How many before and since have been like him! How many have turned obstinately from the pleasant easy path of safety and contentment, to reach wildly at the impossible, scaling the slippery crag just so high as shall dash them to pieces in their fall! There are spirits that seem ever destined to be striving after the unattainable, doomed in a punishment more cruel than that of Tantalus to thirst for a _mirage_ that is never even within the bounds of hope. Be it love, wealth, ambition, their craving seems to be in its very nature insatiable, and, perhaps, even were the wildest and most extravagant of their desires to be granted, they would but turn aside indifferently, as if success must needs be loathsome, and long incontinently for something else that could never be their own. It is well for the philosopher who has learned to create for himself his life’s essentials. Blessed is the barmecide who can make believe that the tasteless water from his earthen pitcher is a draught of nectar from a cup of gold. But woe to the sanguine enthusiast who cannot be convinced that ‘half a loaf is better than no bread;’ the fool who shouts--‘all or none,’ for his war-cry, while he runs a tilt against the invincible windmill of conventionalism, and getting, as he deserves, none instead of all, has every bone in his body broken into the bargain for his pains. Mary Hamilton pleaded for dear life; far dearer, indeed, was that life to her than her own. James Geddes, hearing her sobs and broken accents, became so importunate at the door of the cell, that one or two drunken soldiers from the guard-room, aroused by the noise, came loitering down the dungeon stair; and, at the same moment, Ogilvy, not in the best of humours, returned from his rounds, and the last chance was gone for evermore. Whether the captain had met with any disappointment in visiting the different posts under his charge, or whether he had reason to suppose that his midnight walk was to be more agreeable than usual, and felt aggrieved to find its dulness unrelieved by any variety, it is not our province to inquire; but he certainly showed more zeal for discipline than on his departure, and entering Chastelâr’s cell in person, after kicking poor Geddes away with a bitter curse, ordered the maid-of-honour imperatively to be gone, and summoned two of the soberest men-at-arms to mount sentry for the rest of the night at the head of the stair.