cling and cluster round his heart; and many a story and
anecdote did he relate about these, especially during the Christmas
season of each year, to his old master and to Nancy Briggs, in the log
homestead of Ontario.

Nancy was a waif, who had been sent out by the same thin little old lady
who had sent Jack out. She was very pretty, and possessed of
delightfully amiable domestic qualities. She grew up to be a very
handsome girl, and was a very bright sunbeam in the homestead. But Jack
did not fall in love with her. All unknown to himself his heart was
pre-occupied. Neither did Nancy fall in love with Jack. All
unwittingly she was reserving herself for another lot. Of course our
hero corresponded diligently with the thin little old lady, and
gladdened her heart by showing and expressing strong sympathy with the
waifs of the great city; more than once, in his earlier letters,
mentioning one named Bob Snobbins, about whose fate he felt some
curiosity, but in regard to whose home, if such existed, he could give
no information.

Twice during those years Jack also wrote to the Grove family; but as he
received no answer on either occasion, he concluded that the father must
have been drowned, that old Nell was dead, and the family broken up.
Need we add that the memory of his dear mother never faded or grew dim?
But this was a sacred memory, in regard to which he opened his lips to
no one.

At last there came a day when John Matterby, being in the prime of life,
with ample means and time to spare, set his heart on a holiday and a
visit to the old country--the thin little old lady being yet alive. It
was not so easy, however, for our hero to get away from home as one
might imagine; for, besides being a farmer, he was manager of a branch
bank, secretary to several philanthropic societies, superintendent of a
Sunday-school, and, generally, a helper of, and sympathiser with, all
who loved the Lord and sought to benefit their fellow-men. But, being a
man of resolution, he cut the cords that attached him to these things,
appointed Miss Briggs to superintend the Sunday-school in his absence,
and set sail for England--not in a steamer, as most rich men would have
done, but in a sailing ship, because the vessel happened to be bound for
the port of Blackby, the home of his childhood.

It was winter when he set sail, and the storms of winter were having
high jinks and revels on the deep in the usual way at that season of the