stancy has no part in me. Change is my sine quâ non, no matter if it be change for the worse. It's the same in my relations with people,—women included. If Venus herself were to offer herself to me on the one condition that I'd remain true to her—well, I might promise, but I should break my promise before the honeymoon was over! That's the way I'm made: other people are regular glue-pots; and so the balance of nature is preserved. If I were an astrologer I should expect to find that I was born under a shooting star or a comet. Don't you remember it was the same when we were children? You never had but one pet, that I know of, and that was a broken-down cat with half its fur and one eye gone: you kept it alive for years by a miracle, and when it died you mourned for it and raised a grave-stone over it, and would not be comforted; whereas I had a score of pets each month, and as soon as they got to know me and like me I wanted to get rid of them,—dogs, rabbits, cats, squirrels, or whatever else they were. No, I shall never be at rest, either in body or in mind, although I am the most indolent of mankind; and when I look forward to the life beyond the grave my only fear is that some mistaken purpose to insure my happiness should render me miserable to all eternity. For if I were endowed with the fairest estate and the most charming family and neighbors in heaven, and obliged to remain there and keep up appearances, it would be hell to me; whereas my heaven would consist in being forever on the go, never pausing throughout the immensities of the universe, and indifferent whether the places I visited were the abodes of the blessed or of the damned!"
"Aren't you afraid this will get you into a bad scrape some day?"
He laughed. "A gypsy once told me that I bore a charmed life," he said. "No one that I have injured can ever harm me. It has turned out a true prophecy so far; and if I keep on as I have begun I shall, by and by, get the whole human race on the innocuous side, and then I shall be all right!" . . .
No doubt I have changed as well as Henry: what is certain is that the result of our changes, on either side, has been to draw us further and further apart from each other. He has followed the bent of his nature, I of mine; and that which once was sympathetic now seems almost hostile. One reason is that formerly I could hope that my brother's faults would diminish and his virtues increase; but now there is no room for such hope. I cannot but lament over him. Such men as he do more mischief in the world than deliberate criminals can do; for they have all the charm of goodness, and yet their works are evil.
As regards the particular matter in hand, there was nothing in what he said to disprove his former knowledge of Sinfire; and there were
