ve to be the man these poor souls are searching
for.'

"`Let him be called on deck, and we will see if they acknowledge him as
their son,' said Sir Harry. `There must be many hundred David Campbells
in the world, I suspect, so do not raise their hopes too high by letting
them know that at all events we know the name on board.'

"`David Campbell! David Campbell!' was passed along the decks, and in a
minute a fine active young fellow came tumbling up from below.

"A mother's eye was not to be deceived. She knew him in an instant, and
toddled off as fast as her legs would carry her, followed by her
husband, to meet him. `He is, he is my ain bairn! There's none like
him!' she cried; and not caring a fig for the officers and men standing
around,--before even he knew who she was,--she had him clasped in her
arms, and was covering his cheeks with kisses, while the old father had
got hold of his hand and was tagging away at it just as a man in a hurry
does at a bell-rope.

"Now comes the extraordinary part of the story. Campbell had been
rather a wildish sort of a chap, and getting into some scrape, had gone
on board a tender, at Leith I think it was, and entered the navy. He
could not write, and was ashamed to get any one to write for him, so his
old father and mother did not know where he was, or whether he was alive
or dead.

"At last their hearts grew weary at not hearing tidings of him, and they
resolved to set out together to look out for their lost sheep; for you
see they were decent people and well to do in the world, so they had
money to bear the expense, which was not slight. They had very little
information to guide them. All they knew was, that their son had gone
on board one of the King's ships. A mother's deep love and a father's
affection was the only compass by which they could steer their course.
That did not fail them. They went from port to port, and visited every
ship in harbour, and asked every seaman they met about their son, but
nothing could they hear of him. At last, that very morning, a waggon
had brought them to Poole, and seeing a ship in the offing, which was no
other than the _Royal Charlotte_, they had got a boatman to take them
out to us.

"That, now, is what I call a providential circumstance; indeed, from all
I have seen and learned since I came into the world, I am convinced that
there is nothing happens in it by chance. The God of heaven orders all
for the best in kindness