"'Hermione,' he cried, 'you have disobeyed me. You have insulted my guest, and you have shaken the hopes which I thought I had a right to form, being your father and the author of your being. I said if you did this you should suffer, but I mean to give you one more chance. Mr. Harding was startled rather than alienated. If you show yourself in future the amiable and sensible woman which you can be, he will forget this foolish ebullition and make you the offer his passion inspires. This would mean worldly prosperity, social consideration, and everything else which a reasonable woman, even if she has been disappointed in love, could require. While for me--you cannot know what it would be for me, for you have no capability for appreciating the noble study to which I am devoted.' "'No,' I said, hard and cold as adamant, 'I have no appreciation for a study which, like another Moloch, demands, not only the sacrifice of the self-respect, but even the lives of your unhappy children.' "'You rave,' was his harsh reply. 'I offer you all the pleasures of life, and you call it immolation. Is not Mr. Harding as much of a gentleman as Dr. Sellick? Do I ask you to accept the attentions of a boor or a scape-grace? He is called a very honorable man by those who know him, and if you were ten times handsomer than you are, ten times more amiable, and had no defect calculated to diminish the regard of most men, you would still be scarcely worthy to bear the name of so wealthy, honorable, and highly esteemed a young man.' "'Father, father!' I exclaimed, scarcely able to bear from him this allusion to my misfortune. "'Why he has taken such a sudden, and, if I may say it, violent fancy to you, I find it hard to understand myself. But he has done this, and he has not scrupled to tell me so, and to intimate that he would like the opportunity of cultivating your good graces. Will you, then--I ask it for the last time--extend him a welcome, or must I see my hopes vanish, and with them a life too feeble to survive the disappointment which their loss must occasion.' "'I cannot give any sort of welcome to this man,' I returned. 'If I did, I would be doing him a wrong, as well as you and myself. I dislike him, father, more than I can make you understand. His presence is worse than death to me; I would rather go to my coffin than to his arms. But if I liked him, if he were the beau-ideal of my dreams, could I break the vow I made one day in your presence? This man is not Dr. Sellick; do not then seek to make me forget the oath of isolation I have taken.' "'Fool! fool!' was my father's furious retort. 'I know he is not Dr. Sellick. If he were I should not have his cause to plead to _you_.' "How nearly his secret came out in his rage. 'If I could make you understand; make you see----' "'You make me see that I am giving you a great and bitter disappointment,' I broke in. 'But it only equalizes matters; you have given me one.'