higher things, and must of necessity
commune more closely with God and Nature. I have been
amazed, even in my narrow historical researches, to find so
few of the eminent men of the world taken from the mercantile
profession. It is true that there have been some great

men who were merchants. But they are few. And it is
true also that the opportunities of a merchant for doing good
are greater than the opportunities of other men, yet when
they are improved they are episodes in his business and not
necessary to it.

“I did myself a great wrong by neglecting to marry, when I
was young, from prudential motives; it was a deplorable mistake
and deplorably I have suffered for it; all the sweets of life
have been untasted by me, while I have fed upon its bitterest
food. You, my dear boy will have no such false restraints as
I supposed it necessary to impose upon myself. Be not therefore
self-debarred from life's greatest pleasures. There is
doubtless unhappiness even in the marriage state, and it must
have its drawbacks as all earthly things have; but if you
cannot find happiness there you will look for it in vain, I
fear, elsewhere.”

The young man had fallen on his knees by the bed-side
of the old merchant, but he could only reply to his admonitions
by kissing his hand and bathing it in tears.

It was early in the morning. The intelligence of Mr.
Tuck's death had just been brought to Mr. Tremlett, who
was greatly affected thereby, although it was an event for
which he was by no means unprepared, for he knew that his
partner had long suffered from a diseased heart, and that his
death must be sudden. But they had been associated in business
so long, and had learned so well to accomodate themselves
to each others' whims, leaning on each others' strong
points, and supporting each other in their weak ones, that he
felt as though a part of himself had been torn away, and that
he could not remain long behind thus deprived of his accustomed
help. And he looked back through the long years of
toil and perplexity which he had spent, of anxiety and thriftless
hope, which when satisfied brought no satisfaction, and
he was overpowered at the littleness of the profit which had
accrued to him when he struck a hasty balance in his mind

and found that his outlay of time and strength, had brought
him so poor a recompense as dollars and cents, that had not
the power of soothing his mind with one consolotary reflection.
There lay his gains secured in some vault of ponderous
granite blocks, clamped together with iron bars, and watched
over by a hireling sentinel, as though they were some terrible
evil whose escape would desolate the world, and not the
bits of precious metal whose presence in the house of misery
and want would diffuse smiles and health and happiness; and
there lay as palpable to his mind, the wasted years of his half
century of responsible existence; as he sccanned their worth
he could find but little among them which seemed at all to
compensate for their cost.

While the old merchant lay indulging himself in these reflections,
and his adopted son knelt silently by his bed-side, a
tap was heard at the door, and Jeremiah Jernegan walked in.

Young Tremlett rose hastily from his knees and seated
himself upon the bed-side, and the old man looked inquisitively
at the intruder, who was about to withdraw without
speaking a word, when Mr. Tremlett called him back.

“Sit down, Jeremiah,” said Mr. Tremlett; “we have no
secrets that you may not know. We have all labored together
with poor Mr. Tuck, and together we must all weep
for him. Well, he was a sincere man; and I believe Jeremiah,
an honest merchant. Do you not think he was?”

“I never knew him to do a dishonest act,” replied Jeremiah,
“but far be it from me to judge of any man, but above all
of the dead. Perhaps I was the last person who saw him
alive, but I fear—”

“Fear what?” said Mr. Tremlett, raising himself; “fear
what, Jeremiah? Do you fear that my partner is not happy
now? that he died without repentance Jeremiah?”

“No, those are fears that would not become me?” said
Jeremiah, “but, perhaps I had better not tell what were my
fears.”

“You must tell, Jeremiah,” said Young Tremlett, “your
words have excited a curiosity in my father which you must
satisfy, or he will indulge in harrassing doubts, let us know
what it is you were going to say? You need fear nothing
from us, or if you do not care to speak before me I will retire.”

“No, no,” replied Jeremiah, “I am glad you are here, for
although I came expressely to speak with your father, my
errand could not be completed without seeing you. I was
going to say that I fear I was not the last person who saw
Mr. Tuck alive.”

“Nothing more likely,” said Mr. Tremlett, “it could be
easily ascertained from the housekeeper; but it is a matter of
little moment; for myself I wish that I could have seen him
again, but I cannot now bring myself to look upon him. I
shall feel more composed before long.”

“It matters little to him, now,” said Jeremiah, “but as I
said before I have fears that I hardly know how to name.”

“You puzzle me,” said Mr. Tremlett, “speak out, without
fear, that I may know what you mean.”

“I fear,” said Jeremiah, gazing around him, “that he died
by violence.”

“By violence!” said the old man as his frame shook with
terror, “how by violence? were there any marks upon his
person?”

“No,” said Jeremiah; “and that is why I am so fearful
of speaking my thoughts. But I will relate to you my
reasons, and perhaps you will think I am easily alarmed.
But God knows that I would not mistrust a living soul of so
wicked an intent, yet I have seen so much of depravity and
selfishness that I can hardly doubt that anything that is wicked
may not be true.”

“Go on, go on,” said young Tremlett impatiently.

“Yesterday morning,” said Jeremiah, “I had occasion to
call at Mr. Tuck's house to get a cheek signed, and I found

the old gentleman in his room, very evidently quite ill, although
he would not acknowledge it. He spoke to me about
dying and I was glad of an opportunity, without seeming to
seek it myself, of talking with him on the subject; but when
I attempted to improve the occasion, he grew impatient, and
as I perceived that my remarks disturbed him, I left him, but
with great uneasiness of mind; for I had a presentiment
that his time was at hand. It so happened that my cash-book
did not balance at night when I made up my accounts, and
I was detained in the office until a very late hour in the evening
before I discovered the error; so, after I had closed the
door of the counting room, on my way home I again thought
of poor Mr. Tuck, and I determined to call upon him again,
to speak with him once more, if he should be in a mood to
listen to me. It was very dark and a drizzly rain beat in my
face when I stepped up to the front door of his house, and
just as I was going to pull the bell handle, the door opened,
and a person came hastily out wrapped in a cloak. I supposed
that it must be the physician, and I said, `Doctor.'
`Well?' replied the person; `Is Mr. Tuck better?' I asked;
`Not wemarkable,' replied the doctor; `will it do for me to
see him?' I asked further, for I wished to hear the doctor's
voice again;' `act your own discwetion,' he replied, and a
footstep was heard in the hall at that moment, when the doctor
muffled his cloak about him and walked rapidly down
the street. I would have followed him, but the house-keeper
came to the door in great alarm, and seeing me requested
me to come in as she had heard somebody in the house. I
questioned her about the doctor, and she said that no doctor
had been there. I told her that I met him at the door upon
which she grew frightened and we went up to Mr. Tuck's
chamber together where we found the poor gentleman dead
in his chair, with some papers in his hand. The person
whom I met at the door I am very certain was the same man
who robbed me of my watch, when we were on our way
to Willow-mead together,” he said, turning to young Tremlett.

“I remember it perfectly well,” said John, “and I think I
should know the person if I were to see him again. I am
certain that I should recognise him by his voice.”

“It was by that alone which I knew him;” said Jeremiah,
“for it was too dark to see his face.”

“And was not his name Washington Mortimer, or something
like it?” asked John.

“G. Washington Mortimer;” replied Jeremiah, “here is
the very receipt which he gave me for the watch. I have
preserved it ever since, amongst my papers, and this morning
I found it.”

“There must be something in this,” said Mr. Tremlett,
“but I cannot see what. You had better send the oldest of
the two Tucks to me and I will put him on the track to scent
it out, but in the mean time Jeremiah, and you, my son, do
not whisper a word of this to any one.”

“I freely forgive the man, if it be him who took my
watch,” said Jeremiah, “but I would be glad to discover him,
nevertheless, for you know John, that Hopely, of whom
I borrowed it, always pretended that he did not believe our
story.”

“I had forgotten it,” said John smiling faintly, “but you
need have no alarm about Hopley, for you know he is now
serving out his time in prison, for an offence which no one
doubted his being guilty of.”

“That is true indeed,” replied Jeremiah, “but perhaps
it would be some consolation to him to know that we
were not as bad as he thought us, even in his own degradation.”

“Perhaps so,” said young Tremlett, “but I doubt the reverse
would be more consoling to him.”

“Leave me now,” said the old gentleman, “that I may
compose my thoughts, and prepare myself for the part I must

perform; in the afternoon I must see you both again. And
you, Jeremiah, arrange your accounts as usual, and bring me
your checks to sign for the day's payments.”

Jeremiah and John then withdrew and left the old merchant
to his contemplations.

4. CHAPTER IV.

WHEN a rich man dies, everybody says: “is it possible!”
as though it were quite an impossible thing for audacious
Death to grapple with a man of wealth: when a lawyer
dies, all the courts adjourn with complimentary speeches, and
Justice sheathes her terrible left-handed sword and pockets
her scales for a whole day, as though lawyers were so exceedingly
rare that the loss of one deserved to be wept as a public
calamity; and when a merchant dies, all the ships in the harbour
hoist their flags half-mast, out of respect to his memory,
as though the business of merchandizing was one of such exceeding
honor to humanity that the bare accident of being
connected with it conferred such peculiar merit upon a man
that his loss called for a public demonstration of grief. This
last compliment was paid to Mr. Tuck; and while there was
but one pair of eyes that wept a tear at his funeral, there were
hundreds of yards of bunting, of all possible colors and combinations,
drooping from the half-mast-heads of innumerable
sea-going crafts at the wharfs, and in the river, and bay,
out of respect to his memory.

The old man had been buried; his name had already passed
out of the memories of those who had but just wept him in
bunting; and the world was moving on to all appearance as
usual, when Mrs. Tuck, the dignified sister-in-law of the

deceased, sat down in her back parlor surrounded and supported
in her hour of grief by her three children;—Those
juveniles that kept her in such a continued shifting between
bliss and misery that it would have puzzled her to strike a
balance of the two accounts and carry the result to the right
side. The whole party were clad in deep mourning, and
if it be permitted to departed spirits to look upon the scenes
that they have just left, a doctrine which finds many believers
even in this unbelieving age, Mr. Tuck must have looked
down upon this little family party with great complacency
when he saw how deeply they mourned his loss—in dress.

They had evidently just returned from the house of mourning,
and their minds were occupied with serious things. The
oldest brother, who assumed all the prerogatives which primogeniture
confers in monarchical countries, was the first to
break silence.

“So, Miss,” said T. Jefferson Tuck to his sister, “you will
get married now, considerably quick; and I and your mother
who have had the care of you all your life, will have about
as wide a space in your affections, as we had in your estimable
uncle's. Confound him!”

“Now boys,” said Mrs. Tuck, who spoke with remarkable
clearness considering that she had just come from the funeral
of a relative, for whose sake she had clothed herself in
such very deep mourning, “remember that Julia is your
sister—”

“I hope we may be reminded of that fact by the young
lady herself,” said Fred, interrupting his mother.

“And I hope,” said the sister, “that I may be made to feel
it by some token of brotherly kindness or consideration from
you. But if I was not entitled to it before your uncle's death,
I have no right to claim it now.”

“O! ah!' ejaculated the younger brother.

“Now, Fred,” interrupted the mother.

“My uncle's will is not my will,” continued the sister,

“and it can have no influence upon either my affections or
my actions. As to marriage, it is not for me to say what I
may do.” She had been weeping bitterly when the taunting
remarks of her brothers caused her to reply to them, and as
she concluded her speech she sank upon an ottoman and again
gave way to her grief.

“Pooh!” ejaculated her brother Tom contemptously.

