The doctor shook him cordially by the hands, declaring that he was the first student he ever knew to get his diploma at the end of only three years' study. Clara, amid smiles and blushes, congratulated him. And Mrs. Rocke, as soon as she had him alone, threw her arms around his neck and wept for joy. A few days Traverse gave up solely to enjoyment of his friends' society, and then, growing restless, he began to talk of opening an office and hanging out a sign in Staunton. He consulted the doctor upon this subject. The good doctor heard him out and then, caressing his own chin and looking over the tops of his spectacles, with good-humored satire, he said: "My dear boy, you have confidence enough in me by this time to bear that I should speak plainly to you?" "Oh, Doctor Day, just say whatever you like!" replied the young man, fervently. "Very well, then. I shall speak very plainly--to wit--you'll never succeed in Staunton! No, not if you had the genius of Galen and Esculapius, Abernethy and Benjamin Rush put together!" "My dear sir--why?" "Because, my son, it is written that 'a prophet hath no honor in his own city!' Of our blessed Lord and Saviour the contemptuous Jews said, 'Is not this Jesus, the carpenter's son?'" "Oh, I understand you, sir!" said Traverse, with a deep blush. "You mean that the people who used some years ago to employ me to put in their coal and saw their wood and run their errands, will never trust me to look at their tongues and feel their pulses and write prescriptions!" "That's it, my boy! You've defined the difficulty! And now I'll tell you what you are to do, Traverse! You must go to the West, my lad!" "Go to the West, sir--leave my mother--leave you--leave"--he hesitated and blushed. "Clara? Yes, my son, you must go to the West, leave your mother, leave me and leave Clara! It will be best for all parties! We managed to live without our lad, when he was away at his studies in Washington, and we will try to dispense with him longer if it be for his own good." "Ah, sir; but then absence had a limitation, and the hope of return sweetened every day that passed; but if I go to the West to settle it will be without the remotest hope of returning!" "Not so, my boy--not so--for just as soon as Doctor Rocke has established himself in some thriving western town and obtained a good practice, gained a high reputation and made himself a home--which, as he is a fast young man, in the best sense of the phrase--he can do in a very few years--he may come back here and carry to his western home--his mother," said the doctor, with a mischievous twinkle of his eyes. "Doctor Day, I owe you more than a son's honor and obedience! I will go wherever you think it best that I should," said Traverse, earnestly.