"You are both young, Barton, and you have all the world in which to
overcome your faults and repair your mistakes, and Julia--"

"Not another word of her, mother dear! She has gone more utterly out
of my life than as if she were buried. Then I might think of her; now
I will not," firmly.

"Oh, that this should come to you now, my poor, poor boy!"

"Don't pity me, mother! I am soft enough now, and don't you for a
moment think that I have nothing else to do in this world but to be
killed out of it by the scorn of a girl. Let us not think of these
Markhams. The Judge is ambitious, and proud of his wealth and self,
and his daughter is ambitious too. The world wants me; it has work for
me. I can hear its voices calling me now, and I am not ready. Don't
think I am to sit and languish and pine for any girl;" and his mouth
was firm with will and purpose, and a great swell of pride and pain
agitated the bosom of his mother, who recognized the high elements of
a nature drawn from her own.

"You know, mother," he continued, thoughtfully, "that I am not one
to be loved. I am not handsome and popular, like Morris, whom all
men like and many women love; nor thoughtful and accomplished and
considerate, like Henry, whom everybody esteems and respects, and of
whom so much is expected."

"Do you envy them, Barton?"

"Envy them, mother? Don't I love the world for loving Morris? Don't I
follow him about to feel the gladness that he brings? Don't I live on