Chapter LIX: Conclusion

Such were my adventures in the lands of snow and sunshine--the latitudes of ice and fire!

On the 17th of December, exactly nine months after the day on which Hartly and I had sailed through the Narrows of St. John, we found ourselves bowling along the crowded and busy streets of London in a hackney cab, with our African canoe--all the property we possessed--lashed on the roof thereof.

We separated for a time at the Bank; he to look after another ship, and I--like he of old, who came to the husks and the swine trough--to return to my father's house at Peckham (a tamer and wiser youth than when I left it) and to the circle of my family, who had long since gone into mourning for me.

I am delighted to add that my worthy Robert Hartly soon got another vessel. As sole survivors of the crew of the _Leda_, we obtained, after a world of trouble with the Red-tapists of the Circumlocution Office, the 500_l._ offered by the Governor of Newfoundland for the destruction of the _Black Schooner_.

My share I made over to Hartly, who invested it in the capital of his new owner.

He still preserves, with religious care, the ring of old Mother Jensdochter; and undeterred by all he has undergone, sails from Blackwall for China on the 10th of next month.

THE END.