Then, again, there was a certain satisfaction in knowing that, for his present situation, humble as it was, he was indebted to nobody but himself; and the thought that Bertha’s eyes, if they could have seen him now, would have dwelt upon him with pleasure and approbation, went far to console him for his aching back, his sunburned face, and his swollen and blistered hands.

One day, as Ralph was raking the gravel-walks in the garden, his employer’s daughter, a young lady of seventeen, came out and spoke to him.  His culture and refinement of manner struck her with wonder, and she asked him to tell her his history; but then he suddenly grew very grave, and she forbore pressing him.  From that time she attached a kind of romantic interest to him, and finally induced her father to obtain him a situation that would be more to his taste.  And, before winter came, Ralph saw the dawn of a new future glimmering before him.  He had wrestled bravely with fate, and had once more gained a victory.  He began the career in which success and distinction awaited him as proofreader on a newspaper in the city.  He had fortunately been familiar with the English language before he left home, and by the strength of his will he conquered all difficulties.  At the end of two years he became attached to the editorial staff; new ambitious hopes, hitherto foreign to his mind, awoke within him; and with joyous tumult of heart he saw life opening its wide vistas before him, and he labored on manfully to repair the losses of the past, and to prepare himself for greater usefulness in times to come.  He felt in himself a stronger and fuller manhood, as if the great arteries of the vast universal world-life pulsed in his own being.  The drowsy, indolent existence at home appeared like a dull remote dream from which he had awaked, and he blessed the destiny which, by its very sternness, had mercifully saved him; he blessed her, too, who, from the very want of love for him, had, perhaps, made him worthier of love.

The years flew rapidly.  Society had flung its doors open to him, and what was more, he had found some warm friends, in whose houses he could come and go at pleasure.  He enjoyed keenly the privilege of daily association with high-minded and refined women; their eager activity of intellect stimulated him, their exquisite ethereal grace and their delicately chiseled beauty satisfied his aesthetic cravings, and the responsive vivacity of their nature prepared him ever new surprises.  He felt a strange fascination in the presence of these women, and the conviction grew upon him that their type of womanhood was superior to any he had hitherto known.  And by way of refuting his own argument, he would draw from his pocketbook the photograph of Bertha, which had a secret compartment there all to itself, and, gazing tenderly at it, would eagerly defend her against the disparaging reflections which the involuntary comparison had provoked.  And still, how could he help seeing that her features, though well molded, lacked animation; that her eye, with its deep, trustful glance, was not brilliant, and that the calm earnestness of her face, when compared with the bright, intellectual beauty of his present friends, appeared pale and simple, like a violet in a bouquet of vividly colored roses?  It gave him a quick pang, when, at times, he was forced to admit this; nevertheless, it was the truth.