"Mark, I've set my heart on this."
"My dear mother, blessed is the man or woman that has the wisdom to avoid that error."
"My son," said the lady reproachfully, "you seem without interest in anything."
"I am older, hence less enthusiastic, than you," he answered, smiling, and really believing, perhaps rightly, that, notwithstanding their relation, he felt older than she; "but advise me what to do, and I will do it. I am not unwilling to be a statesman, only——"
"I have told you——"
"To get about and get acquainted. Good! I'll start at once and collar the first voter I meet and demand his friendship." So, laughing, he left her, and within an hour Mrs. Joe saw him ride forth from the gates of Stormpoint.
During his long ride he admitted the reasonableness of his mother's ambition. Aside from the obstacle of great wealth, he was as eligible as another for usefulness and such laurels as come to those who honorably pursue a political career. He might smile at his mother's lofty dreams, yet they were not impossible of attainment; whereas, his own, in so far as they offered any allurement, were both unworthy and impossible. "A man should do something better than bewail his fate," he muttered; "since I cannot love elsewhere I'll be a lover of my country."
Greatly to Mrs. Joe's satisfaction, he thenceforward diligently pursued the preliminary requisite of getting around, in so far as that could be accomplished by long, solitary rides throughout the region. He seldom appeared at dinner without a gratifying account of the acquisition of a new rustic acquaintance, while meantime, the lady of Stormpoint saw to it that he did not remain unknown to such Hampton magnates as she could induce to grace her dinner table, displaying, in the matter of hospitality, a catholicity which surprised Paula and amused Mark, who, however, was quite willing to be amused.
Philosophers who have made the passion of love a subject of investigation (and most philosophers have given some attention to this branch of learning) have noticed that the violent death of an old love is often quickly followed by the birth of a new one. A jilted man or woman is Cupid's easiest prey.
Mrs. Joe may, or may not, have been aware of the truth of the above axiom, or its fitness in the case before her; but, having been fairly successful in interesting Mark in one object of her "policy," she resolved at this time to venture further and urge upon his attention the claims of Paula to his love; and, to her great delight, she found him not inattentive to the suggestion. He told his mother, truly enough, that he had a sincere affection for Paula, and admitted that she was, as far as was compatible with humanity, faultless; for it could hardly be a fault in Paula that he could feel no throb in his pulse, or glow in his bosom, when he recalled her to memory.