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+Project Gutenberg's Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood, by George MacDonald
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood
+
+Author: George MacDonald
+
+
+Release Date: May, 2004 [EBook #5773]
+This file was first posted on September 1, 2002
+Last Updated: April 17, 2013
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANNALS OF A QUIET NEIGHBOURHOOD ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Charles Franks and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+ANNALS OF A QUIET NEIGHBOURHOOD.
+
+By George Macdonald, Ll.D.
+
+New York
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I. DESPONDENCY AND CONSOLATION.
+
+
+Before I begin to tell you some of the things I have seen and heard, in
+both of which I have had to take a share, now from the compulsion of my
+office, now from the leading of my own heart, and now from that destiny
+which, including both, so often throws the man who supposed himself a
+mere on-looker, into the very vortex of events--that destiny which took
+form to the old pagans as a gray mist high beyond the heads of their
+gods, but to us is known as an infinite love, revealed in the mystery
+of man--I say before I begin, it is fitting that, in the absence of a
+common friend to do that office for me, I should introduce myself to
+your acquaintance, and I hope coming friendship. Nor can there be any
+impropriety in my telling you about myself, seeing I remain concealed
+behind my own words. You can never look me in the eyes, though you may
+look me in the soul. You may find me out, find my faults, my vanities,
+my sins, but you will not SEE me, at least in this world. To you I am
+but a voice of revealing, not a form of vision; therefore I am bold
+behind the mask, to speak to you heart to heart; bold, I say, just so
+much the more that I do not speak to you face to face. And when we meet
+in heaven--well, there I know there is no hiding; there, there is no
+reason for hiding anything; there, the whole desire will be alternate
+revelation and vision.
+
+I am now getting old--faster and faster. I cannot help my gray hairs,
+nor the wrinkles that gather so slowly yet ruthlessly; no, nor the
+quaver that will come in my voice, not the sense of being feeble in the
+knees, even when I walk only across the floor of my study. But I have
+not got used to age yet. I do not FEEL one atom older than I did
+at three-and-twenty. Nay, to tell all the truth, I feel a good deal
+younger.--For then I only felt that a man had to take up his cross;
+whereas now I feel that a man has to follow Him; and that makes an
+unspeakable difference.--When my voice quavers, I feel that it is mine
+and not mine; that it just belongs to me like my watch, which does
+not go well-now, though it went well thirty years ago--not more than a
+minute out in a month. And when I feel my knees shake, I think of them
+with a kind of pity, as I used to think of an old mare of my father's of
+which I was very fond when I was a lad, and which bore me across many
+a field and over many a fence, but which at last came to have the same
+weakness in her knees that I have in mine; and she knew it too, and took
+care of them, and so of herself, in a wise equine fashion. These things
+are not me--or _I_, if the grammarians like it better, (I always feel a
+strife between doing as the scholar does and doing as other people do;)
+they are not me, I say; I HAVE them--and, please God, shall soon have
+better. For it is not a pleasant thing for a young man, or a young woman
+either, I venture to say, to have an old voice, and a wrinkled face,
+and weak knees, and gray hair, or no hair at all. And if any moral
+Philistine, as our queer German brothers over the Northern fish-pond
+would call him, say that this is all rubbish, for that we ARE old, I
+would answer: "Of all children how can the children of God be old?"
+
+So little do I give in to calling this outside of me, ME, that I should
+not mind presenting a minute description of my own person such as would
+at once clear me from any suspicion of vanity in so introducing myself.
+Not that my honesty would result in the least from indifference to the
+external--but from comparative indifference to the transitional; not to
+the transitional in itself, which is of eternal significance and result,
+but to the particular form of imperfection which it may have reached at
+any individual moment of its infinite progression towards the complete.
+For no sooner have I spoken the word NOW, than that NOW is dead and
+another is dying; nay, in such a regard, there is no NOW--only a past of
+which we know a little, and a future of which we know far less and far
+more. But I will not speak at all of this body of my earthly tabernacle,
+for it is on the whole more pleasant to forget all about it. And
+besides, I do not want to set any of my readers to whom I would have
+the pleasure of speaking far more openly and cordially than if they were
+seated on the other side of my writing-table--I do not want to set them
+wondering whether the vicar be this vicar or that vicar; or indeed to
+run the risk of giving the offence I might give, if I were anything else
+than "a wandering voice."
+
+I did not feel as I feel now when first I came to this parish. For, as I
+have said, I am now getting old very fast. True, I was thirty when I was
+made a vicar, an age at which a man might be expected to be beginning to
+grow wise; but even then I had much yet to learn.
+
+I well remember the first evening on which I wandered out from the
+vicarage to take a look about me--to find out, in short, where I was,
+and what aspect the sky and earth here presented. Strangely enough, I
+had never been here before; for the presentation had been made me while
+I was abroad.--I was depressed. It was depressing weather. Grave doubts
+as to whether I was in my place in the church, would keep rising and
+floating about, like rain-clouds within me. Not that I doubted about the
+church; I only doubted about myself. "Were my motives pure?" "What were
+my motives?" And, to tell the truth, I did not know what my motives
+were, and therefore I could not answer about the purity of them.
+Perhaps seeing we are in this world in order to become pure, it would be
+expecting too much of any young man that he should be absolutely certain
+that he was pure in anything. But the question followed very naturally:
+"Had I then any right to be in the Church--to be eating her bread and
+drinking her wine without knowing whether I was fit to do her work?"
+To which the only answer I could find was, "The Church is part of God's
+world. He makes men to work; and work of some sort must be done by every
+honest man. Somehow or other, I hardly know how, I find myself in the
+Church. I do not know that I am fitter for any other work. I see no
+other work to do. There is work here which I can do after some fashion.
+With God's help I will try to do it well."
+
+This resolution brought me some relief, but still I was depressed. It
+was depressing weather.--I may as well say that I was not married then,
+and that I firmly believed I never should be married--not from any
+ambition taking the form of self-denial; nor yet from any notion that
+God takes pleasure in being a hard master; but there was a lady--Well, I
+WILL be honest, as I would be.--I had been refused a few months before,
+which I think was the best thing ever happened to me except one. That
+one, of course, was when I was accepted. But this is not much to the
+purpose now. Only it was depressing weather.
+
+For is it not depressing when the rain is falling, and the steam of
+it is rising? when the river is crawling along muddily, and the horses
+stand stock-still in the meadows with their spines in a straight line
+from the ears to where they fail utterly in the tails? I should only put
+on goloshes now, and think of the days when I despised damp. Ah! it was
+mental waterproof that I needed then; for let me despise damp as much as
+I would, I could neither keep it out of my mind, nor help suffering
+the spiritual rheumatism which it occasioned. Now, the damp never gets
+farther than my goloshes and my Macintosh. And for that worst kind of
+rheumatism--I never feel it now.
+
+But I had begun to tell you about that first evening.--I had arrived at
+the vicarage the night before, and it had rained all day, and was still
+raining, though not so much. I took my umbrella and went out.
+
+For as I wanted to do my work well (everything taking far more the shape
+of work to me, then, and duty, than it does now--though, even now,
+I must confess things have occasionally to be done by the clergyman
+because there is no one else to do them, and hardly from other motive
+than a sense of duty,--a man not being able to shirk work because it may
+happen to be dirty)--I say, as I wanted to do my work well, or rather,
+perhaps, because I dreaded drudgery as much as any poor fellow who comes
+to the treadmill in consequence--I wanted to interest myself in it; and
+therefore I would go and fall in love, first of all, if I could, with
+the country round about. And my first step beyond my own gate was up to
+the ankles, in mud.
+
+Therewith, curiously enough, arose the distracting thought how I could
+possibly preach TWO good sermons a Sunday to the same people, when one
+of the sermons was in the afternoon instead of the evening, to which
+latter I had been accustomed in the large town in which I had formerly
+officiated as curate in a proprietary chapel. I, who had declaimed
+indignantly against excitement from without, who had been inclined to
+exalt the intellect at the expense even of the heart, began to fear that
+there must be something in the darkness, and the gas-lights, and the
+crowd of faces, to account for a man's being able to preach a better
+sermon, and for servant girls preferring to go out in the evening. Alas!
+I had now to preach, as I might judge with all probability beforehand,
+to a company of rustics, of thought yet slower than of speech,
+unaccustomed in fact to THINK at all, and that in the sleepiest, deadest
+part of the day, when I could hardly think myself, and when, if the
+weather should be at all warm, I could not expect many of them to be
+awake. And what good might I look for as the result of my labour? How
+could I hope in these men and women to kindle that fire which, in the
+old days of the outpouring of the Spirit, made men live with the sense
+of the kingdom of heaven about them, and the expectation of something
+glorious at hand just outside that invisible door which lay between the
+worlds?
+
+I have learned since, that perhaps I overrated the spirituality of those
+times, and underrated, not being myself spiritual enough to see all
+about me, the spirituality of these times. I think I have learned since,
+that the parson of a parish must be content to keep the upper windows of
+his mind open to the holy winds and the pure lights of heaven; and the
+side windows of tone, of speech, of behaviour open to the earth, to let
+forth upon his fellow-men the tenderness and truth which those upper
+influences bring forth in any region exposed to their operation.
+Believing in his Master, such a servant shall not make haste; shall feel
+no feverous desire to behold the work of his hands; shall be content to
+be as his Master, who waiteth long for the fruits of His earth.
+
+But surely I am getting older than I thought; for I keep wandering away
+from my subject, which is this, my first walk in my new cure. My excuse
+is, that I want my reader to understand something of the state of my
+mind, and the depression under which I was labouring. He will perceive
+that I desired to do some work worth calling by the name of work, and
+that I did not see how to get hold of a beginning.
+
+I had not gone far from my own gate before the rain ceased, though
+it was still gloomy enough for any amount to follow. I drew down my
+umbrella, and began to look about me. The stream on my left was so
+swollen that I could see its brown in patches through the green of
+the meadows along its banks. A little in front of me, the road, rising
+quickly, took a sharp turn to pass along an old stone bridge that
+spanned the water with a single fine arch, somewhat pointed; and through
+the arch I could see the river stretching away up through the meadows,
+its banks bordered with pollards. Now, pollards always made me
+miserable. In the first place, they look ill-used; in the next place,
+they look tame; in the third place, they look very ugly. I had not
+learned then to honour them on the ground that they yield not a jot to
+the adversity of their circumstances; that, if they must be pollards,
+they still will be trees; and what they may not do with grace, they will
+yet do with bounty; that, in short, their life bursts forth, despite of
+all that is done to repress and destroy their individuality. When you
+have once learned to honour anything, love is not very far off; at least
+that has always been my experience. But, as I have said, I had not yet
+learned to honour pollards, and therefore they made me more miserable
+than I was already.
+
+When, having followed the road, I stood at last on the bridge, and,
+looking up and down the river through the misty air, saw two long rows
+of these pollards diminishing till they vanished in both directions, the
+sight of them took from me all power of enjoying the water beneath me,
+the green fields around me, or even the old-world beauty of the little
+bridge upon which I stood, although all sorts of bridges have been from
+very infancy a delight to me. For I am one of those who never get rid
+of their infantile predilections, and to have once enjoyed making a mud
+bridge, was to enjoy all bridges for ever.
+
+I saw a man in a white smock-frock coming along the road beyond, but I
+turned my back to the road, leaned my arms on the parapet of the bridge,
+and stood gazing where I saw no visions, namely, at those very poplars.
+I heard the man's footsteps coming up the crown of the arch, but I would
+not turn to greet him. I was in a selfish humour if ever I was; for
+surely if ever one man ought to greet another, it was upon such a
+comfortless afternoon. The footsteps stopped behind me, and I heard a
+voice:--
+
+"I beg yer pardon, sir; but be you the new vicar?"
+
+I turned instantly and answered, "I am. Do you want me?"
+
+"I wanted to see yer face, sir, that was all, if ye'll not take it
+amiss."
+
+Before me stood a tall old man with his hat in his hand, clothed as I
+have said, in a white smock-frock. He smoothed his short gray hair with
+his curved palm down over his forehead as he stood. His face was of a
+red brown, from much exposure to the weather. There was a certain look
+of roughness, without hardness, in it, which spoke of endurance rather
+than resistance, although he could evidently set his face as a flint.
+His features were large and a little coarse, but the smile that parted
+his lips when he spoke, shone in his gray eyes as well, and lighted up a
+countenance in which a man might trust.
+
+"I wanted to see yer face, sir, if you'll not take it amiss."
+
+"Certainly not," I answered, pleased with the man's address, as he stood
+square before me, looking as modest as fearless. "The sight of a man's
+face is what everybody has a right to; but, for all that, I should like
+to know why you want to see my face."
+
+"Why, sir, you be the new vicar. You kindly told me so when I axed you."
+
+"Well, then, you'll see my face on Sunday in church--that is, if you
+happen to be there."
+
+For, although some might think it the more dignified way, I could not
+take it as a matter of course that he would be at church. A man might
+have better reasons for staying away from church than I had for going,
+even though I was the parson, and it was my business. Some clergymen
+separate between themselves and their office to a degree which I cannot
+understand. To assert the dignities of my office seems to me very like
+exalting myself; and when I have had a twinge of conscience about it,
+as has happened more than once, I have then found comfort in these two
+texts: "The Son of man came not to be ministered unto but to minister;"
+and "It is enough that the servant should be as his master." Neither
+have I ever been able to see the very great difference between right and
+wrong in a clergyman, and right and wrong in another man. All that I
+can pretend to have yet discovered comes to this: that what is right in
+another man is right in a clergyman; and what is wrong in another man
+is much worse in a clergyman. Here, however, is one more proof of
+approaching age. I do not mean the opinion, but the digression.
+
+"Well, then," I said, "you'll see my face in church on Sunday, if you
+happen to be there."
+
+"Yes, sir; but you see, sir, on the bridge here, the parson is the
+parson like, and I'm Old Rogers; and I looks in his face, and he looks
+in mine, and I says to myself, 'This is my parson.' But o' Sundays
+he's nobody's parson; he's got his work to do, and it mun be done, and
+there's an end on't."
+
+That there was a real idea in the old man's mind was considerably
+clearer than the logic by which he tried to bring it out.
+
+"Did you know parson that's gone, sir?" he went on.
+
+"No," I answered.
+
+"Oh, sir! he wur a good parson. Many's the time he come and sit at my
+son's bedside--him that's dead and gone, sir--for a long hour, on a
+Saturday night, too. And then when I see him up in the desk the next
+mornin', I'd say to myself, 'Old Rogers, that's the same man as sat by
+your son's bedside last night. Think o' that, Old Rogers!' But, somehow,
+I never did feel right sure o' that same. He didn't seem to have the
+same cut, somehow; and he didn't talk a bit the same. And when he spoke
+to me after sermon, in the church-yard, I was always of a mind to go
+into the church again and look up to the pulpit to see if he war really
+out ov it; for this warn't the same man, you see. But you'll know all
+about it better than I can tell you, sir. Only I always liked parson
+better out o' the pulpit, and that's how I come to want to make you
+look at me, sir, instead o' the water down there, afore I see you in the
+church to-morrow mornin'."
+
+The old man laughed a kindly laugh; but he had set me thinking, and I
+did not know what to say to him all at once. So after a short pause, he
+resumed--
+
+"You'll be thinking me a queer kind of a man, sir, to speak to my
+betters before my betters speaks to me. But mayhap you don't know what
+a parson is to us poor folk that has ne'er a friend more larned than
+theirselves but the parson. And besides, sir, I'm an old salt,--an old
+man-o'-war's man,--and I've been all round the world, sir; and I ha'
+been in all sorts o' company, pirates and all, sir; and I aint a bit
+frightened of a parson. No; I love a parson, sir. And I'll tell you for
+why, sir. He's got a good telescope, and he gits to the masthead, and
+he looks out. And he sings out, 'Land ahead!' or 'Breakers ahead!' and
+gives directions accordin'. Only I can't always make out what he says.
+But when he shuts up his spyglass, and comes down the riggin', and
+talks to us like one man to another, then I don't know what I should
+do without the parson. Good evenin' to you, sir, and welcome to
+Marshmallows."
+
+The pollards did not look half so dreary. The river began to glimmer
+a little; and the old bridge had become an interesting old bridge. The
+country altogether was rather nice than otherwise. I had found a friend
+already!--that is, a man to whom I might possibly be of some use;
+and that was the most precious friend I could think of in my present
+situation and mood. I had learned something from him too; and I resolved
+to try all I could to be the same man in the pulpit that I was out
+of it. Some may be inclined to say that I had better have formed the
+resolution to be the same man out of the pulpit that I was in it. But
+the one will go quite right with the other. Out of the pulpit I would
+be the same man I was in it--seeing and feeling the realities of
+the unseen; and in the pulpit I would be the same man I was out of
+it--taking facts as they are, and dealing with things as they show
+themselves in the world.
+
+One other occurrence before I went home that evening, and I shall close
+the chapter. I hope I shall not write another so dull as this. I dare
+not promise, though; for this is a new kind of work to me.
+
+Before I left the bridge,--while, in fact, I was contemplating the
+pollards with an eye, if not of favour, yet of diminished dismay,--the
+sun, which, for anything I knew of his whereabouts, either from
+knowledge of the country, aspect of the evening, or state of my own
+feelings, might have been down for an hour or two, burst his cloudy
+bands, and blazed out as if he had just risen from the dead, instead of
+being just about to sink into the grave. Do not tell me that my figure
+is untrue, for that the sun never sinks into the grave, else I will
+retort that it is just as true of the sun as of a man; for that no man
+sinks into the grave. He only disappears. Life IS a constant sunrise,
+which death cannot interrupt, any more than the night can swallow up the
+sun. "God is not the God of the dead, but of the living; for all live
+unto him."
+
+Well, the sun shone out gloriously. The whole sweep of the gloomy river
+answered him in gladness; the wet leaves of the pollards quivered and
+glanced; the meadows offered up their perfect green, fresh and clear
+out of the trouble of the rain; and away in the distance, upon a rising
+ground covered with trees, glittered a weathercock. What if I found
+afterwards that it was only on the roof of a stable? It shone, and that
+was enough. And when the sun had gone below the horizon, and the fields
+and the river were dusky once more, there it glittered still over the
+darkening earth, a symbol of that faith which is "the evidence of things
+not seen," and it made my heart swell as at a chant from the prophet
+Isaiah. What matter then whether it hung over a stable-roof or a
+church-tower?
