La Bruyere. He lived in each time of which he wrote, and the time lived
again in him. Ah! what a writer of romances he would have been if--if
what? If he had had as sad an experience of men's passions as he had
the happy intuition into their humors. But he who would see the mirror
of the shore must look where it is cast on the river, not the ocean.
The narrow stream reflects the gnarled tree and the pausing herd and the
village spire and the romance of the landscape. But the sea reflects
only the vast outline of the headland and the lights of the eternal
heaven.




CHAPTER III.


"It is Lombard Street to a China orange," quoth Uncle Jack.

"Are the odds in favor of fame against failure so great? You do not
speak, I fear, from experience, brother Jack," answered my father, as he
stooped down to tickle the duck under the left ear.

"But Jack Tibbets is not Augustine Caxton. Jack Tibbets is not a
scholar, a genius, a wond--"

"Stop!" cried my father.

"After all," said Mr. Squills, "though I am no flatterer, Mr. Tibbets is
not so far out. That part of your book which compares the crania or
skulls of the different races is superb. Lawrence or Dr. Prichard could