d chance for fortune's
brighter favours. The horse that is to win the race needs not make
all his best running at once; but he that starts badly will rarely do
so. When a young man discusses what shall be his future walk in life,
he is talking of all that concerns his success as far as this world
is concerned. And it is so hard for a youth to know, to make even
a fair guess, as to what his own capacities are! The right man is
wanted in the right place; but how is a lad of two and twenty to
surmise what place will be right for him? And yet, if he surmises
wrong, he fails in taking his tide at its single flood. How many
lawyers are there who should have been soldiers! how many clergymen
who should have been lawyers! how many unsuccessful doctors who might
have done well on 'Change, or in Capel Court!

Bertram had an inkling of this; and Harcourt had more than an
inkling. His path in life was chosen, and he had much self-confidence
that he had chosen it well. He had never doubted much, and since he
had once determined had never doubted at all. He had worked hard, and
was prepared to work hard; not trusting over much in his own talents,
but trusting greatly in his own industry. But Bertram, with double
his friend's genius, had, at any rate as yet, but little of his
friend's stability. To him the world was all before him where to
choose; but he was sadly in want of something that should guide his
choice. He had a high, but at the same time a vague ambition. The
law, the church, letters, art, and politics all enticed him; but
he could not decide of which mistress the blandishments were the
sweetest.

"Well, when shall we have you up in London?" said Harcourt.

"In London! I don't know that I shall go to London. I shall go down
to Hadley for a few weeks of course"--Bertram's uncle lived at the
village of that name, in the close vicinity of Barnet--"but what I
shall do then, I don't in the least know."

"But I know you'll come to London and begin to keep your terms."

"What, at the Middle Temple?"

"At some Temple or some Inn: of course you won't go where anybody
else goes; so probably it will be Gray's Inn."

"No, I shall probably do a much more commonplace thing; come back
here and take orders."

"Take orders! You! You can no more swallow the thirty-nine articles
than I can eat Twisleton's dinner."

"A man never knows what he can do till he tries. A great deal of
good may be done by a clergyman if he be in earnest