"I hardly know what to think,--how I feel. You interest me so much as
you talk that I wish you to succeed: I picture your success. And yet
it maddens me to hear you talk of the Americans in that way,--also
to know that your house will be greater than ours,--that we will be
forgotten. But--yes, tell me all. What will you do then?"

"I shall have California, in the first place, scratched for the gold
that I believe lies somewhere within her. When that great resource
_is_ located and developed I shall publish in every American newspaper
the extraordinary agricultural advantages of the country. In a word,
my object is to make California a great State and its name synonymous
with my own. As I told you before, for fame as fame I care nothing;
I do not care if I am forgotten on my death-bed; but with my blood
biting my veins I must have action while living. Shall I say that
I have a worthier motive in wishing to aid in the development of
civilization? But why worthier? Merely a higher form of selfishness.
The best and the worst of motives are prompted by the same instinct."

"I would advise you," she said, slowly, "never to marry. Your wife
would be very unhappy."

"But no one has greater scorn than you for the man who spends his life
with his lips at the chalice of the poppy."

"True, I had forgotten them." She rose abruptly. "Let us go back," she
said. "It is better not to stay too long."

As they walked down the canon she looked at him furtively. The men of
her race were almost all tall and finely-proportioned, but they did