between your brother and yourself. Ah! you think that
no answer. Will you have a medical simile? Self-examination notes the
symptoms and combats them; self-contemplation does as I did when I was
unstrung by that illness at Poonshedagore, and was always feeling my
own pulse. It dwells on them, and perpetually deplores itself. Oh,
dear! this is no better--what a wretch I am. It is always studying its
deformities in a moral looking-glass."

"Yes, I think poor Norman does that, but I thought it right and humble."

"The humility of a self-conscious mind. It is the very reverse of your
father, who is the most really humble man in existence."

"Do you call self-consciousness a fault?"

"No. I call it a misfortune. In the vain, it leads to prudent vanity; in
the good, to a painful effort of humility."

"I don't think I quite understand what it is."

"No, and you have so much of your father in you, that you never will.
But take care of your brother, and don't let his brains work."

How Ethel was to take care of him she did not know; she could only
keep a heedful eye on him, and rejoice when he took Tom out for a long
walk--a companion certainly not likely to promote the working of the
brain--but though it was in the opposite direction to Cocksmoor, Tom
came home desperately cross, snubbed Gertrude, and fagged Aubrey; but,
then, as Blanche observed, perhaps that was only because his trousers
were splashed.

In her next solitary walk to Cocksmoor, Norman joined Ethel. She was
gratified, but she could not think of one safe word worth saying to him,
and for a mile they preserved an absolute silence, until he first began,
"Ethel, I have been thinking--"

"That you have!" said she, between hope and dread, and the thrill of
being again treated as his friend.

"I want to consult you. Don't you think now that Richard is settled at
home, and if Tom will study medicine, that I could be spared."

"Spared!" exclaimed Ethel. "You are not much at home."

"I meant more than my present absences. It is my earnest wish--" he
paused, and the continuation took her by surprise. "Do you think it
would give my father too much pain to part with me as a missionary to
New Zealand?"

She could only gaze at him in mute amazement.

"Do you think he could bear it?" said Norman hastily.

"He would consent," she replied. "Oh, Norman, it is the most glorious
thing man can do! How I wish I could go with you."

"Your mission is here," said Norma