It can hardly be wondered at that these suddenly presented ambitious projects—this call to be up and doing, and getting forward in the general race of the world—should add a new interest and fascination, in his eyes, to the society of the American father and daughter who had wandered into these distant wilds. And perhaps, after all, he had been merely wasting his time and throwing away his life? That solitary, contented, healthy and happy existence was a mistake—an idle dream—an anachronism, even? The common way of the world was right; and that, as he heard of it in the echoes brought by these strangers from without, was all a pushing and striving and making the most of opportunities, until the end was reached—independence and ease and wealth; the power of choosing this or that continent for a residence; the radiant happiness and glow of success. And then it all seemed so easy and practicable when he heard these two talking about their friends and the fortunes they had made; and it seemed still more easy—and a far more desirable and beautiful thing—when it was Miss Carry herself who was speaking, she seated alone in the stern of the boat, her eyes—that had a kind of surface darkness and softness, like blackberries wet with rain—helping out her speech, and betraying an open friendliness, and even conferring a charm on her descriptions of that far-off pork-producing city of the west. Mr. Hodson, as he sate upright in his easy-chair before the fire, spoke slowly and sententiously, and without any visible enthusiasm; Miss Carry, in the stern of the coble, her face all lit up with the blowing winds and the sunlight, talked with far greater vivacity, and was obviously deeply interested in the future of her companion. And it had come to this now, that, as she sate opposite him, he quite naturally and habitually regarded her eyes as supplementing her meaning; he no longer rather shrank from the directness of her look; he no longer wished that she would sit the other way, and attend to the tops of the salmon-rods. As for their speech together, the exceeding frankness of it and lack of conventionality arose from one or two causes, but no doubt partly from this—that during their various adventures on the loch there was no time for the observance of studied forms. It was ’Do this’ and ’Do that,’ on his part—sometimes with even a sharp word of monition; and with her it was ’Will that do, Ronald?’ or again,—when she was standing up in fell encounter with her unseen enemy, both hands engaged with the rod—’Ronald, tie my cap down, or the wind will blow it away—No, no, the other strings—underneath!’