delay--a delay occasioned by stress of weather on the Atlantic, and
the state of the roads in the valley of the Mohawk, on the journey
from the seaboard. He had lost not an hour, the young man said, in
obeying the summons of his father, the Commodore, to quit England and
return to his Canadian home ere his much-loved mother passed from the
earth.

Eager to reach that home, which was on the shores of Lake Simcoe, the
young Cadet bade the old servitor hasten to get their horses ready
when they would instantly set forth. As they were about to mount, the
younger of the two was accosted by an old friend, now an attache of
Government House, who, learning of the arrival of the packet, and
expecting the young master of Pine Towers, had strolled down to the
landing-place to welcome the newcomer and ask him to partake of the
Governor's hospitality. The young man, however, begged his friend to
have him excused, and with dutiful messages of respect for the
Governor and his household, and a cordial adieu to his former
boon-companion, he rapidly set off for home, closely followed by his
attendant.

Coming up the old military road, cut out between York and Holland
Landing by His Majesty's corps of Queen's Rangers, under the _regime_
of Governor Simcoe, both horsemen fell into a brief silence, broken by
sorrowful inquiries from the younger man regarding the subject which
lay so close to the heart of each. "Dying!" he exclaimed in deep
sadness, and with the utter incapacity of young and ardent life to
conceive the reality of death. "And my own mother. It seems natural
enough for other mothers to die--but mine! Heaven help us! We never
know the meaning of grief until it comes to our own threshold."