young men were left alone, Edward launched out still more. He thought he
was impressing Frank with his knowledge of the world, and the world's ways.
But he was doing all in his power to repel one who had never been much
attracted toward him. Worldly success was his standard of merit. The end
seemed with him to justify the means; if a man prospered, if was not
necessary to scrutinize his conduct too closely. The law was viewed in its
lowest aspect; and yet with a certain cleverness, which preserved Edward
from being intellectually contemptible. Frank had entertained some idea of
studying for a barrister himself: not so much as a means of livelihood as
to gain some idea of the code which makes and shows a nation's conscience:
but Edward's details of the ways in which the letter so often baffles the
spirit, made him recoil. With some anger against himself, for viewing the
profession with disgust, because it was degraded by those who embraced it,
instead of looking upon it as what might be ennobled and purified into a
vast intelligence by high and pure-minded men, he got up abruptly and left
the room.

The girls were sitting over the drawing-room fire, with unlighted candles
on the table, talking, he felt, about his mother; but when he came in they
rose, and changed their tone. Erminia went to the piano, and sang her
newest and choicest French airs. Frank was gloomy and silent; but when she
changed into more solemn music his mood was softened, Maggie's simple and
hearty admiration, untinged by the slightest shade of envy for Erminia's
accomplishments, charmed him. The one appeared to him the perfection of
elegant art, the other of graceful nature. When he looked at Maggie,
and thought of the moorland home from which she had never wandered, the
mysteriously beautiful lines of Wordsworth seemed to become sun-clear to
him.

"And she shall lean her ear
In many a secret place
Where rivulets dance their wayward round,
And beauty born of murmuring sound
Shall pass into her face."

Mr. Buxton, in the dining-room, was really getting to take an interest in
Edward's puzzling cases. They were like tricks at cards. A quick motion,
and out of the unpromising heap, all confused together, presto! the right
card turned up. Edward stated his case, so that there did not seem loophole
for the desired verdict; but through some conjuration, it always came
uppermost at last. He had a graphic way of relating things; and, as he did
no