Out in the battle-field, where the city streets are full of eager soldiers; out where the fray is fiercest, the fire strongest; out where life is not a tranquil dream, but a mad struggle; where men go to their long rest not rusted, but worn; where the night’s slumber is short, and the day’s labour long; out where as iron sharpeneth iron, so doth the face of a man his friend;—there is the only place for energies to be aroused and genius developed, for profitable work to be accomplished, for life’s best lessons to be learned. Thus, at least a dozen times a day, Arthur Dudley, owner of “The Hollow,” is in the habit of expressing himself; and yet you know, as you look in his face, that he is a man whose energy is not to be depended on, whose genius even to a stranger seems problematical; who has never practically conjugated the word “work;” who could not be an apt pupil in any of life’s many schools, no matter who were his teachers, no matter what his opportunities. A handsome man if you will, with his thick brown hair, with his soft, silky moustache, with his kindly-blue eyes, with his regular delicately-cut features, and yet many a plainer face might better, I should imagine, win and retain a woman’s love. His body, like his mind, lacks thews and sinews. He is not one of whom you dare prophecy that God, giving him health and ordinary success, he would climb high. Rather he is one of those of whom you might safely predict, that if he attempted to climb at all, he would fall back grievously worsted. There are some people who seem to be mentally surefooted; and there are others who find every step to fortune so slippery, that giving them time enough, they are certain ultimately to get their necks broken in attempting the ascent. But, under the shelter of his own trees, what can Squire Dudley need with strength beyond that wherewith nature has provided him? It is for men to have their way to make that bone and muscle, an iron will, a ready wit are needful; and all the fields you have surveyed, all the broad meadows, all the rich pastures came to him, not because of the strength of his own right hand, or because of the capacity of his own brain, but simply because his father had owned Berrie Down Hollow before him, and left it to his eldest son. “What could any human being desire more?” friend and stranger, looking over the property, were wont mentally to ask themselves; for the world knew that Squire Dudley was a dissatisfied and discontented man.