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The Return of the Great Vance.
Morris returned from Waterloo in a frame of mind that baffles description.

He was a modest man; he had never conceived an overweening notion of his own powers; he knew himself unfit to write a book, turn a table napkin-ring, entertain a Christmas party with legerdemain--grapple (in short) any of those conspicuous accomplishments that are usually classed under the head of genius.

He knew--he admitted--his parts to be pedestrian, but he had considered them (until quite lately) fully equal to the demands of life.

And today he owned himself defeated: life had the upper hand; if there had been any means of flight or place to flee to, if the world had been so ordered that a man could leave it like a place of entertainment, Morris would have instantly resigned all further claim on its rewards and pleasures, and, with inexpressible contentment, ceased to be.