Chandos shook his head sadly, and replied: "The road to high fortune, my good friend, is not so easily travelled now as once it was. So many are driving along it, that there is no room for one to pass the other."
"There's another reason besides that," answered Lockwood, "why we see so few mount high now-a-days. It's all like bread and butter at a school; there's but a certain portion of butter for the whole; and if the number of mouths be increased, it must be spread thinner. However, as I have said, you can do what you like; for you are young, determined enough for anything, and have a good education, so you may be a great man, if you like."
"You have had a good education too, Lockwood," replied the other.
"Ay, but not so good as yours," said his companion. "Mine has been picked up anyhow; and a man never makes much of that. Besides, you have always been accustomed to keep company with gentlefolks; and I am a boor. Education means something else than cramming a man's head with Greek and Latin, or mathematics either; and, moreover, I don't want to be a great man, if I could. To me it would be as disagreeable, as you will find being a little one."
"Well, well, we have settled that question," said Chandos; "and for the future God will provide."
He then walked up to one of the large bookcases, carved like the screen of an old church, took down a volume so covered with dust that the top looked as if it were bearing a crop of wool, opened it, and read a few lines mechanically. Lockwood stood near, with his arms folded on his broad chest, gazing at him with a thoughtful look, then, tapping him lightly on the arm, he said, "You have forgotten one thing: you will have to receive all these fine things some day soon; how will that square with all your fine plans?"
Chandos took a moment or two to reply; for it would seem, he had not indeed considered the subject. "I will tell you, Lockwood," he said; "I will give you an order to receive them in my name. I shall be near at hand, to do anything more that may be necessary."
"But what am I to do with them?" asked Lockwood, frightened at the idea of such folio volumes, and awful bookcases. "But I will tell you what I can do," he added, a moment afterwards. "There's the young parson over at Northferry, he's a good young man and kind, I have always heard, though I don't know him, and has a large house not yet half furnished. He'll give them place, I'm sure. We can talk of that afterwards. But it must be the good folks' dinner hour, by this time; and keepers have huge appetites."
"Well, let us go back," said Chandos, with a sigh. "But we can walk through the rooms. It will not take us longer."
"The base and the perpendicular are always in their sum more than the hypotenuse," replied Lockwood, drily. "But doubtless they are not so ravenous as to grudge a few minutes to look at places you have not seen for so long, and may never see again.--Odd's life, pull the place down! They must be mad!"