professional men than could get a comfortable livelihood. The
characteristics of the country and its people appeared to them extremely
coarse and terribly _'orrifying'_. Wages, they said, were no better than
those in England. Many who could have got employment preferred
travelling the country over in search of higher wages. Some, however,
went manfully to work at once. Others preferred boarding at a hotel,
living idle upon their stock of funds, waiting patiently for something
upon the wheel of fortune to turn up profitably to their own interests,
and every morning eagerly peering over the "_want advertisements_" of
the _Globe_ and _Witness_, perhaps for months, until their means became
considerably exhausted; and eventually taking a hurried departure to the
_States_, or perchance returning home, utterly disgusted with Canada and
everything connected with it, and carrying in their minds pictures of
the country delineated in the darkest colors.

We now return to our story. Frederick on his return from Tiverton went
immediately to see Clara and the child. When he had made known his
design she felt awfully chagrined at the idea of his intended "foolish
adventure," as she termed it, and also sadly disappointed when she
discovered that all those airy fabrications she had been building up
during the winter were beginning to fall.

"Why, Frederick, what do you really mean by all this?" she exclaimed.
"Do you intend leaving me unmarried and unprovided for, with my child,
to fret out a lonely, miserable existence in your absence?"

"Oh! I shall return in a few months to take you and the child to a happy
home in Canada."

"Ah, Frederick; why again tantalize me with your promises, and false