“There, forgive me once more, and let me try if I cannot amend a temper that any but yourself had grown weary of correcting. I'll work--I'll labor--I'll submit--I'll accept the daily rubs of life, as others take them, and you shall be satisfied with me. We shall go back to all our old pursuits, my dear Billy. I'll join all your ecstasies over Æschylus, and believe as much as I can of Herodotus, to please you. You shall lead me to all the wonders of the stars, and dazzle me with the brightness of visions that my intellect is lost in; and in revenge I only ask that you should sit with me in the studio, and read to me some of those songs of Horace that move the heart like old wine. Shall I own to you what it is which sways me thus uncertainly,--jarring every chord of my existence, making life a sea of stormy conflict? Shall I tell you?” He grasped the other's hand with both his own as he spoke, and, while his lips quivered in strong emotion, went on:-- “It is this, then. I cannot forget, do all that I will, I cannot root out of my heart what I once believed myself to be. You know what I mean. Well, there it is still, like the sense of a wrong or foul injustice, as though I had been robbed and cheated of what never was mine! This contrast between the life my earliest hopes had pictured, and that which I am destined to, never leaves me. All your teachings--and I have seen how devotedly you have addressed yourself to this lesson--have not eradicated from my nature the proud instincts that guided my childhood. Often and often have you warmed my blood by thoughts of a triumph to be achieved by me hereafter,--how men should recognize me as a genius, and elevate me to honors and rewards; and yet would I barter such success, ten thousand times told, for an hour of that high station that comes by birth alone, independent of all effort,--the heirloom of deeds chronicled centuries back, whose actors have been dust for ages. That is real pride,” cried he, enthusiastically, “and has no alloy of the petty vanity that mingles with the sense of a personal triumph.” Traynor hung his head heavily as the youth spoke, and a gloomy melancholy settled on his features; the sad conviction came home to him of all his counsels being fruitless, all his teachings in vain; and as the boy sat wrapped in a wild, dreamy revery of ancestral greatness, the humble peasant brooded darkly over the troubles such a temperament might evoke. “It is agreed, then,” cried Massy, suddenly, “that we are to accept of this great man's bounty, live under his roof, and eat his bread. Well, I accede,--as well his as another's. Have you seen the home they destine for us?”