And the young people settled down, far from the excitements and cares of that business life which Gervase had evaded so successfully, in what is perhaps the most enjoyable of all the ordinary paths of modern existence. All paths of existence are tolerable when people are young and happy and not badly off, though it is not always that these favourites of fortune recognise the fact. Gervase had been one of the most obstinate in his struggle against it, and the most determined to have his own way. Perhaps he considered now that his happiness was owing to the persistence with which he had struggled for his own way. At all events, he had the grace to be very happy, and grumbled no more. He was not indeed a person of literary genius, but he was a man with a subject, which in many cases answers better, as a means of acquiring reputation at least. He had studied very closely, during his forced residence there, the conditions of the West Indian islands. It is a subject of which there are but few qualified exponents. He had seen a great deal of all classes, from the impracticable negro to the demoralised Englishman. Agents, lawyers, all the curious insular community had revealed themselves to him. His experience and his observations were both to be respected, and gave him authority. And he thus acquired rapidly--much more rapidly than had he been a man of genius--a certain recognised position and reputation. He had his subject, in which he was competent to criticise the very first of fine writers, and even with the aid of facts to put him down.