Yet he was honestly dissatisfied with his surroundings, and thought himself hardly used by a hindering fate.  He believed himself to be most anxious to get away, yet he was like a ship which will not be started out of port by anything less than a hurricane.  There really were excuses for his staying at home, and since he had stopped to listen to them they beguiled him more and more, and his friends one by one commended his devotion to his mother and sisters, and sometimes forgot to sympathize with him for his disappointments as they praised him for being such a dutiful son.  To be sure, he might be a great lawyer in Dunport as well as anywhere else; he would not be the first; but a more inspiring life might have made him more enthusiastic and energetic, and if he could have been winning his way faster elsewhere, and sending home good accounts of himself, not to speak of substantial aid, there is no question whether it would not have given his family greater happiness and done himself more good.  He was not possessed of the stern determination which wins its way at all hazards, and so was dependent upon his surroundings for an occasional stimulus.

But Dunport was very grateful to him because he had stayed at home, and he was altogether the most prominent young man in the town.  It is so easy to be thankful that one’s friends are no worse that one sometimes forgets to remember that they might be better; and it would have been only natural if he thought of himself more highly than he ought to think, since he had received a good deal of applause and admiration.  It is true that he had avoided vice more noticeably than he had pursued virtue; but the senior member of the firm, Mr. Sergeant, pronounced his young partner to have been a most excellent student, and not only showed the greatest possible confidence in him, but was transferring a good deal of the business to him already.  Miss Prince and her old lawyer had one secret which had never been suspected, and the townspeople thought more than ever of young Mr. Gerry’s ability when it was known that the most distinguished legal authority of that region had given him a share of a long established business.  George Gerry had been led to think better of himself, though it had caused him no little wonder when the proposal had been made.  It was possible that Mr. Sergeant feared that there might be some alliance offered by his rivals in Dunport.  To be sure, the younger firm had been making a good deal of money, but it was less respected by the leading business men.  Mr. Sergeant had even conferred with his young friend one morning upon the propriety of some new investments; but Mr. Gerry had never even suspected that they were the price of his own new dignity and claim upon the public honor.  Captain Walter Parish and Mr. Sergeant had both been aids and advisers of Miss Prince; but neither had ever known the condition of all her financial affairs, and she had made the most of a comfortable sense of liberty.  To do young Gerry justice, he had not hesitated to express his amazement; and among his elders and betters, at any rate, he had laid his good fortune at the door of Mr. Sergeant’s generosity and kindness instead of his own value.