a premature reflection on certain questions of life; it had
given a bias to his conscience, a sympathy with certain ills, and a
tension of resolve in certain directions, who marked him off from other
youths much more than any talents he possessed.

One day near the end of the long vacation, when he had been making a
tour in the Rhineland with his Eton tutor, and was come for a farewell
stay at the Abbey before going to Cambridge, he said to Sir Hugo--

"What do you intend me to be, sir?" They were in the library, and it
was the fresh morning. Sir Hugo had called him in to read a letter from
a Cambridge Don who was to be interested in him; and since the baronet
wore an air at once business-like and leisurely, the moment seemed
propitious for entering on a grave subject which had never yet been
thoroughly discussed.

"Whatever your inclination leads you to, my boy. I thought it right to
give you the option of the army, but you shut the door on that, and I
was glad. I don't expect you to choose just yet--by-and-by, when you
have looked about you a little more and tried your mettle among older
men. The university has a good wide opening into the forum. There are
prizes to be won, and a bit of good fortune often gives the turn to a
man's taste. From what I see and hear, I should think you can take up
anything you like. You are in the deeper water with your classics than
I ever got into, and if you are rather sick of that swimming, Cambridge
is the place where you can go into mathematics with a will, and disport
yourself on the dry sand as much as you like. I floundered along like a
carp."

"I suppose money will make some difference, sir," said Daniel blushing.
"I shall have to keep myself by-and-by."

"Not exactly. I recommend you not to be extravagant--yes, yes, I
know--you are not inclined to that;--but you need not take up anything
against the grain. You will have a bachelor's income--enough for you to
look about with. Perhaps I had better tell you that you may consider
yourself secure of seven hundred a year. You might make yourself a
barrister--be a writer--take up politics. I confess that is what would
please me best. I should like to have you at my elbow and pulling with
me."

Deronda looked embarrassed. He felt that he ought to make some sign of
gratitude, but other feelings clogged his tongue. A moment was passing
by in which a question about his birth was throbbing within him, and
yet it seemed more impossi