than he did himself—(it is curious how an uncommon position exaggerates our importance in our own eyes)—and take up the thread of the narrative when, at the death of his father, he became "lord of himself, that heritage of wo;"—without money, without a profession, and with relatives on whom he had no claim but kindness—as if that were a claim ever acknowledged by a relative! Not that we would detract one iota from the benevolence which does exist in humanity; there is both more gratitude and more cause for gratitude than it is the fashion now-a-days to admit: but this we do say, that the obligation is never from those on whom we have a claim. Kindness is always unexpected; and "overcomes us like a summer cloud," exciting our "special wonder" as well as thankfulness. In the present state of society, a noble name, without its better part—a noble fortune, is only an encumbrance to its owner. A merely well-born and well-educated young man is the most helpless object in nature. False shame is in him a principle, and the privation of poverty is nothing to its mortification. His habits are opposed to one means of maintenance, his feelings to a second, and his pride to a third. "Dig he cannot, and to beg he is ashamed."
But Charles Smythe had an energy that only required to be thrown upon its own resources, in order to find them. He had literary tastes, and, still more, literary talents; and of all others, these
