"I mean that you cease to like one as soon as you find that you can gain the least advantage over him. If I could really make you a little afraid of me, you would like me all the better for it. No, I will show you none of my weaknesses; and perhaps, if I did, you would not find them of a kind that you could use against me. I can strike at you, but you cannot hurt me. I am armed in proof. I defy you." In saying this, at least, Morton showed some knowledge of his companion's character. To defy her successfully was a great step towards gaining her good graces; for with all her wildness she was very sensitive to the good or ill opinion of those who could compel her to respect them. She became very anxious to know what Morton thought of her. "You say that you do not understand me thoroughly. What is there in me that you do not understand?" "You may say that I do not understand you at all." "That is mere evasion." "Who can understand the language of Babel?" "Do you mean that I speak the language of Babel?" "Who can understand chaos?" "And am I chaos? You are beginning your peculiar style of compliment again." "Do not be displeased at it. All the power and beauty of the universe rose out of chaos." "Now you are flattering in earnest." "You are difficult to satisfy. What may I call you? A wild Arab racer without a rider?" "That will answer better." "Or a rocket without a stick?" "I have seen rockets; but I do not know what the stick is. What is it? What is it for?" "To give balance and aim to the rocket--make it, as the transcendentalists say, mount skyward, and end in stars and 'golden rain.'" "Very fine! And how if it has no stick?" "Then it sparkles, and blazes, and hisses on the ground; flies up and down, this way and that, plays the deuse with every thing and every body, and at last blows itself up to no purpose." "Ah, I see that the stick is very necessary. I will try to get one." "You speak in a bantering tone," said Morton, "but you are in earnest." "I am in earnest!" exclaimed Fanny Euston, with a sudden change of voice and manner. "Every word that you have spoken is true. I am driven hither and thither by feelings and impulses,--some bad, some good,--chasing every new fancy like so many butterflies or will-o'-the-wisps,--without thinking of results--restless--dissatisfied--finding no life but in the excitement of the moment. Sometimes I have hints of better things. Glimpses of light break in upon me; but they come, and they go again. I have no rule of life, no guiding star."