woman, proud, cold, queenly--he had acquired
strength of character, loftier ideals, and a sense of the value of
intellectual gifts, which had kept him singularly free from and
indifferent to, the temptations of the senses. He had learnt to drink
mental stimulants with avidity. He had made one or two brilliant
successes in literature, and was looked upon as a supremely "odd fish,"
by his brother officers.

That third meeting decided his fate. He spoke out his love, spurred on
by a rivalry he had good cause to dread, but spoke to no purpose.
Calmly, though with a sorrow she did not attempt to disguise, she told
her old playmate and friend that her choice was made. She was going to
marry the old, vicious, and fabulously wealthy Russian Prince, Fedor
Ivanovitch Zairoff. She made no pretence of caring for the man whom,
out of a host of suitors, she had selected to wed. When her young lover
stormed and upbraided her she only raised those wonderful stag-like eyes
to his face and said:

"I have a reason, Julian. I cannot explain it. I dare not say more.
Believe me I could not make you happy, _it would not be permitted_."

And having long ago learnt that arguments were utterly useless before
_that_ formula, he had to stand aside--to crush back a strong and
unconquerable passion--to see her pass from his sight and knowledge--and
to bear his life as best he could, with that feeling in his heart of
having staked all on one throw, and lost, that makes so many men
desperate and vicious. That it did not make Julian Estcourt so was
entirely due to great strength of moral character, and a belief in the
responsibilities with which life is charged, and for the abuse of which
it is destined to suffer in future states or conditions, as well as in
its present.

If such belief were universally accepted and pursued, we should soon
cease to hear those ridiculous and humiliating phrases with which
popular favourites are extenuated for the reckless and disgraceful waste
of mind, energy, and usefulness, occasioned by some trifling
disappointment or misfortune. There would be no more sins glossed over
as "sowing wild oats," and "having his fling," or "driven to the bad,"
because once an individual feels he is responsible to _himself_ for
undue physical indulgences--for laws of natural life set at naught, and
spiritual impulses disregarded--he will try to emerge from the slough of
evil, and he will learn with startling rapidity to valu