84 "SUSPENSE."
in the southern seas; but a boat's-load of the crew, among
whom was the junior lieutenant, had managed to land on an
uninhabited island, and make good a living there for four
dreary months. If I had only got Flora with me," Harry
wrote in the letter-in which he was at last able to announce
his rescue, and in which he sought to make light of the hard-
ships he and his companions had undergone-to his father and
mother, the old lass would have found plenty to do among
the rabbits and a kind of partridge. She would have been
invaluable, if her very value had not proved the ruin of her,
and if she had not fallen a victim to her general gaminess, as
other poor beggars were like to do; but that is all over now."
 When the castaway men were at last taken off the island,
it was by a foreign ship that carried them thousands of miles
out of their track; but the sufferers had been treated with
every attention and kindness by good Samaritans in the
guise of Brazilian sailors, and by the time Harry's letter
should reach the parsonage, to disperse any little anxiety that
might be entertained there, the writer would be far on his
way home.
 Mrs. Bloomfield had enough spirit to undertake a journey
to Portsmouth, in order to be the first of all the friends
who accompanied her to greet her son. Her husband was
not able to escort her; he waited placidly with Flora, satisfied
to be taken to the railway station to meet the appointed train.
 I need not say that the old dog was an object of great
interest, while she comported herself with her own exemplary
sobriety. If she had an intuition that her master was on the
road, she did not betray it on this occasion. She had no call
to announce to the idle world of Rushbrook-and it was