portant matters at the most unsuitable times and in the most
ridiculous manners. At all events Robin Wright, while stumbling among
the rocks and rugged ground of that midnight march in Mull, dripping wet
and with the elements at war around him, conceived the idea of declaring
his unalterable, not to say unutterable, attachment to Letta Langley,
who leant heavily on the arm of her preserver. But Robin was intensely
sensitive. He shrank from the idea, (which he had only got the length
of conceiving), as if it had been a suggestion from beneath. It would
be unfair, mean, contemptible, he thought, to take advantage of the
darkness and the elemental noise to press his suit at such a time. No,
he would wait till the morrow.

He did wait for the morrow. Then he waited for the morrow afterwards,
and as each morrow passed he felt that more morrows must come and go,
for it was quite obvious that Letta regarded him only as a brother.

At last, unable to bear it, our unhappy hero suddenly discovered that
one of the morrows was the last of his leave of absence, so he said
good-bye in despair, and parted from his companions, who could not
resist the genial hospitality of their new friends in the cottage on the
west of Mull.

Ten days later Sam got a letter from Robin, telling him that he had
received a cable-telegram from India, from their friend Redpath,
offering him a good situation there, and that, having reached the lowest
depths of despair, he had resolved to accept it, and was sorry he should
not have an opportunity of saying good-bye, as he was urged to start
without a day's delay.

Sam was staying with his friends at the Oban Hotel at the time, having
at last managed to tear himself away from the cottage in Mull.

He instantly ran out and telegraphed--

"Don't accept on any account."

Then he sought Mrs Langley, and opened Robin's case to her. Mrs
Langley listened with a smile of intelligence, and soon after went to
her daughter's room, the window of which commanded a splendid view of
the western sea.

"Letta, dear, are you moralising or meditating?"

"Both, mamma."

"Well, I will try to help you," said Mrs Langley, seating herself by
the window. "By the way, did you hear that Mr Wright has been offered
a lucrative appointment in the Telegraph Department of India, and is
going off at once;--has not time even to say good-bye to his old friend
Sam Shipton?"

Letta turned very pale, then extremely red, then