h has passed there," said my father.

"But not the plough of care: rich, famous, Ellinor his wife, and no
son!"

"It is because his heart is sometimes sad that he would see us."

Roland stared first at my father, next at me. "Then," quoth my uncle,
heartily, "in God's name, let him come. I can shake him by the hand, as
I would a brother soldier. Poor Trevanion! Write to him at once, Sisty."

I sat down and obeyed. When I had sealed my letter, I looked up, and
saw that Roland was lighting his bed-candle at my father's table; and my
father, taking his hand, said something to him in a low voice. I guessed
it related to his son, for he shook his head, and answered in a
stern, hollow voice, "Renew grief if you please; not shame. On that
subject--silence!"

CHAPTER IV.

Left to myself in the earlier part of the day, I wandered, wistful and
lonely, through the vast wilderness of London. By degrees I familiarized
myself with that populous solitude; I ceased to pine for the green
fields. That active energy all around, at first saddening, became soon
exhilarating, and at last contagious. To an industrious mind, nothing is
so catching as industry. I began to grow weary of my golden holiday of
unlaborious childhood, to sigh for toil, to look around me for a career.
The University, which I had before anticipated with pleasure, seemed now
to fade into a dull monastic prospect; after having trod the streets of
London, to wander through cloisters was to go back in life. Day by day,
my mind grew sensibly within me; it came out from the rosy twilight of
boyhood,--it felt the doom of Cain under the broad sun of man.

Uncle Jack soon became absorbed in his new speculation for the good of
the human race, and, except at meals (whereat, to do him justice, he
was punctual enough, though he did not keep us in ignorance of the
sacrifices he made, and the invitations he refused, for our sake), we
seldom saw him. The Captain, too, generally vanished after breakfast,
seldom dined with us, and it was often late before he returned. He
had the latch-key of the house, and let himself in when he pleased.
Sometimes (for his chamber was next to mine) his step on the stairs
awoke me; and sometimes I heard him pace his room with perturbed
strides, or fancied that I caught a low groan. He became every day more
care-worn in appearance, and every day the hair seemed more gray. Yet
he talked to us all easily and cheerfully; and I thought that I was