why I'm single."

"Economy again, Vance."

"Prudence,--dignity," answered Vance, seriously; and sinking into a
revery that seemed gloomy, he shot back to shore.




CHAPTER II.

Mr. Vance explains how he came to grind colours and save half-pence.
--A sudden announcement.

The meal was over; the table had been spread by a window that looked upon
the river. The moon was up: the young men asked for no other lights;
conversation between them--often shifting, often pausing--had gradually
become grave, as it usually does with two companions in youth; while yet
long vistas in the Future stretch before them deep in shadow, and they
fall into confiding talk on what they wish,--what they fear; making
visionary maps in that limitless Obscure.

"There is so much power in faith," said Lionel, "even when faith is
applied but to things human and earthly, that let a man be but firmly
persuaded that he is born to do, some day, what at the moment seems
impossible, and it is fifty to one but what he does it before he dies.
Surely, when you were a child at school, you felt convinced that there
was something in your fate distinct from that of the other boys, whom the
master might call quite as clever,--felt that faith in yourself which