“O, my!” said Fred, and tearing the crape from his hat,
he added, “put that to your mourning,” as he threw it towards
her, “I don't believe in hypocrisy, and I won't wear
mourning for that old miser.”

“Don't do that,” said Tom, giving his brother a sharp
look, “remember you owe something to appearances—to the
family—”

“And to your father's memory,” added his mother.

“Well, then sew it on again,” replied the repentant brother,
“I wish I could pay all that I owe as easily.”

“Now my children,” said Mrs. Tuck, “all our expectations
are at an end, we have nothing to hope from your dear
father's brother, and we must live for each other—”

“And on each other,” said Fred.

“And with each other,” said the mother, “When Julia
gets married I am sure she will not forget us; and you, boys,
can go on with your business; and your sister will always be
ready and willing, I can promise you, to help you with a
little capital; and we shall live very genteely, and keep the
same company that we always have done. My daughter,
why do you weep so; remember that your uncle was a very
old man, and you should have been prepared for his death.”

“I was prepared for his death,” said the young lady, “but
I was not prepared to find that he had regarded me with such
fondness, and I cannot but weep now that I had not known
it while he was living, that I might have been more kind and
attentive to him. Ah me, I fear I shall never know such
another friend.”

“What, with all that money!” said Fred, “never you fear;
you'll have friends enough.”

“Now listen to me,” said Tom, “just mind what I say.
Here is Julia will get something when she's married; but
when she is married, we shall have no claims upon her: and
her husband will not care two straws about us. In that view
of the case, of course we are dished. But if Julia will be a
sensible girl, and listen to reason, we'll do better. The conditions
of the will are, that she is to come into possession of
her uncle's share of the capital of the firm, which comprises
about all he has left, upon the day of her marriage. Now,
observe it is upon the day of her marriage, and not the day
after; therefore if she can persuade old Tremlett, who is the
executor, to put her in possession of the money, she can immediately
make over two thirds of the property to us, which
is our share, and then when she is married in the evening,
she can hand over the balance to her husband, who will not
find fault with the arrangement if he be an honorable man
and if he should grumble at it I will challenge him for insulting
my sister. But I am afraid that this plan could not be
carried out, for old Tremlett is a precise character, and if
Julia should take it into her head to marry his adopted son,
he would see that the young fellow gets all that belonged to
him.”

“That's a capital plan, Tom, and Julia might bring it
about if she were disposed to do so.”

“It is not safe to trust to it,” replied the elder brother; “but
I will suggest a plan that she might carry out, and which she
must carry out, if she have any regard for her family, and
that is, not to marry any man who will not sign an agreement
to give us two thirds of the estate that she may bring him;
and I can promise her she shall never marry upon any other
conditions.”

“You ought to have learned by this time,” replied their
sister rising from the ottoman and walking proudly across

the room, “that the only power which ever compelled me
was the power of kindness and love. I am willing to do
more, perhaps, than either of you would have the heart to
ask, but I will do nothing by force. The debt I owe you is
easily paid, but I shall not even pay that, small as it is, upon
compulsion.”

“Yes Madam,” said her brother Tom, “I have not forgotten
the trick you played us with that pocket book to screen
that young thief upon whom your thoughts are settling just
now; and but for that we should have been as well off as
yourself. When you talk of paying debts my lady, please to
bear in mind that that debt is not omitted in my schedule.
It has got to be paid in full yet. So be careful how you
threaten.”

A sudden interruption at this moment prevented one of the
most thrilling scenes that was probably ever described in history,
and deprived us of an opportunity of improving our pen
in the service of the Tragic Muse.

The door opened and a servant beckoned to the elder
brother who returned after a moment's absence and requested
the other parties to retire and leave him alone with a friend
with whom he had some particular business.

“Well, Jacobs, you are a precious rascal,” said the elder
Tuck to his business friend, who entered the back parlor as
soon as the others had left it; “your name is Dennis, and no
mistake. If you are not hung after the next Oyer and Terminer,
you may thank my benevolent bumps.”

“Well, if I am hung;” replied Mr. Jacobs, for that was the
gentleman's name, “I know who'll dance upon nothink about
the same time.”

“Yes I dare say you do;” replied Tom, “thieves and murderers
generally have accomplices.”

“You may say that without much wisk,” said Mr. Jacobs,
“when you are an accomplish yourself.”

“Come sir,” said Tom, with an air, “I shall have no insolence,

and if you open your Jew's mouth in that manner
again, I will have you taken immediately to prison. Do you
know that hand writing sir? Mr. G. Washington Mortimer,”
and so saying Mr. T. Jefferson Tuck held a scrap of dirty
brown paper up to his friend's eyes.

“Ha! ha! Where did you get that document fwom?” inquired
Mr. Jacobs.

“I know where I got it from,” said Tom; “and where
I got it there's plenty more blacker and ranker. Enough to
hang you half a dozen times.”

Mr. Jacobs looked a little abashed, if that term can properly
be applied to a gentleman of his entire self-possession; and in
a somewhat subdued manner asked for an explanation.

“The truth is Jacobs,” said Tom, “you are known; and
officers are in pursuit of you. Remember old fellow that I
cautioned you in the beginning not to make the dose too strong,
all that I hired you to do, was to put him into a sound sleep
so that you might get the will without waking him; and
what have you done? you have committed murder; and you
took the wrong will; and you have exposed yourself so that
you will be discovered. What did you make any reply for
when you were spoken to at the door? Did you not know
that your rascally voice would lead to your detection? I
warned you in time; but I will be generous to you nevertheless.
If you will promise me to leave New York this very
night, and never return here again, I will promise not to inform
against you.”

“Not without you pay me what you pwomised,” said Mr.
Jacobs, “I've pwefwomed my part, now you do yours.”

“Pay you indeed,” said Tom, “What should I pay you
for; for destroying my brilliant prospects? You took the
very will that I did not want, and the other, which he held
in his hand as if offering it to you, you never touched.”

“Well,” said Mr. Jacobs, “I went where you diwected
me to, and I was fweaful if I touched the papers in his hand I
should wake him.”

“I am not answerable for your bungling work,” said Tom
“and if you think to include me in your villanies, just bear
in mind that you cannot bring a particle of evidence to support
your lies; so if you are not very obedient, I will have
you hung as sure as you stand there.”

“Poo! I am not fwightened at your talk about hanging;
didn't the cowoner's juwy bwing in that he died of the
disease of the heart. You can't hang this child no how,”
said Mr. Jacobs, “and as for that weceipt about the watch
its only a twansaction, there is nothing to fear about that.”

“Well,” said Tom: “your neck is your own, and of course
it's your own business whether you wear a hempen collar or
not. I shall not trouble myself about it.”

“Pay me the money you pwomised, then;” said Mr. Jacobs,
“I have had enough of you; I thought I was dealing
with a man of honor, give me my money and let me go. I'll
get clear of you as fast as I can.”

“I shall give you no money,” replied Tom, “you have
been the means of my losing one fortune, and I shall send
nothing after it.”

“Vewy good, then I shall not quit the city for the excellent
weason that I havn't got money enough to take me away,”
said Mr. Jacobs as he took hold of the door to go.

“Take this,” said Tom, reaching him a roll of bills, “and
let me never see your face again or you will hang for it, I
give you my word and honor.”

The gentleman caught hold of the bills eagerly, and having
thrust them into his pocket, he wished Mr. T. Jefferson Tuck
a very good night, and whispered in his ear confidentially
that if he should ever have occasion for his services he might
hear of him at the old place. And without any other exchange
of compliments the two friends parted.

5. CHAPTER V.

ALTHOUGH Mr. Tremlett did not design that his adopted
son should embark his fortunes in mercantile speculations,
yet he was aware of the advantage which a methodical
mercantile education would confer upon him, let him embrace
whatever course of life he might; therefore he kept the
young man in his counting-room, and exacted from him a
close attention to his duties. It is true that the duties assigned
to him were very far removed from drudgery, and were
rather of a confidential nature; yet they required strict attention
and fidelity, although they allowed him the free use of
a good portion of his time. Perhaps one reason why the old
merchant compelled the attendance of his son in his counting
room was that he might be always near him, for the old gentleman
was always nervous and anxious whenever he was
half a day without seeing him.

There were certain masters of vessels in the employment
of Tremlett and Tuck, whose families drew half pay during
their absence, and it was one of the duties of young Tremlett
to act as cashier when their monthly allowances were paid
out. Amongst those who were in the habit of calling on the
first of every month for their stated allowances, was a hearty
old man who had once sailed in the service of the house, as

first mate of one of their vessels, and whose son now commanded
one of their ships, and had left an order for a certain
sum to be paid for the board of his daughter, an only child
who lived with the old sailor and his wife, her mother having
died when she was an infant.

This hearty old sailor had gained the kindly regard of
young Tremlett by his frank and quaint address, and as he
had not called for his last month's allowance, the young man
put a check in his pocket and called upon him to inquire the
cause of his absence. It was the evening of the day on which
Mr. Tuck was buried, and the presence of the young man
must have been more unexpected than at any other time.
The old sailor, whose name was Clearman, lived in a little
court leading out of the Bowery, and John had some difficulty
in finding the place, although the moment he set his eyes
upon it he knew that old Clearman must live there, every
thing about the house, which was a very humble one, looked
so much like him and seemed to partake of the quaintness and
honesty of his mind; even the little white washed palings in
front of the queerest little garden that could be imagined had a
nautical look; and the steps that led to the front door, with a
bit of tarred rope ornamented at the end with one of those mysterious
knots called a turk's-head, tied to the bannisters for
no conceivable purpose, at least, none that a lands-man could
conceive, looked more like the companion way of a ship, than
the entrance of a quite stationary house. John knocked at
the door, and it was opened by a young girl who showed him
into a little back parlor where he found the old sailor smoking
a pipe in an arm chair with one leg bound up in flannel
and resting upon a stool. An attack of the rheumatism had
kept him confined to the house, and this was the sole cause
of his not calling for the monthly allowance. John was unaffectedly
glad to learn that it was for no more serious cause
and having paid the old man the check and taken his receipt,
he rose to go, when the old sailor and his wife both urged
him with such an earnest but gentle good will to sit down

and take a cup of tea with them that he remained, as much
to his own satisfaction as theirs. There was such an air of
perfect neatness and propriety about the little room that he
could not persuade himself they had not known of his coming
and made preparation for him. The old man immediately
laid aside his pipe, and his wife and the young girl who had
opened the door, spread the table, at which they took their
seats, and the old lady reverently craved a blessing. This
was something new. He had never heard a blessing asked
upon the meat of which he partook at the merchant's table,
neither had he heard one at Mrs. Tuck's, nor at any of the
Louses at which he had visited. It filled his mind with serious
and melancholy thoughts; he had a dim recollection
that he used to hear grace over his dinners when he was an
inmate of the charitable institution from which Mr. Tremblett
had taken him, and he thought it a strange thing that the poor
should be more grateful to God for their poverty than the rich
for their riches. But the hearty voice of the old sailor, and
the cheerful manners of his wife, and above all the bright
countenance of the young girl who sat opposite to him, and
who ever and anon cast her hazel eyes upon him as she
reached him some of the delicacies with which the table was
covered, instantly put to flight and completely annihilated the
remotest shadow of any melancholy thought that had crossed
his mind. The young girl, or rather the young lady, for such
girls are called ladies in the Bowery, was the daughter of the
sea captain whose monthly allowance John had just paid;
she was apparently seventeen, or if more than that. Time
had dealt daintily with her, as though she were a favorite with
the stern old tyrant who shows favors to none; and yet she
must have been more than seventeen for how could such
charms as hers come to perfection in so short a time. In
truth, she was seventeen and six months, as John ascertained
from her grand father by personal inquiry. It is just the age
of which no young lady ever felt ashamed; and but few young
ladies ever had such endowments to grace it, if ever any had
beside Fidelia Clearman, and although John was fully sensible
of the slightest of her outward perfections, and gazed upon
them with a kind of entrancement yet her greatest charm in
his eyes was her cheerful and dutiful deportment to her
grand-parents, who seemed quite unconscious of her beauty,
it was so entirely overshadowed by her goodness. She was
neither tall nor short, but of a proper hight, which exactly
harmonized with her fair complexion, her sunny hair, her
hazel eyes, her smiling mouth and her beautiful neck, that
resembled nothing but itself, and therefore cannot be distinguished
by an epithet, as indeed no genuine beauty properly
can be; and we will not mislead our readers by making comparisons
which could give no just idea of the original.

