CHAPTER IV.
GEORGE DELANY—DECEASED.
"It is a good thing to be alive," Natalie Brande repeated slowly, gazing, as it were, far off through her half-closed eyelids. Then turning to me and looking at me full, wide-eyed, she asked: "A good thing for how many?"
"For all; for everything that is alive."
"Faugh! For few things that are alive. For hardly anything. You say it is a good thing to be alive. How often have you said that in your life?"
"All my life through," I answered stoutly. My constitution was a good one, and I had lived healthily, if hardily. I voiced the superfluous vitality of a well nourished body.
"Then you do not know what it is to feel for others."
There was a scream in the underwood near us. It ended in a short, choking squeak. The girl paled, but she went on with outward calm.
"That hawk or cat feels as you do. I wonder what that young rabbit thinks of life's problem?"
"But we are neither hawks nor cats, nor even young rabbits," I answered warmly. "We can not bear the burthens of the whole animal world. Our own are sufficient for us."