His second rival, Mr. William Murray Bradshaw, had made a half-playful bet with his fair relative, Mrs. Clymer Ketchum, that he would bag a girl within twelve months of date who should unite three desirable qualities, specified in the bet, in a higher degree than any one of the five who were on the matrimonial programme which she had laid out for him,—­and Myrtle was the girl with whom he meant to win the bet.  When a young fellow like him, cool and clever, makes up his mind to bring down his bird, it is no joke, but a very serious and a tolerably certain piece of business.  Not being made a fool of by any boyish nonsense,—­passion and all that,—­he has a great advantage.  Many a woman rejects a man because he is in love with her, and accepts another because he is not.  The first is thinking too much of himself and his emotions,—­the other makes a study of her and her friends, and learns what ropes to pull.  But then it must be remembered that Murray Bradshaw had a poet for his rival, to say nothing of the brother of a bosom friend.

The qualities of a young poet are so exceptional, and such interesting objects of study, that a narrative like this can well afford to linger awhile in the delineation of this most envied of all the forms of genius.  And by contrasting the powers and limitations of two such young persons as Gifted Hopkins and Cyprian Eveleth, we may better appreciate the nature of that divine inspiration which gives to poetry the superiority it claims over every other form of human expression.

Gifted Hopkins had shown an ear for rhythm, and for the simpler forms of music, from his earliest childhood.  He began beating with his heels the accents of the psalm tunes sung at meeting at a very tender age,—­a habit, indeed, of which he had afterwards to correct himself, as, though it shows a sensibility to rhythmical impulses like that which is beautifully illustrated when a circle join hands and emphasize by vigorous downward movements the leading syllables in the tune of Auld Lang Syne, yet it is apt to be too expressive when a large number of boots join in the performance.  He showed a remarkable talent for playing on one of the less complex musical instruments, too limited in compass to satisfy exacting ears, but affording excellent discipline to those who wish to write in the simpler metrical forms,—­the same which summons the hero from his repose and stirs his blood in battle.

By the time he was twelve years old he was struck with the pleasing resemblance of certain vocal sounds which, without being the same, yet had a curious relation which made them agree marvellously well in couples; as eyes with skies; as heart with art, also with part and smart; and so of numerous others, twenty or thirty pairs, perhaps, which number he considerably increased as he grew older, until he may have had fifty or more such pairs at his command.