"Will; how can I tell you? I love you, not your success. If you had not done so well, it would have made no difference. Your success is only an accidental part of you." Oh! the metaphysician! "You are not your success. Yet, of course, I don't love you for your fine degree, you conceited boy, and yet it is for yourself." He kissed her forehead. "The old dream time was pleasant, wasn't it? when we chose to be Archbishop of Canterbury one day and Lord Chancellor the next. To be Leader of the House of Commons is the present ambition. It is a most splendid thing"--the dreamer's eyes looked up into space with the old light in them--"a most splendid thing--to lead the House--to sway the House. But I don't know," he sighed, "it will take an awful lot of work. And the Cambridge business did take it out of one most tremendously. I didn't believe, Nell, that I had such an amount of work in me." "You have been so gloomy lately, Will. Was that fatigue?" [Illustration: "HE KISSED HER FOREHEAD."] "Ambition on the brain, Nell," he replied, lightly--as lightly as of old--success had not destroyed the old gaiety of heart. "I've consulted a learned physician, Dr. Sydenham Celsus Galen, Wimpole Street. He says that an engagement with the right girl--he is extremely particular on that point, so that I do hope, Nell, we have made no mistake--is a sovereign remedy for all mopey, glum, dumpsy, moody, broody, gloomy, sulky, ill-conditioned vapours. It is, he confessed, the only medicine in his pharmacopoeia. All his clients have to follow that prescription. You will very soon find that those glum, dumpsy moods have vanished quite away. You will charm them away. Oh! I live again--I breathe--I think--I don't work so infernally hard--I am once more human--because I love, and because--" The girl's head rested upon his arm, and he kissed her forehead. _Portraits of Celebrities at Different Times of their Lives._ W. CLARK RUSSELL. BORN 1844. [Illustration: AGE 5 (_From an Oil Painting_)] [Illustration: AGE 17.(From a Photograph.) (_As a Midshipman._)] [Illustration: PRESENT DAY. (_From a Photo by Elliott & Fry._)]