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of the younger men to try their hands at the mine, and at last, at the beginning of the second year, they began to wander up, in twos and threes, to ask for employment at Hungry Hill, but even so, the animosity against the mine remained.
    No, it had not been easy, thought John Brodrick, and indeed it was a relief sometimes to get away from Clonmere and across the water to Bronsea, and so up to the cheerful, homely farmhouse of Lletharrog that he had bought for his daughters, where they would spend two or three months of the winter now, every year. Henry’s dream had been realised, and he had visited Paris, Brussels, and Vienna, while John was still reading for the Bar in Lincoln’s Inn.
    It was during the autumn of 1825, when the family had been settled in Lletharrog since August, that John Brodrick had a letter from an anonymous correspondent in Doonhaven. The writing was smudged and practically illegible, but the message ran: “You’d do well to come home if you wish to stop trouble.” The letter was addressed to the shipping-office in Bronsea, and he put it in his pocket and forgot all about it. A week later, when one of his ships, the Henrietta, docked at Bronsea with her shipment of copper, John Brodrick remembered the letter, and as a matter of curiosity showed the message to the master of the vessel. The man looked thoughtful, and did not speak for a moment or two.
    “You have not heard from Captain Nicholson, then, Mr. Brodrick?” he said at last.
    “No, not since the first of the month, when he writes as a matter of course. Why? Is anything wrong?”
    “Maybe he did not wish to cause you anxiety.
    There’s little to go upon anyway. No, sir, I’m wondering whether the letter you have there refers to the losses they have had lately at the mine.”
    “Losses? What losses?”
    “I cannot tell you a great deal about it, sir, having only been in Doonhaven for this shipment, and we were loaded and away in four days. But there’s stuff being taken into Slane and Mundy and other places along the coast, that doesn’t find its way into your vessels, and is not handled by Captain Nicholson or by us.”
    “How do you know this?”
    “Two or three of Captain Nicholson’s own men were speaking of it, sir. The ore is taken up from the mine right enough, but it’s when it is above ground that the mischief starts. I understand that Captain Nicholson is to order some system of watching by night, for it is then that the stuff must be taken away, but whether he has done so or not I cannot say.”
    “Is the matter discussed at all in Doonhaven?”
    “Not directly, sir. But I had the feeling that the people knew about it all the same.”
    John Brodrick thanked the master of the Henrietta, and, ordering his carriage, drove back to Lletharrog, resolved to write to Nicholson that evening and demand an immediate explanation. The letter was never posted, for the very next day there arrived a letter from the mining captain himself, written in great haste and obviously in a state of extreme agitation.
    “A system of plunder is in progress,” he wrote, “that, if it continues, will eventually put a stop to our work. Little by little I have noticed losses of material that was stacked above ground, ready for shipment, but two days ago a large consignment disappeared, over which I had stationed a watch, for I had my suspicions that the theft took place after dark. The man in charge-one of my own people, a Cornishman named Collins-was found in the small hours of the morning with a broken head, and is not likely to recover. It seems he was struck from behind, and saw nothing of his assailant. This attack has so intimidated the rest of his fellows that I am having difficulty in getting men to undertake sentry duty at all, and some of them are even talking of packing their things and returning to Cornwall with their families.”
    John Brodrick read the letter aloud to his daughters and announced his intention of travelling home to