Charles felt more inclined to be angry than to laugh. The arrow fell lightly as regarded his brother’s conversation; for whether it was from natural delicacy of mind, or Ernest’s more than common acquaintance with the pure language of Scripture, his speech was never coarse, and occasionally, when he overcame his reserve, flowed on in unstudied eloquence, unusual in one so young. Charles was indignant at the unfeeling allusion to the trials of Ernest’s early life. “You forget that you speak of my brother,” said he. “He has given you good cause to remember that he is your brother, and your _elder_ brother too,” said Fitzwigram, with a sneer. “But I should have thought it enough for him to have had my name, my fortune, and my estate, without letting him put my judgment also in his pocket, and not leave me even a will of my own!” [Illustration: CHARLES AND FITZWIGRAM.] The blood of young Hope mounted to his forehead. He was beset again by the same enemy, Shame, who clung to Faithful in the Valley of Humiliation. To the Pilgrim that valley was not yet passed, that enemy was not yet conquered. But Charles remembered the words of Faithful, which had made a strong impression on his mind: “Shame, depart! thou art an enemy to my salvation. Shall I entertain thee against my sovereign Lord? How shall I then look Him in the face at His coming?” With a brave resolve to grapple with his own enemy within, as well as to stand the ridicule of tempters without, Charles replied, that if he adopted the principles of his brother, he should gain from him far more than he had lost; and bidding a cool farewell to his late companions, he quitted the house more truly a victor than many a hero who has written his title to glory in the blood of his fellow-creatures. CHAPTER XXI. GREEN PASTURES AND STILL WATERS. “I saw then that they went on their way to a pleasant river, which David the king called ‘the river of God,’ but John ‘the river of the water of life.’”—_Pilgrim’s Progress._