quite sharp enough
to estimate the danger of losing sight of one who was in possession of
all their secrets, and who could at any moment lay his finger upon
every hiding-place in their district.

Adam himself had often listened to--and, in company with others,
silently commended--a story told of years gone by, when a brother of
the owner of the Stamp and Go, one Herkles Johns, had been pressed into
the king's service, and had there acquitted himself so gallantly that
on his return a commission had been offered to him, which he, longing
to take, accepted under condition of getting leave to see his native
place again. With the foreboding that the change of circumstances would
not be well received, he seized the opportunity occasioned by the joy
of his return to speak of the commission as a reward offered to him,
and asked the advice of those around as to whether he had not best
accept it. Opposition met him on every side. "What!" they said, "of his
own free will put himself in a place where some day he might be forced
to seize his father's vessel or swear away the lives of those he had
been born among?" The bare idea was inadmissible; and when, from asking
advice, he grew into giving his opinion, and finally into announcing
his decision, an ominous silence fell on those who heard him; and,
though he was unmolested during his stay, and permitted to leave his
former home, he was never known to reach his ship, aboard which his
mysterious disappearance was much talked of, and inquiries set afloat
to find out the reason of his absence; but among those whose name he
bore, and whose confidence he had shared, he seemed to be utterly
forgotten. His name was never mentioned nor his fate inquired into; and
Adam, remembering that he had seen the justice of this treatment, felt
the full force of its reasoning now applied to his own case, and his
heart sank before the difficulties in which he found himself entangled.

Even to Eve he could not open out his mind clearly, for, unless to one
born and bred among them, the dangers and interests of the free-traders
were matters quite beyond comprehension; so that now, when Eve was
pleading, with all her powers of persuasion, that for her sake Adam
would give up this life of reckless daring, the seemingly deaf ear he
turned to her entreaties was dulled through perplexity, and not, as she
believed, from obstinacy.

Eve, in her turn, could not be thoroughly explicit. There was a
skeleton cupb