o a bad set at the university where
I found him."

"What made you care for him?" Joyce said, simply; "you are so different
from him."

"Well, the story is rather a long one, and I do not know that all of it
is fit for your ears, or that I ought to inflict it upon you. Still I
think you should know something about it. I feel an interest in poor
Melville much the same interest which a man takes in anything that has
cost him some trouble."

"What made you take any trouble about him?" Joyce asked.

"I scarcely know; pity, I think, began it; and who could help pitying
him? He got into the hands of an unprincipled man, much older than
himself, who is, in fact, a relative of mine, and I did what I could to
get him out of his clutches. He got all his money out of him, and then
persuaded him to gamble to get more; of course ending in losing it."

"How dreadful!" Joyce exclaimed. "Does father know?"

"He knows about the money part, of course; about the debts and
difficulties."

"Yes," Joyce exclaimed, with a sigh, "and it has troubled him greatly."

"What I wanted to say to you was, that I think if Melville went abroad,
as he wishes, it might be a good thing, provided a safe companion could
be found for him."

"Will you go?" Joyce said, eagerly.

"No, it is impossible; I could not leave my mother: I am all she has in
the world. We are going to live in Bristol, where I am to be articled to
a good firm of lawyers, and perhaps I may study afterwards for the
bar."

"I thought you were of high family," Joyce said innocently.

"Would that prevent my taking to law?" Gilbert asked, with a smile.

"No; I don't know exactly why it should do so," she said. "Melville
talks so much about things which are right for a gentleman to do, and
things which a gentleman cannot do; and then he dresses so fashionably,
and people remark upon it."

"I don't wonder," Gilbert said, laughing; "but that part of his
proceedings is only laughable. Many men are fops in their youth who tone
down wonderfully when they get old. Let us hope it will be so with him."

"You know," Joyce said, "that Melville ought to spare father expenses
instead of adding to them. There have been two bad harvests and hard
winters, and Mr. Watson, the steward, is getting rather past his work.
Melville ought to take that place now, and save father, for there is
Ralph to be educated, and he ought to have the _best_, for he is so
studious; and then there are the three ot