spatched him on a mission of importance
to Mozambique, after which, before returning here, he was again to go to
the Mauritius. This was many months ago. Not a line have I had from
him, nor can I obtain the slightest information as to what has become of
him. He is not a good correspondent, as I daresay you have discovered.
After he left his ship, he took it into his head that his family would
consider that he had disgraced them, and begged that I would allow him
to call himself by a different name, hoping if he did not write home
that he might be considered dead, and be soon forgotten. I did not
oppose his fancy, because I hoped that he would soon reason himself out
of it. This will account for your not having heard of him, as also for
your father's not receiving any information when he wrote about him.
Had he written to me, poor man, I would have replied, and might have
perhaps induced the lad to return home. However, let bygones be
bygones. I am pleased with you, Ralph. I like your notion of coming
out to look for poor Alfred, and your way of proceeding, and I will help
you by all the means in my power."

"Thank you, sir; thank you for all you say of me and promise to do," I
replied, taking my grandfather's hand. "Now that I find you do not know
where Alfred is, the necessity of my searching for him is greater than
ever. I feel that I hitherto have not been as diligent in carrying out
my object as I ought to have been. I was always buoyed up with the idea
that you knew where Alfred was to be found, and was much less anxious
than I should have been had I known the true state of the case."

"It is happy for you that you did not know the true state of the case;
it is better for all of us that we do not know what the future may bring
forth," observed my grandfather. "When you were at the Mauritius, it
appears Alfred had not reached the island, and I shall hear on our
arrival at Trincomalee whether he has since got there. I expect also to
receive replies to various inquiries I have instituted in different
places, from Aden down the whole of the eastern coast of Africa. I have
traced him as far as Aden, but I do not know the name of the vessel in
which he left that place. I feel confident that he did not go up the
Red Sea, nor is he likely to have come eastward again. You have thus,
then, a definite direction in which to search for him. Rather a wide
region, certainly, and difficult of access, but by persev