I shrunk at these words, and was silent, for they found an accusing echo in my heart.
"Could you endure his absence, Mrs. Ellis?"
"Alas!" said my poor mother, with her eyes full of tears, "adversity has taught me to endure all things patiently—a bitter art to cultivate; but such a separation would be the hardest of all."
"Then we must put him to some respectable business, where hard work and long hours will knock all silly notions out of his head. What kind of business would you like, young man?"
"I do not know, sir."
"Then who should know, sir? But no doubt you despise all manner of business."
I was silent, and my mother gave me an imploring glance to remain so.
"You are a boy—a mere bairn yet," resumed the minister, in that contemptuous manner often adopted by testy old gentlemen to their juniors; "but the trials of life will teach you the hollowness of those romantic fancies which are fostered by novels, playbooks, and such-like literary trash, of which, I doubt not, you have devoured over many already. You wish to be happy?"
"Of course, sir," said I, with a sigh of impatience; for all this sounded uncomfortably like a lecture, or a scrap of the doctor's sermons.
"Then you will find that it most truly consists in bestowing happiness on others."