ever since I lost him?' An't my heart been heavy and watchful always, along of him and you? Sleeping and waking, an't I been upon my post, and wouldn't I scorn to quit it while this here Midshipman held together!'

`Yes, Captain Cuttle,' replied Walter, grasping his hand, `I know you would, and I know how faithful and earnest all you say and feel is. I am sure of it. You don't doubt that I am as sure of it as I am that my foot is again upon this door-step or that I again have hold of this true hand. Do you?'

`No, no, Wal'r,' returned the Captain, with his beaming face.

`I'll hazard no more conjectures,' said Walter, fervently shaking the hard hand of the Captain, who shook his with no less good-will. `All I will add is, Heaven forbid that I should touch my uncle's possessions, Captain Cuttle! Everything that he left here, shall remain in the care of the truest of stewards and kindest of men--and if his name is not Cuttle, he has no name! Now, best of friends, about--Miss Dombey.'

There was a change in Walter's manner, as he came to these two words; and when he uttered them, all his confidence and cheerfulness appeared to have deserted him.

`I thought, before Miss Dombey stopped me when I spoke of her father last night,' said Walter, `--you remember how?'

The Captain well remembered, and shook his head.

`I thought,' said Walter, `before that, that we had but one hard duty to perform, and that it was, to prevail upon her to communicate with her friends, and to return home.'

The Captain muttered a feeble `Awast!' or a `Stand by!' or something or other, equally pertinent to the occasion; but it was rendered so extremely feeble by the total discomfiture with which he received this announcement, that what it was, is mere matter of conjecture.

`But,' said Walter, `that is over. I think so no longer. I would sooner be put back again upon that piece of wreck, on which I have so often floated, since my preservation, in my dreams, and there left to drift, and drive, and die!'

`Hooroar, my lad!' exclaimed the Captain, in a burst of uncontrollable satisfaction. `Hooroar! hooroar! hooroar!'

`To think that she, so young, so good, and beautiful,' said Walter, `so delicately brought up, and born to such a different fortune, should strive with the rough world! But we have seen the gulf that cuts off all behind her, though no one but herself can know how deep it is; and there is no return.'

Captain Cuttle, without quite understanding this, greatly approved of it, and observed in a tone of strong corroboration, that the wind was quite abaft.

`She ought not to be alone here; ought she, Captain Cuttle?' said Walter, anxiously.

`Well, my lad,' replied the Captain, after a little sagacious consideration. `I don't know. You being here to keep her company, you see, and you two being jintly'

`Dear Captain Cuttle!' remonstrated Walter. `I being here! Miss Dombey, in her guileless innocent heart, regards me as her adopted brother; but what would the guile and guilt of my heart be, if I pretended to believe that I had any right to approach her, familiarly, in that character--if I pretended to forget that I am bound, in honour, not to do it?'

`Wal'r, my lad,' hinted the Captain, with some revival of his discomfiture, `an't there no other character as'