what his sober reason cannot approve. If you could have the letter
you then sent before you now, I imagine that you would no longer
wonder that Marston was offended."

"That is impossible; without doubt, he burned my note the moment he
received it."

Mr. Wellford tried in vain to induce Arnest to consent to forget
what was past; but he affirmed that this was impossible, and that he
had no wish to renew an acquaintance with his old friend.

About the same time that this interview took place, Marston was
alone, thinking with sad and softened feelings of the past. The
letter of Arnest was before him; he had turned it over by accident.

"He could not have been himself when he wrote this," he thought. It
was the first time he had permitted himself to think so. "My words
must have stung him severely, lightly as I uttered them, and with no
intention to wound. This matter ought not to have gone on so long.
Friends are not so plentiful that we may carelessly cast those we
have tried and proved aside. He has many excellent qualities."

Pride came quickly, with many suggestions about self-respect, and
what every man owed to himself.

"He owes it to himself to be just to others," Marston truly thought.
"Was I just in failing to apologize to my friend, notwihstanding
this offensive letter? No, I was not; for his action did not
exonerate me from the responsibility of mine. Ah, me! How passion
blinds us!"