hey who were to know me thenceforward were to know me by another name,
and in a rank that had no traditions; and I own I accepted this humble
fortune with a more contented spirit and with less chagrin than it cost
me to hear myself spoken of in this half-contemptuous fashion.

I was now very plainly, simply dressed. I made no display of studs or
watch-chain; I even gave up the ring I used to wear, and took care that
my gloves--in which I once was almost puppyish--should be the commonest
and the cheapest.

If there was something that at moments fell very heavily on my heart
in the utter destitution of my lot, there was, on the other hand, what
nerved my heart and stimulated me in the thought that there was some
heroism in what I was doing. I was, so to say, about to seek my fortune;
and what to a young mind could be more full of interest and anticipation
than such a thought? To be entirely self-dependent; to be thrown into
situations of difficulty, with nothing but one's own resources to rely
on; to be obliged to trust to one's head for counsel, and one's heart
for courage; to see oneself, as it were, alone against the world,--is
intensely exciting.

In the days of romance there were personal perils to confront, and
appalling dangers to be surmounted; but now it was a game of life, to be
played, not merely with a stout heart and a ready hand, but with a cool
head and a steady eye. Young as I was, I had seen a great deal. In that
strange comedy of which my father's guests were the performers,
there was great insight into character to be gained, and a marvellous
knowledge of that skill by which they who live by their wits cultivate
these same wits to live.

If I was not totally corrupted by the habits and ways of that life, I
owe it wholly to those teachings of my dear mother which, through all
the turmoil and confusion of this ill-regulated existence, still held
a place in my heart, and led me again and again to ask myself how _she_
would think of this, or what judgment she would pass on that; and
even in this remnant of a conscience there was some safety. I tried to
persuade myself that it was well for me that all this was now over, and
that an honest existence was now about to open to me,--an existence in
which my good mother's lessons would avail me more, stimulate me to
the right and save me from the wrong, and give to the humblest cares of
daily labor a halo that had never shone on my life of splendor.

It was l