t his strong hands and strong heart had some
scope for their energies! He paused in one mighty torrent of busy faces
and eager footsteps, and despised himself for his inaction. All these
had business of one kind or other; all were earnestly intent upon their
calling; but he was a waif and a straw on the top of the tide, with
every muscle stoutly strung, and every faculty of his brain clear and
sound. Would he let the golden years of his youth slip by, without
laying any foundation for independence? Was this Civil Service
appointment worth the weary waiting? Emigration had often before
presented itself as a course offering certain advantages. Mr. Holt's
conversation had brightened the idea. For his family, as well as
for himself, it would be beneficial. The poor proud father, who had
frequently been unable to leave his house for weeks together, through
fear of arrest for debt, would be happier with an ocean between him and
the ancestral estates, thronged with memories of fallen affluence: the
young brothers, Arthur and George, who were nearing man's years without
ostensible object or employment, would find both abundantly in the
labour of a new country and a settler's life. Robert had a whole
picture sketched and filled in during half an hour's sit in the dingy
coffee-room; from the shanty to the settlement was portrayed by his
fertile fancy, till he was awakened from his reverie by the hearty
voice of Hiram Holt.

'I thought for a minute you were asleep, with your hat over your eyes. I
hope you're thinking of Canada, young man?'

Robert could not forbear smiling.

'Now,' said Mr. Holt, apparently speaking aloud a previous train of
thought, 'of all things in this magnificent city of yours, which I'm
free to confess beats Quebec and Montreal by a long chalk, nothing seems
queerer to me than the thousands of young men in your big shops, who are
satisfied to struggle all their lives in a poor unmanly way, while our
millions of acres are calling out for hands to fell the forests and own
the estates, and create happy homes along our unrivalled rivers and
lakes. The young fellow that sold me these gloves'--showing a new pair
on his hands--'would make as fine a backwoodsman as I ever saw--six feet
high, and strong in proportion. It's the sheerest waste of material to
have that fellow selling stockings.'

But Mr. Holt found Robert Wynn rather taciturn; whereupon he observed:
'I'm long enough in the world young man, to see th