When the supper table had been removed and the little
company had drawn around the fire, the old sailor asked Fidelia
to sing him the little ballad that he had taught her
when she was hardly old enough to lisp.

“O, my dear grandfather,” said Fidelia blushing, “you
must not insist upon my singing; remember that Mr. Tremlett
will not listen to me with your partial ears.”

“Well my little daughter,” said the old man “I will not
say you must if you say you musn't; but that's no excuse for
not singing; I larn't you the song, and I want you to sing it
to my visitor; but if so be that you won't, I must sing it myself.”

And the old man chuckled his fair grand-daughter under
the chin, and his old broad face and his two glistening black
eyes seemed all lighted up and alive with good humor.

“It's a ballad you see,” he said turning to his visitor and
taking his pipe from his mouth, “which I larn't from a young
lady which was a passenger with me, on a v'yage from City
Point to London, and arter that to Archangel, when I was second
mate of the ship Sukey, commanded by captain Josh

Davis, and belonging to the firm of Brumstead and Bishop
when your father was clark with them, before my son, this
little girl's father, was born. This young lady was going to
jine her sweet-heart, which was a clark in a ship chandlery
store in Wapping; a store which I knowed as well as I
knowed your father's store in South street; and she used to
sit on deck with me through my whole watch, whenever it
was a pleasant night and I had the first trick, and sing ballads
to me; and it was she that larn't the ballad to me and I
larn't it to my grand-daughter and now I want she should
sing it for you, for I never saw two young creatures look
more alike than she and the young lady. If I hadn't been
hitched on to the old woman that's sitting there I railly believe
that I should have made a match with that young
woman, for I saw enough to convince me she liked me.”

“Yes, well, it would have saved me a wonderful deal of
trouble if you had,” said the old lady, “but she wasn't such
a simpleton as I was.” And then the old lady laughed; and
the old sailor laughed more heartily than ever, and his great
brown under lip, and his double chin, as they shook and
trembled with mirth seemed the very incarnations of pleasantry
and good humor; and the young lady smiled from sheer
sympathy and displayed ravishing glimpses of her pearly teeth
which almost deprived their young guest of his senses.

“After hearing such an account of the ballad,” said John,
“I cannot think of leaving without hearing it, and if Miss
Clearman will not sing it her grandfather must.”

Fidelia blushed again, and said it was a poor trifle, but if it
would give any pleasure to her grandfather she could not
refuse to sing it, although she knew that Mr. Tremlett would
never ask her to sing it a second time. And then she drew a
guitar case from underneath an old mahogany bureau which
stood in the little room, and after she had tuned her instrument
she accompanied herself to the following words, while her
grandfather marked time with the bowl of his tobacco pipe,

and John listened to her bewitching voice with such intensity
of emotion that he quite forgot that he was gazing upon her.
We regret our inability to furnish the readers of this history
with the air to which the words were warbled, but we have
not been able to discover that it was ever put upon paper.

As soon as the young lady had ceased, her grandfather
kissed her fair forehead, and her young auditor felt an irrepressible
desire to manifest his satisfaction in the same manner;
but his thoughts were suddenly put to flight by a hollow
sepulchral voice which exclaimed in most unearthly
tones, “let us pray!” John involuntarily jumped upon his
feet at this strange sound and looked behind him, but saw
nobody; and looking at the old sailor for an explanation, he
perceived the old man's face and his double chin shaking
with laughter and his glistening eyes all festooned round with
smiles.

“What was it?” inquired the astonished youth.

“It's only Poll;” replied the old woman, “there she is.”

And looking in the direction of her finger he discovered a
venerable looking fowl dressed in a coat of respectable drab
colored feathers, with a rather unbecoming cap of crimson
plumage sitting with great gravity and composedness of features
on top of an old mahogany bureau.

“What a remarkable creature,” said John.

“Yes, yes,” replied the old man, “poll is older than you
and I put together; and I believe she knows as much too.
My father brought that bird from Holland more than fifty-five
year ago, and the marchant which he got it of in Amsterdam
which was his consignee, told him that he had owned her
more than thirty years.”

Such an undoubted specimen of antiquity deserved a close
inspection, and after John had examined her ladyship, he had
not the least doubt of her remote birth, for unlike many of
her sex she took not the slightest pains to disguise her age,
but on the contrary seemed to take considerable pride in her
venerable appearance. How it was possible to laugh, or even
smile, in the presence of such a grave and sedate personage,
was a wonder, but the old man's laughter appeared to come
and go of its own accord, neither giving him much thought
or disturbance, although it kept him well and hearty, and

sustained the brightness of his old black eyes, and the full
volume of his heavy sides and his double chin.

“Poll always reminds us,” said the old lady, “when it's
time for prayers, let who will be here.”

“I hope I do not interrupt you,” said John, but yet showed
no signs of going.

“O, no,” said Fidelia looking up to her grandmother,
“perhaps Mr. Tremlett will not refuse to join in our evening
service.”

“It would give me great pleasure;” he replied, and thereupon
the young lady drew out a little stand with a Bible upon
it, and having unclasped the holy book she read a chapter
with such sweetness and propriety of emphasis that John
wondered why he had never found such beauty in God's
Word before. When the chapter had been read, the venerable
old bird again exclaimed “let us pray” and they all
knelt down, except the old man, who was disabled by his
rheumatic leg, while the old lady repeated in devout and
measured tones the evening prayer from the prayer book, and
at the close their venerable feathered companion pronounced
a solemn. “Amen.”

John could not with propriety prolong his visit, so he bade
good night to his new friends, and hurried home to his father
whom he found alarmed and uneasy at his absence. He
hesitated to say how he had spent the evening, and yet he
blushed at the thought of doing so, he could not tell exactly
why, for assuredly he had done nothing amiss; but the
old merchant did not perceive his embarrassment, or he did
not notice it if he did, and the young man made some observation
which soon changed the subject.

“I cannot discover,” said Mr. Tremlett, “that there was
any foundation for Jeremiah's fears in regard to the sudden
death of my partner; the doctors all agree that it was caused
by a disease of his heart, and as there were no signs of violence
upon his person, I doubt not such was the fact. The

man whom he met at the door had probably get into the
house by means of false keys, and being alarmed by Jeremiah's
appearance had no time to carry anything off. But I
am puzzled at one thing, the will that was found in Mr.
Tuck's hand was not the last one he made, as I have learned
of his lawyer; but he is of opinion that the poor man afterwards
changed his mind and destroyed it; which is not unlikely.
The will which has been found places me in a position
towards his niece which I do not like. I know that her
uncle would have bequeathed to me his entire interest in our
firm if I had not, urged him not to do so. He used to say that
our property had been acquired by our joint exertions and
therefore, when either of us died, the survivor should become
possessed of the whole, but I would not, for your sake, consent
to such an arrangement; and he has left it to my discretion
either to give the young lady her portion of the estate on the
day of her marriage, or upon the settlement of the estate
at my own death; he was doubtless influenced in doing this
by the supposition that you would marry his niece, and that
then the entire property would be united in the possession of
his own representative and mine—seemingly the rightful
hands into which it should fall. And this to me would be
the disposition of it most in conformity with my own wishes,
for although I do not think that I have an inordinate love of
wealth, yet I cannot but feel a wish that our estate, which I
have labored so long to help to accumulate, should remain
entire after I am gone, and be enjoyed by those for whom I
feel a regard.

Mr. Tremlett paused a moment, but the young man made
no reply, for in truth he had not clearly understood all that
the old gentleman had been saying, his thoughts being full of
the antiquated old bird, and the beautiful young girl in whose
company he had spent the evening, and a great estate appeared
so trifling an affair when compared with either, that he
could not entirely divert his thoughts from them.

“But I shall cause the firm to he closed immediately,” resumed
Mr. Tremlett, “and when I have ascertained the
amount due to Mr. Tuck, I shall place it at the disposal of
Julia lest she should think that I wished to control her will.”

John commended his father's generosity, and the old gentleman
smiled at his seeming innocence.

“Julia is a spirited girl and I have loved her ever since the
day when she exposed her brothers, by restoring her uncle's
pocket-book, and I love her better now because she loves you.
It is a matter of great mortification to me, my son, that in so
important a transaction as marriage I am incompetent to give
you any advice. But I hope that advice will not be needed
by you and Julia; you will no doubt be happy in each other,
yet there is one thing that an old gentleman used to tell me
when I was of your age which I think you will do well bear in
mind. “Why don't you get married my boy?” he used to
say to me, `because,' I would reply, `I don't know how to
choose a wife, and I am afraid of getting a bad one,' `poo,
poo,' he would say, `any wife is good enough, if her mother
don't live with you, but the best wife will not be good enough
if she should.' Now I think, from what I have seen of Mrs.
Tuck that she will not add much to your happiness when
you are married if she should live with you.”

John thanked his father tenderly for his hint, and promised
to bear it in mind, and they bade each other good night, and
he was very soon in the pleasant land of dreams where he was
exceedingly amused by an appearance which he could not
look upon long enough to distinguish whether it were a very
old bird or a very young lady, and strange noises, sometimes
like the chaunting of angels, and sometimes like the hoarse
tones of an old friar calling to prayer, haunted his pillow until
daylight.

6. CHAPTER VI.

THE firm of Tremlett & Tuck being composed of two
very sedate old bachelors they imparted a conservative
and orderly character to all the clerks in their service, which
rendered them noticeable for their uniformity and precision
of habits, surrounded as they were, on every side, by changelings
and all manner of hurry-skurry people. The reader
will not be surprised, therefore to find that Mr. Bates still acted
as their head book-keeper, and that Jeremiah had been gradually
promoted, step by step, and not in a disorderly and hurried
manner, until he occupied the responsible post of cashier
of the house. Several of the younger clerks had in the mean
time, however, entered into business, and compromised with
their creditors some half a dozen times; and some of them had
come back to fill their old stations after ruining their friends
and involving themselves in debt to a very large amount.
But ups and downs belong more particularly to the mercantile
profession than to any other, and such changes do not
break many hearts, because they are looked upon as matters
of course.

Mr. Bates' salary was as fixed as his habits, but as it had
no particular influence on natural causes, his family and his
wants had increased to an alarming extent in spite of the
stationary nature of the income that was to supply them; and

Mrs. Bates, who was not wanting in shrewdness and industry,
had consented to receive a few boarders into her family, professedly
for the sake of society, but in truth to help educate
the children. This was a praiseworthy and excellent motive
but some people have a horror of being thought useful and
honest, perhaps from modesty, let us think so at least, as it
is best always to put the fairest construction upon the motives
of others, that they will allow. As Mr. Bates was a good
carver and Mrs. Bates had a peculiar faculty in giving a genteel
air to her table, they gave great satisfaction to their boarders,
which is a fact of sufficiently rare occurrence to entitle
it to a special notice, for it is well known that landladies and
their boarders always make it a point to be dissatisfied with
each other.

