e were going to say
something. Then he put it back without speaking and looked
meditatively through the blue smoke.

"I'm right," Davis went on, "to begin with, we colored people haven't
any show here. Now, if we could go to Central or South America, or
some place like that,--but hang it all, who wants to go thousands of
miles away from home to earn a little bread and butter?"

"There's India and the young Englishmen, if I remember rightly," said
McLean.

"Oh, yes, that's all right, with the Cabots and Drake and Sir John
Franklin behind them. Their traditions, their blood, all that they
know makes them willing to go 'where there ain't no ten commandments
and a man can raise a thirst,' but for me, home, if I can call it
home."

"Well, then, stick it out."

"That's easy enough to say, McLean; but ten to one you've got some
snap picked out for you already, now 'fess up, ain't you?"

"Well, of course I'm going in with my father, I can't help that, but
I've got--"

"To be sure," broke in Davis, "you go in with your father. Well, if
all I had to do was to step right out of college into my father's
business with an assured salary, however small, I shouldn't be falling
on my own neck and weeping to-night. But that's just the trouble with
us; we haven't got fathers before us or behind us, if you'd rather."

"More luck to you, you'll be a father before or behind some one else;
you'll be an ancestor."

"It's more profitable being a descendant, I find."

A glow came into McLean's face and his eyes sparkled as he replied:
"Why, man, if I could, I'd change places with you. You don't deserve
your fate. What is before you? Hardships, perhaps, and long waiting.
But then, you have the zest of the fight, the joy of the action and
the chance of conquering. Now what is before me,--me, whom you are
envying? I go out of here into a dull counting-room. The way is
prepared for me. Perhaps I shall have no hardships, but neither have I
the joy that comes from pains endured. Perhaps I shall have no battle,
but even so, I lose the pleasure of the fight and the glory of
winning. Your fate is infinitely to be preferred to mine."

"Ah, now you talk with the voluminous voice of the centuries,"
bantered Davis. "You are but echoing the breath of your Nelsons, your
Cabots, your Drakes and your Franklins. Why, can't you see, you
sentimental idiot, that it's all different and has to be different
with us? The Anglo-Saxon race has been producin