shoulders. "Ah, my dear friend," said he, tapping his
snuff-box with benevolent superiority, "you are much younger than I am!"

But these conversations, which Trevylyan and Vane often held
together, dull as I fear this specimen must seem to the reader, had an
inexpressible charm for Gertrude. She loved the lofty and generous vein
of philosophy which Trevylyan embraced, and which, while it suited his
ardent nature, contrasted a demeanour commonly hard and cold to all
but herself. And young and tender as she was, his ambition infused its
spirit into her fine imagination, and that passion for enterprise which
belongs inseparably to romance. She loved to muse over his future lot,
and in fancy to share its toils and to exult in its triumphs. And
if sometimes she asked herself whether a career of action might not
estrange him from her, she had but to turn her gaze upon his watchful
eye,--and lo, he was by her side or at her feet!

CHAPTER VI. GORCUM.--THE TOUR OF THE VIRTUES: A PHILOSOPHER'S TALE.

IT was a bright and cheery morning as they glided by Gorcum. The boats
pulling to the shore full of fishermen and peasants in their national
costume; the breeze freshly rippling the waters; the lightness of the
blue sky; the loud and laughing voices from the boats,--all contributed
to raise the spirit, and fill it with that indescribable gladness which
is the physical sense of life.

The tower of the church, with its long windows and its round dial, rose
against the clear sky; and on a bench under a green bush facing the
water sat a jolly Hollander, refreshing the breezes with the fumes of
his national weed.

"How little it requires to make a journey pleasant, when the companions
are our friends!" said Gertrude, as they sailed along. "Nothing can be
duller than these banks, nothing more delightful than this voyage."

"Yet what tries the affections of people for each other so severely as
a journey together?" said Vane. "That perpetual companionship from which
there is no escaping; that confinement, in all our moments of ill-humour
and listlessness, with persons who want us to look amused--ah, it is a
severe ordeal for friendship to pass through! A post-chaise must have
jolted many an intimacy to death."

"You speak feelingly, dear father," said Gertrude, laughing; "and, I
suspect, with a slight desire to be sarcastic upon us. Yet, seriously,
I should think that travel must be like life, and that good persons must
be a