+
+I stood up and wandered a little farther--off the bridge, and along the
+road. I had not gone far before I passed a house, out of which came a
+young woman leading a little boy. They came after me, the boy gazing
+at the red and gold and green of the sunset sky. As they passed me, the
+child said--
+
+"Auntie, I think I should like to be a painter."
+
+"Why?" returned his companion.
+
+"Because, then," answered the child, "I could help God to paint the
+sky."
+
+What his aunt replied I do not know; for they were presently beyond my
+hearing. But I went on answering him myself all the way home. Did God
+care to paint the sky of an evening, that a few of His children might
+see it, and get just a hope, just an aspiration, out of its passing
+green, and gold, and purple, and red? and should I think my day's labour
+lost, if it wrought no visible salvation in the earth?
+
+But was the child's aspiration in vain? Could I tell him God did not
+want his help to paint the sky? True, he could mount no scaffold against
+the infinite of the glowing west. But might he not with his little
+palette and brush, when the time came, show his brothers and sisters
+what he had seen there, and make them see it too? Might he not thus
+come, after long trying, to help God to paint this glory of vapour and
+light inside the minds of His children? Ah! if any man's work is not
+WITH God, its results shall be burned, ruthlessly burned, because poor
+and bad.
+
+"So, for my part," I said to myself, as I walked home, "if I can put one
+touch of a rosy sunset into the life of any man or woman of my cure, I
+shall feel that I have worked with God. He is in no haste; and if I do
+what I may in earnest, I need not mourn if I work no great work on the
+earth. Let God make His sunsets: I will mottle my little fading cloud.
+To help the growth of a thought that struggles towards the light;
+to brush with gentle hand the earth-stain from the white of one
+snowdrop--such be my ambition! So shall I scale the rocks in front, not
+leave my name carved upon those behind me."
+
+People talk about special providences. I believe in the providences, but
+not in the specialty. I do not believe that God lets the thread of my
+affairs go for six days, and on the seventh evening takes it up for
+a moment. The so-called special providences are no exception to the
+rule--they are common to all men at all moments. But it is a fact that
+God's care is more evident in some instances of it than in others to
+the dim and often bewildered vision of humanity. Upon such instances men
+seize and call them providences. It is well that they can; but it would
+be gloriously better if they could believe that the whole matter is one
+grand providence.
+
+I was one of such men at the time, and could not fail to see what I
+called a special providence in this, that on my first attempt to find
+where I stood in the scheme of Providence, and while I was discouraged
+with regard to the work before me, I should fall in with these two--an
+old man whom I could help, and a child who could help me; the one
+opening an outlet for my labour and my love, and the other reminding me
+of the highest source of the most humbling comfort,--that in all my work
+I might be a fellow-worker with God.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II. MY FIRST SUNDAY AT MARSHMALLOWS.
+
+
+These events fell on the Saturday night. On the Sunday morning, I read
+prayers and preached. Never before had I enjoyed so much the petitions
+of the Church, which Hooker calls "the sending of angels upward," or
+the reading of the lessons, which he calls "the receiving of angels
+descended from above." And whether from the newness of the parson, or
+the love of the service, certainly a congregation more intent, or more
+responsive, a clergyman will hardly find. But, as I had feared, it
+was different in the afternoon. The people had dined, and the usual
+somnolence had followed; nor could I find in my heart to blame men and
+women who worked hard all the week, for being drowsy on the day of rest.
+So I curtailed my sermon as much as I could, omitting page after page of
+my manuscript; and when I came to a close, was rewarded by perceiving an
+agreeable surprise upon many of the faces round me. I resolved that, in
+the afternoons at least, my sermons should be as short as heart could
+wish.
+
+But that afternoon there was at least one man of the congregation who
+was neither drowsy nor inattentive. Repeatedly my eyes left the page
+off which I was reading and glanced towards him. Not once did I find his
+eyes turned away from me.
+
+There was a small loft in the west end of the church, in which stood a
+little organ, whose voice, weakened by years of praising, and possibly
+of neglect, had yet, among a good many tones that were rough, wooden,
+and reedy, a few remaining that were as mellow as ever praiseful heart
+could wish to praise withal. And these came in amongst the rest like
+trusting thoughts amidst "eating cares;" like the faces of children
+borne in the arms of a crowd of anxious mothers; like hopes that are
+young prophecies amidst the downward sweep of events. For, though I do
+not understand music, I have a keen ear for the perfection of the single
+tone, or the completeness of the harmony. But of this organ more by and
+by.
+
+Now this little gallery was something larger than was just necessary for
+the organ and its ministrants, and a few of the parishioners had chosen
+to sit in its fore-front. Upon this occasion there was no one there but
+the man to whom I have referred.
+
+The space below this gallery was not included in the part of the church
+used for the service. It was claimed by the gardener of the place, that
+is the sexton, to hold his gardening tools. There were a few ancient
+carvings in wood lying in it, very brown in the dusky light that came
+through a small lancet window, opening, not to the outside, but into
+the tower, itself dusky with an enduring twilight. And there were some
+broken old headstones, and the kindly spade and pickaxe--but I have
+really nothing to do with these now, for I am, as it were, in the
+pulpit, whence one ought to look beyond such things as these.
+
+Rising against the screen which separated this mouldy portion of
+the church from the rest, stood an old monument of carved wood, once
+brilliantly painted in the portions that bore the arms of the family
+over whose vault it stood, but now all bare and worn, itself gently
+flowing away into the dust it commemorated. It lifted its gablet, carved
+to look like a canopy, till its apex was on a level with the book-board
+on the front of the organ-loft; and over--in fact upon this apex
+appeared the face of the man whom I have mentioned. It was a very
+remarkable countenance--pale, and very thin, without any hair, except
+that of thick eyebrows that far over-hung keen, questioning eyes. Short
+bushy hair, gray, not white, covered a well formed head with a high
+narrow forehead. As I have said, those keen eyes kept looking at me
+from under their gray eyebrows all the time of the sermon--intelligently
+without doubt, but whether sympathetically or otherwise I could not
+determine. And indeed I hardly know yet. My vestry door opened upon a
+little group of graves, simple and green, without headstone or slab;
+poor graves, the memory of whose occupants no one had cared to preserve.
+Good men must have preceded me here, else the poor would not have lain
+so near the chancel and the vestry-door. All about and beyond were
+stones, with here and there a monument; for mine was a large parish, and
+there were old and rich families in it, more of which buried their dead
+here than assembled their living. But close by the vestry-door, there
+was this little billowy lake of grass. And at the end of the narrow path
+leading from the door, was the churchyard wall, with a few steps on each
+side of it, that the parson might pass at once from the churchyard
+into his own shrubbery, here tangled, almost matted, from luxuriance
+of growth. But I would not creep out the back way from among my people.
+That way might do very well to come in by; but to go out, I would use
+the door of the people. So I went along the church, a fine old place,
+such as I had never hoped to be presented to, and went out by the door
+in the north side into the middle of the churchyard. The door on the
+other side was chiefly used by the few gentry of the neighbourhood; and
+the Lych-gate, with its covered way, (for the main road had once passed
+on that side,) was shared between the coffins and the carriages, the
+dead who had no rank but one, that of the dead, and the living who had
+more money than their neighbours. For, let the old gentry disclaim it as
+they may, mere wealth, derived from whatever source, will sooner reach
+their level than poor antiquity, or the rarest refinement of personal
+worth; although, to be sure, the oldest of them will sooner give to the
+rich their sons or their daughters to wed, to love if they can, to have
+children by, than they will yield a jot of their ancestral preeminence,
+or acknowledge any equality in their sons or daughters-in-law. The
+carpenter's son is to them an old myth, not an everlasting fact. To
+Mammon alone will they yield a little of their rank--none of it to
+Christ. Let me glorify God that Jesus took not on. Him the nature
+of nobles, but the seed of Adam; for what could I do without my poor
+brothers and sisters?
+
+I passed along the church to the northern door, and went out. The
+churchyard lay in bright sunshine. All the rain and gloom were gone. "If
+one could only bring this glory of sun and grass into one's hope for the
+future!" thought I; and looking down I saw the little boy who aspired to
+paint the sky, looking up in my face with mingled confidence and awe.
+
+"Do you trust me, my little man?" thought I. "You shall trust me then.
+But I won't be a priest to you, I'll be a big brother."
+
+For the priesthood passes away, the brotherhood endures. The priesthood
+passes away, swallowed up in the brotherhood. It is because men cannot
+learn simple things, cannot believe in the brotherhood, that they need a
+priesthood. But as Dr Arnold said of the Sunday, "They DO need it." And
+I, for one, am sure that the priesthood needs the people much more than
+the people needs the priesthood.
+
+So I stooped and lifted the child and held him in my arms. And the
+little fellow looked at me one moment longer, and then put his arms
+gently round my neck. And so we were friends. When I had set him
+down, which I did presently, for I shuddered at the idea of the people
+thinking that I was showing off the CLERGYMAN, I looked at the boy. In
+his face was great sweetness mingled with great rusticity, and I could
+not tell whether he was the child of gentlefolk or of peasants. He did
+not say a word, but walked away to join his aunt, who was waiting for
+him at the gate of the churchyard. He kept his head turned towards me,
+however, as he went, so that, not seeing where he was going, he stumbled
+over the grave of a child, and fell in the hollow on the other side. I
+ran to pick him up. His aunt reached him at the same moment.
+
+"Oh, thank you, sir!" she said, as I gave him to her, with an
+earnestness which seemed to me disproportionate to the deed, and carried
+him away with a deep blush over all her countenance.
+
+At the churchyard-gate, the old man-of-war's man was waiting to have
+another look at me. His hat was in his hand, and he gave a pull to the
+short hair over his forehead, as if he would gladly take that off too,
+to show his respect for the new parson. I held out my hand gratefully.
+It could not close around the hard, unyielding mass of fingers which
+met it. He did not know how to shake hands, and left it all to me. But
+pleasure sparkled in his eyes.
+
+"My old woman would like to shake hands with you, sir," he said.
+
+Beside him stood his old woman, in a portentous bonnet, beneath whose
+gay yellow ribbons appeared a dusky old face, wrinkled like a ship's
+timbers, out of which looked a pair of keen black eyes, where the best
+beauty, that of loving-kindness, had not merely lingered, but triumphed.
+
+"I shall be in to see you soon," I said, as I shook hands with her. "I
+shall find out where you live."
+
+"Down by the mill," she said; "close by it, sir. There's one bed in our
+garden that always thrives, in the hottest summer, by the plash from the
+mill, sir."
+
+"Ask for Old Rogers, sir," said the man. "Everybody knows Old Rogers.
+But if your reverence minds what my wife says, you won't go wrong. When
+you find the river, it takes you to the mill; and when you find the
+mill, you find the wheel; and when you find the wheel, you haven't far
+to look for the cottage, sir. It's a poor place, but you'll be welcome,
+sir."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III. MY FIRST MONDAY AT MARSHMALLOWS.
+
+
+The next day I might expect some visitors. It is a fortunate thing that
+English society now regards the parson as a gentleman, else he would
+have little chance of being useful to the UPPER CLASSES. But I wanted to
+get a good start of them, and see some of my poor before my rich came
+to see me. So after breakfast, on as lovely a Monday in the beginning
+of autumn as ever came to comfort a clergyman in the reaction of his
+efforts to feed his flock on the Sunday, I walked out, and took my way
+to the village. I strove to dismiss from my mind every feeling of DOING
+DUTY, of PERFORMING MY PART, and all that. I had a horror of becoming a
+moral policeman as much as of "doing church." I would simply enjoy the
+privilege, more open to me in virtue of my office, of ministering.
+But as no servant has a right to force his service, so I would be the
+NEIGHBOUR only, until such time as the opportunity of being the servant
+should show itself.
+
+The village was as irregular as a village should be, partly consisting
+of those white houses with intersecting parallelograms of black which
+still abound in some regions of our island. Just in the centre, however,
+grouping about an old house of red brick, which had once been a manorial
+residence, but was now subdivided in all modes that analytic ingenuity
+could devise, rose a portion of it which, from one point of view, might
+seem part of an old town. But you had only to pass round any one of
+three visible corners to see stacks of wheat and a farm-yard; while
+in another direction the houses went straggling away into a wood that
+looked very like the beginning of a forest, of which some of the village
+orchards appeared to form part. From the street the slow-winding,
+poplar-bordered stream was here and there just visible.
+
+I did not quite like to have it between me and my village. I could not
+help preferring that homely relation in which the houses are built up
+like swallow-nests on to the very walls of the cathedrals themselves, to
+the arrangement here, where the river flowed, with what flow there was
+in it, between the church and the people.
+
+A little way beyond the farther end of the village appeared an iron
+gate, of considerable size, dividing a lofty stone wall. And upon the
+top of that one of the stone pillars supporting the gate which I
+could see, stood a creature of stone, whether natant, volant, passant,
+couchant, or rampant, I could not tell, only it looked like something
+terrible enough for a quite antediluvian heraldry.
+
+As I passed along the street, wondering with myself what relations
+between me and these houses were hidden in the future, my eye was caught
+by the window of a little shop, in which strings of beads and elephants
+of gingerbread formed the chief samples of the goods within. It was a
+window much broader than it was high, divided into lozenge-shaped panes.
+Wondering what kind of old woman presided over the treasures in this
+cave of Aladdin, I thought to make a first of my visits by going in and
+buying something. But I hesitated, because I could not think of anything
+I was in want of--at least that the old woman was likely to have. To
+be sure I wanted a copy of Bengel's "Gnomon;" but she was not likely
+to have that. I wanted the fourth plate in the third volume of Law's
+"Behmen;" she was not likely to have that either. I did not care for
+gingerbread; and I had no little girl to take home beads to.
+
+But why should I not go in without an ostensible errand? For this
+reason: there are dissenters everywhere, and I could not tell but I
+might be going into the shop of a dissenter. Now, though, I confess,
+nothing would have pleased me better than that all the dissenters should
+return to their old home in the Church, I could not endure the suspicion
+of laying myself out to entice them back by canvassing or using any
+personal influence. Whether they returned or not, however, (and I did
+not expect many would,) I hoped still, some day, to stand towards every
+one of them in the relation of the parson of the parish, that is, one
+of whom each might feel certain that he was ready to serve him or her at
+any hour when he might be wanted to render a service. In the meantime, I
+could not help hesitating.
+
+I had almost made up my mind to ask if she had a small pocket compass,
+for I had seen such things in little country shops--I am afraid only in
+France, though--when the door opened, and out came the little boy whom
+I had already seen twice, and who was therefore one of my oldest friends
+in the place. He came across the road to me, took me by the hand, and
+said--
+
+"Come and see mother."
+
+"Where, my dear?" I asked.
+
+"In the shop there," he answered.
+
+"Is it your mother's shop?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+I said no more, but accompanied him. Of course my expectation of seeing
+an old woman behind the counter had vanished, but I was not in the least
+prepared for the kind of woman I did see.
+
+The place was half a shop and half a kitchen. A yard or so of counter
+stretched inwards from the door, just as a hint to those who might
+be intrusively inclined. Beyond this, by the chimney-corner, sat the
+mother, who rose as we entered. She was certainly one--I do not say of
+the most beautiful, but, until I have time to explain further--of
+the most remarkable women I had ever seen. Her face was absolutely
+white--no, pale cream-colour--except her lips and a spot upon each
+cheek, which glowed with a deep carmine. You would have said she had
+been painting, and painting very inartistically, so little was the red
+shaded into the surrounding white. Now this was certainly not beautiful.
+Indeed, it occasioned a strange feeling, almost of terror, at first,
+for she reminded one of the spectre woman in the "Rime of the Ancient
+Mariner." But when I got used to her complexion, I saw that the form of
+her features was quite beautiful. She might indeed have been LOVELY but
+for a certain hardness which showed through the beauty. This might have
+been the result of ill health, ill-endured; but I doubted it. For there
+was a certain modelling of the cheeks and lips which showed that the
+teeth within were firmly closed; and, taken with the look of the
+eyes and forehead, seemed the expression of a constant and bitter
+self-command. But there were indubitable marks of ill health upon her,
+notwithstanding; for not to mention her complexion, her large dark eye
+was burning as if the lamp of life had broken and the oil was blazing;
+and there was a slight expansion of the nostrils, which indicated
+physical unrest. But her manner was perfectly, almost dreadfully, quiet;
+her voice soft, low, and chiefly expressive of indifference. She spoke
+without looking me in the face, but did not seem either shy or
+ashamed. Her figure was remarkably graceful, though too worn to be
+beautiful.--Here was a strange parishioner for me!--in a country
+toy-shop, too!
+
+As soon as the little fellow had brought me in, he shrunk away through a
+half-open door that revealed a stair behind.
+
+"What can I do for you, sir?" said the mother, coldly, and with a kind
+of book-propriety of speech, as she stood on the other side of the
+little counter, prepared to open box or drawer at command.
+
+"To tell the truth, I hardly know," I said. "I am the new vicar; but I
+do not think that I should have come in to see you just to-day, if it
+had not been that your little boy there--where is he gone to? He asked
+me to come in and see his mother."
+
+"He is too ready to make advances to strangers, sir."
+
+She said this in an incisive tone.
+
+"Oh, but," I answered, "I am not a stranger to him. I have met him twice
+before. He is a little darling. I assure you he has quite gained my
+heart."
+
+No reply for a moment. Then just "Indeed!" and nothing more.
+
+I could not understand it.
+
+But a jar on a shelf, marked TOBACCO, rescued me from the most pressing
+portion of the perplexity, namely, what to say next.
+
+"Will you give me a quarter of a pound of tobacco?" I said.
+
+The woman turned, took down the jar, arranged the scales, weighed out
+the quantity, wrapped it up, took the money,--and all without one other
+word than, "Thank you, sir;" which was all I could return, with the
+addition of, "Good morning."
+
+For nothing was left me but to walk away with my parcel in my pocket.
+
+The little boy did not show himself again. I had hoped to find him
+outside.