Jeremiah had gone to board with Mrs. Bates, and soon after
he had taken possession of his room, Huldah Hogshart, who
had come to New York to learn the art of making ladies dresses
with a fashionable mantua-maker in Broadway, at the
recommendation of Mr. Tremlett, also took board with Mrs.
Bates; whereupon Jeremiah, resolved upon leaving the house
lest people should make scandalous remarks about the young
lady and himself, but as he made known his scruples to Mrs.
Bates she, after much debate, succeeded in convincing him
that he was exceedingly prudish; and by assuring him that it
would hurt the credit of her house if it were known that
her husband's intimate friend had left it, he consented to remain.
But we wish the reader to understand that he conducted
htmself in the most exemplary manner towards her,
although he felt a growing kindness for her which at times
almost overmastered his discretion. Miss Hogshart was by
no means so strict a disciplinarian as her father, and she was
guilty of some wide departures from the rules of her sect
which would have given the conscientious farmer much concern
of mind if he had witnessed them. For instance, she
had twice accompanied Jeremiah to a presbyterian meeting,

and once she had even entered the precincts of a public garden
where there was much profane music elaborated by fiddles
and cornets-a-piston; and she had looked with a manifest
liking upon a gentleman and lady, decorated with a wicked
profusion of spangles and quite an unnecessary economy of
clothing, who performed certain mysterious and highly figurative
evolutions, the object of which she did not fully comprehend;
but they were called in the bills a `grand pas de
deux.' She moreover showed a decided fondness for decorating
her person with very bright colors, but Jeremiah thought
she had never looked so lovely as when he first saw her, clad
in her blue striped long-short preparing supper over a cheerful
hickory fire. But she was exceedingly neat in her person,
healthy and good-natured, and so fond of Jeremiah that he
could not but love her with sincerity and earnestness, although
he had never told her so in direct words; and he was
exceedingly puzzled to know how to get about it. It was a
subject on which he could not well ask advice of any of his
acquaintance, and as he never read novels wherein he might
have found a great variety of examples of declaring love, he
was in great perplexity. He had several times been on the
point of asking John, who still continued his friend and confidant,
to assist him with a suggestion, but shame had kept
him silent. And it so chanced that an opportunity was afforded
him, the day after the funeral of Mr. Tuck, of speaking
to young Tremlett on the subject, when he found that his
young friend was as ignorant of all necessary forms as himself.

The clerks had all left the counting room and Jeremiah
and John were sitting alone at their desks. “Jeremiah,”
said John, “it is a long time since you and I have spoken a
word in private, but I hope that hereafter we shall not be so
much apart.”

“I hope not,” replied Jeremiah, who perceived that his
young friend had something to communicate to him, and so

he shut up his cash-book and sat down by his side in the now
vacant seat of poor Mr. Tuck.

“I suppose Jeremiah, you think that I am very happy?”

“Indeed,” replied he, “I rather hoped than thought so;
for although I cannot conceive that you should be otherwise,
I know very well that there is much wretchedness in the
world where its existence is never suspected. But what can
cause your unhappiness? I cannot dream of a real cause.”

“You know Jeremiah, it has been always talked of as a
matter of course that I should marry Julia Tuck; how it
happened I scarcely know; but we have been on intimate
terms a good while, and the young lady loves me better than I
wish she did; I do not speak vainly you know, Jeremiah, because
I would it were not so; but I cannot be blind to the
truth. But, Jeremiah, I tell you sincerely and truly, I never
told her that I loved her, neither did I ever speak a word to
her about marriage; and yet she thinks that I intend to marry
her, and so do her friends. But I cannot; and it is this
which makes me unhappy, for I do not know in what manner
I can extricate myself, without giving pain to her and
others whom I do love and respect. I cannot deceive her
longer, or rather allow her to deceive herself, and I dread a
disclosure of my real feelings not more for her sake than my
father's, for last night he told me that he expected, and wished
that I should marry her that the entire estate of the firm
might be kept in my possession.”

Jeremiah was astonished at this disclosure for he had supposed
that John was engaged and sincerely attached to Miss
Tuck, as indeed all his friends believed.

“What must I do, Jeremiah? How can I relieve myself?”

“Really indeed,” replied Jeremiah, “I cannot advise you;
but if it were my case I think I would do nothing. If you
have never told the young lady that you loved her, I do not
see that she has any right to claim your attentions; or that
her friends can with decency urge you to marry her.”

“It is in this manner that I reason with myself,” said John
“but as soon as I meet her, or any of her friends, I feel at
once as though I were in bonds. Perhaps the fault is mine
for having allowed the suspicion of my love for her to grow
into a certainty in the minds of others, by not contradicting
it pointedly, either by words or actions. But her having become
suddenly rich by the death of her uncle, will, in some
measure, relieve me, as no one could accuse me of base motives
if I were to leave her now; for my father has assured
me that he intends to put her in immediate possession of her
uncle's portion of the estate, thinking that I shall very shortly
be entitled to it as her husband. Now if I tell him that I can
never marry her, he may not do it, but be governed by the
strict letter of the will; and if I do not, he may justly reproach
me with dissimulation. Tell me Jeremiah what I
must do to do right, and do not consider what may be politic
or prudent. I have thought so much on the subject that I
hardly know what would be right.”

“That indeed, is a question more easily answered,” replied
Jeremiah, “the right and honest course would be to confess
the true state of your feelings to your father, and let the young
lady discover them herself from your actions; for if you were
to confess to her she might laugh at you for your presumption.”

“Thank you, thank you, Jeremiah,” exclaimed the young
man in an ecstacy, seizing the hand of his adviser and shaking
it heartily, “I will do it; it is the only way, and although
I may cause some tears to be shed it is the only way to save
greater griefs bye and bye.”

“And now,” said Jeremiah, “since you have made me
your confidant, I will make bold to ask your advice in a similar
business, although for very different reasons. If, for instance,”
he continued after moving his lips several times
without uttering any distinct words, “if, for instance, now,
you were going to tell a young lady that you did love her,
how would you do it?”

“Indeed I don't exactly know what course I should take,”
replied John, who for the first time in his life thought to himself
how such a communication could be made; “but I have
no doubt that when any real affection is felt, the declaration
would come out spontaneously.”

“One would think so,” said Jeremiah, “but to have the
thing positively understood, it strikes me that some particular
form of words should be used.”

“But as you meet with no difficulty in expressing yourself
on other subjects I do not see why you should on this,” said
John; “what can be easier; you, for instance are a young
lady, and I wish to tell you that I love you; I draw my chair
close to yours in this manner,” suiting the action to the word
as he spoke, “and taking her by the hand, provided she does
not draw it away, say, `My dear Miss Davis,' or, `my beautiful
Arabella, I love you very dearly and I feel that my existence
will be a blank unless you share it with me, can you
love and will you love me?' of course the young lady then
says `yes' or, `no,' and your existence becomes a good-for-nothing
blank, or like a blank filled up, of immense value as
the case may be.”

“That's very genteelly done, and I am very much obliged
to you; but I should like very much to know what effect
such an address may have produced.”

“Try it, Jeremiah,” said John, “try it.”

“Perhaps I may,” replied Jeremiah.

It now being dark, Jeremiah locked up his books in the
iron safe, and the two friends, having bidden each other good
night, they went to their homes, resolved to profit by each
other's counsel, and we shall see in due time how they proceeded.

7. CHAPTER VII.

AS soon as Jeremiah had swallowed his tea he hastened
up to his room, and in passing through the hall he saw
the shawl and bonnet of Huldah Hogshart lying upon the
bannister, and an uncontrolable fit of lovingness coming over
him at the sight of them, he took them in his arms and stealthily
bore them off to his chamber, and having turned the
key inside, he took a pillow from his bed and dressed it up in
the habiliments of his mistress, and then drew his chair to the
side of the one on which he had placed it, with an air of the
most insinuating and seductive nonchalance; and putting his
arm in a very familiar and easy manner round the neck of his
imaginary mistress, he crossed his legs and looked round the
room very much in the style of a theatrical performer. He
was quite astonished at his own boldness, and patted the
young lady under her imaginary chin, and pressed her waist
with a freedom quite unbecoming; and then he rose from his
seat and falling upon one knee declared his love in the most
impassioned terms conceivable, and vowed that unless she
would accept him as a lover, life would lose all its attractions
and the consequences to himself would be too serious to speak
of. Then he seated himself again by her side, and in a more
subdued and respectful manner, related in a plain and business

like address the story of his affections, and reasoned with
her upon the advantages which a union would be likely to
confer upon them, throwing in a careless and unpremeditated
word about the delight of educating young souls for eternity,
and the advantage of having one's pillow smoothed in sickness
by a companion and friend through evil report and good
report. But he was suddenly startled by a slight noise as
though somebody was breathing through the key hole of his
door, and he discovered that he had been so imprudent as to
go through with his amorous performances directly in the
range of it so that anybody, and everybody, might have looked
at him if they had been disposed to do so; and the supposition
that somebody had been doing so was the most
reasonable thing in the world, for he listened with suspended
breath, and was almost certain that he heard a light footstep
retreating from his door. The thought of having been seen
in his pantomimic performances quite overcame him, and he
blushed to the very tips of his fingers. He undressed the pillow,
and while in the act of folding up the shawl, a smart tap
at the door made his blood tingle all over his body. But he
threw the bonnet and shawl hastily into his clothes-press and
opened the door.

“Good evening Mr. Jernegan,” said Mrs. Bates as she
pushed herself into his chamber,” where is your friend, Mr.
Jernegan?”

“My friend,” said Jeremiah, with the guiltiest look that
ever an innocent man wore, “what friend do you mean, Mrs.
Bates?”

“O, yes;” replied Mrs. Bates, “Mr. Pious, I understand
perfectly. Where is she?” And without further ceremony
she looked under Jeremiah's bed and was evidently astonished
at finding nobody there.

“I shall not allow such liberties in my room,” said Jeremiah
spiritedly; “what can you mean, Mrs. Bates?”

“Don't ask me for a meaning, sir,” replied the lady in a

tone of sarcasm, “but please explain yourself, sir, for introducing
a female person into your room, sir, without my permision,
sir, in my house, sir.”

“There has been no person in my room, either male or female,
to my knowledge,” replied Jeremiah calmly, “except
myself.”

“Very well, sir, very well, sir,” replied the lady; “I have
got eyes, sir, yes sir, I have got eyes, and ears too. Please remember
that, sir;”

“I shall remember it, madam, without any prompting,”
replied Jeremiah, and he was going to add that he was
aware that the lady was the possessor of a tongue as well as
eyes and ears, but it was not in his nature to say an unkind
word to anybody; so he checked himself, and again asked
Mrs. Bates to explain her conduct. But as the lady could
not consistently make an explanation, and as Jeremiah did
not in reality need one, he did not insist upon it, and the lady
withdrew herself in great confusion, which she endeavored to
hide by working herself into a great passion. As soon as she
was gone, Jeremiah sat down to consider how he might best
free himself from his difficulty; but as there was no possible
way of doing it without making a confession that he could
not persuade himself to do, he determined to deliver himself
into the hands of Fate, and meet events as they might transpire
in the best way he could.

