ll, then, I'm awfully sorry; but then you are so
good-natured you tempt one to forget; and my mother she always calls
you Wenna Rosewarne now in speaking to me, as if you were a little
school-girl, instead of being the chief support and pillar of all the
public affairs of Eglosilyan. And now, Miss Wenna, I sha'n't go down
the road with you, because my damp boots and garments would gather the
dust; but perhaps you wouldn't mind stopping two seconds here, and I'm
going to go a cracker and ask you a question: What should a fellow in
my position try to do? You see, I haven't had the least training for
any one of the professions, even if I had any sort of capacity--"

"But why should you wish to have a profession?" she said simply. "You
have more money than is good for you already."

"Then you don't think it ignominious," he said, with his face lighting
up considerably, "to fish in summer and shoot in autumn and hunt in
winter, and make that the only business of one's life?"

"I should if it were the only business, but it needn't be, and you
don't make it so. My father speaks very highly of the way you look
after your property; and he knows what attending to an estate is. And
then you have so many opportunities of being kind and useful to the
people about you that you might do more good that way than by working
night and day at a profession. Then you owe much to yourself, because
if every one began with himself, and educated himself, and became
satisfied and happy with doing his best, there would be no bad conduct
and wretchedness to call for interference. I don't see why you should
be ashamed of shooting and hunting and all that, and doing them as
well as anybody else, or far better, as I hear people say. I don't
think a man is bound to have ambition and try to become famous: you
might be of much greater use in the world, even in such a little
place as Eglosilyan, than if you were in Parliament. I did say to Mrs.
Trelyon that I should like to see you in Parliament, because one has
a natural pride in any person one admires and likes very much, and one
wishes--"

He saw the quick look of fear that sprang to her eyes--not a sudden
appearance of shy embarrassment, but of absolute fear--and he was
almost as startled by her blunder as she herself was. He hastily came
to her rescue. He thanked her in a few rapid and formal words for her
patience and advice; and, as he saw she was trying to turn away and
hide the mortification