But there was no proof of it, and, of course, for a time, hopes were entertained that she might be heard from.

Long after the last real chance had utterly vanished, I pleased myself with the fond illusion that somewhere on the waste of waters she was still floating, and there were YEARS during which I never heard the sound of the great guns booming inland from the Navy-yard without saying to myself, "The Wasp has come!" and almost thinking I could see her, as she rolled in, crumpling the water before her, weather-beaten, barnacled, with shattered spars and threadbare canvas, welcomed by the shouts and tears of thousands.
This was one of those dreams that I nursed and never told.

Let me make a clean breast of it now, and say, that, so late as to have outgrown childhood, perhaps to have got far on towards manhood, when the roar of the cannon has struck suddenly on my ear, I have started with a thrill of vague expectation and tremulous delight, and the long-unspoken words have articulated themselves in the mind's dumb whisper, THE WASP HAS COME! -- Yes, children believe plenty of queer things.

I suppose all of you have had the pocket-book fever when you were little ?--What do I mean?
Why, ripping up old pocket-books in the firm belief that bank-bills to an immense amount were hidden in them .-- So, too, you must all remember some splendid unfulfilled promise of somebody or other, which fed you with hopes perhaps for years, and which left a blank in your life which nothing has ever filled up .-- O.

T.quitted our household carrying with him the passionate regrets of the more youthful members.