thoughts far--far away;--whither?




CHAPTER XXX.

Quae fert adolescentia
Ea ne me celet consuefeci filium.--TERENCE.

["The things which youth proposes I accustomed
my son that he should never conceal from me."]

The next morning Clarence was lounging over his breakfast, and
glancing listlessly now at the pages of the newspapers, now at the
various engagements for the week, which lay confusedly upon his table,
when he received a note from Talbot, requesting to see him as soon as
possible.

"Had it not been for that man," said Clarence to himself, "what should
I have been now? But, at least, I have not disgraced his friendship.
I have already ascended the roughest because the lowest steps on the
hill where Fortune builds her temple. I have already won for the name
I have chosen some 'golden opinions' to gild its obscurity. One year
more may confirm my destiny and ripen hope into success: then--then, I
may perhaps throw off a disguise that, while it befriended, has not
degraded me, and avow myself to her! Yet how much better to dignify
the name I have assumed than to owe respect only to that which I have
not been deemed worthy to inherit! Well, well, these are bitter
thoughts; let me turn to others. How beautiful Flora looked last