sometimes a great help. It opens the eyes a little sooner than they would
have opened of themselves. And time," he added, with a half sigh and with
an appeal in his tone, as if he would justify himself to my conscience, "is
half the battle in this world. It is over so soon."

"No sooner than it ought to be," I rejoined.

"So it may appear to you," he returned; "for you, I presume to
conjecture, have worked hard and done much. I may or may not have worked
hard--sometimes I think I have, sometimes I think I have not--but I
certainly have done little. Here I am nearly thirty, and have made no mark
on the world yet."

"I don't know that that is of so much consequence," I said. "I have never
hoped for more than to rub out a few of the marks already made."

"Perhaps you are right," he returned. "Every man has something he can do,
and more, I suppose, that he can't do. But I have no right to turn a visit
into a visitation. Will you please tell Miss Walton that I am very sorry I
presumed on the privileges of a drawing-master, and gave her pain. It was
so far from my intention that it will be a lesson to me for the future."

With these words he took his leave, and I could not help being greatly
pleased both with them and with his bearing. He was clearly anything but a
common man.