y life attracted
all my desires. I could again be a boy in everything, did I not
recognize the stern necessity which calls me to be a man. I could
dance with you still, whirling swiftly round the room to the sweet
sound of the music, stretching the hours of delight out to the very
dawn, were it not for Adam's doom. In the sweat of my brow must I eat
my bread. There is a time for all things, Maryanne; but with me the
time for such pastimes as those is gone."

"You'll keep company with some other young woman before long, George,
and then you'll be less gloomy."

"Never! That phase of life is also over. Why should I? To what
purpose?"

"To be married, of course."

"Yes; and become a woman's slave, like poor Poppins; or else have
my heart torn again with racking jealousy, as it was with you. No,
Maryanne! Let those plodding creatures link themselves with women
whose bodies require comforting but whose minds never soar. The world
must be populated, and therefore let the Briskets marry."

"I suppose you've heard of him, George?"

"Not a word."

"La, now! I declare you've no curiosity to inquire about any one. If
I was dead and buried to-morrow, I believe you'd never ask a word
about me."

"I would go to your grave, Maryanne, and sit there in silence."

"Would you, now? I hope you won't, all the same. But about Brisket.
You remember when that row was, and you were so nigh choking him?"

"Do I remember? Ay, Maryanne; when shall I forget it? It was the last
hour of my madness."

"I never admired you so much as I did then, George. But never mind.
That's all done and over now;--isn't it?"

"All done and over," said Robinson, mournfully repeating her words.

"Of course it is. But about Brisket. Immediately after that, the very
next day, he went out to Gogham,--where he was always going, you
know, with that cart of his, to buy sheep. Sheep, indeed!"

"And wasn't it for sheep?"

"No, George. Brisket was the sheep, and there was there a little
she-wolf that has got him at last into her claws. Brisket is married,
George."

"What! another Poppins! Ha! ha! ha! We shall not want for children."

"He has seen his way at last. She was a drover's daughter; and now
he's married her and brought her home."

"A drover's daughter?"

"Well, he says a grazier's; but it's all the same. He never would
have done for me, George; never. And I'll tell you more; I don't
think I ever saw the man as would. I should have taken either