the wharf: and there the Major turned back
upon me suddenly and I thought he had been unable to face the terrible
gust which came sweeping up from the harbour: but it was not so. He had
turned on purpose, and putting his hands upon my shoulders, he said,--

"Hamlyn, Hamlyn, you have taught me a lesson."

"I suppose so," I said. "I have shown you what a fool a tender-hearted
soft-headed fellow may make of himself by yielding to his impulses. But
I have a defence to offer, my dear sir, the best of excuses, the only
real excuse existing in this world. I couldn't help it."

"I don't mean that, Hamlyn," he answered. "The lesson you have taught
me is a very different one. You have taught me that there are bright
points in the worst man's character, a train of good feeling which no
tact can bring out, but yet which some human spark of feeling may
light. Here is this man Hawker, of whom we heard that he was dangerous
to approach, and whom the good chaplain was forced to pray for and
exhort from a safe distance. The man for whose death, till ten minutes
ago, I was rejoicing. The man I thought lost, and beyond hope. Yet you,
by one burst of unpremeditated folly, by one piece of silly
sentimentality; by ignoring the man's later life, and carrying him back
in imagination to his old schoolboy days, have done more than our good
old friend the Chaplain could have done without your assistance. There
is a spark of the Divine in the worst of men, if you can only find it."

In spite of the Major's parliamentary and didactic way of speaking, I
saw there was truth at the bottom of what he said, and that he meant
kindly to me, and to the poor fellow who was even now among the dead;
so instead of arguing with him, I took his arm, and we fought homewards
together through the driving rain.

Imagine three months to have passed. That stormy spring had changed
into a placid, burning summer. The busy shearing-time was past; the
noisy shearers were dispersed, heaven knows where (most of them
probably suffering from a shortness of cash, complicated with delirium
tremens). The grass in the plains had changed from green to dull grey;
the river had changed his hoarse roar for a sleepy murmur, as though
too lazy to quarrel with his boulders in such weather. A hot dull haze
was over forest and mountain. The snow had perspired till it showed
long black streaks on the highest eminences. In short, summer had come
with a vengeance; every one felt hot, id