A RAY OF HOPE. 407 " What makes you so sad, mamma ? " asked Jack. " I was thinking of your father, my child," she answered ; " would you not iike to see him ? " '* Yes, yes ; îs he coming hère ? "
- No, my boy, he must not corne hcre."
- Then iet us take Dick, and Tom, and Hercules, and go
to him." Mrs. Weldon trîed to conceal her tears.
- Hâve you heard from papa ?"
•* No." " Then why do you not wrîte to hîm ?"
- Write to him ? " repeated hîs mother, " that îs the vcry
thing I was thinking about." The child little knew the agitation that was troubling her mind. Meanwhile Mrs. Weldon had another înducemcnt which she hardly ventured to own to herself for postponing her final décision. Was it absolutely impossible that her libération should be effected by some différent meàns altogether ? ' / A few days prevîously she had ovcrhcard a conversation outside her hut, and over this she had found herself cort- tînually pondering. Alvez and one of the Ujiji dealers, discussîng the future prospects of their business, mutually agrced in denouncing the efforts that were beîng made for the suppression of thé slave-traffic, not only by the cruisers on the coast, but by the intrusion of travellers and missionaries into the in- .terior. Alvez averred that ail thèse trdublesomc visitors ought to be exterminàted forthwith. "But kill one, and another crops up," rcplicd the dealer.
- Yes, their exaggerated reports bring up a swarm of
them," said Alvez. It scemed a subject of bitter complaînt that the markcts t)f Nyangwé, Zanzibar, and the lake-district had becn invaded by Speke and Grant and others, and although they congratulated cach other that the western provinces
