there than he can anywhere else--and so he can."

"Indeed, sir: if I may be so bold to ask, why, with this opinion,
have you left the great city to bury yourself in a miserable village
like Charlemont?"

The question was so quickly put, and with so much apparent keenness,
that Stevens found the tables suddenly reversed. But he was in
nowise discomposed. He answered promptly.

"You forget," he said, "that I was speaking of very young men, of
an ambitious temper, who were seeking to become lawyers. The student
of divinity may very well be supposed to be one who would withdraw
himself from the scene of ambition, strifes, vanities, and tumultuous
passions."

"You speak, sir, as if there were a material difference in our
years?" said Hinkley inquiringly.

"Perhaps it is less than in our experience, my young friend," was
the answer of the other, betraying that quiet sense of superiority
which would have been felt more gallingly by Hinkley had he been
of a less modest nature. Still, it had the effect of arousing some
of the animal in his blood, and he responded in a sentence which was
not entirely without its sneer, though it probably passed without
penetrating such a buff of self-esteem as guarded the sensibilities
of our adventurer.

"You are fortunate sir, if, at your time of life, you have succeeded
in withdrawing your thoughts and feelings, with your person, from