'I am a brute and an ass!--And yet I do not like to tell you so.
For if I am an ass, what are you?'

'Heyday!'

'Look here.--I am wasting my time and brains on ribaldry, but I am
worth nothing better--at least, I think so at times; but you, who
can do anything you put your hand to, what business have you, in the
devil's name, to be throwing yourself away on gimcracks and fox-
hunting foolery? Heavens! If I had your talents, I'd be--I'd make
a name for myself before I died, if I died to make it.' The colonel
griped his hand hard, rose, and looked out of the window for a few
minutes. There was a dead, brooding silence, till he turned to
Lancelot,--

'Mr. Smith, I thank you for your honesty, but good advice may come
too late. I am no saint, and God only knows how much less of one I
may become; but mark my words,--if you are ever tempted by passion,
and vanity, and fine ladies, to form liaisons, as the Jezebels call
them, snares, and nets, and labyrinths of blind ditches, to keep you
down through life, stumbling and grovelling, hating yourself and
hating the chain to which you cling--in that hour pray--pray as if
the devil had you by the throat,--to Almighty God, to help you out
of that cursed slough! There is nothing else for it!--pray, I tell
you!'

There was a terrible earnestness about the guardsman's face which
could not be mistaken. Lancelot looked at him for a moment, and
then dropped his eyes ashamed, as if he had intruded on the