career, and that he would hardly do save by efforts greater than the
ordinary man can put forth. The ordinary man?--Was he in any respect
extraordinary? were his powers noteworthy? It was the first time that
he had deliberately posed this question to himself, and for answer came
a rush of confident blood, pulsing through all the mechanism of his
being.

The train of thought which occupied him during this long trudge was to
remain fixed in his memory; in any survey of the years of pupilage this
recollection would stand prominently forth, associated, moreover, with
one slight incident which at the time seemed a mere interruption of his
musing. From a point on the high-road he observed a small quarry, so
excavated as to present an interesting section; though weary, he could
not but turn aside to examine these strata. He knew enough of the
geology of the county to recognise the rocks and reflect with
understanding upon their position; a fragment in his hand, he sat down
to rest for a moment. Then a strange fit of brooding came over him.
Escaping from the influences of personality, his imagination wrought
back through eras of geologic time, held him in a vision of the
infinitely remote, shrivelled into insignificance all but the one fact
of inconceivable duration. Often as he had lost himself in such
reveries, never yet had he passed so wholly under the dominion of that
awe which attends a sudden triumph of the pure intellect. When at
length he rose, it was with wide, blank eyes, and limbs partly numbed.
These needed half-an-hour's walking before he could recover his mood of
practical self-search.

Until the last moment he could not decide whether to let his mother
know how he had reached Twybridge. His arrival corresponded pretty well
with that of a train by which he might have come. But when the door
opened to him, and the familiar faces smiled their welcome, he felt
that he must have nothing to do with paltry deceit; he told of his
walk, explaining it by the simple fact that this morning he had found
himself short of money. How that came to pass, no one inquired. Mrs.
Peak, shocked at such martyrdom, tended him with all motherly care; for
once, Godwin felt that it was good to have a home, however simple.

This amiable frame of mind was not likely to last beyond the first day.
Matter of irritation soon enough offered itself, as was invariably the
case at Twybridge. It was pleasant enough to be feted as the hero of
the