"Yes, sir; I intend to be at Mr. Beilby's office on the 11th."

"That's right. Never lose a day. In losing a day now, you don't lose
what you might earn now in a day, but what you might be earning when
you're at your best. A young man should always remember that. You can't
dispense with a round in the ladder going up. You only make your time at
the top so much the shorter."

"I hope you'll find that I'm all right, sir. I don't mean to be idle."

"Pray don't. Of course, you know, I speak to you very differently from
what I should do if you were simply going away from my office. What I
shall have to give Florence will be very little--that is, comparatively
little. She shall have a hundred a year, when she marries, till I die;
and after my death and her mother's she will share with the others. But
a hundred a year will be nothing to you."

"Won't it, sir? I think a very great deal of a hundred a year. I'm to
have a hundred and fifty from the office; and I should be ready to marry
on that to-morrow."

"You couldn't live on such an income--unless you were to alter your
habits very much."

"But I will alter them."

"We shall see. You are so placed, that by marrying you would lose a
considerable income; and I would advise you to put off thinking of it
for the next two years."