h respectable
people. Your mother and I will see you as soon as you come out of
prison; not at Battersby--we do not wish you to come down here at
present--but somewhere else, probably in London. You need not shrink
from seeing us; we shall not reproach you. We will then decide about
your future.

"At present our impression is that you will find a fairer start
probably in Australia or New Zealand than here, and I am prepared to
find you 75 or even if necessary so far as 100 pounds to pay your
passage money. Once in the colony you must be dependent upon your own
exertions.

"May Heaven prosper them and you, and restore you to us years hence a
respected member of society.--Your affectionate father, T. PONTIFEX."

Then there was a postscript in Christina's writing.

"My darling, darling boy, pray with me daily and hourly that we may
yet again become a happy, united, God-fearing family as we were before
this horrible pain fell upon us.--Your sorrowing but ever loving
mother, C. P."

This letter did not produce the effect on Ernest that it would have done
before his imprisonment began. His father and mother thought they could
take him up as they had left him off. They forgot the rapidity with
which development follows misfortune, if the sufferer is young and of a
sound temperament. Ernest made no reply to his father's letter, but his
desire for a total break developed into something like a passion. "There
are orphanages," he exclaimed to himself, "for children who have lost
their parents--oh! why, why, why, are there no harbours of refuge for
grown men who have not yet lost them?" And he brooded over the bliss of
Melchisedek who had been born an orphan, without father, without mother,
and without descent.

CHAPTER LXVIII

When I think over all that Ernest told me about his prison meditations,
and the conclusions he was drawn to, it occurs to me that in reality he
was wanting to do the very last thing which it would have entered into
his head to think of wanting. I mean that he was trying to give up
father and mother for Christ's sake. He would have said he was giving
them up because he thought they hindered him in the pursuit of his truest
and most lasting happiness. Granted, but what is this if it is not
Christ? What is Christ if He is not this? He who takes the highest and
most self-respecting view of his own welfare which it is in his power to
c