A Bartered Birthright A Bartered Birthright After debating the matter for ten years or so, John Hertford had made up his mind to adopt St. Petersburg as a place of residence, and was now on his way back to New York, to order his affairs to that end. He was not rich, but then he was not extravagant, and his moderate income was more than sufficient for the wants of a man who had no one dependent on him, and who had entirely made up his mind not to marry. He had been in love more than once in his life, and yet, ardent as his feelings had been for the objects who aroused that emotion in him, he had never had quite the feeling to make him long to call any woman his wife. The truth was owned to himself in his secret heart--that word “wife” possessed for him a significance which involved so much that he had often wondered, in early youth, if he could ever actually find, in one personality, all the qualities of mind and heart and person which he looked for. In maturer years, he had quite satisfied himself that the idea was absurd. So he abandoned his youthful dreams, without any great ado, especially as he had found that life had certain positive compensations for their loss. He made up his mind, however, that he could not accept less than his ideal in marriage, and so, with more or less contentment, he had shaped his life to the demands and dimensions of a bachelor existence, and was looking forward with pleasure to the more deliberate and satisfactory settlement of himself and his belongings at the brilliant capital on his return. He was not indolent, and his taste for art, music and literature gave him plenty of occupation to diversify the life of social pleasure in the midst of which he had cast his lines. He was a very popular man, and yet one could hardly tell exactly why it was that men and women, and even children, liked him so. His face was strong and interesting rather than handsome, and his figure active and powerful rather than elegant. He had no especial charms of manner, except a supremely winning trait of gentleness, which would have made the eternal happiness of his wife--had there been such a being! He was not looking forward with much pleasure to his visit to his native country, and had bound himself by the severest obligations to be back in a very short time; and now, on the first day out on his ocean voyage, he found himself wishing that the trip to New York was over, and that he was going back. There would be so many changes among his old friends--so many reminders of the painful fact that youth was passing--a thing he could ignore much better in Russia than in his own land!