It is difficult to explain how that good fellow was affected by the news. He had the warmest personal regard for Frank, loving him with something of paternal fondness; he had always impressed him with the propriety of marriage, and had looked forward with real anxiety to the time when he should see his friend settled for life. Not until then, he thought, would those talents which he knew Frank possessed enable him to take his proper position in the world: what he did now was well enough; but it was merely the evanescent sparkle of his genius. Soberly settled down with a woman worthy of him, the real products of his intellect and his reading would come forth, and he would step into the first rank of the men of his time. And now it had all come to this! Frank was married; but he had made a wrong selection, and was a moody, discontented, blighted man. The aspect of affairs was horrible; and when told of their real condition by his wife, George Harding determined that he would exercise his prerogative of friend, and speak to Churchill on the subject. Accordingly the next day when he saw Frank at the usual consultation at the office, Harding waited until the other man had left the room, and then, placing his hand affectionately on his friend's shoulder, said: "I want two minutes with you, Frank." "Two hours, if you like, Harding; it's all the same to me," replied Churchill wearily. "I want you to tell me what ails you,--what has worked such a complete change in you, physically and morally; or rather, I don't want you to tell me, for I know." Churchill looked up defiantly with flushed cheeks, as he exclaimed, "What do you know? are my private affairs topics for the tittle-tattle of--there, God help me! I'm weak as water. Now I want to quarrel with my best friend!" "No, you don't, old man; and you would get no quarrel out of me, if you wished it ever so much. But I can't bear this any longer; I can't bear to see you losing your health and your spirits; and wearing yourself out day by day as you are, without coming to the rescue. Let us look the matter boldly in the face at once. You're--you're not quite happy at home, Frank, eh?" "Happy!" he echoed, with a strange hollow laugh; "no, not entirely perhaps."