Nothing could seem more prosperous than my friend Morier’s career; but few people knew how utterly miserable he really was. He had one son, in many respects the very image of his father, a giant in stature, very handsome, and most attractive. In spite of all we said to him he would not send his son to a public school in England, but kept him with him at the different embassies, where his only companions were the young attachés and secretaries. He had a private tutor, and when that tutor declared that young Morier was fit for the University, his father managed to get him into Balliol, recommending him to the special care of the Master. He actually lived in the Master’s house for a time, but enjoyed the greatest liberty that an undergraduate at Oxford may enjoy. His father was wrapped up in his boy, but at the same time tried to frighten him into hard work, or at least into getting through the examinations. All was in vain; young Morier was so nervous that he could never pass an examination. What might be expected followed, and the father had at last to remove him to begin work as an honorary attaché at his own embassy. I liked the young man very much, but my own impression is that his nervousness quite unfitted him for serious work. The end was beyond description sad. He went to South Africa in the police force, distinguished himself very much, came back to England, and then on his second voyage to the Cape died suddenly on board the steamer. I have seldom seen such utter misery as his father’s. He loved his son and the son loved his father passionately, but the father expected more than it was physically and mentally possible for the son to do. Hence arose misunderstandings, and yet beneath the surface there was this passionate love, like the love of lovers. When I saw my old friend last, he cried and sobbed like a child: his heart was really broken. He went on for a few years more, suffering much from ill health, but really killed at last by his utter misery. I knew him in the bright morning of his life, at the meridian of his great success, and last in the dark night when light and life seems gone, when the moon and all the stars are extinguished, and nothing remains but patient suffering and the hope of a brighter morn to come.