"For something noble; to gain some lofty end."
"Well, I hope you'll succeed in your high-wrought schemes; but for my part, I see no use in fretting and toiling through this life, to secure some transitory fame and honor. Better pass its hours away as easily and quietly as we can."
"We should not live shrunk away in ourselves, but strive to do something for the benefit and happiness of our species."
"O, well, Annie! if to render others happy is your wish and aim, you have but to remain here in your humble cottage home, and I'll promise you you'll do that."
"Why, George," said she, noticing his rueful countenance, "what makes you look so woe-begone? As if I were about to fly to the ends of the earth, when I'm only going two little miles to Parson Grey's Rectory, and promise to walk to Scraggiewood every Saturday evening with you."
"But I feel as if I was going to lose you, Annie, for all that; the times that are past will never return."
"No; but there may be brighter ones ahead," she answered, hopefully.
George shook his head. None of her lofty aspirations found response in his bosom; the present moment occupied his thoughts. So the common wants of life were supplied, and he free from pain and anxiety, he was content, nor wished or thought of aught beyond. The great world of the future he never longed to scan, nor penetrate its misty-veiled depths, and leave a name for lofty deeds and noble actions, that should vibrate on the ear of time when he was no more.
And thus drifted asunder on the great ocean of life the barks that had floated on calmly side by side through a few years of quiet pleasure. They might never spread their sails together again; wider and wider would the distance grow between them; higher and higher would swell the waves as they sped on their separate courses; the one light and buoyant with her freight of noble hopes and dauntless steersman at the helm, the other without sail or ballast, drifted about at the mercy of winds and waves.
CHAPTER IV.