As a result of this meeting an audience was arranged for him and his friends next day with the President, who heard them with great civility, though he gave them no assurance that he would accept their views, and furnished no clew to lead them to think they had made any impression at all. They came away, therefore, somewhat downcast. Before the Southerners left for home, Senator Rockfield called on Dr. Cary and, taking him aside, had a long talk with him, explaining somewhat the situation and the part he had felt himself compelled to take. He wound up, however, with an appeal that Dr. Cary would not permit political differences to divide them and would allow him to render him personally any assistance that his situation might call for. “I am rich now, Cary,” he said; “while you have suffered reverses and may have found your means impaired and yourself at times even cramped. (The Doctor thought how little he knew of the real facts.) “It is the fortune of war, and I want you to allow me to help you. I suppose you must have lost a good deal?” he said, interrogatively. A change passed over the old Doctor’s face. Reminiscence, pain, resolution were all at work, and the pleasant light which had been there did not return, but in its place was rather the shade of deepened fortitude. “No,” he said, quietly. “‘War cannot plunder Virtue.’ I have learned that a quiet mind is richer than a crown.” “Still, I know that the war must have injured you some,” urged the Senator. “We were chums in old times and I want it to be so now. I have never forgotten what you were to me, and what I told my wife of your influence on me was less than the fact. Why, Cary, I even learnt my politics from you,” he said, with a twinkle in his eye. Dr. Cary thanked him, but was firm. He could think of nothing he could do for him. “Except this: think of us as men. Come down and see for yourself.” “Still practising Plutarch,” said the Senator. “Well, the time may come, even if it has not come yet, and I want you to promise me that when it does, you will call on me—either for yourself or any friend of yours. It will be a favor to me, Cary,” he added, with a new tone in his voice, seeing the look on the Doctor’s face. “Somehow, you have turned back the dial, and taken me back to the time when we were young and fresh, and full of high hopes and—yes—aspirations, and I had not found out how d—d mean and sordid the world is. It will be a favor to me.” “All right, I will,” said the Doctor, “if my friends need it.” And the two friends shook hands. So the Commission from the old county returned home.