her added thousand
to thousand, and said to his heart wearily many and many a time, "It
is all vexation of spirit."

At the end of the second year Crawford wrote a most important letter
to his son. There was an opening for the family that might never come
again. All arrangements had been made for Colin to enter the coming
contest for a seat in Parliament. The Marquis of B---- had been spoken
to, and Crawford and he had come to an understanding Crawford did not
give the particulars of the "understanding," but he told Colin that
his "political career was assured." He himself would take care of the
works. Political life was open to his son, and if money and influence
could put him in the House of Peers, money should not be spared.

The offer was so stupendous, the future it looked forward to so great,
Crawford never doubted Colin's proud, acquiescence. That much he owed
to a long line of glorious ancestors; it was one of the obligations of
noble birth; he would not dare to, neglect it.

Impatiently he waited Colin's answer. Indeed, he felt sure Colin would
answer such a call in person. He was disappointed when a letter came;
he had not known, till then, how sure he had felt of seeing his son.
And the letter was a simple blow to him. Very respectfully, but very
firmly, the proposition was declined. Colin said he knew little of
parties and cabals, and was certain, at least, that nothing could
induce him to serve under the Marquis of B----. He could not see his
obligations to the dead Crawfords as his father did. He considered his
life his own. It had come to him with certain tastes, which he meant
to improve and gratify, for only in that way was life of any value to
him.

The laird laid the letter in Tallisker's hands without a word. He was
almost broken-hearted. He had not yet got to that point where
money-making for money's sake was enough. Family aggrandizement and
political ambition are not the loftiest motives of a man's life, but
still they lift money-making a little above the dirty drudgery of mere
accumulation. Hitherto Crawford had worked for an object, and the
object, at least in his own eyes, had dignified the labor.

In his secret heart he was angry at Colin's calm respectability. A
spendthrift prodigal, wasting his substance in riotous living, would
have been easier to manage than this young man of aesthetic tastes,
whose greatest extravagance was a statuette or a picture. Tallisker,
too, was more uneasy t