+
+Pondering, speculating, I now set out for the mill, which, I had already
+learned, was on the village side of the river. Coming to a lane leading
+down to the river, I followed it, and then walked up a path outside the
+row of pollards, through a lovely meadow, where brown and white cows
+were eating and shining all over the thick deep grass. Beyond the
+meadow, a wood on the side of a rising ground went parallel with the
+river a long way. The river flowed on my right. That is, I knew that it
+was flowing, but I could not have told how I knew, it was so slow. Still
+swollen, it was of a clear brown, in which you could see the browner
+trouts darting to and fro with such a slippery gliding, that the motion
+seemed the result of will, without any such intermediate and complicate
+arrangement as brain and nerves and muscles. The water-beetles went
+spinning about over the surface; and one glorious dragon-fly made a mist
+about him with his long wings. And over all, the sun hung in the sky,
+pouring down life; shining on the roots of the willows at the bottom of
+the stream; lighting up the black head of the water-rat as he hurried
+across to the opposite bank; glorifying the rich green lake of the
+grass; and giving to the whole an utterance of love and hope and joy,
+which was, to him who could read it, a more certain and full revelation
+of God than any display of power in thunder, in avalanche, in stormy
+sea. Those with whom the feeling of religion is only occasional, have
+it most when the awful or grand breaks out of the common; the meek
+who inherit the earth, find the God of the whole earth more evidently
+present--I do not say more present, for there is no measuring of His
+presence--more evidently present in the commonest things. That which is
+best He gives most plentifully, as is reason with Him. Hence the quiet
+fulness of ordinary nature; hence the Spirit to them that ask it.
+
+I soon came within sound of the mill; and presently, crossing the stream
+that flowed back to the river after having done its work on the corn,
+I came in front of the building, and looked over the half-door into the
+mill. The floor was clean and dusty. A few full sacks, tied tight at
+the mouth--they always look to me as if Joseph's silver cup were just
+inside--stood about. In the farther corner, the flour was trickling down
+out of two wooden spouts into a wooden receptacle below. The whole place
+was full of its own faint but pleasant odour. No man was visible. The
+spouts went on pouring the slow torrent of flour, as if everything could
+go on with perfect propriety of itself. I could not even see how a man
+could get at the stones that I heard grinding away above, except he went
+up the rope that hung from the ceiling. So I walked round the corner of
+the place, and found myself in the company of the water-wheel, mossy
+and green with ancient waterdrops, looking so furred and overgrown and
+lumpy, that one might have thought the wood of it had taken to growing
+again in its old days, and so the wheel was losing by slow degrees the
+shape of a wheel, to become some new awful monster of a pollard. As yet,
+however, it was going round; slowly, indeed, and with the gravity of
+age, but doing its work, and casting its loose drops in the alms-giving
+of a gentle rain upon a little plot of Master Rogers's garden, which was
+therefore full of moisture-loving flowers. This plot was divided from
+the mill-wheel by a small stream which carried away the surplus water,
+and was now full and running rapidly.
+
+Beyond the stream, beside the flower bed, stood a dusty young man,
+talking to a young woman with a rosy face and clear honest eyes. The
+moment they saw me they parted. The young man came across the stream at
+a step, and the young woman went up the garden towards the cottage.
+
+"That must be Old Rogers's cottage?" I said to the miller.
+
+"Yes, sir," he answered, looking a little sheepish.
+
+"Was that his daughter--that nice-looking young woman you were talking
+to?"
+
+"Yes, sir, it was."
+
+And he stole a shy pleased look at me out of the corners of his eyes.
+
+"It's a good thing," I said, "to have an honest experienced old mill
+like yours, that can manage to go on of itself for a little while now
+and then."
+
+This gave a great help to his budding confidence. He laughed.
+
+"Well, sir, it's not very often it's left to itself. Jane isn't at her
+father's above once or twice a week at most."
+
+"She doesn't live with them, then?"
+
+"No, sir. You see they're both hearty, and they ain't over well to do,
+and Jane lives up at the Hall, sir. She's upper housemaid, and waits on
+one of the young ladies.--Old Rogers has seen a great deal of the world,
+sir."
+
+"So I imagine. I am just going to see him. Good morning."
+
+I jumped across the stream, and went up a little gravel-walk, which led
+me in a few yards to the cottage-door. It was a sweet place to live
+in, with honeysuckle growing over the house, and the sounds of the
+softly-labouring mill-wheel ever in its little porch and about its
+windows.
+
+The door was open, and Dame Rogers came from within to meet me. She
+welcomed me, and led the way into her little kitchen. As I entered,
+Jane went out at the back-door. But it was only to call her father, who
+presently came in.
+
+"I'm glad to see ye, sir. This pleasure comes of having no work to-day.
+After harvest there comes slack times for the likes of me. People don't
+care about a bag of old bones when they can get hold of young men. Well,
+well, never mind, old woman. The Lord'll take us through somehow. When
+the wind blows, the ship goes; when the wind drops, the ship stops; but
+the sea is His all the same, for He made it; and the wind is His all the
+same too."
+
+He spoke in the most matter-of-fact tone, unaware of anything poetic in
+what he said. To him it was just common sense, and common sense only.
+
+"I am sorry you are out of work," I said. "But my garden is sadly out
+of order, and I must have something done to it. You don't dislike
+gardening, do you?"
+
+"Well, I beant a right good hand at garden-work," answered the old
+man, with some embarrassment, scratching his gray head with a troubled
+scratch.
+
+There was more in this than met the ear; but what, I could not
+conjecture. I would press the point a little. So I took him at his own
+word.
+
+"I won't ask you to do any of the more ornamental part," I said,--"only
+plain digging and hoeing."
+
+"I would rather be excused, sir."
+
+"I am afraid I made you think"--
+
+"I thought nothing, sir. I thank you kindly, sir."
+
+"I assure you I want the work done, and I must employ some one else if
+you don't undertake it."
+
+"Well, sir, my back's bad now--no, sir, I won't tell a story about it. I
+would just rather not, sir."
+
+"Now," his wife broke in, "now, Old Rogers, why won't 'ee tell the
+parson the truth, like a man, downright? If ye won't, I'll do it for
+'ee. The fact is, sir," she went on, turning to me, with a plate in her
+hand, which she was wiping, "the fact is, that the old parson's man for
+that kind o' work was Simmons, t'other end of the village; and my man is
+so afeard o' hurtin' e'er another, that he'll turn the bread away from
+his own mouth and let it fall in the dirt."
+
+"Now, now, old 'oman, don't 'ee belie me. I'm not so bad as that. You
+see, sir, I never was good at knowin' right from wrong like. I never was
+good, that is, at tellin' exactly what I ought to do. So when anything
+comes up, I just says to myself, 'Now, Old Rogers, what do you think the
+Lord would best like you to do?' And as soon as I ax myself that, I know
+directly what I've got to do; and then my old woman can't turn me no
+more than a bull. And she don't like my obstinate fits. But, you see, I
+daren't sir, once I axed myself that."
+
+"Stick to that, Rogers," I said.
+
+"Besides, sir," he went on, "Simmons wants it more than I do. He's got a
+sick wife; and my old woman, thank God, is hale and hearty. And there is
+another thing besides, sir: he might take it hard of you, sir, and think
+it was turning away an old servant like; and then, sir, he wouldn't be
+ready to hear what you had to tell him, and might, mayhap, lose a deal
+o' comfort. And that I would take worst of all, sir."
+
+"Well, well, Rogers, Simmons shall have the job."
+
+"Thank ye, sir," said the old man.
+
+His wife, who could not see the thing quite from her husband's point of
+view, was too honest to say anything; but she was none the less cordial
+to me. The daughter stood looking from one to the other with attentive
+face, which took everything, but revealed nothing.
+
+I rose to go. As I reached the door, I remembered the tobacco in my
+pocket. I had not bought it for myself. I never could smoke. Nor do I
+conceive that smoking is essential to a clergyman in the country; though
+I have occasionally envied one of my brethren in London, who will sit
+down by the fire, and, lighting his pipe, at the same time please his
+host and subdue the bad smells of the place. And I never could hit his
+way of talking to his parishioners either. He could put them at their
+ease in a moment. I think he must have got the trick out of his pipe.
+But in reality, I seldom think about how I ought to talk to anybody I am
+with.
+
+That I didn't smoke myself was no reason why I should not help Old
+Rogers to smoke. So I pulled out the tobacco.
+
+"You smoke, don't you, Rogers?" I said.
+
+"Well, sir, I can't deny it. It's not much I spend on baccay, anyhow. Is
+it, dame?
+
+"No, that it bean't," answered his wife.
+
+"You don't think there's any harm in smoking a pipe, sir?"
+
+"Not the least," I answered, with emphasis.
+
+"You see, sir," he went on, not giving me time to prove how far I was
+from thinking there was any harm in it; "You see, sir, sailors learns
+many ways they might be better without. I used to take my pan o' grog
+with the rest of them; but I give that up quite, 'cause as how I don't
+want it now."
+
+"'Cause as how," interrupted his wife, "you spend the money on tea for
+me, instead. You wicked old man to tell stories!"
+
+"Well, I takes my share of the tea, old woman, and I'm sure it's a deal
+better for me. But, to tell the truth, sir, I was a little troubled in
+my mind about the baccay, not knowing whether I ought to have it or not.
+For you see, the parson that's gone didn't more than half like it, as
+I could tell by the turn of his hawse-holes when he came in at the door
+and me a-smokin'. Not as he said anything; for, ye see, I was an old
+man, and I daresay that kep him quiet. But I did hear him blow up a
+young chap i' the village he come upon promiscus with a pipe in his
+mouth. He did give him a thunderin' broadside, to be sure! So I was in
+two minds whether I ought to go on with my pipe or not."
+
+"And how did you settle the question, Rogers?"
+
+"Why, I followed my own old chart, sir."
+
+"Quite right. One mustn't mind too much what other people think."
+
+"That's not exactly what I mean, sir."
+
+"What do you mean then? I should like to know."
+
+"Well, sir, I mean that I said to myself, 'Now, Old Rogers, what do you
+think the Lord would say about this here baccay business?"'
+
+"And what did you think He would say?"
+
+"Why, sir, I thought He would say, 'Old Rogers, have yer baccay; only
+mind ye don't grumble when you 'aint got none.'"
+
+Something in this--I could not at the time have told what--touched
+me more than I can express. No doubt it was the simple reality of the
+relation in which the old man stood to his Father in heaven that made me
+feel as if the tears would come in spite of me.
+
+"And this is the man," I said to myself, "whom I thought I should be
+able to teach! Well, the wisest learn most, and I may be useful to him
+after all."
+
+As I said nothing, the old man resumed--
+
+"For you see, sir, it is not always a body feels he has a right to spend
+his ha'pence on baccay; and sometimes, too, he 'aint got none to spend."
+
+"In the meantime," I said, "here is some that I bought for you as I came
+along. I hope you will find it good. I am no judge."
+
+The old sailor's eyes glistened with gratitude. "Well, who'd ha' thought
+it. You didn't think I was beggin' for it, sir, surely?"
+
+"You see I had it for you in my pocket."
+
+"Well, that IS good o' you, sir!"
+
+"Why, Rogers, that'll last you a month!" exclaimed his wife, looking
+nearly as pleased as himself.
+
+"Six weeks at least, wife," he answered. "And ye don't smoke yourself,
+sir, and yet ye bring baccay to me! Well, it's just like yer Master,
+sir."
+
+I went away, resolved that Old Rogers should have no chance of
+"grumbling" for want of tobacco, if I could help it.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV. THE COFFIN.
+
+
+On the way back, my thoughts were still occupied with the woman I had
+seen in the little shop. The old man-of-war's man was probably the
+nobler being of the two; and if I had had to choose between them, I
+should no doubt have chosen him. But I had not to choose between them; I
+had only to think about them; and I thought a great deal more about
+the one I could not understand than the one I could understand. For Old
+Rogers wanted little help from me; whereas the other was evidently
+a soul in pain, and therefore belonged to me in peculiar right of my
+office; while the readiest way in which I could justify to myself the
+possession of that office was to make it a shepherding of the sheep. So
+I resolved to find out what I could about her, as one having a right to
+know, that I might see whether I could not help her. From herself it was
+evident that her secret, if she had one, was not to be easily gained;
+but even the common reports of the village would be some enlightenment
+to the darkness I was in about her.
+
+As I went again through the village, I observed a narrow lane striking
+off to the left, and resolved to explore in that direction. It led up
+to one side of the large house of which I have already spoken. As I came
+near, I smelt what has been to me always a delightful smell--that of
+fresh deals under the hands of the carpenter. In the scent of those
+boards of pine is enclosed all the idea the tree could gather of the
+world of forest where it was reared. It speaks of many wild and bright
+but chiefly clean and rather cold things. If I were idling, it would
+draw me to it across many fields.--Turning a corner, I heard the sound
+of a saw. And this sound drew me yet more. For a carpenter's shop was
+the delight of my boyhood; and after I began to read the history of our
+Lord with something of that sense of reality with which we read other
+histories, and which, I am sorry to think, so much of the well-meant
+instruction we receive in our youth tends to destroy, my feeling about
+such a workshop grew stronger and stronger, till at last I never could
+go near enough to see the shavings lying on the floor of one, without
+a spiritual sensation such as I have in entering an old church; which
+sensation, ever since having been admitted on the usual conditions to a
+Mohammedan mosque, urges me to pull off, not only my hat, but my shoes
+likewise. And the feeling has grown upon me, till now it seems at times
+as if the only cure in the world for social pride would be to go for
+five silent minutes into a carpenter's shop. How one can think of
+himself as above his neighbours, within sight, sound, or smell of one, I
+fear I am getting almost unable to imagine, and one ought not to get out
+of sympathy with the wrong. Only as I am growing old now, it does not
+matter so much, for I daresay my time will not be very long.
+
+So I drew near to the shop, feeling as if the Lord might be at work
+there at one of the benches. And when I reached the door, there was
+my pale-faced hearer of the Sunday afternoon, sawing a board for a
+coffin-lid.
+
+As my shadow fell across and darkened his work, he lifted his head and
+saw me.
+
+I could not altogether understand the expression of his countenance as
+he stood upright from his labour and touched his old hat with rather a
+proud than a courteous gesture. And I could not believe that he was glad
+to see me, although he laid down his saw and advanced to the door. It
+was the gentleman in him, not the man, that sought to make me welcome,
+hardly caring whether I saw through the ceremony or not. True, there
+was a smile on his lips, but the smile of a man who cherishes a secret
+grudge; of one who does not altogether dislike you, but who has a claim
+upon you--say, for an apology, of which claim he doubts whether you know
+the existence. So the smile seemed tightened, and stopped just when it
+got half-way to its width, and was about to become hearty and begin to
+shine.
+
+"May I come in?" I said.
+
+"Come in, sir," he answered.
+
+"I am glad I have happened to come upon you by accident," I said.
+
+He smiled as if he did not quite believe in the accident, and considered
+it a part of the play between us that I should pretend it. I hastened to
+add--
+
+"I was wandering about the place, making some acquaintance with it, and
+with my friends in it, when I came upon you quite unexpectedly. You know
+I saw you in church on Sunday afternoon."
+
+"I know you saw me, sir," he answered, with a motion as if to return to
+his work; "but, to tell the truth, I don't go to church very often."
+
+I did not quite know whether to take this as proceeding from an honest
+fear of being misunderstood, or from a sense of being in general
+superior to all that sort of thing. But I felt that it would be of no
+good to pursue the inquiry directly. I looked therefore for something to
+say.
+
+"Ah! your work is not always a pleasant one," I said, associating the
+feelings of which I have already spoken with the facts before me, and
+looking at the coffin, the lower part of which stood nearly finished
+upon trestles on the floor.
+
+"Well, there are unpleasant things in all trades," he answered. "But it
+does not matter," he added, with an increase of bitterness in his smile.
+
+"I didn't mean," I said, "that the work was unpleasant--only sad. It
+must always be painful to make a coffin."
+
+"A joiner gets used to it, sir, as you do to the funeral service. But,
+for my part, I don't see why it should be considered so unhappy for a
+man to be buried. This isn't such a good job, after all, this world,
+sir, you must allow."
+
+"Neither is that coffin," said I, as if by a sudden inspiration.
+
+The man seemed taken aback, as Old Rogers might have said. He looked at
+the coffin and then looked at me.
+
+"Well, sir," he said, after a short pause, which no doubt seemed longer
+both to him and to me than it would have seemed to any third person, "I
+don't see anything amiss with the coffin. I don't say it'll last till
+doomsday, as the gravedigger says to Hamlet, because I don't know so
+much about doomsday as some people pretend to; but you see, sir, it's
+not finished yet."
+
+"Thank you," I said; "that's just what I meant. You thought I was hasty
+in my judgment of your coffin; whereas I only said of it knowingly what
+you said of the world thoughtlessly. How do you know that the world is
+finished anymore than your coffin? And how dare you then say that it is
+a bad job?"
+
+The same respectfully scornful smile passed over his face, as much as
+to say, "Ah! it's your trade to talk that way, so I must not be too hard
+upon you."
+
+"At any rate, sir," he said, "whoever made it has taken long enough
+about it, a person would think, to finish anything he ever meant to
+finish."
+
+"One day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as
+one day," I said.
+
+"That's supposing," he answered, "that the Lord did make the world. For
+my part, I am half of a mind that the Lord didn't make it at all."
+
+"I am very glad to hear you say so," I answered.
+
+Hereupon I found that we had changed places a little. He looked up
+at me. The smile of superiority was no longer there, and a puzzled
+questioning, which might indicate either "Who would have expected that
+from you?" or, "What can he mean?" or both at once, had taken its place.
+I, for my part, knew that on the scale of the man's judgment I had
+risen nearer to his own level. As he said nothing, however, and I was in
+danger of being misunderstood, I proceeded at once.
+
+"Of course it seems to me better that you should not believe God had
+done a thing, than that you should believe He had not done it well!"
+
+"Ah! I see, sir. Then you will allow there is some room for doubting
+whether He made the world at all?"
+
+"Yes; for I do not think an honest man, as you seem to me to be, would
+be able to doubt without any room whatever. That would be only for
+a fool. But it is just possible, as we are not perfectly good
+ourselves--you'll allow that, won't you?"
+
+"That I will, sir; God knows."
+
+"Well, I say--as we're not quite good ourselves, it's just possible that
+things may be too good for us to do them the justice of believing in
+them."