But a new difficulty soon presented itself, which, strangely
enough, he had not anticipated. On going below he found
the whole house in a state of great excitement about Miss
Hogshart's shawl, and the young lady herself in tears. Somebody
had entered the hall while the boarders were at supper
and stolen it and her hat, although the thief had taken nothing
else, notwithstanding there were a number of coats
hanging upon the hall stand. This was the report. Jeremiah
blushed with shame, for he at once made up his mind
not to confess his guilt. And yet he hesitated upon second

thoughts, for he had to acknowledge to himself that it would
be a piece of gross dissimulation, a thing that he abhorred.
Poor Jeremiah! he had never before stood battling between
good and evil. He was in a sad perplexity, but as he could
not see that any harm could come of the business, except to
himself, he at last resolved to make a present of just such
another hat and shawl to Miss Hogshart, and keep his own
folly to himself.

Let not the reader suppose that we would justify the conduct
of Jeremiah: No. He acted a lie, and he must abide by
its consequences; what they may be, we shall ascertain bye and
bye. But let the reader bear in mind, although we would not
insinuate that he would be guilty of such a thing himself,
that a lie to screen one from ridicule is as bad as a lie to gain
anything else, even so poor a thing as money.

Jeremiah felt more guilty and shame-faced than he had ever
before felt in his life, when Huldah Hogshart thanked him
for his goodness, and extolled his generosity in the presence
of all the boarders. It is true that the shawl she had lost
could not be replaced, as Jeremiah discovered; it was of a
much finer quality and a richer pattern than any that could
be found in Broadway. How so modest a young lady as Miss
Hogshart had happened to possess a shawl of such rare
beauty, he had too much delicacy, of course, to inquire, but it
puzzled him when he thought of it, for he had never seen
her wear it before that evening.

On entering the parlor, John found his father watching
anxiously for his return, and he resolved at once to make a
full confession of the true state of his feelings in regard to
Julia Tuck; but the old gentleman immediately began to talk
about his property, and to give directions about the investment
of certain sums; and at the close of every period, just
as the young man was on the point of divulging his secret,
he would begin anew, and so the evening wore away until
it was time for bed, when just as an opportunity offered by a

lull in the old gentleman's conversation, they were startled by
a knock at the door, and directly a stout gentleman, with
glossy hair and a red face, wearing the clothes of a gentleman
but without the smallest air of one, made his appearance, and
announced himself as a police officer. His business was to
inform Mr. Tremlett that he had arrested a person who bore
a strong resemblanceto Mr. G. Washington Mortimer, the gentleman
whom Jeremiah suspected of breaking into Mr. Tuck's
house on the night of the poor man's death. John was very
much excited at this intelligence and offered to go immediately
in search of Tom Tuck, and with him and Jeremiah, go to
the house of detention to satisfy themselves whether the
prisoner were the real culprit.

Mr. Tremlett at first objected to the young man's proposition,
but at last consented, and he left the house in company
with the officer and proceeded to Mrs. Tuck's, where they
found Tom, but he refused to join them, lest he should be
tempted to do some violence to the villain. They found
Jeremiah in bed, but he immediately dressed himself and
went with them to the prison, although he declared that in
his heart he hoped it was not the right man, as he would be
extremely sorry to get the poor fellow into trouble. The
police officer said he had no doubt of it, and told Jeremiah
he was a regular wag. For which Jeremiah reproved him
and told him he made no pretensions that way.

On entering the lock-up-house, they found the prisoner
stretched at full length upon a wooden bench, with his glazed
cap for a pillow, snoring very loud and apparently enjoying a
sweet and dreamless sleep.

“My, my!” said Jeremiah, looking upon the sleeper, “that
cannot be the person.”

“What for?” said the officer.

“Surely, he could never sleep so soundly, if he had ever
injured anybody,” replied Jeremiah.

“O, no, of course not; particularly after such a tramp as I
gave him yesterday and to day,” said the police officer, who
thought that Jeremiah was giving vent to his waggishness.
“But the proof of the pudding isn't in looking at it. Come,
get up, and let's see the color of your eyes;” and without
farther ceremony he kicked over the bench and put a sudden
stop to the gentleman's snoring.

“Stop of that!” exclaimed the suddenly awakened gentleman,
“don't you know better nor to commit such an outwage
on a gentleman confined on suspicion. If you do
something of that sort again I'll make you wepent of it, mister.
See 'f I don't. I know my wights as well as another
individual.”

“What do you think of him, gentlemen?” asked the officer
“is he the man?”

“No doubt of it,” replied Jeremiah, “let us go, I do not
like this place.”

“Stop, stop,” said his companion, “I should like to inquire
after his lady. I wonder if she is as particular as ever about
her eggs.”

“Don't,” said Jeremiah, “the man has feelings, and I
would no more inflict a wound upon his mind than I would
upon his body. Let us go. I am satisfied.”

“Well, gentlemen, you'll be on hand in the morning? We
shall want your testimony, and I shall want the reward you
know.” And so they parted.

“The reward!” thought Jeremiah as he walked through the
now deserted streets, after he parted with John. “The reward!
O, is there no way for that poor man to live, but he must trade
on the crimes and sufferings of his fellow-creatures. The
reward! It is by such means then, that he buys those fine
clothes, and perhaps his wife and daughters flaunt through
the streets, and parade their silks and gew-gaws up and down
the aisles of churches, while he is prowling about in dens of
vice, and among the haunts of wretchedness and misery to

seize upon some poor wretch on whose head the law has set
a price. And he claims a reward! Perhaps this poor man
whom he has now seized was taken from the arms of an innocent
wife, or torn from shrieking children, who have never
dreamed of their father's crimes. And the Law provides no
officers for the apprehension of wrong-doers, but private citizens
must offer rewards to tempt men to act like bloodhounds
and hunt their fellow beings for the sake of gain. Ah!”—

8. CHAPTER V.

“SO, Jacobs, you have allowed yourself to be caught,” said
the elder Tuck to an individual in the city prison.
“Well, you'll be hung, as I always predicted. But don't
lay the blame upon me; I cautioned you in time.”

“Yes, a pwecious scwape you've bwought me into. But I
can pwomise you now, as I did before, I won't suffer alone,
you may put all your anxious fears to west on that gwound,”
replied the person addressed.

“Don't be insolent, Jacobs,” replied his accomplished visitor,
“or I'll leave you without another word.”

“Go, go,” said Mr. Jacobs, coolly, “and I'll take pwecious
good care you'll soon be bwought back again.”

“And what is the nature of the complaint for which you
are arrested? Is it murder, or house-breaking? or some of your
low Chatham-square practices?”

“It's not much, something about a watch, and a suspicion
of breaking into your uncle's house,” said Mr. Jacobs, “and
those two fellows are the only witnesses; but if they are not
got out of the way I'll blow you.”

“No threats you rascal. You don't deserve my commiseration
but you know I can't refuse to do a good turn even to
a fellow like you. I will take care that they do not appear
against you. But be discreet and keep your mouth shut, or
to the gallows you go.”

“I'll do my part; but I can't be left here without no
amusement. Send me a box of pwincipes and the morning
papers; and all the new novels as fast as ever they're published,
and a pwartwidge, and a charlotte wusse.”

“So, you read novels do you, you rascal?” said Mr. Tuck,
“well, that accounts for some of your villanies. I'll see that
you get some suitable books.” And he turned to go.

“Good morning to you,” said Mr. Jacobs, making a horrible
face at him as soon as his back was turned, “and don't
forget to make my wespects to Fwed.”

As Tom Tuck left the prison door, he was joined by his
brother, who had just lighted his third cigar.

“Is it him?” inquired Fred.

“Yes,” replied Tom, jerking out the word as though he
meant it should strike with force, as it did; for his brother
started and turned pale at the sound of it.

“And what did he say?” said Fred taking his brother's
arm and turning down a bye street.

“He told me to give his respects to you,” said Tom.

“Ah, he's very good. Was that all?”

“No,” replied his brother.

“And what's to be done?”

“That must be determined,” replied Tom, “But one thing
must be done, or we are undone. Jack Tremlett, and that
croaking Jeremiah must be got out of the way before to-morrow,
for then he will be examined.”

“Can't you persuade John to run away with Julia?” suggested
Fred.

“No, no, he has not much inclination for that; and if he
had, there's no need. Something must be done, and quickly
done too; I'll study it out to-day. But it's time now to
be in Wall Street. We must look after that large note to
day.”

And then the two brother's walked hastily down Broadway,
until they reached Wall street, when they followed the

tide of brokers, bank-clerks, cashiers, secretaries of insurance
companies, and a horde of mongrel money changers, attornies
and note-shavers who kept disappearing here and there, some
diving down into deep and dingy cellars and others mounting
tall stair-cases into pigeon-holes of offices in third and fourth
stories, until they reached their own proper office, when they
too popped down into a granite basement, and the living stream
continued to pour on above their heads. The office of the
Brothers Tuck would not, to the uninitiated, convey any very
magnificent ideas of business, it being a little cooped up
place with no other furniture than two painted desks, three
old arm chairs, a few steel pens, a glass inkstand, some loose
bank checks, and a profusion of cobwebs, and a small boy
with a very dirty shirt collar ostentatiously turned over his
jacket, as though dirty linen were a very pleasant thing to
feast one's eyes upon. But the denizens of Wall street care
very little for office furniture; the chief business of that street
being transacted on the side walks, and thousands, millions
even, of dollars changing hands without any such formal
records being made as the smallest transactions in a merchant's
counting room require.

The brothers Tuck understood perfectly well the importance
of appearances, and they neglected not the smallest matter
which would have an effect upon their credit. They never
spoke of their losses, but always contrived to publish their
gains; and perhaps it would not be a very gross venture to
assert that they sometimes exaggerated them. Their sole
capital when they commenced business was their relationship
to Mr. Tuck, upon which they had acquired a very extensive
credit, and entered into speculations, the particulars of
which it is not necessary at this time to notice. The brothers
had scarcely entered their office when they were visited by
young Tremlett, who called to congratulate them upon the
arrest of Mr. G. Washington Mortimer, for by that name alone
he knew their friend Jacobs, and to inquire if their sister

would remain at home during the morning, as his father had
commissioned him to inform her that her uncle's portion of
the estate of Tremlett and Tuck should be placed at her command
as soon as a division of the property could be made.

The brothers were in raptures at this last piece of information,
as they affected to be with the first, and as soon as the
young man had left their office, for the first time, perhaps, in
their lives, they embraced each other, and seemed entirely overcome
with the most delightful anticipations. Fred immediately
lighted a cigar, but Tom, who abominated tobacco,
sat down at his desk and began to foot up the columns of his
check-book, and both began to form enchanting tableaux after
their own manners, out of the materials which the communication
of young Tremlett had furnished; for they looked
upon the property of their sister as their own, feeling very
certain that if she would not yield it to them by gentle means,
that, by their mother's aid, they could force it from her; and
in the space of five minutes Tom had placed himself at the
head of half a dozen moneyed institutions, as it was the fashion
in those days to call moneyless corporations; and Fred
had read through scores of new novels, and smoked cigars
enough to stock the shop of a Broadway tobacconist.

