"
"You did retire in season, my lad, if truth is what you are after;
for, had you staid a hundred years on board ship, you never would have
made a sailor."
When I said this, I fancied I had uttered a pretty severe
thing. Rupert took it so coolly, however, as to satisfy me at once,
that he thought differently on the subject.
"Clearly, it is not my vocation. Nature intended me for something
better, I trust, and I mistook a boyish inclination for a taste. A
little experience taught me better, and I am now where I feel I ought
to be. I wish, Miles, you had come to the study of the law, at the
time you went to sea. You would have been, by this time, at the bar,
and would have had a definite position in society."
"I am very glad I did not. What the deuce should I have done as a
lawyer--or what advantage would it have been to me, to be admitted to
the bar?"
"Advantage!--Why, my dear fellow, every advantage in the world. You
know how it is, in this country, I suppose, in the way of society, my
dear Miles?"
"Not I--and, by the little I glean from the manner you sheer about in
your discourse, I wish to know nothing. Do young men study law merely
to be genteel?"
"Do not despise knowledge, my boy; it is of use, even in trifles. Now,
in this country, you know, we have very few men of mere leisure--heirs
of estates, to live on their incomes, as is done in Europe; but,
nine-tenths of us must follow professions, of which there are only
half-a-dozen suitable for a gentleman.
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