he is a melancholy object; a reg'lar Settler in every respect. There's
house with a winder, but I am afraid of their being proud. I don't know
whether a door ain't too aristocratic; but here goes for the first one!'

He went up to the nearest cabin, and knocked with his hand. Being
desired to enter, he complied.

'Neighbour,' said Mark; 'for I AM a neighbour, though you don't know me;
I've come a-begging. Hallo! hal--lo! Am I a-bed, and dreaming!'

He made this exclamation on hearing his own name pronounced, and finding
himself clasped about the skirts by two little boys, whose faces he had
often washed, and whose suppers he had often cooked, on board of that
noble and fast-sailing line-of-packet ship, the Screw.

'My eyes is wrong!' said Mark. 'I don't believe 'em. That ain't my
fellow-passenger younder, a-nursing her little girl, who, I am sorry to
see, is so delicate; and that ain't her husband as come to New York to
fetch her. Nor these,' he added, looking down upon the boys, 'ain't them
two young shavers as was so familiar to me; though they are uncommon
like 'em. That I must confess.'

The woman shed tears, in very joy to see him; the man shook both his
hands and would not let them go; the two boys hugged his legs; the sick
child in the mother's arms stretched out her burning little fingers, and
muttered, in her hoarse, dry throat, his well-remembered name.

It was the same family, sure enough. Altered by the salubrious air of
Eden. But the same.

'This is a new sort of a morning call,' said Mark, drawing a long
breath. 'It strikes one all of a heap. Wait a little bit! I'm a-coming
round fast. That'll do! These gentlemen ain't my friends. Are they on
the visiting list of the house?'

The inquiry referred to certain gaunt pigs, who had walked in after him,
and were much interested in the heels of the family. As they did not
belong to the mansion, they were expelled by the two little boys.

'I ain't superstitious about toads,' said Mark, looking round the room,
'but if you could prevail upon the two or three I see in company, to
step out at the same time, my young friends, I think they'd find the
open air refreshing. Not that I at all object to 'em. A very handsome
animal is a toad,' said Mr Tapley, sitting down upon a stool; 'very
spotted; very like a partickler style of old gentleman about the throat;
very bright-eyed, very cool, and very slippy. But one sees 'em to the
best advantage out of doors perha