But we will leave them to their pleasant occupation, and
follow young Tremlett on his mission to their sister. He
was fully determined to inform her, in some manner, that she
would not misunderstand, that their close intimacy must
cease, and that thence forward she must regard him only as
a friend. But when he entered the parlor of her mother's
house, he found her in tears; weeping as he believed for the
loss of her uncle, and his tender nature would not allow him
to add to her grief. Therefore, he saluted her with his accustomed
gentleness and familiarity of manner, and his kind
words and cheerful smile were the sweetest consolation that
could have been offered to her wounded feelings; for it was
not her uncle's death that caused her tears, but the reproaches

of her mother who had again been telling her that she threw
away her love upon a man who showed none for her in return.

Mrs. Tuck was one of those tender mothers who are always
seeking for an opportunity to make their children unhappy
out of pure love; and since she had discovered that
she could at any time throw her daughter into hysterics by
barely hinting that John Tremlett was indifferent to her, she
rarely allowed a day to pass by without causing her to shed
a flood of tears at least; and she had been unusually successful
this morning, the young lady having wept very bitterly
and being just on the point of convulsions when the subject
of her grief made his appearance. But at the sound of his
voice, her sobs were hushed, and one glance at his face dried
up the fountain of her tears. How could she indulge in grief
when he was by; the first and sole object of her young affections,
who had for more than ten years held entire control in
her thoughts, whether sleeping or waking, until he seemed
like a part of her own being; and every tear that she had
shed for him, and every harsh word she had endured from
her mother and brothers for his sake, had but made him dearer
to her. Her love for him had been of such long growth, beginning
in her childhood and increasing in intensity as her
person matured, that it had become to her a thing of course,
and she never dreamed that it was not ardently returned by
him, although to other eyes his attentions seemed to be rather
prompted by amiable feelings than love. He was too respectful
for a lover, too even in his temper, too easily satisfied, too
good-natured in her presence, and too content when absent.
But these things she could not see. She only saw his worth,
and knowing her own regard for him, she could not see why
he should not love her as she did him; and when her mother
told her that he did not, she attributed her mother's doubts to
family pride; she would not believe that, which to suspect,
would alone have killed her.

John had the most tender regard for her feelings, and his
respectful consideration was construed by her as a return for
the passionate fondness which she took no pains to conceal.

He was possessed of all the outward graces of person
which create a kindly and loving sympathy even before the
graces of the mind, which alone beget love, are known, and
these were heightened because he appeared entirely unconscious
of them himself; and yet he possessed that air of ease
and quiet unconcern so peculiar to those who have an instinctive
feeling that they will appear to advantage and excite
admiration let them do as they may. There was nothing
about him that reminded you of a hidden defect or an attempt
at display. If he wore his hair long, its glossy luxuriance
was a glory to his head; if he cropped it close, it displayed
his perfectly formed neck and seemed to add a new grace to
his person; if he was moved by mirth, his whole features appeared
to have gained their highest character; but when he
was depressed by sadness, you felt that his down cast eyes,
his closed lips, and the tender melancholy of his countenance
formed the expression best suited to his features; when excitement
spread the rosy glow of health upon his cheek and
he trod with buoyant step, a gentle moisture upon his fair
brow, his mouth half unclosed and his eyes sparkling with
animal life, then he appeared to shine forth in his proper form
and to exult in his strength and beauty; but look at him sitting
by the bed-side of his father with the dim rays of a
chamber-lamp feebly illuminating his pale countenance, and
making his deep blue eyes seem black as night, and his wavy
brown hair like a raven's wing, while he modestly listens to
the counsel of the old man, who detains him by needless repetition
for the mere pleasure of gazing upon him, and you
would still think that you saw him in his most fortunate
aspect.

But she possessed none of those graces of expression which,
though so worthless in themselves, are so potent in gaining

esteem, and sympathy, and even love; she was dark in complexion,
slight in her person, with thin and ill-formed lips, a
harsh voice, and eyes that were painfully brilliant, and, except
when agitated by passion her motions were languid and her
conversation spiritless. Her education had been of a kind to
heighten all the defects of her person and to strengthen all the
worst qualities of her mind; a fashionable boarding school
had enfeebled her body, and the alternate indulgence and
severity of her mother had rendered her capricious and resentful,
and the rude conduct of her brothers had compelled
her to a violence of manner which was foreign to her natural
temper.

When John told her that her uncle's portion of the estate
of Tremlett and Tuck would be placed at her command as
soon as a division of the property could be effected; she barely
replied that Mr. Tremlett was very kind but that she would
not violate her uncle's will by accepting of it before the time
appointed by him.

John looked upon her with a feeling of tender pity, for he
feared she was nursing hopes which would never be realized;
but he did not know how to undeceive her, and he left it to
time to reveal what he felt must soon be known.

“You take this news very quietly,” he said, “there are
not many young ladies who would receive such an announcement
with so little emotion.”

“Perhaps not,” replied Julia, “and I might have taken it
with more emotion myself if any one but you had made it
to me.”

“So, then, it is my little worth which makes the fortune
seem less,” said John.

“Ah, you cruel!” replied she looking reproachfully in his
face, “how you pervert my meaning. You know it is your
great worth which makes the fortune appear so little.”

“No, no, I cannot think so, although you say it. But do
you know how great the fortune is?”

“Indeed I do not care,” she said, “except for his sake
who will use it. He knows, does he not?”

“Indeed, I cannot tell,” replied John carelessly; “but I
know that whoever the user may be, he will have a noble fortune,
and I hope it will serve him as long as it took your uncle
to scrape it together.”

Julia's face turned very pale as he spoke, but it flushed
with crimson as she said with down-cast eyes and a trembling
voice, “but you know how much the fortune is, do you
not?”

“I have been told it will exceed half a million,” he replied.

“That is a very, very large sum; larger, a vast deal larger
than I ever dreamed of possessing, for my dreams have not
been encumbered with gold; but large as it is I would give
it all, yes, if it were ten times as large, to know one thing.”

“That would indeed be a costly secret,” he said laughingly,
“but a woman once gave more than that to satisfy her
curiosity.”

“Women have always paid dear enough for all they have
learned,” she replied, “but I would, besides the fortune
which my uncle's partiality bequeathed to me, give my
life.”

At this moment Mrs. Tuck entered the parlor and prevented
a catastrophe which John foresaw, from the passionate
manner of the young lady could not be prevented.

And Mrs. Tuck upon learning the cause of the young
man's visit was so overcome at the intelligence that she sat
and fanned herself with a newspaper for a long time before
she could gather breath to speak, and happily for the young
lady she attributed her agitation to excess of joy. Like her
two sons she looked upon the money as her own, counting
the real possessor as hardly entitled to a word in regard to
it. A new house filled with French furniture, a new carriage
with a footman in white top boots, new jewelry, a host

of servants and a set of plate, visits to Marquand's and Stewart's,
jaunts to the springs, and a few other trifles of a kindred
excellence flitted through her imagination, and so disordered
her vision that the furniture of the room she sat in,
and the dress that she wore seemed to contaminate her by
their touch.

John was happy of an opportunity to be gone, and seeing
that Mrs. Tuck was agitated by feelings which she was dying
to coin into words took pity upon her, and bidding the
two ladies good morning, returned to his duties at the counting
room, where we must follow him, and leave the mother
and daughter to the enjoyment of their tete a tete on their
bright prospects.

9. CHAPTER IX.

THE death of Mr. Tuck had imposed new duties upon
young Tremlett, and he was forced to confine himself
to his desk the whole day, and at dark, when he threw down
his pen and was preparing to go home, he remembered that a
foreign arrival in the morning had brought intelligence from
Captain Clearman and letters for his daughter, the young
lady in the Bowery, which he had, by some strange mistake
put into his pocket, instead of sending them to her, as he
should have done. This was very wrong, as he honestly
confessed; and to punish himself for his negligence, he resolved
to take them up into the Bowery and deliver them into
the young lady's own hands and confess his fault. It would
learn him to do better another time. So he buttoned up his
coat and hurried off on his penitential errand; but so little
like a penance did his pilgrimage into the Bowery appear to
him, that he was forced to confess he never found that famous
thoroughfare one half so pleasant before. It did, indeed, appear
to him like what its name would lead a stranger to expect,
a mossy road winding amongst venerable trees by the
green margin of crystal brooks, with climbing vines dropping
their clustered fruit around and warbling birds filling
the air with melody; instead of a cobble-paved street lighted
with gas and and filled with oyster saloons and pawnbrokers'
shops, with nothing in the world to remind one of a `bowery'

save a farmer's waggon from Westchester stopping at the
door of a feed store. But he walked on encountering many
a sad sight which gave him no sadness, and jostled by rude
passengers who could get no rudeness from him, until he
reached the little court where the old sailor lived, where
he found the quaint little garden with its two large conch
shells, and the two bits of rope with the two turks'-heads, and
the bright little brass knocker, and the yellow painted stoop
exactly as he had left them; and on entering this quiet home
he found the old man, and the old lady, and the young lady,
and the drab colored parrot, exactly as he had found them before,
excepting that they now all met him with smiling faces,
whereas before they had welcomed him with a serious and
respectful air; only poll preserved her gravity; nothing
could have induced her to unbend.

But when the letters were handed to the young lady, then
there were renewed smiles, sobered a little by a vagrant tear,
which, coming unbid, was soon dashed away, as tears should
be; and the old sailor took larger whiffs of his pipe, and the
old lady rubbed her spectacles, and Fidelia knelt down at her
grandmother's feet who read the letters aloud; and they were
all exceedingly happy at the news, and the bearer of the letters
having heard the contents, took his hat and said he must
leave them, but upon being pressed, consented to take a cup
of tea with them lest he should hurt the feelings of the old
couple; so they sat down to the same neat and well spread
board as before, the old lady again implored a blessing, and
after tea the old man told the same stories, and laughed the
same good-natured and honest laugh, Fidelia sang the same
little ballad, only with a sweeter voice and a more bewitching
smile, and afterwards the venerable old bird startled them
again with her exclamation of `let us pray;' for it appeared,
to their visitor at least, that the evening was not half spent;
and after prayer poll again pronounced her solemn amen, and
John again took his leave, more delighted than ever with
Fidelia, and resolved to see her again the very next night.

The first sight of this young lady had given him a new
taste of life, with which he was so enchanted that with all the
inconsiderateness of youth he yielded himself up to its influences
without taking a second thought about propriety, or
fitness, or prudence, or station, or age, or wealth, or any of
those numberless considerations which are known by the experienced
to be so essential to secure permanent happiness
when one makes a business of falling in love. But if he was
enchanted on his first visit he was enraptured and maddened
on the second, and instead of cooly calculating the advantages
which his prospects of wealth, his education, and his person
should entitle him to, and prudently exacting a certain
amount of family dignity, of wealth, of connections and of
personal accomplishment in exchange for them, he renounced
them all and with a total disregard of riches and position
thought of nothing but the charms of Fidelia which eclipsed
and annihilated every possible consideration, save only his
father; and but for the respect which he felt for the good
old man, he would have proposed immediate marriage to her
before he left the quiet little house. What the effect of such
a sudden and astounding proposition would have been it is
not easy to conceive, since it is very certain, from events
which afterwards transpired, that neither Fidelia nor her
grand parents had she most remote suspicion that John had
called upon them from any other than the kindest and most
respectful motives. For although it is true that she looked
upon him as the very perfection of humanity yet she could not
but consider that there was a great gulf between them which it
would require at least half a million of dollars to fill up, and
she did not even in her dreams, once fancy so wild and improbable
an event as his falling in love with her. She looked
upon him as a superior being, one whom she could venerate
and love, as she might a distant star, without a hope of
calling it her own, and therefore to be loved fervently and
ardently, without passion, or dissapointment, or jealousy.

