to-night, Davis?" Very kindly, and with a quick change.

"Quite well, Miss."

"Are you sure? Your voice sounds altered in my hearing."

"No, Miss, I am a stronger man than ever. But, England is nothing to
me."

Miss Maryon sat silent for so long a while, that I believed she had done
speaking to me for one time. However, she had not; for by-and-by she
said in a distinct clear tone:

"No, good friend; you must not say that England is nothing to you. It is
to be much to you, yet--everything to you. You have to take back to
England the good name you have earned here, and the gratitude and
attachment and respect you have won here: and you have to make some good
English girl very happy and proud, by marrying her; and I shall one day
see her, I hope, and make her happier and prouder still, by telling her
what noble services her husband's were in South America, and what a noble
friend he was to me there."

Though she spoke these kind words in a cheering manner, she spoke them
compassionately. I said nothing. It will appear to be another strange
confession, that I paced to and fro, within call, all that night, a most
unhappy man, reproaching myself all the night long. "You are as ignorant
as any man alive; you are as obscure as any man alive; you are as poor as
any man alive; you are no better than the mud under your foot." That was
the way in which I went on against myself until the morning.