“Both dead, did you say? Your mother dead? For her sake I chiefly longed to return to England; and she gone, boy! Do you know who I am? I am your uncle! Did you ever hear of your uncle, Tom Sedgwick, the naturalist?”
“Indeed I have,” I answered. “And I heard that he had gone away, long ago, to the Eastern Seas, and was supposed to have lost his life.”
“That was but natural enough, as I did not appear,” answered Mr Sedgwick. “But it is very wonderful that you should have come to the very place where I have been so long living apart from my fellow-creatures. And your sister, what is her name?”
I told him.
“And the other little girl, is she a relation? for I have no difficulty in distinguishing which is my niece.”
“No; she is Captain Davenport’s daughter,” I answered.
“A nice, pretty little girl. But Emily—I must see Emily again.”
I ran to call her. She came down trembling; for she had often heard our mother speak of our uncle, and for her sake had longed to see him. Mr Sedgwick pressed her fondly in his arms.
“Yes, you are the very image of your mother,” he said, looking in her face again and again.
Thus, for some time, we sat talking of the past, rather than the present.