himself somewhat by abusing this gentleman when he saw no friend of the
absent one near, but he will likely look the next time before he speaks,
and now,' said he, taking his hat, 'once more I apologize and express my
regret at having been forced to disturb you, but I feel that you will
easily forgive me under the circumstances,' and dear uncle, what do you
think, but every man there shook him by the hand and stroked him on the
shoulder, speaking his praises loudly and all they knew of the
chivalrous stranger was that he was a transient guest at the house, who
was passing through Dublin on his way farther south, and that his name
was 'Edgeworth.' So is this not an exciting piece of news, dear uncle;
think while you are living placidly in America, your wrongs are being
enthusiastically righted in the old world."

Henry Rayne laid down the letter and looked steadily into the fire. What
a torrent memory had let loose upon him! he lived the old years all over
again, he saw the dear familiar scenes buried in the half-burned coals,
the smiling associations of the past. "Poor Bob" he said, "and I have
never seen him once in all these years, to think he should have stood by
me now as he did that day at college when I punished that rascal
Tremaine. How I wish I could find him out! good honest friend that he
is, can I ever repay him, I wonder, for this noble action done me?" Here
Rayne lost himself in a long reverie, he went over the days of his
boyhood again, and as he thought, a smile half sad stole over his face,
and in the end a tear was actually glistening in each eye. It was the
old old story over again, memory weeping over dead joys, experience
sighing for the happy long ago. The same influence was upon him now as
guided the pen of Blair when it wrote "How painful the remembrance of
joys departed never to return," and as inspired Byron when he sighed
"Ah, happy years! once more who would not be a boy?"