+
+"But there are things, you must allow, so plainly wrong!"
+
+"So much so, both in the world and in myself, that it would be to me
+torturing despair to believe that God did not make the world; for then,
+how would it ever be put right? Therefore I prefer the theory that He
+has not done making it yet."
+
+"But wouldn't you say, sir, that God might have managed it without
+so many slips in the making as your way would suppose? I should think
+myself a bad workman if I worked after that fashion."
+
+"I do not believe that there are any slips. You know you are making a
+coffin; but are you sure you know what God is making of the world?"
+
+"That I can't tell, of course, nor anybody else."
+
+"Then you can't say that what looks like a slip is really a slip, either
+in the design or in the workmanship. You do not know what end He has in
+view; and you may find some day that those slips were just the straight
+road to that very end."
+
+"Ah! maybe. But you can't be sure of it, you see."
+
+"Perhaps not, in the way you mean; but sure enough, for all that, to try
+it upon life--to order my way by it, and so find that it works well. And
+I find that it explains everything that comes near it. You know that no
+engineer would be satisfied with his engine on paper, nor with any proof
+whatever except seeing how it will go."
+
+He made no reply.
+
+It is a principle of mine never to push anything over the edge. When
+I am successful, in any argument, my one dread is of humiliating my
+opponent. Indeed I cannot bear it. It humiliates me. And if you want him
+to think about anything, you must leave him room, and not give him such
+associations with the question that the very idea of it will be painful
+and irritating to him. Let him have a hand in the convincing of himself.
+I have been surprised sometimes to see my own arguments come up fresh
+and green, when I thought the fowls of the air had devoured them up.
+When a man reasons for victory and not for the truth in the other
+soul, he is sure of just one ally, the same that Faust had in fighting
+Gretchen's brother--that is, the Devil. But God and good men are against
+him. So I never follow up a victory of that kind, for, as I said, the
+defeat of the intellect is not the object in fighting with the sword of
+the Spirit, but the acceptance of the heart. In this case, therefore, I
+drew back.
+
+"May I ask for whom you are making that coffin?"
+
+"For a sister of my own, sir."
+
+"I'm sorry to hear that."
+
+"There's no occasion. I can't say I'm sorry, though she was one of the
+best women I ever knew."
+
+"Why are you not sorry, then? Life's a good thing in the main, you will
+allow."
+
+"Yes, when it's endurable at all. But to have a brute of a husband
+coming home at any hour of the night or morning, drunk upon the money
+she had earned by hard work, was enough to take more of the shine out of
+things than church-going on Sundays could put in again, regular as she
+was, poor woman! I'm as glad as her brute of a husband, that she's out
+of his way at last."
+
+"How do you know he's glad of it?"
+
+"He's been drunk every night since she died."
+
+"Then he's the worse for losing her?"
+
+"He may well be. Crying like a hypocrite, too, over his own work!"
+
+"A fool he must be. A hypocrite, perhaps not. A hypocrite is a terrible
+name to give. Perhaps her death will do him good."
+
+"He doesn't deserve to be done any good to. I would have made this
+coffin for him with a world of pleasure."
+
+"I never found that I deserved anything, not even a coffin. The only
+claim that I could ever lay to anything was that I was very much in want
+of it."
+
+The old smile returned--as much as to say, "That's your little game in
+the church." But I resolved to try nothing more with him at present;
+and indeed was sorry that I had started the new question at all, partly
+because thus I had again given him occasion to feel that he knew better
+than I did, which was not good either for him or for me in our relation
+to each other.
+
+"This has been a fine old room once," I said, looking round the
+workshop.
+
+"You can see it wasn't a workshop always, sir. Many a grand dinner-party
+has sat down in this room when it was in its glory. Look at the
+chimney-piece there."
+
+"I have been looking at it," I said, going nearer.
+
+"It represents the four quarters of the world, you see."
+
+I saw strange figures of men and women, one on a kneeling camel, one
+on a crawling crocodile, and others differently mounted; with various
+besides of Nature's bizarre productions creeping and flying in
+stone-carving over the huge fire-place, in which, in place of a fire,
+stood several new and therefore brilliantly red cart-wheels. The sun
+shone through the upper part of a high window, of which many of the
+panes were broken, right in upon the cart-wheels, which, glowing thus in
+the chimney under the sombre chimney-piece, added to the grotesque look
+of the whole assemblage of contrasts. The coffin and the carpenter stood
+in the twilight occasioned by the sharp division of light made by a
+lofty wing of the house that rose flanking the other window. The room
+was still wainscotted in panels, which, I presume, for the sake of the
+more light required for handicraft, had been washed all over with white.
+At the level of labour they were broken in many places. Somehow or
+other, the whole reminded me of Albert Durer's "Melencholia."
+
+Seeing I was interested in looking about his shop, my new friend--for
+I could not help feeling that we should be friends before all was over,
+and so began to count him one already--resumed the conversation. He had
+never taken up the dropped thread of it before.
+
+"Yes, sir," he said; "the owners of the place little thought it would
+come to this--the deals growing into a coffin there on the spot where
+the grand dinner was laid for them and their guests! But there is
+another thing about it that is odder still; my son is the last male"--
+
+Here he stopped suddenly, and his face grew very red. As suddenly he
+resumed--
+
+"I'm not a gentleman, sir; but I will tell the truth. Curse it!--I beg
+your pardon, sir,"--and here the old smile--"I don't think I got that
+from THEIR side of the house.--My son's NOT the last male descendant."
+
+Here followed another pause.
+
+As to the imprecation, I knew better than to take any notice of a mere
+expression of excitement under a sense of some injury with which I was
+not yet acquainted. If I could get his feelings right in regard to other
+and more important things, a reform in that matter would soon follow;
+whereas to make a mountain of a molehill would be to put that very
+mountain between him and me. Nor would I ask him any questions, lest
+I should just happen to ask him the wrong one; for this parishioner of
+mine evidently wanted careful handling, if I would do him any good. And
+it will not do any man good to fling even the Bible in his face. Nay,
+a roll of bank-notes, which would be more evidently a good to most
+men, would carry insult with it if presented in that manner. You cannot
+expect people to accept before they have had a chance of seeing what the
+offered gift really is.
+
+After a pause, therefore, the carpenter had once more to recommence,
+or let the conversation lie. I stood in a waiting attitude. And while I
+looked at him, I was reminded of some one else whom I knew--with whom,
+too, I had pleasant associations--though I could not in the least
+determine who that one might be.
+
+"It's very foolish of me to talk so to a stranger," he resumed.
+
+"It is very kind and friendly of you," I said, still careful to make no
+advances. "And you yourself belong to the old family that once lived in
+this old house?"
+
+"It would be no boast to tell the truth, sir, even if it were a credit
+to me, which it is not. That family has been nothing but a curse to
+ours."
+
+I noted that he spoke of that family as different from his, and yet
+implied that he belonged to it. The explanation would come in time. But
+the man was again silent, planing away at half the lid of his sister's
+coffin. And I could not help thinking that the closed mouth meant to
+utter nothing more on this occasion.
+
+"I am sure there must be many a story to tell about this old place, if
+only there were any one to tell them," I said at last, looking round
+the room once more.--"I think I see the remains of paintings on the
+ceiling."
+
+"You are sharp-eyed, sir. My father says they were plain enough in his
+young days."
+
+"Is your father alive, then?"
+
+"That he is, sir, and hearty too, though he seldom goes out of doors
+now. Will you go up stairs and see him? He's past ninety, sir. He has
+plenty of stories to tell about the old place--before it began to fall
+to pieces like."
+
+"I won't go to-day," I said, partly because I wanted to be at home
+to receive any one who might call, and partly to secure an excuse for
+calling again upon the carpenter sooner than I should otherwise have
+liked to do. "I expect visitors myself, and it is time I were at home.
+Good morning."
+
+"Good morning, sir."
+
+And away home I went with a new wonder in my brain. The man did not
+seem unknown to me. I mean, the state of his mind woke no feeling of
+perplexity in me. I was certain of understanding it thoroughly when I
+had learned something of his history; for that such a man must have a
+history of his own was rendered only the more probable from the fact
+that he knew something of the history of his forefathers, though,
+indeed, there are some men who seem to have no other. It was strange,
+however, to think of that man working away at a trade in the very house
+in which such ancestors had eaten and drunk, and married and given
+in marriage. The house and family had declined together--in outward
+appearance at least; for it was quite possible both might have risen in
+the moral and spiritual scale in proportion as they sank in the social
+one. And if any of my readers are at first inclined to think that this
+could hardly be, seeing that the man was little, if anything, better
+than an infidel, I would just like to hold one minute's conversation
+with them on that subject. A man may be on the way to the truth, just in
+virtue of his doubting. I will tell you what Lord Bacon says, and of all
+writers of English I delight in him: "So it is in contemplation: if a
+man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will
+be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties." Now I
+could not tell the kind or character of this man's doubt; but it was
+evidently real and not affected doubt; and that was much in his favour.
+And I couid see that he was a thinking man; just one of the
+sort I thought I should get on with in time, because he was
+honest--notwithstanding that unpleasant smile of his, which did irritate
+me a little, and partly piqued me into the determination to get the
+better of the man, if I possibly could, by making friends with him. At
+all events, here was another strange parishioner. And who could it be
+that he was like?
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V. VISITORS FROM THE HALL.
+
+
+When I came near my own gate, I saw that it was open; and when I came
+in sight of my own door, I found a carriage standing before it, and a
+footman ringing the bell. It was an old-fashioned carriage, with two
+white horses in it, yet whiter by age than by nature. They looked as if
+no coachman could get more than three miles an hour out of them, they
+were so fat and knuckle-kneed. But my attention could not rest long
+on the horses, and I reached the door just as my housekeeper was
+pronouncing me absent. There were two ladies in the carriage, one old
+and one young.
+
+"Ah, here is Mr. Walton!" said the old lady, in a serene voice, with a
+clear hardness in its tone; and I held out my hand to aid her descent.
+She had pulled off her glove to get a card out of her card-case, and so
+put the tips of two old fingers, worn very smooth, as if polished with
+feeling what things were like, upon the palm of my hand. I then offered
+my hand to her companion, a girl apparently about fourteen, who took
+a hearty hold of it, and jumped down beside her with a smile. As I
+followed them into the house, I took their card from the housekeeper's
+hand, and read, Mrs Oldcastle and Miss Gladwyn.
+
+I confess here to my reader, that these are not really the names I read
+on the card. I made these up this minute. But the names of the persons
+of humble position in my story are their real names. And my reason for
+making the difference will be plain enough. You can never find out my
+friend Old Rogers; you might find out the people who called on me in
+their carriage with the ancient white horses.
+
+When they were seated in the drawing-room, I said to the old lady--
+
+"I remember seeing you in church on Sunday morning. It is very kind of
+you to call so soon."
+
+"You will always see me in church," she returned, with a stiff bow,
+and an expansion of deadness on her face, which I interpreted into an
+assertion of dignity, resulting from the implied possibility that I
+might have passed her over in my congregation, or might have forgotten
+her after not passing her over.
+
+"Except when you have a headache, grannie," said Miss Gladwyn, with an
+arch look first at her grandmother, and then at me. "Grannie has bad
+headaches sometimes."
+
+The deadness melted a little from Mrs Oldcastle's face, as she turned
+with half a smile to her grandchild, and said--
+
+"Yes, Pet. But you know that cannot be an interesting fact to Mr.
+Walton."
+
+"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Oldcastle," I said. "A clergyman ought to
+know something, and the more the better, of the troubles of his flock.
+Sympathy is one of the first demands he ought to be able to meet--I know
+what a headache is."
+
+The former expression, or rather non-expression, returned; this time
+unaccompanied by a bow.
+
+"I trust, Mr. Walton, I TRUST I am above any morbid necessity for
+sympathy. But, as you say, amongst the poor of your flock,--it IS very
+desirable that a clergyman should be able to sympathise."
+
+"It's quite true what grannie says, Mr. Walton, though you mightn't
+think it. When she has a headache, she shuts herself up in her own room,
+and doesn't even let me come near her--nobody but Sarah; and how she can
+prefer her to me, I'm sure I don't know."
+
+And here the girl pretended to pout, but with a sparkle in her bright
+gray eye.
+
+"The subject is not interesting to me, Pet. Pray, Mr. Walton, is it a
+point of conscience with you to wear the surplice when you preach?"
+
+"Not in the least," I answered. "I think I like it rather better on the
+whole. But that's not why I wear it."
+
+"Never mind grannie, Mr. Walton. _I_ think the surplice is lovely. I'm
+sure it's much liker the way we shall be dressed in heaven, though
+I don't think I shall ever get there, if I must read the good books
+grannie reads."
+
+"I don't know that it is necessary to read any good books but the good
+book," I said.
+
+"There, grannie!" exclaimed Miss Gladwyn, triumphantly. "I'm so glad
+I've got Mr Walton on my side!"
+
+"Mr Walton is not so old as I am, my dear, and has much to learn yet."
+
+I could not help feeling a little annoyed, (which was very foolish, I
+know,) and saying to myself, "If it's to make me like you, I had rather
+not learn any more;" but I said nothing aloud, of course.
+
+"Have you got a headache to-day, grannie?"
+
+"No, Pet. Be quiet. I wish to ask Mr Walton WHY he wears the surplice."
+
+"Simply," I replied, "because I was told the people had been accustomed
+to it under my predecessor."
+
+"But that can be no good reason for doing what is not right--that people
+have been accustomed to it."
+
+"But I don't allow that it's not right. I think it is a matter of no
+consequence whatever. If I find that the people don't like it, I will
+give it up with pleasure."
+
+"You ought to have principles of your own, Mr Walton."
+
+"I hope I have. And one of them is, not to make mountains of molehills;
+for a molehill is not a mountain. A man ought to have too much to do in
+obeying his conscience and keeping his soul's garments clean, to mind
+whether he wears black or white when telling his flock that God loves
+them, and that they will never be happy till they believe it."
+
+"They may believe that too soon."
+
+"I don't think any one can believe the truth too soon."
+
+A pause followed, during which it became evident to me that Miss
+Gladwyn saw fun in the whole affair, and was enjoying it thoroughly.
+Mrs Oldcastle's face, on the contrary, was illegible. She resumed in a
+measured still voice, which she meant to be meek, I daresay, but which
+was really authoritative--
+
+"I am sorry, Mr Walton, that your principles are so loose and unsettled.
+You will see my honesty in saying so when you find that, objecting to
+the surplice, as I do, on Protestant grounds, I yet warn you against
+making any change because you may discover that your parishioners are
+against it. You have no idea, Mr Walton, what inroads Radicalism,
+as they call it, has been making in this neighbourhood. It is quite
+dreadful. Everybody, down to the poorest, claiming a right to think for
+himself, and set his betters right! There's one worse than any of the
+rest--but he's no better than an atheist--a carpenter of the name of
+Weir, always talking to his neighbours against the proprietors and the
+magistrates, and the clergy too, Mr Walton, and the game-laws; and what
+not? And if you once show them that you are afraid of them by going a
+step out of your way for THEIR opinion about anything, there will be
+no end to it; for, the beginning of strife is like the letting out
+of water, as you know. _I_ should know nothing about it, but that, my
+daughter's maid--I came to hear of it through her--a decent girl of the
+name of Rogers, and born of decent parents, but unfortunately attached
+to the son of one of your churchwardens, who has put him into that mill
+on the river you can almost see from here."
+
+"Who put him in the mill?"
+
+"His own father, to whom it belongs."
+
+"Well, it seems to me a very good match for her."
+
+"Yes, indeed, and for him too. But his foolish father thinks the match
+below him, as if there was any difference between the positions of
+people in that rank of life! Every one seems striving to tread on the
+heels of every one else, instead of being content with the station to
+which God has called them. I am content with mine. I had nothing to do
+with putting myself there. Why should they not be content with theirs?
+They need to be taught Christian humility and respect for their
+superiors. That's the virtue most wanted at present. The poor have to
+look up to the rich"--
+
+"That's right, grannie! And the rich have to look down on the poor."
+
+"No, my dear. I did not say that. The rich have to be KIND to the poor."
+
+"But, grannie, why did you marry Mr Oldcastle?"
+
+"What does the child mean?"
+
+"Uncle Stoddart says you refused ever so many offers when you were a
+girl."
+
+"Uncle Stoddart has no business to be talking about such things to
+a chit like you," returned the grandmother smiling, however, at the
+charge, which so far certainly contained no reproach.
+
+"And grandpapa was the ugliest and the richest of them all--wasn't he,
+grannie? and Colonel Markham the handsomest and the poorest?"
+
+A flush of anger crimsoned the old lady's pale face. It looked dead no
+longer.
+
+"Hold your tongue," she said. "You are rude."
+
+And Miss Gladwyn did hold her tongue, but nothing else, for she was
+laughing all over.
+
+The relation between these two was evidently a very odd one. It was
+clear that Miss Gladwyn was a spoiled child, though I could not help
+thinking her very nicely spoiled, as far as I saw; and that the old lady
+persisted in regarding her as a cub, although her claws had grown quite
+long enough to be dangerous. Certainly, if things went on thus, it was
+pretty clear which of them would soon have the upper hand, for grannie
+was vulnerable, and Pet was not.
+
+It really began to look as if there were none but characters in my
+parish. I began to think it must be the strangest parish in England,
+and to wonder that I had never heard of it before. "Surely it must be in
+some story-book at least!" I said to myself.
+
+But her grand-daughter's tiger-cat-play drove the old lady nearer to me.
+She rose and held out her hand, saying, with some kindness--
+
+"Take my advice, my dear Mr Walton, and don't make too much of your
+poor, or they'll soon be too much for you to manage.--Come, Pet: it's
+time to go home to lunch.--And for the surplice, take your own way and
+wear it. _I_ shan't say anything more about it."
+
+"I will do what I can see to be right in the matter," I answered as
+gently as I could; for I did not want to quarrel with her, although I
+thought her both presumptuous and rude.
+
+"I'm on your side, Mr Walton," said the girl, with a sweet comical
+smile, as she squeezed my hand once more.
+
+I led them to the carriage, and it was with a feeling of relief that I
+saw it drive off.
