"
"Well, be it so. Now for this history of yours, which you have
promised to give me, by the way, any time these two years."
"It can be told in a few words; and I hope it may be of service. A
human life, properly generalized on, is at any time as good as most
sermons. It is full of what I call the morality of idees. I suppose
you know to what I owe my names?"
"Not I--to your sponsors in baptism, like all the rest of us, I
suppose."
"You're nearer the truth than you may imagine, this time, boy. I was
found, a child of a week old, they tell me, lying in a basket, one
pleasant morning, in a stone-cutter's yard, on the North River side of
the town, placed upon a bit of stone that was hewing out for the head
of a grave, in order, as I suppose, that the workmen would be sure to
find me, when they mustered at their work. Although I have passed for
a down-easter, having sailed in their craft in the early part of my
life, I'm in truth York born."
"And is this all you know of your origin, my dear Marble?"
"All I _want_ to know, after such a hint. A man is never anxious
to make the acquaintance of parents who are afraid to own him. I dare
say, now, Miles, that _you_ knew, and loved, and respected
_your_ mother?"
"Love, and respect her! I worshipped her, Marble; and she deserved it
all, if ever human being did!"
"Yes, yes; I can understand _that_," returned Marble, making a
hole in the sand with his heel, and looking both thoughtful and
melancholy.
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