But he had never valued himself on his prospective riches,
and therefore he did not undervalue others whose prospects
were not as bright as his own; neither had he ever been
troubled with any of those overwhelming feelings of the irresistible
charms of his own person which are common to
good looking young men of his age; and his only fear was
that he might not be acceptable to Fidelia. But it was not
in his nature to disguise his feelings long, except when the
utterance of them would cause pain, and he resolved as soon
as he reached his fathers chamber to confess to the old gentleman
the exact state of his affections, and then to make a
formal offer to the young lady herself.

But on entering his father's office he found him with an
open letter in his hand, and apparently in a state of great
perplexity.

“I am glad you have come, my boy,” said the old gentleman,
brightning up as the young man entered; “here is a
most perplexing affair, and I do not see how we are to
manage it.”

“What is it, can my advice be of any service?”

“I hardly know what to make of it,” continued Mr. Tremlett,
“here's a letter that has been brought to me this evening
but from whom I do not know, stating that our correspondent
in Charleston is on the point of failing, and that unless
I, or my partner, of whose death the writer does not appear
to have been aware, do not immediately repair to that city we
shall lose the very large amount now owing to us by him.”

“It is a very strange business, indeed,” said John, “have
you any reason to believe the statement?”

“None whatever. But you know that our correspondent,
Mr. Loudon, has property in his hands, belonging to the firm,
to a very large amount, and it will not do to trust to chance
for its security. Even though I were willing to risk my own
property I have no right to sacrifice that of my partner's representative,
so I think we must look into this business.”

“Perhaps it would be well to write to Mr. Loudon, first,”
said John, “something is due to the feelings of so old a correspondent.”

“True, true,” replied the old merchant, “but more is due
to ourselves. I have always made it a point, my son, in business
engagements, to look upon men as mere machines; feelings
are things which, you know, I never treat lightly; but,
in business they must be thrown aside. Loudon is a heavy
operator in cotton on his own account, and it is by no means
improbable that he may have ruined himself by bad speculations;
and now I think of it, his book-keeper is a Scotchman
to whom I once made a small loan when he was embarrassed,
and who afterwards carried letters of recommendation from
me to Charleston, by which means he got employment; and
it is the likeliest thing in the world that he has taken this method
of repaying the favor, for he was a grateful fellow.”

“It seems very natural,” said John, “but how are you to
avail yourself of his suggestion? You cannot leave, yourself
at this time.”

“True, true, what can be done?”

“Will it be prudent to send Jeremiah?”

“No, no, Jeremiah could not be trusted on so delicate an
errand; he is too honest and unsuspecting. Every day
something turns up to make me feel the loss of poor Mr. Tuck.”
replied the old gentleman as he put his hand to his eyes.

“Could you trust Mr. Bates?” said John.

“No, no,” replied Mr. Tremlett, “Bates would never do.
He is too precise, too exact; he would only do what he might
be instructed to do, and nothing more; but this is a case
where no instructions can be given. Crisp would not do, he
is too much of a dandy, he might be bought with a cigar and
a glass of champagne; Keckhaussen would do if he could
talk English. Let me see.”

“There is Van;” suggested John.

“Which of the Vans?” replied the old gentleman.

“Van Winkle.”

“No, no, he is too young, and if he were not, he is too
simple.”

“Could you trust to Tom Tuck?” asked John.

“I could trust to his ability, if nothing more were required;”
replied Mr. Tremlett, “but it will not do to employ a stranger
on such a business.”

“Have you no other correspondent there, whom you could
trust?”

“Yes, but not without a breach of confidence towards Loudon,
which I could not be guilty of,” replied Mr. Tremlett.
“After all, my son, I see no alternative, but for you to go on
this unpleasant business yourself.”

John bit his lip, and looked a little disconcerted, for he
had formed a plan of operations, in his own mind, for the next
fortnight, which an excursion to Charleston would completely
overthrow. In truth, we will inform the reader, as he has
a right to know, John had formed a very strong resolution, to
which he had bound himself without writing, to spend every
evening of the succeeding two weeks at the little yellow house
in the Bowery, and the few thousands of dollars owing by
the Charleston merchant appeared to him too trifling a matter
to call for such a sacrifice as he would have to make to secure
them. But he made no objections, and the old gentleman
either did not see, or would not, that his proposition was
not a very pleasant one. “You will be absent but a very
short time,” continued the fond old man, “or I would not
consent to your going; and the journey will be shorter to
you, than it will to me, for there will be novelty and excitement
to divert your attention, while I shall be left alone without
a friend to cheer me until you return.”

A second thought had worked a change in John's mind,
for he felt the unreasonableness of objecting to his father's
wishes; and he expressed a cheerful willingness to undertake
the business; although he had doubts of the necessity of the

journey. And he truly said that he felt a disinclination to
leaving the old gentleman for so long a time. But it being
a matter of urgent necessity, they both heroically agreed to
bear their temporary separation with fortitude, and made
themselves very happy in the thoughts of meeting after a
brief absence.

The old gentleman detained his son in conversation as
long as he could, but as it was necessary to make preparations
for leaving the next morning they separated at an earlier hour
than usual, and John, after he had retired to his chamber, sat
down and penned a few, but expressive lines to Fidelia, in
which he told her in simple language, without adornment or
exaggeration, that he loved her, and that on his return he
should call upon her to learn from her own lips whether or
not she could love him in return. Never before had he expressed
himself on paper so easily, so feelingly, and so much
to his own satisfaction. After he had written his letter he
read it over and over again, delighted at the true expression
of his own feelings, and wondering at his success in
a style of composition which he had then attempted for the
first time. Those who feel can write feelingly, but counterfeit
feelings on paper, like counterfeit laughter, or counterfeit
tears, affect nobody, because feelings lie deeper than the
eye or the ear, and like can only affect like; as the devil
could not tempt St. Anthony, although he has tempted so
many sham saints before and since his time, and the angel
could find shelter with no man but Lot in all Sodom because
Lot alone of all its inhabitants partook of the angel's nature.

When he had folded and sealed his letter to Fidelia, he
attempted to write to Julia, but after many attempts and great
study he was obliged to give it up, he could neither arrange
his thoughts to suit him, nor find proper words in which to
express them. Something was necessary, but he could not
write, and at last he determined to wait until his return and
then make a formal explanation to her brothers and let chance

direct him afterwards. And then he resigned himself to sleep
and forgot all his cares and anxieties and rambled, spirit-free
over the beautiful land of dreams, and his soul refreshed herself
by drinking at the fountains of living waters from which
she was exiled during her attendance upon his body, which,
while she was thus pleasantly employed, regained the vigor
and beauty it had lost during the day, and rendered itself
more worthy of her dwelling.

But his old father remained many hours in dark and silent
watchfulness, his spirit weary of his body and yet unable to
leave it; for Nature has seemingly reversed her rule of compensating
in regard to sleep, giving it in liberal measure to the
young and healthful, whose cares are few, and whose memories
are pleasant, but doling it out with a niggard hand to the
old and diseased, who have many cares they would forget, and
memories that do but sadden them.

The next morning John was up with the sun, and his preparations
being completed, he entrusted the letter for Fidelia
to the keeping of Jeremiah, from whom he exacted a promise
that he would deliver it in person to the young lady herself
that very evening, and having taken a tender leave of his
father, whose old eyes ran over with tears, for the first time
in many a long day, as he shook the young man by the hand
and in vain endeavoured to ask God's blessing upon him, he
brushed the falling drops from his own bright eyes and followed
by his servant departed upon his journey.

10. CHAPTER X.

THE good fortune which had fallen to Julia Tuck had
produced a greater change in the feelings of all her relatives
than it had in her; for although it was a source of
unspeakable joy to her to have it in her power to bestow a
fortune upon the man whom she loved above all the earth,
the fortune itself was otherwise trivial in her eyes, for she
had resolved, at the first, to use no part of it for her own gratification,
and to leave it to the generosity of her future husband
to bestow what part he chose upon her mother and brothers.
But as she had not intimated her determination to them, they
revelled in the most intoxicating anticipations of the uses to
which they would appropriate her money, and looked upon
her and her husband, whoever he might be, as persons of secondary
consideration to themselves.

Mrs. Tuck had already engaged an extra servant and
ordered a silver tea-set, and her youngest son, Fred, had sent
off his library of novels to be re-bound in green morocco; he
had bought a new gold-headed cane, a crimson satin robe-de-chambre
lined with white merino, a pair of cream-colored
horses, and had bespoke a yellow tiger. His brother Tom, who
hated ostentation in dress and furniture, had simply furnished
himself with the costliest pocket-chronometer he could find,

and in a quiet way had gone into an operation in fancy
stocks large enough to ruin the richest merchant in Wall
street. His highest ambition, and the object of all his operations,
was to gain a reputation in that particular spot; and
let not the reader accuse him of a low ambition, for Tom well
knew that a sensation in Wall street, like a throb of the heart
in the animal economy, would be felt at the extremities of the
world which bounded his vision. As his sister had not yet
come into possession of her property, it could not of course be
of any service to him in an actual operation where money
must be paid out; but the reputation of a rich relation will
enable a man to transact a very heavy business on credit,
which his character alone would not allow him to do. This
trading upon the reputation of one's friends, although practised
to a very great extent, does not seem to accord with the
cunning and cautiousness of the mercantile profession. But
merchants are like a certain species of domestic animals, whose
name it will not do to mention in this connection, that are so
suspicious, and so close; that you could not by the most artful
representations deceive them into danger, nor even induce
them to show their heads in daylight, but by the mere scent
of a piece of toasted cheese, may be lured into traps which
otherwise they could not have been persuaded to look at from
a distance.

When this amiable family assembled at their tea-table, they
seemed to be invested with new characters, every individual
with the exception of the young lady, having grown very
dignified and high minded, so much so, indeed, that they not
only exacted a more dignified bearing in others, but they displayed
their own airs with profuse liberality; even the cook
and chambermaid had caught the infection and tossed their
heads disdainfully to the servants next door.

Mrs. Tuck was continually jogging the memories of the
boys not to forget their sister, and the boys were continually
reminding each other that they took no notice of Julia, and

both of them handed her a chair together, and both of them
asked her in the same breath if they could do anything for
her in the evening, and both of them brought her a present;
Fred's, being a newly imported annual, filled with the softest
looking female nobilities conceivable, and Tom's, a gold
fillagree card-case.

These attentions appeared rather to embarrass their sister
than to please her; the rudeness with which they had formerly
treated her was not so annoying, because it was more
genuine. Nothing can make a sensitive person more uneasy
than to be treated with insincerity, because you cannot tell the
exact degree of deceit which is practised towards you, and as
you do not want to repay kind attentions with contempt, you
do not want to acknowledge yourself deceived by returning
thanks for sinister motives.

But, in the case of Julia Tuck and her brothers, there was
no need of refining upon motives, as she understood them perfectly
well, and gave them to understand that they did not
deceive her. With the second cup of tea, all the assumed
airs with which they had sat down began to wear off, and
they all gradually fell into their natural characters.

“So, they say Jack Tremlett has sloped,” observed Fred to
his brother; “do you really think he has gone to England?”

Julia turned pale and let her cup slip from her fingers.

“My son!” said Mrs. Tuck frowning upon Fred, “how
can you be so rude.”

“Fact, isn't it Tom?”

“Fred, you are a fool,” replied his brother; “young Tremlett
has gone on a short journey somewhere on business; I
believe; at least, they told me so at the counting house.”

Julia took up her cup again, but she could not carry it to
her lips, her hand trembled so violently.

