"One either assumes a more dictatorial tone, or takes more than his
share of the talk, or is more apt to contradict the great man of the
company,--at least _I_ do."

"Don't go, Tom I don't! don't!" called out Dr. Barret.

"Not go?--after all these splendid preparations!" said Layton, with a
laugh. "After yourself exclaiming, 'What a swell!'"

"It 'll never pay,--never pay,--never pay!" croaked out Poll.

"That I'm sure of, doctor. I never knew one of these politic things that
did; but yet we go on through life practising them in the face of all
their failure, dancing attendance at levees, loitering in antechambers,
all to be remembered by some great man who is just as likely to hate the
sight of us. However, this shall be my last transgression."

The faint female voice muttered some indistinct words about what he
"owed to himself," and the "rightful station that belonged to him;" but
he speedily cut the reflection short as he said: "So long as a man is
poor as I am, he can only hold his head high by total estrangement from
the world. Let him dare to mix with it, and his threadbare coat and
patched shoes will soon convince him that they will extend no equality
to him who comes among them in such beggarly fashion. With what
authority, I ask, can he speak, whose very poverty refutes his
sentiments, and the simple question stands forth unanswerable: 'If this
man knew so much, why is he as we see him?'"

"This is, then, to say that misfortune is never unmerited. Surely you do
not mean that, Herbert?" said she, with an eagerness almost painful.

"It is exactly what I would say,--that for all the purposes of worldly
judgments upon men, there is no easier rule than to assume that they
who fail deserve failure. Richelieu never asked those who sought high
command, 'Are you skilful in the field? are you clever in strategy?'
but' 'Are you lucky?'"

A deep sigh was her only answer.

"I wonder who Millar's fourth man is to be? Colonel Karstairs, I know,
is one; a man of importance to me, Grace," said he, laughing; "a
two-guinea subscriber to the dispensary! How I wish I were in a more
fitting spirit of submissiveness to my betters; and, by ill fortune,
this is one of my rebellious days!"

"Don't go, Tom! Don't go, I say!" yelled out Poll.

"Prophet of evil, and evil prophet, hold your tongue! I will go," said
he, sternly, and as if answering a responsible adviser; and setting his
hat on, with a certain air of dogged defi