"'You must pardon all my rudeness,' he said, in a shamefaced manner. 'But, to be very candid with you, I was never met so boldly before, and I like it. We men of the world hate nothing so much as a coward. If some of your brethren had the courage of their convictions and challenged us poor devils boldly, things might be different. We like men to show that they believe in Hell by trying to keep us from it.' But now I am sounding my own praises. It is enough to say that he promised to think the matter over; and I clinched the whole business by getting his promise that he would be at the altar on Christmas morning." I thought a good deal, and said: "It is a wholesome lesson. We have no scruple in cuffing Jem Deady or Bill Shanahan; but we don't like to tackle the big-wigs. And they despise us for our cowardice. Isn't that it? Well, my dear fellow, you are a [Greek: tetragônos anêr], as old Aristotle would say,--an idea, by the way, stolen by Dante in his 'sta come torre ferma.' In plainer language, you're a _brick_! Poor little Bittra! how pleased she'll be!" CHAPTER XIV FIRST FRIDAYS I notice, as I proceed with these mnemonic scraps from my diary, and try to cast them into shape, a curious change come over me. I feel as one waking from a trance, and all the numbed faculties revive and assert their power; and all the thoughts and desires, yea, even the capabilities of thirty years ago, come back and seem to claim their rightful places, as a deposed king would like to sit on his throne, and hold his sceptre once more before he dies. And so all my ideas are awakening; and the cells of memory, as if at some magic _Sesame_, yield up their contents; and even the mechanical trick of writing, which they say is never fully lost, appears to creep back into my rheumatized fingers as the ink flows freely from my pen. I know, indeed, that some say I am passing into my second childhood. I do not resent it; nor would I murmur even at such a blessed dispensation. For I thank God I have kept through all the vicissitudes of life, and all the turbulence of thought, the heart of a little child.