loved him--not
with impetuosity, for Jack was never impetuous: all his feelings were
deep, calm, patient, tender, unconquerable by time or chance. The two
felt that mutual attraction which opposites and counterparts possess.
Harry was the most popular man in his class. Nature had done everything
for him, and lavished those gifts of which she is usually most sparing.
He had a good mind and genial wit; a relish for every form of enjoyment;
a perfect form, the glorious beauty of a Greek god, with crisp golden
curls, brilliant deep-set eyes of blue, noble and chiselled features;
frank manners which none could resist; spirits which nothing could
depress; an impetuous temper, but passing like a flash the moment it was
spent. Jack, on the other hand, had no beauty, and was regarded by those
whom he did not care for as a dull fellow. He was a little slow, and had
slight appreciation of wit except to admire every evidence of it in
Harry. He had certain settled objects in life, and spent none of his
forces on the pleasant distractions which the rest of us sought on the
way. He had been born with a sort of reposeful energy, which had always
impressed me with the conviction that no ordinary situation was enough
for him; and at college there was something disproportionate in his
position among light-hearted boys, so that I never wondered that he
found our aims trivial. He possessed to the full that force of character
by which a man masters himself, always keeps himself in check, and in
times of risk and extremity of peril can suffice unto his own needs and
courageously resist sorrow, misfortune and disappointment.

But while Harry, full of lawless and uncontrollable impulses, had a
stormy and untried future before him, in which he was to be obliged to
work hard for all his successes, Jack's seemed a dazzling vista of
prosperity and ease. He was already engaged to the girl he loved; he was
the only son of a man whose wealth was enormous; and while the rest of
us were to be hungrily gazing into the world's windows with our cold
hands in our empty pockets, he was calmly to take the prettiest girl we
knew by the hand and lead her away into a fairyland whose glories we
might only guess at. But he took all his prospects very quietly: not
even for the sake of love did he neglect his work. He rarely spoke of
Georgy, and I knew that it would never be his fault to illuminate with
too bright a glare the sweet mysteries of the love that must li