tting. It was not until darkness had begun to settle down on the
town that the skipper returned on board, and gave him leave to go
ashore.

Ruby did not return in the little coaster in which he had left his
native place. That vessel had been wrecked not long after he joined
her, but the crew were saved, and Ruby succeeded in obtaining a berth
as second mate of a large ship trading between Hull and the Baltic.
Returning from one of his voyages with a pretty good sum of money in
his pocket, he resolved to visit his mother and give it to her. He
therefore went aboard an Arbroath schooner, and offered to work his
passage as an extra hand. Remembering his former troubles in
connexion with the press-gang, he resolved to conceal his name from
the captain and crew, who chanced to be all strangers to him.

It must not be supposed that Mrs. Brand had not heard of Ruby since
he left her. On the contrary, both she and Minnie Gray got letters as
frequently as the postal arrangements of those days would admit of;
and from time to time they received remittances of money, which
enabled them to live in comparative comfort. It happened, however,
that the last of these remittances had been lost, so that Mrs. Brand
had to depend for subsistence on Minnie's exertions, and on her
brother's liberality. The brother's power was limited, however, and
Minnie had been ailing for some time past, in consequence of her
close application to work, so that she could not earn as much as
usual. Hence it fell out that at this particular time the widow found
herself in greater pecuniary difficulties than she had ever been in
before.

Ruby was somewhat of an original. It is probable that every hero is.
He resolved to surprise his mother by pouring the money he had
brought into her lap, and for this purpose had, while in Hull,
converted all his savings into copper, silver, and gold. Those
precious metals he stowed separately into the pockets of his huge
pea-jacket, and, thus heavily laden, went ashore about dark, as soon
as the skipper returned.

At this precise hour it happened that Mrs. Brand, Minnie Gray, and
Captain Ogilvy were seated at their supper in the kitchen of the
cottage.

Two days previously the captain had called, and said to Mrs. Brand--

"I tell 'ee what it is, sister, I'm tired of livin' a solitary
bachelor life, all by myself, so I'm goin' to make a change, lass."

Mrs. Brand was for some moments speechless, and Minnie, who was
se