+
+The old lady certainly was not pleasant. She had a white smooth face
+over which the skin was drawn tight, gray hair, and rather lurid hazel
+eyes. I felt a repugnance to her that was hardly to be accounted for by
+her arrogance to me, or by her superciliousness to the poor; although
+either would have accounted for much of it. For I confess that I have
+not yet learned to bear presumption and rudeness with all the patience
+and forgiveness with which I ought by this time to be able to meet them.
+And as to the poor, I am afraid I was always in some danger of being a
+partizan of theirs against the rich; and that a clergyman ought never to
+be. And indeed the poor rich have more need of the care of the clergyman
+than the others, seeing it is hardly that the rich shall enter into the
+kingdom of heaven, and the poor have all the advantage over them in that
+respect.
+
+"Still," I said to myself, "there must be some good in the woman--she
+cannot be altogether so hard as she looks, else how should that child
+dare to take the liberties of a kitten with her? She doesn't look to ME
+like one to make game of! However, I shall know a little more about her
+when I return her call, and I will do my best to keep on good terms with
+her."
+
+I took down a volume of Plato to comfort me after the irritation which
+my nerves had undergone, and sat down in an easy-chair beside the open
+window of my study. And with Plato in my hand, and all that outside my
+window, I began to feel as if, after all, a man might be happy, even if
+a lady had refused him. And there I sat, without opening my favourite
+vellum-bound volume, gazing out on the happy world, whence a gentle wind
+came in, as if to bid me welcome with a kiss to all it had to give me.
+And then I thought of the wind that bloweth where it listeth, which is
+everywhere, and I quite forgot to open my Plato, and thanked God for the
+Life of life, whose story and whose words are in that best of books, and
+who explains everything to us, and makes us love Socrates and David and
+all good men ten times more; and who follows no law but the law of love,
+and no fashion but the will of God; for where did ever one read words
+less like moralising and more like simple earnestness of truth than all
+those of Jesus? And I prayed my God that He would make me able to speak
+good common heavenly sense to my people, and forgive me for feeling so
+cross and proud towards the unhappy old lady--for I was sure she was not
+happy--and make me into a rock which swallowed up the waves of wrong in
+its great caverns, and never threw them back to swell the commotion
+of the angry sea whence they came. Ah, what it would be actually to
+annihilate wrong in this way!--to be able to say, it shall not be wrong
+against me, so utterly do I forgive it! How much sooner, then, would the
+wrong-doer repent, and get rid of the wrong from his side also! But the
+painful fact will show itself, not less curious than painful, that it
+is more difficult to forgive small wrongs than great ones. Perhaps,
+however, the forgiveness of the great wrongs is not so true as it seems.
+For do we not think it is a fine thing to forgive such wrongs, and so
+do it rather for our own sakes than for the sake of the wrongdoer? It is
+dreadful not to be good, and to have bad ways inside one.
+
+Such thoughts passed through my mind. And once more the great light
+went up on me with regard to my office, namely, that just because I was
+parson to the parish, I must not be THE PERSON to myself. And I prayed
+God to keep me from feeling STUNG and proud, however any one might
+behave to me; for all my value lay in being a sacrifice to Him and the
+people.
+
+So when Mrs Pearson knocked at the door, and told me that a lady and
+gentleman had called, I shut my book which I had just opened, and
+kept down as well as I could the rising grumble of the inhospitable
+Englishman, who is apt to be forgetful to entertain strangers, at least
+in the parlour of his heart. And I cannot count it perfect hospitality
+to be friendly and plentiful towards those whom you have invited to your
+house--what thank has a man in that?--while you are cold and forbidding
+to those who have not that claim on your attention. That is not to be
+perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect. By all means tell people,
+when you are busy about something that must be done, that you cannot
+spare the time for them except they want you upon something of yet more
+pressing necessity; but TELL them, and do not get rid of them by the
+use of the instrument commonly called THE COLD SHOULDER. It is a wicked
+instrument that, and ought to have fallen out of use by this time.
+
+I went and received Mr and Miss Boulderstone, and was at least thus far
+rewarded--that the EERIE feeling, as the Scotch would call it, which I
+had about my parish, as containing none but CHARACTERS, and therefore
+not being CANNIE, was entirely removed. At least there was a wholesome
+leaven in it of honest stupidity. Please, kind reader, do not fancy I am
+sneering. I declare to you I think a sneer the worst thing God has not
+made. A curse is nothing in wickedness to it, it seems to me. I do mean
+that honest stupidity I respect heartily, and do assert my conviction
+that I do not know how England at least would get on without it. But
+I do not mean the stupidity that sets up for teaching itself to its
+neighbour, thinking itself wisdom all the time. That I do not respect.
+
+Mr and Miss Boulderstone left me a little fatigued, but in no way sore
+or grumbling. They only sent me back with additional zest to my Plato,
+of which I enjoyed a hearty page or two before any one else arrived. The
+only other visitors I had that day were an old surgeon in the navy, who
+since his retirement had practised for many years in the neighbourhood,
+and was still at the call of any one who did not think him too
+old-fashioned--for even here the fashions, though decidedly elderly
+young ladies by the time they arrived, held their sway none the less
+imperiously--and Mr Brownrigg, the churchwarden. More of Dr Duncan by
+and by.
+
+Except Mr and Miss Boulderstone, I had not yet seen any common people.
+They were all decidedly uncommon, and, as regarded most of them, I
+could not think I should have any difficulty in preaching to them.
+For, whatever place a man may give to preaching in the ritual of the
+church--indeed it does not properly belong to the ritual at all--it is
+yet the part of the so-called service with which his personality has
+most to do. To the influences of the other parts he has to submit
+himself, ever turning the openings of his soul towards them, that he may
+not be a mere praying-machine; but with the sermon it is otherwise. That
+he produces. For that he is responsible. And therefore, I say, it was a
+great comfort to me to find myself amongst a people from which my spirit
+neither shrunk in the act of preaching, nor with regard to which it was
+likely to feel that it was beating itself against a stone wall. There
+was some good in preaching to a man like Weir or Old Rogers. Whether
+there was any good in preaching to a woman like Mrs Oldcastle I did not
+know.
+
+The evening I thought I might give to my books, and thus end my first
+Monday in my parish; but, as I said, Mr Brownrigg, the churchwarden,
+called and stayed a whole weary hour, talking about matters quite
+uninteresting to any who may hereafter peruse what I am now writing.
+Really he was not an interesting man: short, broad, stout, red-faced,
+with an immense amount of mental inertia, discharging itself in constant
+lingual activity about little nothings. Indeed, when there was no new
+nothing to be had, the old nothing would do over again to make a fresh
+fuss about. But if you attempted to convey a thought into his mind which
+involved the moving round half a degree from where he stood, and looking
+at the matter from a point even so far new, you found him utterly,
+totally impenetrable, as pachydermatous as any rhinoceros or behemoth.
+One other corporeal fact I could not help observing, was, that his
+cheeks rose at once from the collar of his green coat, his neck being
+invisible, from the hollow between it and the jaw being filled up to
+a level. The conformation was just what he himself delighted to
+contemplate in his pigs, to which his resemblance was greatly increased
+by unwearied endeavours to keep himself close shaved.--I could not help
+feeling anxious about his son and Jane Rogers.--He gave a quantity of
+gossip about various people, evidently anxious that I should regard them
+as he regarded them; but in all he said concerning them I could scarcely
+detect one point of significance as to character or history. I was
+very glad indeed when the waddling of hands--for it was the perfect
+imbecility of hand-shaking--was over, and he was safely out of the gate.
+He had kept me standing on the steps for full five minutes, and I did
+not feel safe from him till I was once more in my study with the door
+shut.
+
+I am not going to try my reader's patience with anything of a more
+detailed account of my introduction to my various parishioners. I shall
+mention them only as they come up in the course of my story. Before
+many days had passed I had found out my poor, who, I thought, must be
+somewhere, seeing the Lord had said we should have them with us always.
+There was a workhouse in the village, but there were not a great many in
+it; for the poor were kindly enough handled who belonged to the place,
+and were not too severely compelled to go into the house; though, I
+believe, in this house they would have been more comfortable than they
+were in their own houses.
+
+I cannot imagine a much greater misfortune for a man, not to say a
+clergyman, than not to know, or knowing, not to minister to any of the
+poor. And I did not feel that I knew in the least where I was until I
+had found out and conversed with almost the whole of mine.
+
+After I had done so, I began to think it better to return Mrs
+Oldcastle's visit, though I felt greatly disinclined to encounter that
+tight-skinned nose again, and that mouth whose smile had no light in it,
+except when it responded to some nonsense of her grand-daughter's.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI. OLDCASTLE HALL.
+
+
+About noon, on a lovely autumn day, I set out for Oldcastle Hall. The
+keenness of the air had melted away with the heat of the sun, yet still
+the air was fresh and invigorating. Can any one tell me why it is that,
+when the earth is renewing her youth in the spring, man should feel
+feeble and low-spirited, and gaze with bowed head, though pleased heart,
+on the crocuses; whereas, on the contrary, in the autumn, when nature is
+dying for the winter, he feels strong and hopeful, holds his head erect,
+and walks with a vigorous step, though the flaunting dahlias discourage
+him greatly? I do not ask for the physical causes: those I might be able
+to find out for myself; but I ask, Where is the rightness and fitness in
+the thing? Should not man and nature go together in this world which
+was made for man--not for science, but for man? Perhaps I have some
+glimmerings of where the answer lies. Perhaps "I see a cherub that sees
+it." And in many of our questions we have to be content with such an
+approximation to an answer as this. And for my part I am content with
+this. With less, I am not content.
+
+Whatever that answer may be, I walked over the old Gothic bridge with
+a heart strong enough to meet Mrs Oldcastle without flinching. I might
+have to quarrel with her--I could not tell: she certainly was neither
+safe nor wholesome. But this I was sure of, that I would not quarrel
+with her without being quite certain that I ought. I wish it were NEVER
+one's duty to quarrel with anybody: I do so hate it. But not to do it
+sometimes is to smile in the devil's face, and that no one ought to do.
+However, I had not to quarrel this time.
+
+The woods on the other side of the river from my house, towards which I
+was now walking, were of the most sombre rich colour--sombre and rich,
+like a life that has laid up treasure in heaven, locked in a casket
+of sorrow. I came nearer and nearer to them through the village, and
+approached the great iron gate with the antediluvian monsters on the top
+of its stone pillars. And awful monsters they were--are still! I see the
+tail of one of them at this very moment. But they let me through very
+quietly, notwithstanding their evil looks. I thought they were saying to
+each other across the top of the gate, "Never mind; he'll catch it soon
+enough." But, as I said, I did not catch it that day; and I could not
+have caught it that day; it was too lovely a day to catch any hurt even
+from that most hurtful of all beings under the sun, an unwomanly woman.
+
+I wandered up the long winding road, through the woods which I had
+remarked flanking the meadow on my first walk up the river. These
+woods smelt so sweetly--their dead and dying leaves departing in sweet
+odours--that they quite made up for the absence of the flowers. And the
+wind--no, there was no wind--there was only a memory of wind that woke
+now and then in the bosom of the wood, shook down a few leaves, like the
+thoughts that flutter away in sighs, and then was still again.
+
+I am getting old, as I told you, my friends. (See there, you seem my
+friends already. Do not despise an old man because he cannot help loving
+people he never saw or even heard of.) I say I am getting old--(is it
+BUT or THEREFORE? I do not know which)--but, therefore, I shall never
+forget that one autumn day in those grandly fading woods.
+
+Up the slope of the hillside they rose like one great rainbow-billow of
+foliage--bright yellow, red-rusty and bright fading green, all kinds and
+shades of brown and purple. Multitudes of leaves lay on the sides of
+the path, so many that I betook myself to my old childish amusement of
+walking in them without lifting my feet, driving whole armies of them
+with ocean-like rustling before me. I did not do so as I came back. I
+walked in the middle of the way then, and I remember stepping over many
+single leaves, in a kind of mechanico-merciful way, as if they had been
+living creatures--as indeed who can tell but they are, only they must be
+pretty nearly dead when they are on the ground.
+
+At length the road brought me up to the house. It did not look such a
+large house as I have since found it to be. And it certainly was not
+an interesting house from the outside, though its surroundings of green
+grass and trees would make any whole beautiful. Indeed the house itself
+tried hard to look ugly, not quite succeeding, only because of the kind
+foiling of its efforts by the Virginia creepers and ivy, which, as if
+ashamed of its staring countenance, did all they could to spread their
+hands over it and hide it. But there was one charming group of old
+chimneys, belonging to some portion behind, which indicated a very
+different, namely, a very much older, face upon the house once--a face
+that had passed away to give place to this. Once inside, I found there
+were more remains of the olden time than I had expected. I was led up
+one of those grand square oak staircases, which look like a portion of
+the house to be dwelt in, and not like a ladder for getting from one
+part of the habitable regions to another. On the top was a fine expanse
+of landing, another hall, in fact, from which I was led towards the
+back of the house by a narrow passage, and shown into a small dark
+drawing-room with a deep stone-mullioned window, wainscoted in oak
+simply carved and panelled. Several doors around indicated communication
+with other parts of the house. Here I found Mrs Oldcastle, reading what
+I judged to be one of the cheap and gaudy religious books of the present
+day. She rose and RECEIVED me, and having motioned me to a seat, began
+to talk about the parish. You would have perceived at once from her
+tone that she recognised no other bond of connexion between us but the
+parish.
+
+"I hear you have been most kind in visiting the poor, Mr Walton. You
+must take care that they don't take advantage of your kindness, though.
+I assure you, you will find some of them very grasping indeed. And
+you need not expect that they will give you the least credit for good
+intentions."
+
+"I have seen nothing yet to make me uneasy on that score. But certainly
+my testimony is of no weight yet."
+
+"Mine is. I have proved them. The poor of this neighbourhood are very
+deficient in gratitude."
+
+"Yes, grannie,----"
+
+I started. But there was no interruption, such as I have made to
+indicate my surprise; although, when I looked half round in the
+direction whence the voice came, the words that followed were all
+rippled with a sweet laugh of amusement.
+
+"Yes, grannie, you are right. You remember how old dame Hope wouldn't
+take the money you offered her, and dropped such a disdainful courtesy.
+It was SO greedy of her, wasn't it?"
+
+"I am sorry to hear of any disdainful reception of kindness," I said.
+
+"Yes, and she had the coolness, within a fortnight, to send up to me and
+ask if I would be kind enough to lend her half-a-crown for a few weeks."
+
+"And then it was your turn, grannie! You sent her five shillings, didn't
+you?--Oh no; I'm wrong. That was the other woman."
+
+"Indeed, I did not send her anything but a rebuke. I told her that it
+would be a very wrong thing in me to contribute to the support of such
+an evil spirit of unthankfulness as she indulged in. When she came to
+see her conduct in its true light, and confessed that she had behaved
+very abominably, I would see what I could do for her."
+
+"And meantime she was served out, wasn't she? With her sick boy at home,
+and nothing to give him?" said Miss Gladwyn.
+
+"She made her own bed, and had to lie on it."
+
+"Don't you think a little kindness might have had more effect in
+bringing her to see that she was wrong."
+
+"Grannie doesn't believe in kindness, except to me--dear old grannie!
+She spoils me. I'm sure I shall be ungrateful some day; and then she'll
+begin to read me long lectures, and prick me with all manner of headless
+pins. But I won't stand it, I can tell you, grannie! I'm too much
+spoiled for that."
+
+Mrs Oldcastle was silent--why, I could not tell, except it was that she
+knew she had no chance of quieting the girl in any other way.
+
+I may mention here, lest I should have no opportunity afterwards, that
+I inquired of dame Hope as to her version of the story, and found that
+there had been a great misunderstanding, as I had suspected. She was
+really in no want at the time, and did not feel that it would be quite
+honourable to take the money when she did not need it--(some poor people
+ARE capable of such reasoning)--and so had refused it, not without a
+feeling at the same time that it was more pleasant to refuse than
+to accept from such a giver; some stray sparkle of which feeling,
+discovered by the keen eye of Miss Gladwyn, may have given that
+appearance of disdain to her courtesy to which the girl alluded. When,
+however, her boy in service was brought home ill, she had sent to ask
+for what she now required, on the very ground that it had been offered
+to her before. The misunderstanding had arisen from the total incapacity
+of Mrs Oldcastle to enter sympathetically into the feelings of one
+as superior to herself in character as she was inferior in worldly
+condition.
+
+But to return to Oldcastle Hall.
+
+I wished to change the subject, knowing that blind defence is of no use.
+One must have definite points for defence, if one has not a thorough
+understanding of the character in question; and I had neither.
+
+"This is a beautiful old house," I said. "There must be strange places
+about it."
+
+Mrs Oldcastle had not time to reply, or at least did not reply, before
+Miss Gladwyn said--
+
+"Oh, Mr Walton, have you looked out of the window yet? You don't know
+what a lovely place this is, if you haven't."
+
+And as she spoke she emerged from a recess in the room, a kind of dark
+alcove, where she had been amusing herself with what I took to be
+some sort of puzzle, but which I found afterwards to be the bit and
+curb-chain of her pony's bridle which she was polishing up to her own
+bright mind, because the stable-boy had not pleased her in the matter,
+and she wanted both to get them brilliant and to shame the lad for
+the future. I followed her to the window, where I was indeed as much
+surprised and pleased as she could have wished.
+
+"There!" she said, holding back one of the dingy heavy curtains with her
+small childish hand.
+
+And there, indeed, I saw an astonishment. It did not lie in the lovely
+sweeps of hill and hollow stretching away to the horizon, richly wooded,
+and--though I saw none of them--sprinkled, certainly with sweet villages
+full of human thoughts, loves, and hopes; the astonishment did not lie
+in this--though all this was really much more beautiful to the higher
+imagination--but in the fact that, at the first glance, I had a vision
+properly belonging to a rugged or mountainous country. For I had
+approached the house by a gentle slope, which certainly was long and
+winding, but had occasioned no feeling in my mind that I had reached any
+considerable height. And I had come up that one beautiful staircase; no
+more; and yet now, when I looked from this window, I found myself on the
+edge of a precipice--not a very deep one, certainly, yet with all the
+effect of many a deeper. For below the house on this side lay a great
+hollow, with steep sides, up which, as far as they could reach, the
+trees were climbing. The sides were not all so steep as the one on which
+the house stood, but they were all rocky and steep, with here and there
+slopes of green grass. And down in the bottom, in the centre of the
+hollow, lay a pool of water. I knew it only by its slaty shimmer through
+the fading green of the tree-tops between me and it.
