Reader, did you ever think of the power of spheres?  The influence that goes out from an individual or mass of individuals, we mean—­that subtle, invisible power that acts from one upon another, and which when aggregated is almost irresistible?  You have felt it in a company moved by a single impulse which carried you for a time with the rest, though all your calmer convictions were in opposition to the movement.  It has kept you silent by its oppressive power when you should have spoken out in a ringing protest, and it has borne you away on its swift or turbulent current when you should have stood still and been true to right.  Again, in the company of good and true men, moved by the inspiration of some noble cause, how all your weakness and hesitation has died out! and you have felt the influence of that subtle sphere to which we refer.

Everywhere and at all times are we exposed to the action of these mental and moral spheres, which act upon and impress us in thousands of different ways, now carrying us along in some sudden public excitement in which passion drowns the voice of reason, and now causing us to drift in the wake of some stronger nature than our own whose active thought holds ours in a weak, assenting bondage.

You understand what we mean.  Now take the pervading sphere of an occasion like the one we are describing, and do you not see that to go against it is possible only to persons of decided convictions and strong individuality?  The common mass of men and women are absorbed into or controlled by its subtle power.  They can no more set themselves against it, if they would, than against the rush of a swiftly-flowing river.  To the young it is irresistible.

As Ellis Whitford, with Blanche leaning on his arm, gained the supper-room, he met the eyes of his mother, who was on the opposite side of the table, and read in them a sign of warning.  Did it awaken a sense of danger and put him on his guard?  No; it rather stirred a feeling of anger.  Could she not trust him among gentlemen and ladies—­not trust him with Blanche Birtwell by his side?  It hurt his pride and wounded his self-esteem.

He was in the sphere of liberty and social enjoyment and among those who did not believe that wine was a mocker, but something to make glad the heart and give joy to the countenance; and when it began to flow he was among the first to taste its delusive sweets.  Blanche, for whom he poured a glass of champagne, took it from his hand, but with only half a smile on her lips, which was veiled by something so like pain or fear that Ellis felt as if the lights about him had suddenly lost a portion of their brilliancy.  He stood holding his own glass, after just tasting its contents, waiting for Blanche to raise the sparkling liquor to her lips, but she seemed like one under the influence of a spell, not moving or responding.

CHAPTER X.

Blanche still held the untasted wine in her hand, when her father, who happened to be near, filled a glass, and said as he bowed to her: