“Humility!” said he, bursting into a bitter laugh,--“you know the man well! Humility! there are not ten noblemen in Ireland this minute has the pride and impudence of that man. If you saw the way he walked down the steps to his carriage, giving a little nod here, and a little smile there,--maybe offering two fingers to some one of rank in the crowd--you'd say, 'There's a Prince coming home to his own country,--see how, in all their joy, he won't let them be too familiar with him!'” “Are you quite just--quite fair in all this, dearest papa?” “Well, I suppose I'm not,” said he, testily. “It's more likely the fault lies in myself,--a poor, broken-down country gentleman, looking at everything on the dark side, thinking of the time when his own family were something in the land, and Mr. Davenport Dunn very lucky if he got leave to sit down in the servants'-hall. Nothing more likely than that!” added he, bitterly, as he walked up and down the little room in moody displeasure. “No, no, papa, you mistake me,” said she, looking affectionately at him. “What I meant was this, that to a man so burdened with weighty cares--one whose brain carries so many great schemes and enterprises--a sense of humility, proud enough in its way, might naturally mingle with all the pleasures of the moment, whispering as it were to his heart, 'Be not carried away by this flattery, be not carried away by your own esteem; it is less you than the work you are destined for that men are honoring. While they seem to cheer the pilot, it is rather the glorious ocean to which he is guiding them that they address their salutations.' Might not some such consciousness as this have moved him at such a time?” “Indeed, I don't know, and I don't much care,” said Kellett, sulkily. “I suppose people don't feel, nowadays, the way they used when I was young. There's new inventions in everything.” “Human nature is the same in all ages!” said she, faintly. “Faith, and so much the worse for it, Bella. There's more bad than good in life,--more cruelty and avarice and falsehood than there's kindness, benevolence, and honesty. For one good-natured act I 've met with, have n't I met twenty, thirty, no, but fifty, specimens of roguery and double-dealing. If you want to praise the world, don't call Paul Kellett into court, that's all!” “So far from agreeing with you,” cried she, springing up and drawing her arm within his, “you are exactly the very testimony I'd adduce. From your own lips have I heard more stories of generosity--more instances of self-devotion, trustfulness, and true kindness--than I have ever listened to in life.” “Ay, amongst the poor, Bella,--amongst the poor!” said Kellett, half ashamed of his recantation.