“I have seen a child get angry with his toys—his top or his ball, when it would not spin or bound as he wished it—and vent his anger by destroying them, when it was only his own lack of judgment and skill that prevented his enjoying them. I suppose it was that same trait in me, only in tenfold degree, that has made me wish to destroy every one who opposed or disappointed me in my schemes or ambition.” He paused a moment, and Earle watched him curiously. He had never heard anything so strange before. “Had I lived for ten, twenty, or even forty years more, I suppose I should have gone on in the same way,” Mr. Dalton resumed. “I suppose as long as I knew you were enjoying the position and possessions I had so coveted, I should have continued to hate you, and striven to do you injury. But my hatred can do you no further harm now, nor me any good where I am going; neither money nor position, the two things that I have most coveted all my life, can benefit me further. I have never believed in a God, have tried to believe that man was like the brutes, and consequently must get all the enjoyments possible out of this life; but now that I have come to this”—lifting his wasted hand and regarding it with a strange expression of wonder, and perplexity, and regret—“I do not feel quite so confident that God and eternity are not solemn truths. That the mind is something greater than the body, and will probably exist in another state, I am at last convinced; but I have no time to discuss metaphysics now. My life has been a failure, for I have missed _everything_ for which I sought most eagerly. I have never known what it is to be really happy. I have done a great deal of evil, and I do not know a single human being that is better for my having lived in the world. The only good thing that I can think of connected with myself is, that no one will sorrow or be made unhappy by my death;” and the smile that accompanied these words was intensely bitter. “I have told you how I disliked you from the first, simply because Richard Forrester was interested in you, and I was jealous of any one who was likely to win anything from him. You know how I scorned you because Editha took a girlish fancy to you, and you dared to treat her as if you considered yourself her equal. I was so angry that day in court that I could have blotted you out of existence had I possessed the power, and throttled her when she stood up so fearlessly in that crowded room and asserted your innocence. I was afraid she would learn to love you, and persist in marrying you. I knew that Richard Forrester was rich, and that she would have all his money; but I meant she should get more, by making a wealthy marriage. The more _she_ had, the more I thought _I_ should have, and stand the higher in the world for it.”