still in one of
his rapid walks across the room, 'you and I never could agree in
anything, and never shall.'

'I hope we may yet agree in many things,' said Rowland gently. 'At
present, all I wish you to do is to pay your debts, go to London, take
out your stamps, and become an attorney.'

'I am the best judge of that, and shall be my own master now. At all
events, I can make some people ashamed of themselves.'

'I only wish to advise you for your good, now that you are your own
master. Your poor father begged me--'

'Oh, Rowland, I can't stand any more about my father. Everybody knows
what he was, and, I suppose, nobody expects me to live in the same line.
I am emancipated, thank heaven! and the world shall soon know it.'

'Still, he was your father.'

'No one knows that better than I do, I should imagine; but if you expect
me to mourn as others do for a parent, you will be disappointed. He
never showed me one token of love, or acted by me as a father from the
day of my birth till his death.'

'At least he has left you and your mother handsomely provided for, and
with his last words, hoped that you were now very steady.'

'He did! I wonder who dares to say that I am not steady? But how do you
know how we are provided for?'

'He begged me to write down what he was worth. I will give it you at
some future period, but not now.'

'Why not now?'

'Because I think it is scarcely yet a time to consider money matters.
After the last duties are performed you shall have the paper. Part of
his property is written down, but a box of gold and some other sums he
did not name. After that last sad scene one can scarcely think of
anything earthly. Oh, Howel! I wish you would consider the shortness and
uncertainty of life, and what is its end.'

'So awful do I consider its end that I mean to enjoy it while it lasts.
But don't go off with the impression that I was not shocked and
frightened with what we have just seen. It is one thing to read and
write about a death-bed and another to witness it. But I cannot weep or
pray as some people can.'

'You might do both if you would only seek aright.'

'There, enough! I am past being preached to as a naughty boy, and can
now look forward to some enjoyment without robbing my own father, or
getting my mother to rob him, to procure it. But I shall never forget
that last struggle? no, never.'

Here, with a face of horror, Howel began his restless walk again.
Rowland sat in melanc