I do not get safely through this business, you are the next heir."

"It is curious news to hear, at a dinner in Burma," Stanley said,
thoughtfully. "At any rate, I can assure you honestly that the news
gives me no particular satisfaction. I suppose it would be a nice
thing, to come in for a peerage; but my prospects out here are
good. I have no intention of staying in the army, after the end of
the war; and am really in partnership with my uncle, with whom I
have been for the last three years in business, which is turning
out very well. I like the life, and have every chance of making
enough to retire on, with ample means. Certainly, I should not like
to come into the title by the death of anyone that I knew."

"That is the fortune of war," the other said, smiling. "We get our
steps by death vacancies. We are sorry for the deaths, but the
steps are not unwelcome.

"By the way, my name is Harry. I know that yours is Stanley. I vote
that we call each other by them. We are cousins, you know, and I
suppose that as you are my heir, you must be my nearest male
relation, at present; so I vote that we call each other by our
Christian names, instead of Brookeing each other, always."

"I shall be very glad to do so," Stanley said, cordially. "I hope
that we shall be close friends, as well as distant relations."

Then, as there was a momentary lull in the conversation, Harry
raised his voice and said to the colonel:

"A very curious thing has just happened, Colonel. Brooke and myself
have just discovered that we are cousins and, what is still more
curious, that if anything happens to me, he takes my place as next
heir to my uncle, a fact of which he was entirely ignorant."

"That is certainly a very curious coincidence, Brooke; very
singular. Then you have not met before?"

"I did not even know of his existence, Colonel; and had, indeed, no
idea that Captain Brooke, his father, had been married. The
cousinship is a distant one; but there is no question, whatever, as
to his being next in succession to myself to the peerage."

The discovery excited general interest; and quite turned the
conversation, for the time, from the subject of the war and of
their approaching advance. After dinner was finished, many of the
officers gathered round Stanley, asking him questions about the
nature of the country, and his experiences as a captive in the
hands of the Burmese. Presently Colonel Adair, who had also dined
at the mess, join