ense of kinship surged in his heart; these
were his people, this his lot as well as theirs. For the first time he
saw it in detachment. Till now he had regarded it with the friendly eyes
of a participator who looked no further. Today he did look further: the
whole world invited his eyes, offering him a great piece of luck to look
through. The opportunity was in his hand which, if he could seize and
hold, would lift and carry him on. He was as much aware of its potential
significance as anyone could be, and what leapt in his veins till
he could have laughed aloud was the splendid conviction of resource.
Already in the door of the passage he had achieved, from that point he
looked at the scene before him with an impulse of loyalty and devotion.
A tenderness seized him for the farmers of Fox County, a throb of
enthusiasm for the idea they represented, which had become for
him suddenly moving and pictorial. At that moment his country came
subjectively into his possession; great and helpless it came into his
inheritance as it comes into the inheritance of every man who can take
it, by deed of imagination and energy and love. He held this microcosm
of it, as one might say, in his hand and looked at it ardently; then he
took his way across the road.

A tall thickly built young fellow detached himself from a group, smiling
broadly at the sight of Murchison, and started to meet him.

"Hello, Lorne," he said. He had smiled all the way anticipating the
encounter. He was obviously in clothes which he did not put on every
day, but the seriousness of this was counteracted by his hard felt hat,
which he wore at an angle that disregarded convention.

"Hello, Elmore! You back?"

"That's about it."

"You don't say! Back to stay?"

"Far's I can see. Young Alf's made up his mind to learn the dentist
business, and the old folks are backin' him; so I don't see but I've got
to stop on and run the show. Father's gettin' up in years now."

"Why, yes. I suppose he must be. It's a good while since you went West.
Well, what sort of a country have they got out Swan River way? Booming
right along?"

"Boom nothing. I don't mean to say there's anything the matter with
the country; there ain't; but you've got to get up just as early in
the mornings out there as y'do anywhere, far's I noticed. An' it's a
lonesome life. Now I AM back I don't know but little old Ontario's good
enough for me. 'N I hear you've taken up the law, Lorne. Y'always had