river. Some strange, vague impression
was on me, that I needed time and place to commune with myself and be
alone; that a large unsettled account lay between me and my conscience,
which could not be longer deferred; but of what nature, how originating,
and how tending, I know nothing whatever.

I resolved to submit myself to a searching examination, to ascertain
what I might about myself. In my favorite German authors I had
frequently read that men's failures in life were chiefly owing to
neglect of this habit of self-investigation; that though we calculate
well the dangers and difficulties of an enterprise, we omit the more
important estimate of what may be our capacity to effect an object, what
are our resources, wherein our deficiencies.

"Now for it," I thought, as I entered the little arbor,--"now for it,
Potts; kiss the book, and tell the whole truth and nothing but the
truth."

As I said this, I took off my hat and bowed respectfully around to
the members of an imaginary court. "My name," said I, in a clear and
respectful voice, "is Algernon Sydney Potts. If I be pushed to the
avowal, I am sorry it _is_ Potts. Algernon Sydney do a deal, but they
can't do everything,--not to say that captious folk see a certain bathos
in the collocation with my surname. Can a man hope to make such a name
illustrious? Can be aspire to the notion of a time when people will
allude to the great Potts, the celebrated Potts, the immortal Potts?" I
grew very red, I felt my cheek on fire as I uttered this, and I suddenly
bethought me of Mr. Pitt, and I said aloud, "And, if Pitt, why not
Potts?" That was a most healing recollection. I revelled in it for a
long time. "How true is it," I continued, "that the halo of greatness
illumines all within its circle, and the man is merged in the grandeur
of his achievements. The men who start in life with high sounding
designations have but to fill a foregone pledge,--to pay the bill that
fortune has endorsed. Not so was our case, Pitt. To us is it to lay
every foundation stone of our future greatness. There was nothing
in _your_ surname to foretell you would be a Minister of State at
one-and-thirty,--there is no letter of _mine_ to indicate what I shall
be. But what is it that I am to be? Is it Poet, Philosopher, Politician,
Soldier, or Discoverer? Am I to be great in Art, or illustrious in
Letters? Is there to be an ice tract of Behring's Straits called Potts's
Point, or a planet styled Pottsiu