then arrived, bidding me make whatever preparations my departure would
necessitate, that at the end of the autumn session he would come to
take me home for good. This was a sad and unexpected surprise for me.
I had just begun to be fascinated by my studies, which were now of
quite a dignified nature. I might as well add, since it cannot but
provoke a bland and suggestive smile from masculine erudition, that I
had actually taken up moral philosophy, and aspired to distinguish
myself later as a metaphysician of some repute. But alas! for the
vanity of human purposes and desires, this empty little note of my
father's came like the chillest wintry blast and smothered the small
creeping flame of my newly awakened ambition. I pleaded and prayed for
an extension of time, but the ultimate explanation was a rather
lengthy epistle from my step-mother, in which she adduced most
persuasively that "there was no help for it, that I must come home."
Canada had changed administrators, and somebody very distinguished was
expected to replace the old Governor-General. It was a most propitious
and opportune occasion for me to make my _debut_ in society, and, all
things considered, I had had quite enough instruction now to fit me
for an honorable position in the world.

How foolishly and vainly assiduous I had been! An honourable position,
according to that respectable authority, was literally no position at
all. Its preliminary stage was that of an idle pleasure-seeker; its
more progressive, that of an artful husband hunter, and its
summit--ah! its summit was where she stood herself, and where a
deplorable percentage of our society wives and mothers are standing or
strutting about with their brilliant plumage expanded, airing their
silly pride and lisping out in self-laudatory accents the story of
their empty achievements in society.