II.

Leaning from our bridge we may content ourselves with a hurried shot
at George, laboriously toiling at his books, sedulously attending his
classes, with his Mary spending glorious Saturday mornings that, as
they brought him nearer to knowledge of her, sent him from her yet
more fevered; and, straining towards another point, we will focus for
an instant upon Margaret his cousin, and Bill Wyvern, her adored.

Mr. William Wyvern had most vigorously whacked about among events
since that evening when his Margaret had composed her verses for
George. At that time a fellow-student with George at St. Peter's
Hospital, he had now abandoned the profession and was started upon the
literary career (as he named it) that long he had wished to follow.
The change had been come by with little difficulty. Professor Wyvern--
that eminent biologist whose fame was so tremendous that even now a
normally forgetful Press yet continued to paragraph him while he spent
in absent-minded seclusion the ebb of that life which at the flood had
so mightily advanced knowledge--Professor Wyvern was too much attached
to his son, too docile in the hands of his loving wife, to gainsay any
wish that Bill might urge and that Mrs. Wyvern might support.

Bill achieved his end: the stories he had had printed in magazines,
secretly shown to his proud mother, were now brought forth and
chuckled over with glee by the Professor. The famous biologist
struggled through one of the stories, vowed he had read them all,
cheerily patted Bill's arm with his shaky old hand, and cheerfully
abandoned the hope he had held of seeing his son a great surgeon.