cousin's mind into an unhealthy fungus crop, were to Amyas simply, as he
expressed it, "wind and moonshine;" and he treated his cousin as a
sort of harmless lunatic, and, as they say in Devon, "half-baked." And
Eustace knew it; and knew, too, that his cousin did him an injustice.
"He used to undervalue me," said he to himself; "let us see whether he
does not find me a match for him now." And then went off into an agony
of secret contrition for his self-seeking and his forgetting that
"the glory of God, and not his own exaltation," was the object of his
existence.

There, dear readers, Ex pede Herculem; I cannot tire myself or you
(especially in this book) with any wire-drawn soul-dissections. I have
tried to hint to you two opposite sorts of men,--the one trying to be
good with all his might and main, according to certain approved methods
and rules, which he has got by heart, and like a weak oarsman, feeling
and fingering his spiritual muscles over all day, to see if they are
growing; the other not even knowing whether he is good or not, but just
doing the right thing without thinking about it, as simply as a little
child, because the Spirit of God is with him. If you cannot see the
great gulf fixed between the two, I trust that you will discover it some
day.

But in justice be it said, all this came upon Eustace, not because he
was a Romanist, but because he was educated by the Jesuits. Had he been
saved from them, he might have lived and died as simple and honest a
gentleman as his brothers, who turned out like true Englishmen (as did
all the Romish laity) to face the great Armada, and one of whom was
fighting at that very minute under St. Leger in Ireland, and as brave
and loyal a soldier as those Roman Catholics whose noble blood has
stained every Crimean battlefield; but his fate was appointed otherwise;
and the Upas-shadow which has blighted the whole Romish Church, blighted
him also.

"Ah, my dearest cousin!" said Eustace, "how disappointed I was this
morning at finding I had arrived just a day too late to witness your
triumph! But I hastened to your home as soon as I could, and learning
from your mother that I should find you here, hurried down to bid you
welcome again to Devon."

"Well, old lad, it does look very natural to see you. I often used to
think of you walking the deck o' nights. Uncle and the girls are all
right, then? But is the old pony dead yet? And how's Dick the smith, and
Nancy? Grown a fin