A COMPARISON.
I think, ofttimes, that lives of men may be
Likened to wandering winds that come and go,
Not knowing whence they rise, whither they blow
O'er the vast globe, voiceful of grief or glee.
Some lives are buoyant zephyrs sporting free
In tropic sunshine; some long winds of woe
That shun the day, wailing with murmurs low,
Through haunted twilights, by the unresting sea;
Others are ruthless, stormful, drunk with might,
Born of deep passion or malign desire:
They rave 'mid thunder-peals and clouds of fire.
Wild, reckless all, save that some power unknown
Guides each blind force till life be overblown,
Lost in vague hollows of the fathomless Night.
Paul H. Hayne.
THROUGH WINDING WAYS.
CHAPTER XI.
No boy with the ordinary sources of pleasurable activity open to him can realize the gloom and despondency I felt at times when cut off from the healthful energies of other men. I was no longer morbid; I would not allow myself to feel that my infirmity was a bar to the enjoyment of life; yet, all the same, I dreaded society and shrank from the fresh conviction of inferiority I was certain to experience in going out with Harry, who was strongest where I was so weak. He was the most delightful fellow in society that I have ever seen. He comprehended everybody and everything with the grasp of an ardent and sympathetic spirit. He was happy in possessing a natural facility for pleasing women of all ages and all degrees. The professors' wives and daughters were all in love with him: his rooms were full of the work of white hands. He had as many smoking-caps as there are days in the week, and might have fitted out the entire class with slippers. But nobody wondered: he was so handsome and tall and godlike that every woman believed in him, and felt the charm of his grand manner, which put romance and chivalry into the act of helping her over a puddle.
I probably felt more reverence for the meanest woman we met in the street than he did for his grandest friend in society; but, nevertheless, his splendid courtesy illuminated the slightest social duty, whereas I stood rayless beside him. He had been unlucky where his mother was concerned: she was a weak woman to begin with, had never loved her husband, and had left him for another man, whom she married after the disgrace and sorrow she caused had killed her boy's father. Harry never spoke of this, but, perhaps unconsciously to himself, it had changed the feeling he might have had toward women into something defiant and cynical; and the attraction they possessed for him was in danger of becoming debased, since he admired them, old and young, with too scanty a respect, and believed too little in the worth of any emotion they awoke in his heart or mind.
It had been a matter of discussion between Harry and myself whether we should attend Mrs. Dwight's party. But Jack had peremptory orders to bring us both, and of course when the evening came we went. I had not seen Georgy Lenox since the visit she had paid me a few months after my accident, and I had often told myself that I wished never to see her any more. Yet now that I was again near her I was eager to meet and talk with her. I had often felt myself superior to other fellows of my age on account of this very experience of living down a passion; but since I had received her note I might have known that my experience had done little for me—that I had merely been removed from temptation; for, school myself as I might, my blood was leaping in my veins at the thought of looking into her eyes again. One cannot be twenty and be wise at the same time. But then in some matters a man is never wise, let his age be what it may.
Mrs. Dwight's parlors were long and spacious and splendidly furnished. They were well filled too before we entered, for we were so anxious to do the most truly elegant thing to-night that we had put off making our appearance until long past ten o'clock. Whatever expectations we may have had of making a sensation in the rooms were considerably damped by the awkwardness of our début. Jack knew the house, and at once skirted the crowd to find what he wanted, but Harry and I were obliged to stand still in a corner, ignorant of everything save the name of our hostess, waiting for something to turn up. The ordeal was not so disagreeable as it might seem. The band played in the alcove, the women were well dressed and, to our eyes, radiantly beautiful, while the men appealed to our critical curiosity. Plenty of our college dons were there, and many of the leading men of the day, but more interesting to us were the perfectly-dressed, graceful society-men a little beyond our own age: these we watched carefully, with the superior air of contempt with which every man of every age views the social success of others; yet we envied them nevertheless. In one of these we simultaneously recognized an old friend, and exclaimed together, "If there isn't Thorpe!"