grudge to this unfortunate that humble place in the world
of men which he held with such a boyish pride, those poor pleasures in
which he took such innocent delight! He thought of his own son, as the
train bore him away to his consultation, good and fairly satisfactory,
but guarded on every side, petted, pampered. How much would it cost to
bring into his own boy's handsome face the glow of surprised delight
which had overspread the pale features of this poor lad at the gift of
the four-and-sixpenny book.

But even as the thought passed through his mind, his lips curved with a
smile of proud tenderness. The absurdity of the comparison! His own
handsome, well-grown lad, with his fair, frank face and proudly carried
head, and the poor little city clerk--the pallor of ill-health and
confinement on the dusky face; the meagre figure; the head, over-heavy
with its brown curls, thrust forwards, as if in eagerness to reach the
goal before his feet could carry him there.

"Ah, happiness is found in unexpected places, and is a matter of
temperament only, and not of circumstance at all," the doctor told
himself, when Clomayne's clerk and the girl he called Cicely, passed
the door of his first-class carriage, their destination reached. Peter
was holding the girl's sleeve and hurrying her along, his head pushed
forward, and on his face that look of eager joyousness which to the
eyes that watched and that _knew_ was so full of pathos. The voluble
tongue was wagging as the pair trotted past. He heard his own name
mentioned. And so Clomayne's clerk passed from the eyes that watched,
for ever.

"I'll keep an eye on that poor fellow. I'll speak about him to Ladell;
and when he begins to go down-hill, I'll lend a helping hand," the
doctor said, making one of those resolutions that testify surely to the
spiritual part of us, and do honour to the hearts that record them,
even when, as now, they are not kept.

The doctor fully meant to keep his when he made it, but he forgot.

He forgot it, until one sunshiny morning in the spring of the next
year, when, as he sat at his solitary lunch, there was brought to him a
letter. It was in a careful and childish hand, and he read it almost at
a glance as he ate the biscuit and drank the glass of Burgundy which he
allowed himself for his midday meal.

"DEAR SIR," the letter ran--"Peter was coming to tell you he had
been promoted again. A junior was wanted to help with some work
thro