“I suppose he sent you a note, sister, to advise you of the
fact?” said Fred.

“No, he did not, you know he did not,” she replied, bursting

into tears, “and he has not gone. You say so to agitate
me; but the time will come when you will not sport with my
feelings.”

“Now children,” said Mrs. Tuck in a tone of authority, “I
command you to conduct yourselves with more propriety towards
your sister; please remember, both of you, that she is
no longer a child, and that her present position entitles her to
a more respectful and affectionate manner than you have
been accustomed to show to her. Your sister is the head of
the family now.”

“Well;” said Fred, shoving his plate across the table,
“suppose she is; am I to be held accountable for the actions of
Mister Jack Tremlett? I rather guess not.”

“Now mother,” said Tom, “if you want Fred to behave,
as he should, just learn to behave yourself.”

“Come, Tom, that's piling it up a little too high;” said
Fred in a reproving manner.

“And as for you, Julia,” continued Tom, turning to his
sister, “it is time you gave up that fellow. If he has gone to
Charleston without sending you word, I'll break off the match
as soon as he comes back. Just remember, all of you, that I
have got something to say in this family.”

“If he has left without sending me word,” replied Julia,
rising from the table, “It was because he had a very good
reason for doing so, and if I do not complain, no one else has
a right to do so.”

“If he has done that, you ought to complain,” said her mother,
“O! if your poor father had ever treated me so, I would
never have seen his face again.”

“There,” said Fred, “smoke that.”

“You are determined to drive me from this house,” said
Julia, “but if you do, I will never return to it,” and so saying
she left the room.

“Now you have done it,” said Tom.

“I?” said his mother.

“Yes, you, and you,” replied Tom.

“O, my children,” replied the mother, putting her handkerchief
to her eyes.

But, before any reply could be made, the chambermaid
came running into the room and exclaimed that Miss Julia
was in convulsions, upon which they all ran out together, in
great alarm, towards the young lady's chamber. We will
leave them to finish their evening's performance; and once
more return to Jeremiah with whose adventures we propose
to draw the second book of our history to a close.

Jeremiah had parted with his young friend in the morning
with a good deal of regret, for although he was to be absent
but a fortnight, yet for that fortnight he would be wholly destitute
of a sympathetic friend; and his sources of pleasure
were too restricted, for him not to feel sensibly the removal
of even one. He did not know the exact nature of the business
which called young Tremlett away; he only knew that
it was an urgent call, and thought no more about it, but the
letter which he had entrusted to his care puzzled him sorely
because it was directed to a young lady; and as soon as his
daily work was done he hurried up into the Bowery to the
old sailor's house to deliver it according to his instructions;
with a slight hope, perhaps, that he should learn something
of its contents.

Jeremiah had never been to the house before, and it was
quite dark when he reached there; he found the old couple
seated quietly before the little grate, with their grand daughter
seated between them reading from an old book of travels.
It was a huge volume liberally illustrated with plates, and
printed in a type almost too large to allow the eye to take in a
reasonably long word at a glance; the old sailor had brought
it from London when he was a youngster, and it had been read
through by all the members of his family scores of times, and
they still found amusement in its pages.

The old couple welcomed Jeremiah very heartily, and the

young lady took his hat and reached him a chair; he en
quired if it was Miss Clearman, and, as she blushed and
answered `yes,' he reached her the letter; upon which she
blushed still deeper, and asked if it was from her father.

“I do not know,” replied Jeremiah, “but I think not.”
For he was not so slow of apprehension as not to guess at
the nature of its contents when he perceived how surpassingly
beautiful the young lady was.

“I wonder who it can be from?” said Fidelia, turning the
letter over and over in her hand, and then trying to spell out
the motto on the seal, “Who can it be.”

“Open it and see, my little daughter,” said her grandfather
“that's the way I always used to do when I got a letter from
your grandmother,” and then the old man took his pipe from
his mouth and enjoyed a quiet honest laugh, which was so
genuine and unaffected that Jeremiah laughed too, and
thought he had never seen such a humorous old gentleman
before.

“Every body always knowed my letters easy enough,”
said the old man, “for you see, Mr. Jernegan, I never spelt
a word right in my life. Nat'rally I couldn't, for I never had
but one quarter's schooling; but then I always was sure to get
letters enough in it. They warn't put together in a ship-shape
fashion; and I always write so plain that you could read my
writing across the river; and my owners always said that
they had as lief read my letters as any ship-master's in their
employ;” and then the old man let his under lip fall and
shook his old body again with another quiet explosion of
mirth, which it was impossible to see and not try to imitate.
And while he had been talking to Jeremiah, Fidelia
had opened and read her letter.

“Well, what is the news my little daughter?” said the old
man.

“Nothing,” quietly answered Fidelia, as she folded up the
letter; but her grandmother perceived that she put her hand

to her heart and stealthily drew a long sigh. And a few moments,
afterwards, when she found an excuse to leave the
room, the old lady followed after her.

“Do you know who the letter was from, Mr. Jernegan?”
asked the old man, as soon the ladies had left the room.

“It was given to me by young Mr. Tremlett,” replied Jeremiah.

“Ah, I never liked the looks of letters from young people,”
said the old man drawing a long whiff at his pipe. “I don't
suppose that Mr. Tremlett would write anything out of the
way to my grand-darter, but I never liked the looks of letters.”

“I do not know that he wrote the letter,” said Jeremiah,
“but if he did, I can assure you that it contains nothing
wrong. He is incapable of an evil thought.”

“So I told my wife,” said the old man, “after he was here
the other night; but letters have a suspicious look. I am
now rising my seventy-sixth year, and I never wrote a letter
to a young woman in my life.”

“Indeed!” said Jeremiah.

“Never, and I don't think, now, I ever shall. And what
is more, I don't owe a dollar in the world; and I never was
sued, and I never sued a man in my life; and I never in all
my going to sea, which was for more than fifty-five years,
struck a man, or called one out of his name; and to the
best of my knowledge I never wronged a living soul out of a
copper, and I never spent a shilling for my pleasure in a
foreign port, in all my rambling about.”

“That is very remarkable,” said Jeremiah.

“It was always pleasure enough for me to sit down and
think about the old woman and the children; and I knew
that they wanted all the shillings I might have to spare.”

“And I dare say you never repented of your prudence,'
said Jeremiah.

“And what is more,” continued the old sailor after having
refreshed himself with two or three long pulls at his pipe, “I

never killed but one man in my life, and that man was a
Dutchman.”

“Is it possible,” said Jeremiah, opening his eyes very wide
“that you killed a Dutchman?”

“I will tell you how it happened,” said the old man, as he
knocked the ashes from his pipe and refilled it with tobacco,
“in the year eighty-five, I was second officer of the brig Betsey
lying in the port of Archangel, waiting for a cargo of tallow
to take to London. Our first officer was a Dutchman of the
name of Scraffle, and our skipper's name was captain Paddock;
he belonged to the town of Salem, and he was the
most ill-favored dog that ever stepped on a ship's deck; which
was owing mostly to his having been kicked in the face by a
horse. One Sunday afternoon I asked leave to take the jolly
boat and go ashore; the mate was standing by at the time,
and the captain said, no, because I was too much of an old
soldier. Now that, you know, Mr. Jernegan is the worst
name that you can call a sailor-man, and I was tempted to
take the captain and throw him overboard; but I kept my
temper, and I says to him, `I will keep my hands off of you,
captain Paddock, because it would not be respectful to strike
a superior officer, but I will tell you what I will do; as soon
as we get to the States, I'll go to Salem and enquire for the
horse that kicked you in the face, and if I can find him I will
treat him to a peck of oats. With that the mate began to
laugh, and the captain began to stamp and swear; and the
more he swore the more the mate laughed, until at last he
lay down upon the deck and began to roll over and over until
he rolled down into the fore peak, and one of the sailors, which
was an Irishman, jumped on deck and called out, `sure Mr.
Scraffle is kilt entirely.' And the captain says he, `there,
you have killed the mate with your confounded nonsense,'
`well,' said I, `that is the first man I ever killed;' and it was
the last.”

“And was he really killed?” asked Jeremiah with an
alarming look.

“O, no,” replied the old man, “he made out to eat his rations
the next day. But the skipper took good care never
to call me an old soldier again.”

Fidelia and her grandmother now returned, and the remainder
of the evening was spent in agreeable conversation; and
Jeremiah had just looked at his watch and was thinking
about bidding the good old couple and their lovely grand-daughter
good night, when he was startled by the warning
voice of Poll, who exclaimed with unusual solemnity `let us
pray.'

The history of the drab parrot now had to be related, which
gave Jeremiah greater delight than any history he had ever
listened to in his life, and his feelings had become so warmly
enlisted in favor of every member of the little family that when
the old lady invited him to remain and join in their evening service,
he dropped into a chair again with a feeling of infinite gratification,
and, at the close of the prayer, pronounced an amen
in as solemn and impressive a tone as the venerable bird
herself, who, at the sound of his voice, peered over the top of
the bureau as if looking for the individual who was attempting
to disturb her prerogative.

At last when Jeremiah could not decently prolong his
visit another moment, he took his leave equally in love with
the parrot and Fidelia, and the old man and his wife. Scarcely
had the door closed upon him when Fidelia took the letter
from her bosom, and kissed it with rapturous delight, and
clasped her arms around her grand-father's neck and sobbed
for very joy. It was her hour of happiness, which,
though she were never to know another, was so full of sweetness
and bliss, that it would suffice for a long life.

Her grandfather and grandmother cautioned her against indulging
in too lively hopes, and remainded her in their plain
and honest terms of the liability of every human expectation
to be blasted. But, though she listened attentively to their
admonitions, they could not dampen her ardent feelings. She

was loved by the man whose perfections had inspired her with
a feeling of awe. It was enough. How could there be disappointments
in a world which opened upon her vision so
brightly and so alluring.

Jeremiah came out of the little court and emerged into the
Bowery in a state of most delightful agitation, and it being
very dark, and the street but imperfectly lighted, he did not
discover until he had proceeded some distance, perhaps the
length of three or four blocks, that he was followed by a female
who was trying to overtake him. As soon as he did
perceive her, he stopped, and she caught hold of his arm.

“My good woman,” said Jeremiah, “what do you want
of me?”

“O, do not call me a good woman,” said the female, “I
am a very bad woman.”

“Are you, indeed,” said Jeremiah, whose heart was touched
by such a remarkable confession; “what can I do for you?”

“O, sir,” replied the woman, who appeared young and
handsome, as the street light illuminated her face, “O, sir,
you can do nothing for me; but my poor sister is dying, and
she cannot die in peace unless some good man will pray with
her. Will you not come to her?”

“My poor friend,” said Jeremiah, “I am far from being a
good man, but if I can be of service to your sister lead me to
her.”

“O, sir,” cried the unfortunate, “your are so good, and my
poor sister will die so happy, if you will but say a good word
to her and pray for her. This way sir, this way.”

And the woman clung to his arm and hurried him along until
they came to a dark cross-street into which she turned, and,
after walking a short distance, she turned into another dark
street and soon they came to a modern built brick house with
some kind of a tree in front, and having opened the street-door
with a night key she led him up a pair of stairs through
a well furnished hall, and conducted him into a small bedroom

containing no other furniture than a bed and rocking
chair. “Sit down,” she said upon which Jeremiah seated
himself in the rocking chair and she closed the door and
locked it on the outside. “Make yourself easy until morning,”
she said, speaking to him through the key hole, “my sister
is better.”