life had not, to a father like Mr. Darrell,
occasioned grief sharper than his death."

LIONEL.--"You amaze me. Mr. Darrell spoke of him as a boy of great
promise."

GEORGE.--"He had that kind of energy which to a father conveys the idea
of promise, and which might deceive those older than himself--a fine
bright-eyed, bold-tongued boy, with just enough awe of his father to
bridle his worst qualities before him."

LIONEL.--"What were those?"

GEORGE.--"Headstrong arrogance--relentless cruelty. He had a pride which
would have shamed his father out of pride, had Guy Darrell detected its
nature--purse pride! I remember his father said to me with a half-laugh:
'My boy must not be galled and mortified as I was every hour at
school--clothes patched and pockets empty.' And so, out of mistaken
kindness, Mr. Darrell ran into the opposite extreme, and the son was
proud, not of his father's fame, but of his father's money, and withal
not generous, nor exactly extravagant, but using money as power-power
that allowed him to insult an equal or to buy a slave. In a word, his
nickname at school was 'Sir Giles Overreach.' His death was the result
of his strange passion for tormenting others. He had a fag who could
not swim, and who had the greatest terror of the water; and it was while
driving this child into the river out of his depth that cramp seized
himself, and he was drowned. Yes, when I think what that boy would
have been as a man, succeeding to Darrell's wealth--and had Darrell
persevered (as he would, perhaps, if the boy had lived) in his public
career--to the rank and titles he would probably have acquired and
bequeathed--again, I say, in man's affliction is often Heaven's mercy."

Lionel listened aghast. George continued: "Would that I could speak as
plainly to Mr. Darrell himself! For we find constantly in the world that
there is no error that misleads us like the error that is half a truth
wrenched from the other half; and nowhere is such an error so common as
when man applies it to the judgment of some event in his own life, and
separates calamity from consolation."

LIONEL.--"True; but who could have the heart to tell a mourning father
that his dead son was worthless?"

GEORGE.--"Alas! my young friend, the preacher must sometimes harden his
own heart if he would strike home to another's soul. But I am not sure
that Mr. Darrell would need so cruel a kindness. I believe that his
clear intellect must have divined some