care or share in yours.' Now, there never
was a fellow with less of this selfishness than you--"

"Do not speak to me of what I was, my dear friend. There's not a plank
of the old craft remaining. The name alone lingers, and even that will
soon be extinct."

"So, then, you still hold to this stern resolution? Shall I tell you
what I think of it?"

"Perhaps you had better not do so," said Glencore, sternly.

"By Jove! then, I will, just for that menace," said Harcourt. "I said,
'This is vengeance on Glencore's part.'"

"To whom, sir, did you make this remark?"

"To myself, of course. I never alluded to the matter to any other;
never."

"So far, well," said Glencore, solemnly; "for had you done so, we had
never exchanged words again!"

"My dear fellow," said Harcourt, laying his hand affectionately on the
other's, "I can well imagine the price a sensitive nature like yours
must pay for the friendship of one so little gifted with tact as I am.
But remember always that there's this advantage in the intercourse: you
can afford to hear and bear things from a man of _my_ stamp, that would
be outrages from perhaps the lips of a brother. As Upton, in one of his
bland moments, once said to me, 'Fellows like you, Harcourt, are the
bitters of the human pharmacopoeia,--somewhat hard to take, but very
wholesome when you're once swallowed.'"

"You are the best of the triad, and no great praise that, either,"
muttered Glencore to himself. After a pause, he continued: "It has not
been from any distrust in your friendship, Harcourt, that I have not
spoken to you before on this gloomy subject. I know well that you bear
me more affection than any one of all those who call themselves my
friends; but when a man is about to do that which never can meet
approval from those who love him, he seeks no counsel, he invites no
confidence. Like the gambler, who risks all on a single throw, he makes
his venture from the impulse of a secret mysterious prompting within,
that whispers, 'With this you are rescued or ruined!' Advice, counsel!"
cried he, in bitter mockery, "tell me, when have such ever alleviated
the tortures of a painful malady? Have you ever heard that the writhings
of the sick man were calmed by the honeyed words of his friends at the
bedside? I"--here his voice became full and loud--"I was burdened with a
load too great for me to bear. It had bowed me to the earth, and all
but crushed me! The sense of an unaccomplished venge