d and delivered from the
disgrace of deformity now so hideously infecting both his spirit and
his flesh.

Of this he was so well assured that, disregarding the felt, though
unseen, presence of that errant soul, disdaining to do battle with it,
he leaned forward once more, looking down into the close-packed arena
of the great theatre. All those brilliant figures, members of his own
class, here present, were matter of indifference to him. In this moment
of conscious and supreme farewell, it was to the dull-coloured
multitude that he turned. They still moved him to sympathy.
Unconsciously they had enlightened him concerning matters of infinite
moment. At their hands he would receive penance and absolution. Before
they dealt more closely with him,--since that dealing must involve
suffering which might temporarily cloud his friendship for them,--he
wanted to bid them farewell and assure them of his conviction of the
righteousness of their corporate action. So, silently, he blessed them,
taking leave of them in peace. Then he found there were other farewells
to be said.--Farewell to earthly life as he had known it, the struggle
and very frequent anguish of it, its many frustrated purposes, fair
illusions, unfulfilled hopes. He must bid farewell, moreover, to art as
he had relished it--to learning, as he had all too intermittently
pursued it--to travel, as he had found solace in it--to the
inexhaustible interest, the inextinguishable humour and pathos, in
brief, of things seen. And, reviewing all this, a profound nostalgia of
all those minor happinesses which are the natural inheritance of the
average man arose in him--happiness of healthy, light-hearted
activities, not only of the athlete and the fighting-man, but of the
playing-field, and the ball-room, and the river--happinesses to him
inevitably denied. With an almost boyish passion of longing, he cried
out for these.--Just for one day to have lived with the ease and
freedom with which the vast majority of men habitually live! Just for
one day to have been neither dwarf nor cripple, but to have taken his
place and his chance with the rest, before it all was over and the tale
told!

But very soon Richard put these thoughts from him, deeming it unworthy
to dwell upon them at this juncture. The call was to go forward, not to
go back. So he settled himself in his chair once more, pulling the
velvet drapery forward so as to shut out the sight of the house.
Bitterness should