market-garden?"

"If I'm not mistaken, Tom, that's my uncle's plantation."

"With all my heart, Mas'r Harry; but choked as I am with thirst I should
like one of them pumpkins or some of the other outlandish fruits. Let's
have a pen'orth, sir. My! what a sight though! I hope this is the
spot. But there, only look, Mas'r Harry, did you ever see such
sparrows? Look at the colour of 'em! If I don't take home a cageful,
and one of them red and yaller poll-parrots, I don't stand here now.
But are you sure your uncle Reuben lives here, Mas'r Harry?"

"I think this must be the spot, Tom," I said, "according to the guide's
description."

"Why, he must be quite a lord, sir. He's never touched taller or soap
in his life, I'll bet. But, say, Mas'r Harry, we look rough uns to go
and see him, don't us?"

I laughed and then led the way, Tom following close behind, till we
entered a sort of court-yard surrounded by sheds, with men and women
busily at work at what I afterwards learned was the preparation of the
cocoa.

"And you're Harry Grant then, are you?" said a tall, brown-skinned man,
who was pointed out to me as the owner of the place, and who, upon my
introducing myself, received me with a hearty English grip of the hand.
"Hang it, my lad, it brings old times back to see a face fresh from
home! You're your mother's boy plain enough. But come in, and welcome,
my lad, though we have been in a bit of a stew; my girl upset in a canoe
and half drowned; but the gentleman with her saved her. She's not much
the worse for it, though."

I turned round hastily and just in time to stop Tom, who was about to
blurt out the whole affair, for I thought it better to be silent, I
hardly knew why, my mind being just then in a state of confusion, it
being rather startling to find that I had probably been the means of
saving the life of my own cousin; though why the gentleman who was with
her--whoever he might be--should have the credit of what Tom and I had
done, I did not know. Anyhow, I was to be beneath the same roof, and I
thought matters would come right in the end.

My uncle led the way into a cool half-darkened room, where I was
introduced to an aunt, of whose existence I was not aware, inasmuch as
she was the lately married widow of a neighbouring planter. Then I
heard my uncle say:

"Not lying down, Lill? All right again? Glad of it! Well, this is a
cousin for you, and I hope you will be good friends."

I hard