“I thank you for it,” said Cashel, pressing his hand; “few have ever cared to tell me truths.”
“Say, rather, few have cared to resign their influence over you by showing they knew your weak points. Now, I have too deep an interest in you, and too slight a regard for any profit your acquaintance can render myself, to be swayed by this. You don't know, you cannot know, what a charm there is to an old fellow like myself—whose humble fortunes limit to a life of mere routine—to think that he has an opportunity of counselling one in your station,—to feel that he has sown the seed of some good principle, that one day or other will bear its fruit. Yes, years hence, when you have forgotten the old village doctor,—or if by chance remember him, only to recall his vulgarity or eccentricity,—I will be an anxious watcher over you, flattering myself to think that I have had some share in instilling the precepts by which you are winning good men's esteem. These thoughts are poor men's treasures, but he that feels them would not barter them for gold.”
“I have long wished for such a counsellor,” said Cashel, fervently.
“The advice will not be the less stringent that it comes when you are heart-sick of frivolity,” said Tiernay. “What could your fine company up yonder teach you? Such of them as are above mere folly trade in vice. I have seen them all since they have assembled here, and I am no mean physiognomist, and there is but one among them deserving of better than the poor heartless life they 're leading.”
“I can guess whom you mean,” said Roland, half pleased and half fearful.
“Well, she indeed would merit a better lot; and yet I would she were gone.”
“Why so? Do you grudge as even a passing 'gleam of virtue's brightness'?”
“She is more dangerous than the veriest coquette that ever lured a man to ruin. It is in such as she, where noble qualities have run to waste, where generous sentiments and pure affections have been blighted by the cold chill of a world that fosters not such gifts, the peril is ever greatest; for her sake and for yours, I would she were gone.”
As they spoke thus, they had reached the wide esplanade in front of the great house, from the windows of which lights were gleaming, while sounds of festivity and pleasure floated on the night air.
Tiernay halted for a second, and then said, “Who could believe that the owner of that princely mansion, filled as it is with pleasure-loving guests, and every adjunct that can promote enjoyment, should leave it, to wander on foot with a poor old village doctor, whose only merit is to utter unpalatable truths!”