December's sky is chill and drear, December's leaf is dun and sere; No longer Autumn's glowing red Upon our forest hills is shed; No more beneath the evening beam The wave reflects their crimson gleam; The shepherd shifts his mantle's fold And wraps him closely from the cold: His dogs no merry circles wheel, But shivering follow at his heel; And cowering glances often cast As deeper moans the gathering blast. --_Scott._ "Ah what is good must be worked for," wrote the wisest of our sages. Ishmael felt the truth of this, and worked hard. His first success at the bar had been so brilliant as to dazzle and astonish all his contemporaries; and upon the fame of that success he prospered exceedingly. But Ishmael well knew that if it needed hard work to win fame, it needed much harder work to keep it. He felt that if he became idle or careless now, his brilliant success would prove to be but a meteor's flash, instead of the clear and steady planet light he intended it to become. He read and thought with great diligence and perseverance; and so he often found a way through labyrinths of difficulty that would have baffled any less firmly persistent thinker and worker. And thus his success, splendid from the first, was gaining permanency every day. His reputation was established on a firm foundation, and be was building it up strongly as well as highly. Strangers who had heard of the celebrated young barrister, and had occasion to seek his professional services, always expected to find a man of thirty or thirty-five years old, and were astonished to see one of scarcely twenty-two. Ishmael was very much admired and courted by the best circles of the Capital; but, though eminently social and affectionate in his nature, he entered only moderately into society. Devotion to company and attention to business were incompatible, he knew. If there ever happened to be an alternative of a tempting evening party, where he might be sure of meeting many congenial friends on the one hand, and an impending case that required careful preparation on the other, you may rely on it that Ishmael sacrificed pleasure and gave himself up to duty. And this he did, not occasionally, but always; in this way he earned and retained his high position. And, ambitious young reader, this is the only way. Thus in useful and successful work Ishmael employed the autumn that Claudia in her distant home was wasting in idleness and repinings. On the first Monday in December Congress met, as usual. And about the middle of the month the Supreme Court sat. Therefore Ishmael was not very much surprised when one morning, just after he had brought a very difficult suit to a triumphant termination, he saw his friend Judge Merlin enter his private office.