t home
shortly afterwards, and settled in Yorkshire; and the other day on my
return to England, to which my ill-health drove me, I learned that my
old Colonel was really dead, and had left me a handsome legacy, with
his house in Yorkshire. I am now going down to Yorkshire to convert the
chattels into gold--to receive my money, and I shall then seek out my
good brother, my household gods, and, perhaps, though it's not likely,
settle into a sober fellow for the rest of my life.' I don't tell you,
young gentleman, that those were your father's exact words,--one can't
remember verbatim so many years ago;--but it was to that effect. He left
me the next day, and I never heard any thing more of him: to say the
truth, he was looking wonderfully yellow, and fearfully reduced. And I
fancied at the time, he could not live long; he was prematurely old, and
decrepit in body, though gay in spirit; so that I had tacitly imagined
in never hearing of him more--that he had departed life. But, good
Heavens! did you never hear of this legacy?"

"Never: not a word!" said Walter, who had listened to these particulars
in great surprise. "And to what part of Yorkshire did he say he was
going?"

"That he did not mention."

"Nor the Colonel's name?"

"Not as I remember; he might, but I think not. But I am certain that the
county was Yorkshire, and the gentleman, whatever was his name, was a
Colonel. Stay! I recollect one more particular, which it is lucky I
do remember. Your father in giving me, as I said before, in his own
humorous strain, the history of his adventures, his hair-breadth escapes
from his duns, the various disguises, and the numerous aliases he had
assumed, mentioned that the name he had borne in India, and by which,
he assured me, he had made quite a good character--was Clarke: he also
said, by the way, that he still kept to that name, and was very merry on
the advantages of having so common an one. 'By which,' he said wittily,
'he could father all his own sins on some other Mr. Clarke, at the same
time that he could seize and appropriate all the merits of all his other
namesakes.' Ah, no offence; but he was a sad dog, that father of yours!
So you see that, in all probability, if he ever reached Yorkshire, it
was under the name of Clarke that he claimed and received his legacy."

"You have told me more," said Walter joyfully, "than we have heard
since his disappearance, and I shall turn my horses' heads northward
to-morrow