ng; was; certainly not a broken spirit; but a mind and temper so sternly disciplined; that; in ordinary intercourse with him; one did not know but that he led a calm; contented life。 Only after several years of friendship was I able to form a just idea of what the man had gone through; or of his actual existence。 Little by little Ryecroft had subdued himself to a modestly industrious routine。 He did a great deal of mere hack…work; he reviewed; he translated; he wrote articles; at long intervals a volume appeared under his name。 There were times; I have no doubt; when bitterness took hold upon him; not seldom he suffered in health; and probably as much from moral as from physical over…strain; but; on the whole; he earned his living very much as other men do; taking the day's toil as a matter of course; and rarely grumbling over it。
Time went on; things happened; but Ryecroft was still laborious and poor。 In moments of depression he spoke of his declining energies; and evidently suffered under a haunting fear of the future。 The thought of dependence had always been intolerable to him; perhaps the only boast I at any time heard from his lips was that he had never incurred debt。 It was a bitter thought that; after so long and hard a struggle with unkindly circumstance; he might end his life as one of the defeated。
A happier lot was in store for him。 At the age of fifty; just when his health had begun to fail and his energies to show abatement; Ryecroft had the rare good fortune to find himself suddenly released from toil; and to enter upon a period of such tranquillity of mind and condition as he had never dared to hope。 On the death of an acquaintance; more his friend than he imagined; the wayworn man of letters learnt with astonishment that there a life ann