l be over." For Lionel, growing
excited, teased the horse with his whip; and the horse bolting, took the
cab within an inch of a water-cart.

"Fame, fame!" cried Lionel, unheeding the interruption. "What would
I not give to have and to hold it for an hour?" "Hold an eel, less
slippery; a scorpion, less stinging! But--" added Vance, observing his
companion's heightened colour--"but," he added seriously, and with an
honest compunction, "I forgot, you are a soldier, you follow the career
of arms! Never heed what is said on the subject by a querulous painter!
The desire of fame may be folly in civilians: in soldiers it is wisdom.
Twin-born with the martial sense of honour, it cheers the march; it
warms the bivouac; it gives music to the whir of the bullet, the roar
of the ball; it plants hope in the thick of peril; knits rivals with the
bond of brothers; comforts the survivor when the brother falls; takes
from war its grim aspect of carnage; and from homicide itself extracts
lessons that strengthen the safeguards to humanity, and perpetuate life
to nations. Right: pant for fame; you are a soldier!"

This was one of those bursts of high sentiment from Vance, which, as
they were very rare with him, had the dramatic effect of surprise.
Lionel listened to him with a thrilling delight. He could not answer:
he was too moved. The artist resumed, as the cabriolet now cleared the
Park, and rolled safely and rapidly along the road. "I suppose, during
the five years you have spent abroad completing your general education,
you have made little study, or none, of what specially appertains to the
profession you have so recently chosen."

"You are mistaken there, my dear Vance. If a man's heart be set on
a thing, he is always studying it. The books I loved best, and most
pondered over, were such as, if they did not administer lessons,
suggested hints that might turn to lessons hereafter. In social
intercourse, I never was so pleased as when I could fasten myself to
some practical veteran,--question and cross-examine him. One picks up
more ideas in conversation than from books; at least I do. Besides,
my idea of a soldier who is to succeed some day is not that of a mere
mechanician-at-arms. See how accomplished most great captains have been.
What observers of mankind! what diplomatists! what reasoners! what men
of action, because men to whom reflection had been habitual before they
acted! How many stores of idea must have gone to the jud