regular little travelled monkey, like the one belonging to the Dutchman that we were reading about the other day which could do everything almost but speak, although I don’t think anybody would accuse you of any want of ability on the latter score, you chatterbox!”

“No, no, little mother; I think not likewise,” chuckled Eric complacently. “I’m not one of your silent ones, not so! But, hurrah!—There comes Fritz turning in under the old gateway. He said he would try and get away for half an hour in the afternoon from the counting-house to wish me another good-bye and see me off, if Herr Grosschnapper could spare him. Ah ha, Master Fritz,” shouted out the sailor lad, as his brother drew nigh, “you’re just in time to see the last of me. I thought the worthy Herr would not let you come, you are so very late.”

“Better late than never,” said the other, smiling, coming up beside the pair, who were standing in front of one of the railway carriages, into which Eric had already bundled his bag. “The old man did growl a bit about my ‘idling away the afternoon,’ as he called it; but when I impressed him with the fact that you were going away to sea, he relented and let me come, saying that it was a good job such a circumstance did not occur every day!”

“Much obliged to him, I’m sure!” said Eric, with that usual toss of his head which threw back his mane-like locks of yellow hair. “He would have been a fine old curmudgeon to have refused you leave to wish good-bye to your only brother!” And he put one of his arms round Fritz’s neck as he spoke.

“Hush, my son,” interposed Madame Dort. “You must not speak ill of the good merchant who has been such a kind friend to Fritz and given him regular employment in his warehouse!”

“All right, mutterchen, I won’t mention again the name of the old cur—, I mean dear old gentleman, little mother, there!” And then catching the twinkling eye of Fritz, the two burst into a simultaneous laugh at the narrow escape there had been of his repeating the obnoxious epithet; while Madame Dort could not help smiling too, as she gazed fondly into the merry face of the roguish boy, standing by his brother’s side and clinging to him with that deep fraternal affection which is so rarely seen, alas! in members of the same family.

Truly, they were sons of whom any mother might have been proud.

Fritz was tall and manly, by virtue of his two-and-twenty years and a small fringe of dark down that covered his upper lip; Eric was shorter by some inches, but more thick-set and with broader shoulders, predicting that he would be the bigger of the two as time rolled on.

The firstborn, Fritz, with his closely cropped hair and swarthy complexion, took after his dead father, who had been a Holsteiner—a mariner by profession, who had sailed his ship from the Elbe some years before for the last time, and left his wife to bring up her fatherless boys by the sweat of her brow and her own exertions; for Captain Dort had left but little worldly goods behind him, his all being embarked with himself in his ship, which was lost, with all hands on board, in the North Sea. Fritz and Eric had both been too young at the time to appreciate the struggles of their mother to support herself and them, until she had achieved a comfortable competency by teaching music and languages in several rich Hanoverian families; and now she had no longer to battle for her bread.

Eric took after her in face and expression, having the same light-coloured hair and bright blue eyes; but there the resemblance ceased, as hardly had he grown to boyhood than he evinced that desire for a sea life which he must have inherited with his father’s blood—he would, he must be a sailor!

Being the youngest, he naturally was her pet; and thus, although the recollection of her husband’s fate was ever before her, and Madame Dort had a dread of the sea which only those who have suffered a similar bereavement can fully understand, she could not resist the boy’s continual pleadings, backed up as they were by his evident and unaffected bias of mind towards everything connected with ships and shipping; for, Eric never seemed so happy as when frequenting the quays and talking with the sailors and sea-captains who came to the old port of Lubeck, where of late years the mother had taken up her residence, in order to be near Fritz, who had obtained a clerkship in a merchant’s house there, through the friendly offices of the parents of one of the music-teacher’s pupils.

Eric had already received his ‘sea-baptism,’ so to speak, having been on a trip to England in a Hamburgh cattle-boat, and on a cruise up the Baltic in a timber-ship; but he was now going away in a Dutch vessel to the East Indies, the voyage promising to occupy more than a year, so there is no wonder that his mother was anxious on his account, thinking she would never live to see him again. It seemed so terrible to her as she stood on the railway platform, surrounded by all the bustle and preparation of the train about to depart, to fancy, as she gazed with longing eyes at her brave and gallant Eric, with his lion-like head and curling locks of golden hair, that she might never look on her sailor laddie’s merry, loving face any more; and, tears dropped from the widow’s eyes as she drew him towards her, clasping him to her, as if she could not bear to let him go.

“Come, mother,” said Fritz, after a moment’s interval. “Time is up! The guard is calling out for the passengers to take their seats. Eric, old fellow, good-bye, and God bless you! You will write to the mother and me from every port you touch at?”

“Aye, surely,” said the boy, a sob breaking his voice and banishing the mannish composure which he had tried to maintain to the last. “Good-bye, Fritz; you’ll take care of mother?”

“Don’t you fear, that will I, brother!” was the answer in those earnest tones which Fritz always used when he was making a promise and giving his word to anything he undertook—a word which he never broke.

“And now, good-bye, mutterchen, my own darling little mother,” said Eric, clasping his mother in a last clinging hug; “you’ll never forget me, but will keep strong and well till I come back.”

“I will try, my child, with God’s help,” sobbed out the poor lady. “But, may He preserve you and bring you back safe to my arms! Good-bye, my darling. You must never forget Him or me; my consolation in your absence will be that your prayers will ascend to heaven along with mine.”

“You may trust me, mother, indeed you may. Good-bye, little mother! God bless you, mutterchen! Good-bye!” cried out the sailor lad from the carriage window; and then, the train moved off, puffing and panting out of the station, leaving Fritz and his mother standing on the platform, and waving their handkerchiefs in farewell to Eric, who was as busily engaged gesticulating, with his hat in one hand and in the other a newspaper that his brother had brought him, shouting out, ‘Lebewohl!’—a sobbing farewell it was—for the last time, and still waving adieux when his voice failed him!

“Never mind, my mother,” said Fritz softly, giving his arm to the heart-stricken lady, and leading her away with tender care from the railway station to their now sadly bereaved home. “Cheer up, and hope, mutterchen! You have a son still left you, who will never desert you or quit his post of looking after you, till Eric, the dear boy, comes back.”

“I know, my son, I know your love and affection,” replied Madame Dort, pressing his arm to her side affectionately; “but, who can tell what the future may have in store for us? Ah, it’s a wise proverb that, dear son, which reminds us that ‘man proposes, but God disposes!’”

“It is so,” murmured Fritz, more to himself than to her; “still, I trust we’ll all meet again beneath the old roof-tree.”

“And I the same, from the bottom of my heart!” said his mother, in