[CHAPTER III.]
MORAL DECLENSION.
ALONE—amid books, mortars, vials, and the more startling appendages of a doctor's office—sat the young student, whose suit had been rejected. The volumes over which he had been poring were closed; the anatomical preparations laid aside; the theory and practice of medicine alike forgotten. He sat with his head bowed down; his whole attitude one of deep dejection.
"It is folly to give way thus," he said, arousing himself. "Her heart and her hand are already pledged to another, and can, therefore, never be mine. How little did I dream of this! Sweet girl! How can I give up the dear hope of one day calling her my own! But it must be done. Who can be my fortunate rival?"
As this last sentence was uttered almost aloud, the door of the office opened, and his friend Lawrence Dunbar came in.
"What has come over you, Lloyd?" he said, as soon as he had looked into Hudson's face. "One would think you hadn't a friend in the world."
"I am not so badly off as that comes to, I hope; though I cannot say that I feel very bright. But you look as if you were in the best possible humor with yourself and everybody else."
"And so I am; and I have cause to be, Lloyd! I have something to tell you, as a friend, which I think will gratify you exceedingly."
"Ah! What is it?"
"I have wooed and won the sweetest maiden in the city."