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16, 1863.]

“ Hardy, old boy! is that you or your ghost? I thought you were in Australia still. Glad to see you!” cried a frank, cheery voice from among the crowd of passengers mounting the slimy seaward steps of the Admiralty Pier at Dover. The French packet, very full and rather late, had just come in, and was disgorging its passengers. A number of lookers-on had gathered, as usual, to scan the pale and rueful faces of the new arrivals, and I, a visitor at the Lord Warden Hotel, and much in want of occupation, had joined the lookers-on.

I turned to the left, and was confronted by a bronzed, soldierly-looking man in a laced cap and a cloak of foreign cut, and whose left hand was encumbered by a very diplomatic-looking despatch-box, while his right hand was extended towards me—a Queen’s messenger, evidently.

But so long a time had passed since our last meeting, and so many new faces had come under my notice, that my recognition of the stranger was not immediate, causing the latter to exclaim, rather reproachfully: