ry moment to say
something that would retrieve his previous blunders; but who can please
those who are determined not to be pleased? And yet Sandal was annoyed
at his own injustice, and then still more annoyed at Steve for causing
him to be unjust. Besides which, the young man's eagerness for change,
his enthusiasms and ambitions, offended him in a particular way that
morning; for he had had an unpleasant letter from his son Harry, who was
not eager and enthusiastic and ambitious, but lazy, extravagant, and
quite commonplace. Also Charlotte had not cared to come out with him,
and the immeasurable self-complacency of his nephew Julius had really
quite spoiled his breakfast; and then, below all, there was that
disagreeable feeling about the Latriggs.

So Stephen did not conciliate Sandal, and he was himself very much
grieved at the squire's evident refusal of his friendly advances. There
is no humiliation so bitter as that of a rejected offering. Was it not
the failure of Cain's attempted propitiation that kindled the flame of
hate and murder in his heart? Steve Latrigg went back to Up-Hill,
nursing a feeling of indignation against the man who had so suddenly
conceived a dislike to him, and who had dashed, with regrets and
doubtful speeches and faint praise, all the plans which at sunrise had
seemed so full of hope, and so worthy of success.

The squire was equally annoyed. He could not avoid speaking of the
interview, for it irritated him, and was uppermost in his thoughts. He
detailed it with a faint air of pitying contempt. "The lad is upset with
the money and land he has come into, and the whole place is too small
for his greatness." That was what he said, and he knew he was unjust;
but the moral atmosphere between Steve and himself had become permeated
with distrust and dislike. Unhappy miasmas floated hither and thither in
it, and poisoned him. When with Stephen he hardly recognized himself: he
did not belong to himself. Sarcasm, contradiction, opposing ideas, took
possession of and ruled him by the forces of antipathy, just as others
ruled him by the forces of love and attraction.

The days that had been full of peaceful happiness were troubled in all
their hours; and yet the sources of trouble were so vague, so blended
with what he had called unto himself, that he could not give vent to his
unrest and disappointment. His life had had a jar; nothing ran smoothly;
and he was almost glad when Julius announced the n