64 THE SHIPWRECK,

of all his follies and regrets, had rendered him more mise-
rable by far than the victims of his cruel injustice.

Unfortunately Philip’s own character was in too many
respects similar to his antagonist’s. Never had young
Merville given himself the trouble to inquire from his own
heart, whether he was not, at the least, quite as much in
the wrong as he knew the count to be. If Charles was
haughty, Philip was insolent; if the former was prone to
provoke, the latter was ever ready to repel injury by insult.
If Philip had but reflected for a moment on that maxim of
sacred writ—a soft answer turneth away wrath, if he had
been courageous enough to have practised it but once; the
count would have been pacified, and numberless grievances

‘and sufferings, and much bitter remorse would have been
avoided by both of them.

When Philip beheld the eyes of Charles bedewed with
tears, his first emotion was one of surprise. “And can
so harsh and proud a.tyrant know how to weep?” said he
to himself. “Does his heart still retain some latent sparks
of sensibility?” Philip was sincere; for he now remem-
bered how often he had thrown himself in the way of the
count for no other purpose than to insult and provoke him.
For the first time in his life he put himself in the place of
his enemy, and inquired if under such circumstances he