"'That's my own look-out. I tell you once for all, Alick, I don't choose you to ride rough-shod over me, because you fancy yourself superior. I will do as I please. I have lost a deal of money to-night, and I mean to play on until I win it back.'
"You will only lose more. You are not in a fit state to deal with sharpers. You are so tipsy now, you can hardly stand.'
"As I said this, I put my arm around him to lead him away, when he, maddened I suppose by drink and his recent losses, burst from me, and turning sharp round, struck me a violent blow on the face. 'Let that satisfy you, whether I am drunk or sober,' he exclaimed, and with a bitter laugh, returned to the party he had quitted.
"Geoffrey, I felt that blow in my heart. The disgrace was little in comparison to the consciousness that it came from his hand—the hand of the friend I loved. I could have returned the injury with ten-fold interest; but I did nothing of the sort. I stood looking after him with dim eyes and a swelling heart, repeating to myself—
"'Is it possible that Edward struck me?'
"That blow, however, achieved a great moral reformation. It led me to think—to examine my past life, and to renounce for ever those follies, which I now felt were debasing to both soul and body, and unworthy the pursuit of any rational creature.
"The world expected me, as a gentleman, to ask satisfaction of Edward for the insult I had received.
"I set the, world and its false laws at defiance.
"I returned to my lodgings and wrote him a brief note, telling him that I forgave him, and gently remonstrating with him on the violence of his conduct.
"Instead of answering, or apologizing for what he had done, he listened to the advice of a pack of senseless idiots, who denounced me as a coward, and lauded his rash act to the skies.