+
+"There!" again exclaimed Miss Gladwyn; "isn't that beautiful? But you
+haven't seen the most beautiful thing yet. Grannie, where's--ah! there
+she is! There's auntie! Don't you see her down there, by the side of the
+pond? That pond is a hundred feet deep. If auntie were to fall in she
+would be drowned before you could jump down to get her out. Can you
+swim?"
+
+Before I had time to answer, she was off again.
+
+"Don't you see auntie down there?"
+
+"No, I don't see her. I have been trying very hard, but I can't."
+
+"Well, I daresay you can't. Nobody, I think, has got eyes but myself. Do
+you see a big stone by the edge of the pond, with another stone on the
+top of it, like a big potato with a little one grown out of it?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Well, auntie is under the trees on the opposite side from that stone.
+Do you see her yet?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Then you must come down with me, and I will introduce you to her. She's
+much the prettiest thing here. Much prettier than grannie."
+
+Here she looked over her shoulder at grannie, who, instead of being
+angry, as, from what I had seen on our former interview, I feared
+she would be, only said, without even looking up from the little
+blue-boarded book she was again reading--
+
+"You are a saucy child."
+
+Whereupon Miss Gladwyn laughed merrily.
+
+"Come along," she said, and, seizing me by the hand, led me out of the
+room, down a back-staircase, across a piece of grass, and then down a
+stair in the face of the rock, towards the pond below. The stair went
+in zigzags, and, although rough, was protected by an iron balustrade,
+without which, indeed, it would have been very dangerous.
+
+"Isn't your grandmamma afraid to let you run up and down here, Miss
+Gladwyn?" I said.
+
+"Me!" she exclaimed, apparently in the utmost surprise. "That WOULD be
+fun! For, you know, if she tried to hinder me--but she knows it's no
+use; I taught her that long ago--let me see, how long: oh! I don't
+know--I should think it must be ten years at least. I ran away, and they
+thought I had drowned myself in the pond. And I saw them, all the time,
+poking with a long stick in the pond, which, if I had been drowned
+there, never could have brought me up, for it is a hundred feet deep,
+I am sure. How I hurt my sides trying to keep from screaming with
+laughter! I fancied I heard one say to the other, 'We must wait till she
+swells and floats?'"
+
+"Dear me! what a peculiar child!" I said to myself.
+
+And yet somehow, whatever she said--even when she was most rude to her
+grandmother--she was never offensive. No one could have helped feeling
+all the time that she was a little lady.--I thought I would venture a
+question with her. I stood still at a turn of the zigzag, and looked
+down into the hollow, still a good way below us, where I could now
+distinguish the form, on the opposite side of the pond, of a woman
+seated at the foot of a tree, and stooping forward over a book.
+
+"May I ask you a question, Miss Gladwyn?"
+
+"Yes, twenty, if you like; but I won't answer one of them till you give
+up calling me Miss Gladwyn. We can't be friends, you know, so long as
+you do that."
+
+"What am I to call you, then? I never heard you called by any other name
+than Pet, and that would hardly do, would it?"
+
+"Oh, just fancy if you called me Pet before grannie! That's grannie's
+name for me, and nobody dares to use it but grannie--not even auntie;
+for, between you and me, auntie is afraid of grannie; I can't think
+why. I never was afraid of anybody--except, yes, a little afraid of old
+Sarah. She used to be my nurse, you know; and grandmamma and everybody
+is afraid of her, and that's just why I never do one thing she wants
+me to do. It would never do to give in to being afraid of her, you
+know.--There's auntie, you see, down there, just where I told you
+before."
+
+"Oh yes! I see her now.--What does your aunt call you, then?"
+
+"Why, what you must call me--my own name, of course."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"Judy."
+
+She said it in a tone which seemed to indicate surprise that I should
+not know her name--perhaps read it off her face, as one ought to know a
+flower's name by looking at it. But she added instantly, glancing up in
+my face most comically--
+
+"I wish yours was Punch."
+
+"Why, Judy?"
+
+"It would be such fun, you know."
+
+"Well, it would be odd, I must confess. What is your aunt's name?"
+
+"Oh, such a funny name!--much funnier than Judy: Ethelwyn. It sounds as
+if it ought to mean something, doesn't it?"
+
+"Yes. It is an Anglo-Saxon word, without doubt."
+
+"What does it mean?"
+
+"I'm not sure about that. I will try to find out when I go home--if you
+would like to know."
+
+"Yes, that I should. I should like to know everything about auntie
+Ethelwyn. Isn't it pretty?"
+
+"So pretty that I should like to know something more about Aunt
+Ethelwyn. What is her other name?"
+
+"Why, Ethelwyn Oldcastle, to be sure. What else could it be?"
+
+"Why, you know, for anything I knew, Judy, it might have been Gladwyn.
+She might have been your father's sister."
+
+"Might she? I never thought of that. Oh, I suppose that is because I
+never think about my father. And now I do think of it, I wonder why
+nobody ever mentions him to me, or my mother either. But I often think
+auntie must be thinking about my mother. Something in her eyes, when
+they are sadder than usual, seems to remind me of my mother."
+
+"You remember your mother, then?"
+
+"No, I don't think I ever saw her. But I've answered plenty of
+questions, haven't I? I assure you, if you want to get me on to the
+Catechism, I don't know a word of it. Come along."
+
+I laughed.
+
+"What!" she said, pulling me by the hand, "you a clergyman, and laugh at
+the Catechism! I didn't know that."
+
+"I'm not laughing at the Catechism, Judy. I'm only laughing at the idea
+of putting Catechism questions to you."
+
+"You KNOW I didn't mean it," she said, with some indignation.
+
+"I know now," I answered. "But you haven't let me put the only question
+I wanted to put."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"How old are you?"
+
+"Twelve. Come along."
+
+And away we went down the rest of the stair.
+
+When we reached the bottom, a winding path led us through the trees to
+the side of the pond, along which we passed to get to the other side.
+
+And then all at once the thought struck me--why was it that I had never
+seen this auntie, with the lovely name, at church? Was she going to turn
+out another strange parishioner?
+
+There she sat, intent on her book. As we drew near she looked up and
+rose, but did not come forward.
+
+"Aunt Winnie, here's Mr. Walton," said Judy.
+
+I lifted my hat and held out my hand. Before our hands met, however, a
+tremendous splash reached my ears from the pond. I started round. Judy
+had vanished. I had my coat half off, and was rushing to the pool, when
+Miss Oldcastle stopped me, her face unmoved, except by a smile, saying,
+"It's only one of that frolicsome child's tricks, Mr Walton. It is well
+for you that I was here, though. Nothing would have delighted her more
+than to have you in the water too."
+
+"But," I said, bewildered, and not half comprehending, "where is she?"
+
+"There," returned Miss Oldcastle, pointing to the pool, in the middle
+of which arose a heaving and bubbling, presently yielding passage to the
+laughing face of Judy.
+
+"Why don't you help me out, Mr Walton? You said you could swim."
+
+"No, I did not," I answered coolly. "You talked so fast, you did not
+give me time to say so."
+
+"It's very cold," she returned.
+
+"Come out, Judy dear," said her aunt. "Run home and change your clothes.
+There's a dear."
+
+Judy swam to the opposite side, scrambled out, and was off like a
+spaniel through the trees and up the stairs, dripping and raining as she
+went.
+
+"You must be very much astonished at the little creature, Mr Walton."
+
+"I find her very interesting. Quite a study."
+
+"There never was a child so spoiled, and never a child on whom it took
+less effect to hurt her. I suppose such things do happen sometimes. She
+is really a good girl; though mamma, who has done all the spoiling, will
+not allow me to say she is good."
+
+Here followed a pause, for, Judy disposed of, what should I say next?
+And the moment her mind turned from Judy, I saw a certain stillness--not
+a cloud, but the shadow of a cloud--come over Miss Oldcastle's face, as
+if she, too, found herself uncomfortable, and did not know what to say
+next. I tried to get a glance at the book in her hand, for I should know
+something about her at once if I could only see what she was reading.
+She never came to church, and I wanted to arrive at some notion of the
+source of her spiritual life; for that she had such, a single glance at
+her face was enough to convince me. This, I mean, made me even anxious
+to see what the book was. But I could only discover that it was an old
+book in very shabby binding, not in the least like the books that young
+ladies generally have in their hands.
+
+And now my readers will possibly be thinking it odd that I have never
+yet said a word about what either Judy or Miss Oldcastle was like. If
+there is one thing I feel more inadequate to than another, in taking
+upon me to relate--it is to describe a lady. But I will try the girl
+first.
+
+Judy was rosy, gray-eyed, auburn-haired, sweet-mouthed. She had
+confidence in her chin, assertion in her nose, defiance in her eyebrows,
+honesty and friendliness over all her face. No one, evidently, could
+have a warmer friend; and to an enemy she would be dangerous no longer
+than a fit of passion might last. There was nothing acrid in her; and
+the reason, I presume, was, that she had never yet hurt her conscience.
+That is a very different thing from saying she had never done wrong, you
+know. She was not tall, even for her age, and just a little too plump
+for the immediate suggestion of grace. Yet every motion of the child
+would have been graceful, except for the fact that impulse was always
+predominant, giving a certain jerkiness, like the hopping of a bird,
+instead of the gliding of one motion into another, such as you might see
+in the same bird on the wing.
+
+There is one of the ladies.
+
+But the other--how shall I attempt to describe her?
+
+The first thing I felt was, that she was a lady-woman. And to feel that
+is almost to fall in love at first sight. And out of this whole, the
+first thing you distinguished would be the grace over all. She was
+rather slender, rather tall, rather dark-haired, and quite blue-eyed.
+But I assure you it was not upon that occasion that I found out the
+colour of her eyes. I was so taken with her whole that I knew
+nothing about her parts. Yet she was blue-eyed, indicating northern
+extraction--some centuries back perhaps. That blue was the blue of the
+sea that had sunk through the eyes of some sea-rover's wife and settled
+in those of her child, to be born when the voyage was over. It had been
+dyed so deep INGRAYNE, as Spenser would say, that it had never been worn
+from the souls of the race since, and so was every now and then shining
+like heaven out at some of its eyes. Her features were what is called
+regular. They were delicate and brave.--After the grace, the dignity was
+the next thing you came to discover. And the only thing you would not
+have liked, you would have discovered last. For when the shine of the
+courtesy with which she received me had faded away a certain look of
+negative haughtiness, of withdrawal, if not of repulsion, took its
+place, a look of consciousness of her own high breeding--a pride, not of
+life, but of circumstance of life, which disappointed me in the midst
+of so much that was very lovely. Her voice was sweet, and I could have
+fancied a tinge of sadness in it, to which impression her slowness of
+speech, without any drawl in it, contributed. But I am not doing well as
+an artist in describing her so fully before my reader has become in the
+least degree interested in her. I was seeing her, and no words can make
+him see her.
+
+Fearing lest some such fancy as had possessed Judy should be moving in
+her mind, namely, that I was, if not exactly going to put her through
+her Catechism, yet going in some way or other to act the clergyman, I
+hastened to speak.
+
+"This is a most romantic spot, Miss Oldcastle," I said; "and as
+surprising as it is romantic. I could hardly believe my eyes when I
+looked out of the window and saw it first."
+
+"Your surprise was the more natural that the place itself is not
+properly natural, as you must have discovered."
+
+This was rather a remarkable speech for a young lady to make. I
+answered--
+
+"I only know that such a chasm is the last thing I should have expected
+to find in this gently undulating country. That it is artificial I was
+no more prepared to hear than I was to see the place itself."
+
+"It looks pretty, but it has not a very poetic origin," she returned.
+"It is nothing but the quarry out of which the old house at the top of
+it was built."
+
+"I must venture to differ from you entirely in the aspect such an origin
+assumes to me," I said. "It seems to me a more poetic origin than
+any convulsion of nature whatever would have been; for, look you," I
+said--being as a young man too much inclined to the didactic, "for, look
+you," I said--and she did look at me--"from that buried mass of rock
+has arisen this living house with its histories of ages and generations;
+and"--
+
+Here I saw a change pass upon her face: it grew almost pallid. But her
+large blue eyes were still fixed on mine.
+
+"And it seems to me," I went on, "that such a chasm made by the
+uplifting of a house therefrom, is therefore in itself more poetic
+than if it were even the mouth of an extinct volcano. For, grand as the
+motions and deeds of Nature are, terrible as is the idea of the fiery
+heart of the earth breaking out in convulsions, yet here is something
+greater; for human will, human thought, human hands in human labour and
+effort, have all been employed to build this house, making not only the
+house beautiful, but the place whence it came beautiful too. It stands
+on the edge of what Shelley would call its 'antenatal tomb'--now
+beautiful enough to be its mother--filled from generation to generation
+"--
+
+Her face had grown still paler, and her lips moved as if she would
+speak; but no sound came from them. I had gone on, thinking it best
+to take no notice of her paleness; but now I could not help expressing
+concern.
+
+"I am afraid you feel ill, Miss Oldcastle."
+
+"Not at all," she answered, more quickly than she had yet spoken.
+
+"This place must be damp," I said. "I fear you have taken cold."
+
+She drew herself up a little haughtily, thinking, no doubt, that after
+her denial I was improperly pressing the point. So I drew back to the
+subject of our conversation.
+
+"But I can hardly think," I said, "that all this mass of stone could be
+required to build the house, large as it is. A house is not solid, you
+know."
+
+"No," she answered. "The original building was more of a castle, with
+walls and battlements. I can show you the foundations of them still; and
+the picture, too, of what the place used to be. We are not what we were
+then. Many a cottage, too, has been built out of this old quarry. Not a
+stone has been taken from it for the last fifty years, though. Just let
+me show you one thing, Mr. Walton, and then I must leave you."
+
+"Do not let me detain you a moment. I will go at once," I said; "though,
+if you would allow me, I should be more at ease if I might see you safe
+at the top of the stair first."
+
+She smiled.
+
+"Indeed, I am not ill," she answered; "but I have duties to attend to.
+Just let me show you this, and then you shall go with me back to mamma."
+
+She led the way to the edge of the pond and looked into it. I followed,
+and gazed down into its depths, till my sight was lost in them. I could
+see no bottom to the rocky shaft.
+
+"There is a strong spring down there," she said. "Is it not a dreadful
+place? Such a depth!"
+
+"Yes," I answered; "but it has not the horror of dirty water; it is as
+clear as crystal. How does the surplus escape?"
+
+"On the opposite side of the hill you came up there is a well, with a
+strong stream from it into the river."
+
+"I almost wonder at your choosing such a place to read in. I should
+hardly like to be so near this pond," said I, laughing.
+
+"Judy has taken all that away. Nothing in nature, and everything out of
+it, is strange to Judy, poor child! But just look down a little way into
+the water on this side. Do you see anything?"
+
+"Nothing," I answered.
+
+"Look again, against the wall of the pond," she said.
+
+"I see a kind of arch or opening in the side," I answered.
+
+"That is what I wanted you to see. Now, do you see a little barred
+window, there, in the face of the rock, through the trees?"
+
+"I cannot say I do," I replied.
+
+"No. Except you know where it is--and even then--it is not so easy to
+find it. I find it by certain trees."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"It is the window of a little room in the rock, from which a stair leads
+down through the rock to a sloping passage. That is the end of it you
+see under the water."
+
+"Provided, no doubt," I said, "in case of siege, to procure water."
+
+"Most likely; but not, therefore, confined to that purpose. There are
+more dreadful stories than I can bear to think of"---
+
+Here she paused abruptly, and began anew "---As if that house had
+brought death and doom out of the earth with it. There was an old
+burial-ground here before the Hall was built."
+
+"Have you ever been down the stair you speak of?" I asked.
+
+"Only part of the way," she answered. "But Judy knows every step of it.
+If it were not that the door at the top is locked, she would have dived
+through that archway now, and been in her own room in half the time. The
+child does not know what fear means."
+
+We now moved away from the pond, towards the side of the quarry and the
+open-air stair-case, which I thought must be considerably more pleasant
+than the other. I confess I longed to see the gleam of that water at the
+bottom of the dark sloping passage, though.
+
+Miss Oldcastle accompanied me to the room where I had left her mother,
+and took her leave with merely a bow of farewell. I saw the old lady
+glance sharply from her to me as if she were jealous of what we might
+have been talking about.
+
+"Grannie, are you afraid Mr. Walton has been saying pretty things to
+Aunt Winnie? I assure you he is not of that sort. He doesn't understand
+that kind of thing. But he would have jumped into the pond after me and
+got his death of cold if auntie would have let him. It WAS cold. I think
+I see you dripping now, Mr Walton."
+
+There she was in her dark corner, coiled up on a couch, and laughing
+heartily; but all as if she had done nothing extraordinary. And, indeed,
+estimated either by her own notions or practices, what she had done was
+not in the least extraordinary.
+
+Disinclined to stay any longer, I shook hands with the grandmother,
+with a certain invincible sense of slime, and with the grandchild with
+a feeling of mischievous health, as if the girl might soon corrupt the
+clergyman into a partnership in pranks as well as in friendship.
+She fallowed me out of the room, and danced before me down the oak
+staircase, clearing the portion from the first landing at a bound. Then
+she turned and waited for me, who came very deliberately, feeling the
+unsure contact of sole and wax. As soon as I reached her, she said, in a
+half-whisper, reaching up towards me on tiptoe--
+
+"Isn't she a beauty?"
+
+"Who? your grandmamma?" I returned.
+
+She gave me a little push, her face glowing with fun. But I did not
+expect she would take her revenge as she did. "Yes, of course," she
+answered, quite gravely. "Isn't she a beauty?"
+
+And then, seeing that she had put me hors de combat, she burst into loud
+laughter, and, opening the hall-door for me, let me go without another
+word.
+
+I went home very quietly, and, as I said, stepping with curious care--of
+which, of course, I did not think at the time--over the yellow and brown
+leaves that lay in the middle of the road.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII. THE BISHOP'S BASIN.
