"
"Then I was obliged to confess I had scarcely received a hundred pounds
in fees this year; but I told him the reason; this is such a small
district, and all the ground occupied. London, I said, was my sphere."
"And so it is," said Rosa, eagerly; for this jumped with her own little
designs. "Genius is wasted in the country. Besides, whenever anybody
worth curing is ill down here, they always send to London for a doctor."
"I told him so, dearest," said the lover. "But he answered me directly,
then I must set up in London, and as soon as my books showed an income
to keep a wife, and servants, and children, and insure my life for five
thousand pounds"--
"Oh, that is so like papa. He is director of an insurance company, so
all the world must insure their lives."
"No, dear, he was quite right there: professional incomes are most
precarious. Death spares neither young nor old, neither warm hearts
nor cold. I should be no true physician if I could not see my own
mortality." He hung his head and pondered a moment, then went on, sadly,
"It all comes to this--until I have a professional income of eight
hundred a year at least, he will not hear of our marrying; and the cruel
thing is, he will not even consent to an engagement.
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