“True! true! Very likely,” cried Charles, going to the window to look at a regiment of dragoons galloping through the town; “but I have other employment for my eyes. Do look at those fine fellows who are galloping by! Did you ever see a handsomer uniform than the colonel’s? And what a fine horse! ‘Gad! I wish I had a commission in the army: I should so like to be in his place this minute.” “This minute? Yes, perhaps, you would; because he has, as you say, a handsome uniform and a fine horse: but all his minutes may not be like this minute.” “Faith, William, that is almost as soberly said as my old uncle himself could have spoken. See what it is to live shut up with old folks! You catch all their ways, and grow old and wise before your time.” “The danger of growing wise before my time does not alarm me much: but perhaps, cousin, you feel that danger more than I do?” “Not I,” said Charles, stretching himself still farther out of the window to watch the dragoons, as they were forming on the parade in the market-place. “I can only say, as I said before, that I wish I had been put into the army instead of into this cursed cotton manufactory. Now the army is a genteel profession, and I own I have spirit enough to make it my first object to look and live like a gentleman.” “And I have spirit enough,” replied William, “to make it my first object to look and live like an independent man; and I think a manufacturer, whom you despise so much, may be perfectly independent. I am sure, for my part, I am heartily obliged to my uncle for breeding me up to business; for now I am at no man’s orders; no one can say to me, ‘Go to the east, or go to the west; march here, or march there; fire upon this man, or run your bayonet into that.’ I do not think the honour and pleasure of wearing a red coat, or of having what is called a genteel profession, would make me amends for all that a soldier must suffer, if he does his duty. Unless it were for the defence of my country, for which I hope and believe I should fight as well as another, I cannot say that I should like to be hurried away from my wife and children, to fight a battle against people with whom I have no quarrel, and in a cause which perhaps I might not approve of.” “Well, as you say, William, you that have a wife and children are quite in a different situation from me. You cannot leave them, of course. Thank my stars, I am still at liberty, and I shall take care and keep myself so: my plan is to live for myself, and to have as much pleasure as I possibly can.” Whether this plan of living for himself was compatible with the hopes of having as much pleasure as possible, we leave it to the heads and hearts of our readers to decide. In the mean time we must proceed with his history. Soon after this conversation had passed between the two partners, another opportunity occurred of showing their characters still more distinctly.