+
+
+I went home very quietly, as I say, thinking about the strange elements
+that not only combine to make life, but must be combined in our idea of
+life, before we can form a true theory about it. Now-a-days, the vulgar
+notion of what is life-like in any annals is to be realised by sternly
+excluding everything but the commonplace; and the means, at least, are
+often attained, with this much of the end as well--that the appearance
+life bears to vulgar minds is represented with a wonderful degree of
+success. But I believe that this is, at least, quite as unreal a mode
+of representing life as the other extreme, wherein the unlikely, the
+romantic, and the uncommon predominate. I doubt whether there is a
+single history--if one could only get at the whole of it--in which there
+is not a considerable admixture of the unlikely become fact, including
+a few strange coincidences; of the uncommon, which, although striking at
+first, has grown common from familiarity with its presence as our own;
+with even, at least, some one more or less rosy touch of what we call
+the romantic. My own conviction is, that the poetry is far the deepest
+in us, and that the prose is only broken-down poetry; and likewise that
+to this our lives correspond. The poetic region is the true one, and
+just, THEREFORE, the incredible one to the lower order of mind; for
+although every mind is capable of the truth, or rather capable of
+becoming capable of the truth, there may lie ages between its capacity
+and the truth. As you will hear some people read poetry so that no
+mortal could tell it was poetry, so do some people read their own lives
+and those of others.
+
+I fell into these reflections from comparing in my own mind my former
+experiences in visiting my parishioners with those of that day. True,
+I had never sat down to talk with one of them without finding that
+that man or that woman had actually a HISTORY, the most marvellous and
+important fact to a human being; nay, I had found something more or
+less remarkable in every one of their histories, so that I was more than
+barely interested in each of them. And as I made more acquaintance with
+them, (for I had not been in the position, or the disposition either,
+before I came to Marshmallows, necessary to the gathering of such
+experiences,) I came to the conclusion--not that I had got into an
+extraordinary parish of characters--but that every parish must be more
+or less extraordinary from the same cause. Why did I not use to see such
+people about me before? Surely I had undergone a change of some sort.
+Could it be, that the trouble I had been going through of late, had
+opened the eyes of my mind to the understanding, or rather the simple
+SEEING, of my fellow-men?
+
+But the people among whom I had been to-day belonged rather to such as
+might be put into a romantic story. Certainly I could not see much that
+was romantic in the old lady; and yet, those eyes and that tight-skinned
+face--what might they not be capable of in the working out of a story?
+And then the place they lived in! Why, it would hardly come into my
+ideas of a nineteenth-century country parish at all. I was tempted to
+try to persuade myself that all that had happened, since I rose to look
+out of the window in the old house, had been but a dream. For how could
+that wooded dell have come there after all? It was much too large for a
+quarry. And that madcap girl--she never flung herself into the pond!--it
+could not be. And what could the book have been that the lady with the
+sea-blue eyes was reading? Was that a real book at all? No. Yes. Of
+course it was. But what was it? What had that to do with the matter?
+It might turn out to be a very commonplace book after all. No; for
+commonplace books are generally new, or at least in fine bindings. And
+here was a shabby little old book, such as, if it had been commonplace,
+would not have been likely to be the companion of a young lady at the
+bottom of a quarry--
+
+   "A savage place, as holy and enchanted
+    As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
+    By woman wailing for her demon lover."
+
+I know all this will sound ridiculous, especially that quotation from
+Kubla Khan coming after the close of the preceding sentence; but it is
+only so much the more like the jumble of thoughts that made a chaos
+of my mind as I went home. And then for that terrible pool, and
+subterranean passage, and all that--what had it all to do with this
+broad daylight, and these dying autumn leaves? No doubt there had been
+such places. No doubt there were such places somewhere yet. No doubt
+this was one of them. But, somehow or other, it would not come in well.
+I had no intention of GOING IN FOR--that is the phrase now--going in for
+the romantic. I would take the impression off by going to see Weir the
+carpenter's old father. Whether my plan was successful or not, I shall
+leave my reader to judge.
+
+I found Weir busy as usual, but not with a coffin this time. He was
+working at a window-sash. "Just like life," I thought--tritely perhaps.
+"The other day he was closing up in the outer darkness, and now he is
+letting in the light."
+
+"It's a long time since you was here last, sir," he said, but without a
+smile.
+
+Did he mean a reproach? If so, I was more glad of that reproach than I
+would have been of the warmest welcome, even from Old Rogers. The fact
+was that, having a good deal to attend to besides, and willing at the
+same time to let the man feel that he was in no danger of being bored by
+my visits, I had not made use even of my reserve in the shape of a visit
+to his father.
+
+"Well," I answered, "I wanted to know something about all my people,
+before I paid a second visit to any of them."
+
+"All right, sir. Don't suppose I meant to complain. Only to let you know
+you was welcome, sir."
+
+"I've just come from my first visit to Oldcastle Hall. And, to tell the
+truth, for I don't like pretences, my visit to-day was not so much
+to you as to your father, whom, perhaps, I ought to have called upon
+before, only I was afraid of seeming to intrude upon you, seeing we
+don't exactly think the same way about some things," I added--with a
+smile, I know, which was none the less genuine that I remember it yet.
+
+And what makes me remember it yet? It is the smile that lighted up his
+face in response to mine. For it was more than I looked for. And his
+answer helped to fix the smile in my memory.
+
+"You made me think, sir, that perhaps, after all, we were much of the
+same way of thinking, only perhaps you was a long way ahead of me."
+
+Now the man was not right in saying that we were much of the same way of
+THINKING; for our opinions could hardly do more than come within sight
+of each other; but what he meant was right enough. For I was certain,
+from the first, that the man had a regard for the downright, honest
+way of things, and I hoped that I too had such a regard. How much of
+selfishness and of pride in one's own judgment might be mixed up with
+it, both in his case and mine, I had been too often taken in--by myself,
+I mean--to be at all careful to discriminate, provided there was a
+proportion of real honesty along with it, which, I felt sure, would
+ultimately eliminate the other. For in the moral nest, it is not as with
+the sparrow and the cuckoo. The right, the original inhabitant is the
+stronger; and, however unlikely at any given point in the history it may
+be, the sparrow will grow strong enough to heave the intruding cuckoo
+overboard. So I was pleased that the man should do me the honour of
+thinking I was right as far as he could see, which is the greatest
+honour one man can do another; for it is setting him on his own steed,
+as the eastern tyrants used to do. And I was delighted to think that the
+road lay open for further and more real communion between us in time to
+come.
+
+"Well," I answered, "I think we shall understand each other perfectly
+before long. But now I must see your father, if it is convenient and
+agreeable."
+
+"My father will be delighted to see you, I know, sir. He can't get so
+far as the church on Sundays; but you'll find him much more to your mind
+than me. He's been putting ever so many questions to me about the new
+parson, wanting me to try whether I couldn't get more out of you than
+the old parson. That's the way we talk about you, you see, sir. You'll
+understand. And I've never told him that I'd been to church since you
+came--I suppose from a bit of pride, because I had so long lefused to
+go; but I don't doubt some of the neighbours have told him, for he never
+speaks about it now. And I know he's been looking out for you; and I
+fancy he's begun to wonder that the parson was going to see everybody
+but him. It WILL be a pleasure to the old man, sir, for he don't see a
+great many to talk to; and he's fond of a bit of gossip, is the old man,
+sir."
+
+So saying, Weir led the way through the shop into a lobby behind, and
+thence up what must have been a back-stair of the old house, into a
+large room over the workshop. There were bits of old carving about
+the walls of the room yet, but, as in the shop below, all had been
+whitewashed. At one end stood a bed with chintz curtains and a
+warm-looking counterpane of rich faded embroidery. There was a bit of
+carpet by the bedside, and another bit in front of the fire; and there
+the old man sat, on one side, in a high-backed not very easy-looking
+chair. With a great effort he managed to rise as I approached him,
+notwithstanding my entreaties that he would not move. He looked much
+older when on his feet, for he was bent nearly double, in which posture
+the marvel was how he could walk at all. For he did totter a few steps
+to meet me, without even the aid of a stick, and, holding out a thin,
+shaking hand, welcomed me with an air of breeding rarely to be met with
+in his station in society. But the chief part of this polish sprung
+from the inbred kindliness of his nature, which was manifest in the
+expression of his noble old countenance. Age is such a different thing
+in different natures! One man seems to grow more and more selfish as he
+grows older; and in another the slow fire of time seems only to consume,
+with fine, imperceptible gradations, the yet lingering selfishness in
+him, letting the light of the kingdom, which the Lord says is within,
+shine out more and more, as the husk grows thin and is ready to fall
+off, that the man, like the seed sown, may pierce the earth of this
+world, and rise into the pure air and wind and dew of the second life.
+The face of a loving old man is always to me like a morning moon,
+reflecting the yet unrisen sun of the other world, yet fading before its
+approaching light, until, when it does rise, it pales and withers away
+from our gaze, absorbed in the source of its own beauty. This old man,
+you may see, took my fancy wonderfully, for even at this distance of
+time, when I am old myself, the recollection of his beautiful old face
+makes me feel as if I could write poetry about him.
+
+"I'm blithe to see ye, sir," said he. "Sit ye down, sir."
+
+And, turning, he pointed to his own easy-chair; and I then saw his
+profile. It was delicate as that of Dante, which in form it marvellously
+resembled. But all the sternness which Dante's evil times had generated
+in his prophetic face was in this old man's replaced by a sweetness of
+hope that was lovely to behold.
+
+"No, Mr Weir," I said, "I cannot take your chair. The Bible tells us to
+rise up before the aged, not to turn them out of their seats."
+
+"It would do me good to see you sitting in my cheer, sir. The pains that
+my son Tom there takes to keep it up as long as the old man may want it!
+It's a good thing I bred him to the joiner's trade, sir. Sit ye down,
+sir. The cheer'll hold ye, though I warrant it won't last that long
+after I be gone home. Sit ye down, sir."
+
+Thus entreated, I hesitated no longer, but took the old man's seat. His
+son brought another chair for him, and he sat down opposite the fire and
+close to me. Thomas then went back to his work, leaving us alone.
+
+"Ye've had some speech wi' my son Tom," said the old man, the moment he
+was gone, leaning a little towards me. "It's main kind o' you, sir, to
+take up kindly wi' poor folks like us."
+
+"You don't say it's kind of a person to do what he likes best," I
+answered. "Besides, it's my duty to know all my people."
+
+"Oh yes, sir, I know that. But there's a thousand ways ov doin' the same
+thing. I ha' seen folks, parsons and others, 'at made a great show ov
+bein' friendly to the poor, ye know, sir; and all the time you could
+see, or if you couldn't see you could tell without seein', that
+they didn't much regard them in their hearts; but it was a sort of
+accomplishment to be able to talk to the poor, like, after their own
+fashion. But the minute an ould man sees you, sir, he believes that
+you MEAN it, sir, whatever it is. For an ould man somehow comes to know
+things like a child. They call it a second childhood, don't they, sir?
+And there are some things worth growin' a child again to get a hould ov
+again."
+
+"I only hope what you say may be true--about me, I mean."
+
+"Take my word for it, sir. You have no idea how that boy of mine, Tom
+there, did hate all the clergy till you come. Not that he's anyway
+favourable to them yet, only he'll say nothin' again' you, sir. He's got
+an unfortunate gift o' seein' all the faults first, sir; and when a
+man is that way given, the faults always hides the other side, so that
+there's nothing but faults to be seen."
+
+"But I find Thomas quite open to reason."
+
+"That's because you understand him, sir, and know how to give him head.
+He tould me of the talk you had with him. You don't bait him. You don't
+say, 'You must come along wi' me,' but you turns and goes along wi' him.
+He's not a bad fellow at all, is Tom; but he will have the reason
+for everythink. Now I never did want the reason for everything. I was
+content to be tould a many things. But Tom, you see, he was born with
+a sore bit in him somewheres, I don't rightly know wheres; and I don't
+think he rightly knows what's the matter with him himself."
+
+"I dare say you have a guess though, by this time, Mr. Weir," I said;
+"and I think I have a guess too."
+
+"Well, sir, if he'd only give in, I think he would be far happier. But
+he can't see his way clear."
+
+"You must give him time, you know. The fact is, he doesn't feel at home
+yet.' And how can he, so long as he doesn't know his own Father?"
+
+"I'm not sure that I rightly understand you," said the old man, looking
+bewildered and curious.
+
+"I mean," I answered, "that till a man knows that he is one of God's
+family, living in God's house, with God up-stairs, as it were, while
+he is at his work or his play in a nursery below-stairs, he can't feel
+comfortable. For a man could not be made that should stand alone, like
+some of the beasts. A man must feel a head over him, because he's not
+enough to satisfy himself, you know. Thomas just wants faith; that is,
+he wants to feel that there is a loving Father over him, who is doing
+things all well and right, if we could only understand them, though it
+really does not look like it sometimes."
+
+"Ah, sir, I might have understood you well enough, if my poor old head
+hadn't been started on a wrong track. For I fancied for the moment that
+you were just putting your finger upon the sore place in Tom's mind.
+There's no use in keeping family misfortunes from a friend like you,
+sir. That boy has known his father all his life; but I was nearly half
+his age before I knew mine."
+
+"Strange!" I said, involuntarily almost.
+
+"Yes, sir; strange you may well say. A strange story it is. The Lord
+help my mother! I beg yer pardon, sir. I'm no Catholic. But that prayer
+will come of itself sometimes. As if it could be of any use now! God
+forgive me!"
+
+"Don't you be afraid, Mr Weir, as if God was ready to take offence at
+what comes naturally, as you say. An ejaculation of love is not likely
+to offend Him who is so grand that He is always meek and lowly of
+heart, and whose love is such that ours is a mere faint light--'a little
+glooming light much like a shade'--as one of our own poets says, beside
+it."
+
+"Thank you, Mr Walton. That's a real comfortable word, sir. And I am
+heart-sure it's true, sir. God be praised for evermore! He IS good, sir;
+as I have known in my poor time, sir. I don't believe there ever was one
+that just lifted his eyes and looked up'ards, instead of looking down to
+the ground, that didn't get some comfort, to go on with, as it were--the
+ready--money of comfort, as it were--though it might be none to put in
+the bank, sir."
+
+"That's true enough," I said. "Then your father and mother--?"
+
+And here I hesitated.
+
+"Were never married, sir," said the old man promptly, as if he would
+relieve me from an embarrassing position. "_I_ couldn't help it. And I'm
+no less the child of my Father in heaven for it. For if He hadn't made
+me, I couldn't ha' been their son, you know, sir. So that He had more to
+do wi' the makin' o' me than they had; though mayhap, if He had His way
+all out, I might ha' been the son o' somebody else. But, now that things
+be so, I wouldn't have liked that at all, sir; and bein' once born so,
+I would not have e'er another couple of parents in all England, sir,
+though I ne'er knew one o' them. And I do love my mother. And I'm so
+sorry for my father that I love him too, sir. And if I could only get
+my boy Tom to think as I do, I would die like a psalm-tune on an organ,
+sir."
+
+"But it seems to me strange," I said, "that your son should think so
+much of what is so far gone by. Surely he would not want another father
+than you, now. He is used to his position in life. And there can be
+nothing cast up to him about his birth or descent."
+
+"That's all very true, sir, and no doubt it would be as you say. But
+there has been other things to keep his mind upon the old affair.
+Indeed, sir, we have had the same misfortune all over again among the
+young people. And I mustn't say anything more about it; only my boy Tom
+has a sore heart."
+
+I knew at once to what he alluded; for I could not have been about in my
+parish all this time without learning that the strange handsome woman
+in the little shop was the daughter of Thomas Weir, and that she was
+neither wife nor widow. And it now occurred to me for the first time
+that it was a likeness to her little boy that had affected me so
+pleasantly when I first saw Thomas, his grandfather. The likeness to his
+great-grandfather, which I saw plainly enough, was what made the other
+fact clear to me. And at the same moment I began to be haunted with a
+flickering sense of a third likeness which I could not in the least fix
+or identify.
+
+"Perhaps," I said, "he may find some good come out of that too."
+
+"Well, who knows, sir?"
+
+"I think," I said, "that if we do evil that good may come, the good we
+looked for will never come thereby. But once evil is done, we may
+humbly look to Him who bringeth good out of evil, and wait. Is your
+granddaughter Catherine in bad health? She looks so delicate!"
+
+"She always had an uncommon look. But what she looks like now, I don't
+know. I hear no complaints; but she has never crossed this door since
+we got her set up in that shop. She never conies near her father or her
+sister, though she lets them, leastways her sister, go and see her. I'm
+afraid Tom has been rayther unmerciful, with her. And if ever he put a
+bad name upon her in her hearing, I know, from what that lass used to be
+as a young one, that she wouldn't be likely to forget it, and as little
+likely to get over it herself, or pass it over to another, even her own
+father. I don't believe they do more nor nod to one another when they
+meet in the village. It's well even if they do that much. It's my belief
+there's some people made so hard that they never can forgive anythink."
+
+"How did she get into the trouble? Who is the father of her child?"
+
+"Nay, that no one knows for certain; though there be suspicions, and one
+of them, no doubt, correct. But, I believe, fire wouldn't drive his name
+out at her mouth. I know my lass. When she says a thing, she 'll stick
+to it."
+
+I asked no more questions. But, after a short pause, the old man went
+on.
+
+"I shan't soon forget the night I first heard about my father and
+mother. That was a night! The wind was roaring like a mad beast about
+the house;--not this house, sir, but the great house over the way."
+
+"You don't mean Oldcastle Hall?" I said.
+
+"'Deed I do, sir," returned the old man, "This house here belonged
+to the same family at one time; though when I was born it was another
+branch of the family, second cousins or something, that lived in it. But
+even then it was something on to the downhill road, I believe."
+
+"But," I said, fearing my question might have turned the old man aside
+from a story worth hearing, "never mind all that now, if you please. I
+am anxious to hear all about that night. Do go on. You were saying the
+wind was blowing about the old house."
+
+"Eh, sir, it was roaring!-roaring as if it was mad with rage! And every
+now and then it would come down the chimley like out of a gun, and blow
+the smoke and a'most the fire into the middle of the housekeeper's room.
+For the housekeeper had been giving me my supper. I called her auntie,
+then; and didn't know a bit that she wasn't my aunt really. I was at
+that time a kind of a under-gamekeeper upon the place, and slept over
+the stable. But I fared of the best, for I was a favourite with the old
+woman--I suppose because I had given her plenty of trouble in my time.
