and of
the most superb self-confidence. He rested upon his intellect as a man
may rest upon a rock. The power of his personality was calm and immense.
I felt it vehemently. I shook and trembled under it. I hated and loathed
the man for it, because I wanted and could never possess it. So, too, I
hated my cousin Gavin for his possessions, his long and sure-sighted
eyes, great and strong arms, broad chest, lithe legs, bright agility. My
body could do nothing. My soul could do nothing--except one great thing.
It could fully observe and comprehend its own impotence. It could fully
and desperately envy and pine to be what it could never be. Could never
be, do I say? Wait! Remember that is only what I thought then as I sat
upon the rock, and, with haggard young eyes, watched the clear brown
water slipping furtively past between my knees.

My disease seemed to culminate that day, I remember. I was a sick
invalid alone in the mist. Something--it might have been vitriol--was
eating into me, eating, eating its way to my very heart, to the core of
me. Oh, to be stunted and desire to be straight and tall, to be dwarf
and wish to be giant, to be stupid and long to be a genius, to be ugly
and yearn to be in face as one of the shining gods, to have no power
over men, and to pine to fascinate, hold, dominate a world of men--this
indeed is to be in hell! I was in hell that Autumn day. I clenched my
thin, weak hands together. I clenched my teeth from which the pale lips
were drawn back in a grin; and I realised all the spectral crowd of my
shortcomings. They stood before me like demons of the Brocken--yes, yes,
of the Brocken!--and I cursed God with the sound of the burn ringing and
chattering in my ears. And I devoted Gavin, Doctor Wedderburn, every man
highly placed, every lowest peasant, who could do even one of all the
things I could not do, to damnation. The paroxysm that took hold of me
was like a fit, a convulsion. I came out of it white and feeble. And,
suddenly, the voice of the burn seemed to come from a long way off. I
put out my hand, and took up from the rock on which I had laid it,
"Faust." And, scarcely knowing what I did, I began mechanically to
read--to the dim rapture of the burn--

"_Scene III.--The Study. Faust (entering, with the poodle)._" I began to
read, do I say, mechanically? Yes, it is true, but soon, very soon, the
spell of Goethe was laid upon me. I was in the lofty-arched, narrow
Gothic chamber, with that li