As I was wondering and perhaps not well pleased, Durham said, "I had hoped you would not call, till I had made it look as it did last week,--and then you needn't have known it." "Known what, friend ?" "Well, only this; I came to a stain in the marble, and as I resolved you should have everything of the best,--I took another block, and have worked at it night and day, in hopes you wouldn't find me out.

There's the other figure, under that cloth." Now, considering that the new block involved a cost of some twenty pounds,--and that the old one might have been artificially doctored, and that anyhow the risk and loss were equitably as much, mine as his,--and further that the young sculptor had little more than daily bread, if that,--I do say all this proves Durham to have been the noble fellow I found him to be for years.

He is long gone, like so many other friends, to that Brighter World.

His life-story in this was a touching one, as he told it to me; and I think known to very few besides myself.

In youth he loved and was beloved; but friends and circumstances hindered; so she married some one else who, to Durham's constant horror and indignation, treated his wife brutally: till, one happy day, he died in some fit, probably from his own excesses.