all--to deny myself what I yearned after--just to
spare you."

The words came with a slow and faltering utterance from him, and his
lips quivered when he had done speaking.

"I 'm not quite sure the plan was a good one," said she, in a low voice.

"Nor am I now," said he, sternly; "but I did it for the best."

She heaved a heavy sigh, and was silent.

"Mayhap I thought, too," said he, after a pause, "that when you
looked back at all the sacrifices I had made for you, how I toiled
and labored,--not as other men toil and labor, for _my_ handicraft was
always exercised with a convict ship in the offing--There, you needn't
shudder now; I 'm here beside you safe. Well, I thought you 'd say,
'After all, he gave me every advantage in his power. If he could n't
bestow on me station and riches, he made me equal to their enjoyment if
they ever befell me. He didn't bring me down to his own level, nor to
feel the heartburnings of his own daily life, but he made me, in thought
and feeling, as good as any lady in the land.'"

"And for what--to what end?" said she, wildly.

"That you might be such, one day, girl," said he, passionately. "Do you
think I have not known every hour, for the last thirty-odd years, what I
might have been, had I been trained, and schooled, and taught the things
that others know? Have I not felt that I had pluck, daring, energy, and
persistence that only wanted knowledge to beat them all, and leave them
nowhere? Have I not said to myself, 'She has every one of these, and she
has good looks to boot; and why shouldn't she go in and carry away the
cup?' And do you think, when I said that, that I was n't striking a
docket of bankruptcy against my own heart forever? for to make _you_
great was to make _me_ childless!"

Lizzy covered her face with her hands, but never uttered a word.

"I did n't need any one to tell me," resumed he, fiercely, "that
training you up in luxury and refinement was n't the way to make you
satisfied with poverty, or proud of such a father as myself. I knew
deuced well what I was preparing for myself there. 'But no matter,' I
said, 'come what will, _she_ shall have a fair start of it. Show me the
fellow will try a balk,--show me the man will cross the course while
she's running.'"

Startled by the thick and guttural utterance of his words, Lizzy removed
her hands from her face, and stared eagerly at him. Strongly shaken by
passion as he was, every line and lineament tense with e