+That's always the way, sir.--Well, as I was a-saying, when the wind
+stopped for a moment, down came the rain with a noise that sounded like
+a regiment of cavalry on the turnpike road t'other side of the hill. And
+then up the wind got again, and swept the rain away, and took it all in
+its own hand again, and went on roaring worse than ever. 'You 'll be wet
+afore you get across the yard, Samuel,' said auntie, looking very prim
+in her long white apron, as she sat on the other side of the little
+round table before the fire, sipping a drop of hot rum and water, which
+she always had before she went to bed. 'You'll be wet to the skin,
+Samuel,' she said. 'Never mind,' says I. 'I'm not salt, nor yet sugar;
+and I'll be going, auntie, for you'll be wanting your bed.'-'Sit ye
+still,' said she. 'I don't want my bed yet.' And there she sat, sipping
+at her rum and water; and there I sat, o' the other side, drinking the
+last of a pint of October, she had gotten me from the cellar--for I had
+been out in the wind all day. 'It was just such a night as this,' said
+she, and then stopped again.--But I'm wearying you, sir, with my long
+story."
+
+"Not in the least," I answered. "Quite the contrary. Pray tell it out
+your own way. You won't tire me, I assure you."
+
+So the old man went on.
+
+"' It was just such a night as this,' she began again--'leastways it was
+snow and not rain that was coming down, as if the Almighty was a-going
+to spend all His winter-stock at oncet.'--'What happened such a night,
+auntie?' I said. 'Ah, my lad!' said she, 'ye may well ask what happened.
+None has a better right. You happened. That's all.'--'Oh, that's all,
+is it, auntie?' I said, and laughed. 'Nay, nay, Samuel,' said she, quite
+solemn, 'what is there to laugh at, then? I assure you, you was anything
+but welcome.'--'And why wasn't I welcome?' I said. 'I couldn't help it,
+you know. I'm very sorry to hear I intruded,' I said, still making game
+of it, you see; for I always did like a joke. 'Well,' she said, 'you
+certainly wasn't wanted. But I don't blame you, Samuel, and I hope you
+won't blame me.'--'What do you mean, auntie ?' I mean this, that it's
+my fault, if so be that fault it is, that you're sitting there now, and
+not lying, in less bulk by a good deal, at the bottom of the Bishop's
+Basin.' That's what they call a deep pond at the foot of the old
+house, sir; though why or wherefore, I'm sure I don't know. 'Most
+extraordinary, auntie!' I said, feeling very queer, and as if I really
+had no business to be there. 'Never you mind, my dear,' says she;
+'there you are, and you can take care of yourself now as well as
+anybody.'--'But who wanted to drown me?' 'Are you sure you can forgive
+him, if I tell you?'--'Sure enough, suppose he was sitting where you be
+now,' I answered. 'It was, I make no doubt, though I can't prove it,--I
+am morally certain it was your own father.' I felt the skin go creepin'
+together upon my head, and I couldn't speak. 'Yes, it was, child; and
+it's time you knew all about it. Why, you don't know who your own father
+was!'--'No more I do,' I said; 'and I never cared to ask, somehow.
+I thought it was all right, I suppose. But I wonder now that I never
+did.'--'Indeed you did many a time, when you was a mere boy, like; but
+I suppose, as you never was answered, you give it up for a bad job,
+and forgot all about it, like a wise man. You always was a wise child,
+Samuel.' So the old lady always said, sir. And I was willing to believe
+she was right, if I could. 'But now,' said she, 'it's time you knew all
+about it.--Poor Miss Wallis!--I'm no aunt of yours, my boy, though I
+love you nearly as well, I think, as if I was; for dearly did I love
+your mother. She was a beauty, and better than she was beautiful,
+whatever folks may say. The only wrong thing, I'm certain, that she ever
+did, was to trust your father too much. But I must see and give you the
+story right through from beginning to end.--Miss Wallis, as I came to
+know from her own lips, was the daughter of a country attorney, who had
+a good practice, and was likely to leave her well off. Her mother died
+when she was a little girl. It's not easy getting on without a mother,
+my boy. So she wasn't taught much of the best sort, I reckon. When her
+father died early, and she was left atone, the only thing she could do
+was to take a governess's place, and she came to us. She never got on
+well with the children, for they were young and self willed and rude,
+and would not learn to do as they were bid. I never knew one o' them
+shut the door when they went out of this room. And, from having had all
+her own way at home, with plenty of servants, and money to spend, it was
+a sore change to her. But she was a sweet creature, that she was. She
+did look sorely tried when Master Freddy would get on the back of her
+chair, and Miss Gusta would lie down on the rug, and never stir for all
+she could say to them, but only laugh at her.--To be sure!' And then
+auntie would take a sip at her rum and water, and sit considering old
+times like a static. And I sat as if all my head was one great ear, and
+I never spoke a word. And auntie began again. 'The way I came to know
+so much about her was this. Nobody, you see, took any notice or care of
+her. For the children were kept away with her in the old house, and my
+lady wasn't one to take trouble about anybody till once she stood in her
+way, and then she would just shove her aside or crush her like a spider,
+and ha' done with her.'--They have always been a proud and a fierce
+race, the Oldcastles, sir," said Weir, taking up the speech in his own
+person, "and there's been a deal o' breedin in-and-in amongst them, and
+that has kept up the worst of them. The men took to the women of
+their own sort somehow, you see. The lady up at the old Hall now is a
+Crowfoot. I'll just tell you one thing the gardener told me about
+her years ago, sir. She had a fancy for hyacinths in her rooms in
+the spring, and she Had some particular fine ones; and a lady of her
+acquaintance begged for some of them. And what do you think she did? She
+couldn't refuse them, and she couldn't bear any one to have them as good
+as she. And so she sent the hyacinth-roots--but she boiled 'em first.
+The gardener told me himself, sir.--'And so, when the poor thing,' said
+auntie, 'was taken with a dreadful cold, which was no wonder if you saw
+the state of the window in the room she had to sleep in, and which I
+got old Jones to set to rights and paid him for it out of my own pocket,
+else he wouldn't ha' done it at all, for the family wasn't too much in
+the way or the means either of paying their debts--well, there she was,
+and nobody minding her, and of course it fell to me to look after her.
+It would have made your heart bleed to see the poor thing flung all of a
+heap on her bed, blue with cold and coughing. "My dear!" I said; and she
+burst out crying, and from that moment there was confidence between us.
+I made her as warm and as comfortable as I could, but I had to nurse
+her for a fortnight before she was able to do anything again. She didn't
+shirk her work though, poor thing. It was a heartsore to me to see the
+poor young thing, with her sweet eyes and her pale face, talking away
+to those children, that were more like wild cats than human beings. She
+might as well have talked to wild cats, I'm sure. But I don't think she
+was ever so miserable again as she must have been before her illness;
+for she used often to come and see me of an evening, and she would sit
+there where you are sitting now for an hour at a time, without speaking,
+her thin white hands lying folded in her lap, and her eyes fixed on the
+fire. I used to wonder what she could be thinking about, and I had made
+up my mind she was not long for this world; when all at once it was
+announced that Miss Oldcastle, who had been to school for some time, was
+coming home; and then we began to see a great deal of company, and for
+month after month the house was more or less filled with visitors, so
+that my time was constantly taken up, and I saw much less of poor Miss
+Wallis than I had seen before. But when we did meet on some of the back
+stairs, or when she came to my room for a few minutes before going to
+bed, we were just as good friends as ever. And I used to say, "I wish
+this scurry was over, my dear, that we might have our old times again."
+And she would smile and say something sweet. But I was surprised to see
+that her health began to come back--at least so it seemed to me, for her
+eyes grew brighter and a flush came upon her pale face, and though the
+children were as tiresome as ever, she didn't seem to mind it so much.
+But indeed she had not very much to do with them out of school hours
+now; for when the spring came on, they would be out and about the place
+with their sister or one of their brothers; and indeed, out of doors
+it would have been impossible for Miss Wallis to do anything with them.
+Some of the visitors would take to them too, for they behaved so badly
+to nobody as to Miss Wallis, and indeed they were clever children, and
+could be engaging enough when they pleased.--But then I had a blow,
+Samuel. It was a lovely spring night, just after the sun was down, and I
+wanted a drop of milk fresh from the cow for something that I was
+making for dinner the next day; so I went through the kitchen-garden and
+through the belt of young larches to go to the shippen. But when I got
+among the trees, who should I see at the other end of the path that went
+along, but Miss Wallis walking arm-in-arm with Captain Crowfoot, who was
+just home from India, where he had been with Lord Clive. The captain was
+a man about two or three and thirty, a relation of the family, and the
+son of Sir Giles Crowfoot'--who lived then in this old house, sir, and
+had but that one son, my father, you see, sir.--'And it did give me a
+turn,' said my aunt, 'to see her walking with him, for I felt as sure as
+judgment that no good could come of it. For the captain had not the best
+of characters--that is, when people talked about him in chimney corners,
+and such like, though he was a great favourite with everybody that knew
+nothing about him. He was a fine, manly, handsome fellow, with a smile
+that, as people said, no woman could resist, though I'm sure it would
+have given me no trouble to resist it, whatever they may mean by that,
+for I saw that that same smile was the falsest thing of all the false
+things about him. All the time he was smiling, you would have thought he
+was looking at himself in a glass. He was said to have gathered a power
+of money in India, somehow or other. But I don't know, only I don't
+think he would have been the favourite he was with my lady if he hadn't.
+And reports were about, too, of the ways and means by which he had made
+the money; some said by robbing the poor heathen creatures; and some
+said it was only that his brother officers didn't approve of his
+speculating as he did in horses and other things. I don't know whether
+officers are so particular. At all events, this was a fact, for it was
+one of his own servants that told me, not thinking any harm or any shame
+of it. He had quarrelled with a young ensign in the regiment. On
+which side the wrong was, I don't know. But he first thrashed him most
+unmercifully, and then called him out, as they say. And when the poor
+fellow appeared, he could scarcely see out of his eyes, and certainly
+couldn't take anything like an aim. And he shot him dead,--did Captain
+Crowfoot.'--Think of hearing that about one's own father, sir! But I
+never said a word, for I hadn't a word to say.--'Think of that, Samuel,'
+said my aunt, 'else you won't believe what I am going to tell you. And
+you won't even then, I dare say. But I must tell you, nevertheless and
+notwithstanding.--Well, I felt as if the earth was sinking away from
+under the feet of me, and I stood and stared at them. And they came on,
+never seeing me, and actually went close past me and never saw me; at
+least, if he saw me he took no notice, for I don't suppose that the
+angel with the flaming sword would have put him out. But for her, I
+know she didn't see me, for her face was down, burning and smiling at
+once.'--I'm an old man now, sir, and I never saw my mother; but I can't
+tell you the story without feeling as if my heart would break for the
+poor young lady.--'I went back to my room,' said my aunt, 'with my empty
+jug in my hand, and I sat down as if I had had a stroke, and I never
+moved till it was pitch dark and my fire out. It was a marvel to me
+afterwards that nobody came near me, for everybody was calling after me
+at that time. And it was days before I caught a glimpse of Miss Wallis
+again, at least to speak to her. At last, one night she came to my room;
+and without a moment of parley, I said to her, "Oh, my dear! what was
+that wretch saying to you?"--"What wretch?" says she, quite sharp like.
+"Why, Captain Crowfoot," says I, "to be sure."--"What have you to say
+against Captain Crowfoot?" says she, quite scornful like. So I tumbled
+out all I had against him in one breath. She turned awful pale, and she
+shook from head to foot, but she was able for all that to say, "Indian
+servants are known liars, Mrs Prendergast," says she, "and I don't
+believe one word of it all. But I'll ask him, the next time I see
+him."--"Do so, my dear," I said, not fearing for myself, for I knew he
+would not make any fuss that might bring the thing out into the air, and
+hoping that it might lead to a quarrel between them. And the next time
+I met her, Samuel--it was in the gallery that takes to the west
+turret--she passed me with a nod just, and a blush instead of a smile
+on her sweet face. And I didn't blame her, Samuel; but I knew that that
+villain had gotten a hold of her. And so I could only cry, and that
+I did. Things went on like this for some months. The captain came and
+went, stopping a week at a time. Then he stopped for a whole month, and
+this was in the first of the summer; and then he said he was ordered
+abroad again, and went away. But he didn't go abroad. He came again in
+the autumn for the shooting, and began to make up to Miss Oldcastle, who
+had grown a line young woman by that time. And then Miss Wallis began
+to pine. The captain went away again. Before long I was certain that if
+ever young creature was in a consumption, she was; but she never said a
+word to me. How ever the poor thing got on with her work, I can't think,
+but she grew weaker and weaker. I took the best care of her she would
+let me, and contrived that she should have her meals in her own room;
+but something was between her and me that she never spoke a word about
+herself, and never alluded to the captain. By and by came the news that
+the captain and Miss Oldcastle were to be married in the spring. And
+Miss Wallis took to her bed after that; and my lady said she had never
+been of much use, and wanted to send her away. But Miss Oldcastle, who
+was far superior to any of the rest in her disposition, spoke up for
+her. She had been to ask me about her, and I told her the poor thing
+must go to a hospital if she was sent away, for she had ne'er a home
+to go to. And then she went to see the governess, poor thing! and spoke
+very kindly to her; but never a word would Miss Wallis answer; she
+only stared at her with great, big, wild-like eyes. And Miss Oldcastle
+thought she was out of her mind, and spoke of an asylum. But I said she
+hadn't long to live, and if she would get my lady her mother to consent
+to take no notice, I would take all the care and trouble of her. And she
+promised, and the poor thing was left alone. I began to think myself her
+mind must be going, for not a word would she speak, even to me, though
+every moment I could spare I was up with her in her room. Only I was
+forced to be careful not to be out of the way when my lady wanted me,
+for that would have tied me more. At length one day, as I was settling
+her pillow for her, she all at once threw her arms about my neck, and
+burst into a terrible fit of crying. She sobbed and panted for breath so
+dreadfully, that I put my arms round her and lifted her up to give her
+relief; and when I laid her down again, I whispered in her ear, "I know
+now, my dear. I'll do all I can for you." She caught hold of my hand and
+held it to her lips, and then to her bosom, and cried again, but more
+quietly, and all was right between us once more. It was well for her,
+poor thing, that she could go to her bed. And I said to myself, "Nobody
+need ever know about it; and nobody ever shall if I can help it." To
+tell the truth, my hope was that she would die before there was any need
+for further concealment. "But people in that condition seldom die,
+they say, till all is over; and so she lived on and on, though plainly
+getting weaker and weaker.--At the captain's next visit, the wedding-day
+was fixed. And after that a circumstance came about that made me uneasy.
+A Hindoo servant--the captain called him his NIGGER always--had been
+constantly in attendance upon him. I never could abide the snake-look of
+the fellow, nor the noiseless way he went about the house. But this time
+the captain had a Hindoo woman with him as well. He said that his man
+had fallen in with her in London; that he had known her before; that she
+had come home as nurse with an English family, and it would be very nice
+for his wife to take her back with her to India, if she could only give
+her house room, and make her useful till after the wedding. This was
+easily arranged, and he went away to return in three weeks, when the
+wedding was to take place. Meantime poor Emily grew fast worse, and
+how she held out with that terrible cough of hers I never could
+understand--and spitting blood, too, every other hour or so, though not
+very much. And now, to my great trouble, with the preparations for
+the wedding, I could see yet less of her than before; and when Miss
+Oldcastle sent the Hindoo to ask me if she might not sit in the room
+with the poor girl, I did not know how to object, though I did not at
+all like her being there. I felt a great mistrust of the woman somehow
+or other. I never did like blacks, and I never shall. So she went, and
+sat by her, and waited on her very kindly--at least poor Emily said so.
+I called her Emily because she had begged me, that she might feel as if
+her mother were with her, and she was a child again. I had tried before
+to find out from her when greater care would be necessary, but she
+couldn't tell me anything. I doubted even if she understood me. I longed
+to have the wedding over that I might get rid of the black woman, and
+have time to take her place, and get everything prepared. The captain
+arrived, and his man with him. And twice I came upon the two blacks
+in close conversation.--Well, the wedding-day came. The people went to
+church; and while they were there a terrible storm of wind and snow came
+on, such that the horses would hardly face it. The captain was going
+to take his bride home to his father, Sir Giles's; but, short as the
+distance was, before the time came the storm got so dreadful that no one
+could think of leaving the house that night. The wind blew for all the
+world just as it blows this night, only it was snow in its mouth, and
+not rain. Carriage and horses and all would have been blown off the
+road for certain. It did blow, to be sure! After dinner was over and the
+ladies were gone to the drawing-room, and the gentlemen had been sitting
+over their wine for some time, the butler, William Weir--an honest man,
+whose wife lived at the lodge--came to my room looking scared. "Lawks,
+William!" says I,' said my aunt, sir, '"whatever is the matter with
+you?"--"Well, Mrs Prendergast!" says he, and said no more. "Lawks,
+William," says I, "speak out."--"Well," says he, "Mrs Prendergast,
+it's a strange wedding, it is! There's the ladies all alone in the
+withdrawing-room, and there's the gentlemen calling for more wine, and
+cursing and swearing that it's awful to hear. It's my belief that swords
+will be drawn afore long."--"Tut!" says I, "William, it will come the
+sooner if you don't give them what they want. Go and get it as fast as
+you can."--"I don't a'most like goin' down them stairs alone, in sich
+a night, ma'am," says he. "Would you mind coming with me?"--"Dear me,
+William," says I, "a pretty story to tell your wife"--she was my own
+half-sister, and younger than me--"a pretty story to tell your wife,
+that you wanted an old body like me to go and take care of you in your
+own cellar," says I. "But I'll go with you, if you like; for, to tell
+the truth, it's a terrible night." And so down we went, and brought up
+six bottles more of the best port. And I really didn't wonder, when I
+was down there, and heard the dull roar of the wind against the rock
+below, that William didn't much like to go alone.--When he went back
+with the wine, the captain said, "William, what kept you so long? Mr
+Centlivre says that you were afraid to go down into the cellar." Now,
+wasn't that odd, for it was a real fact? Before William could reply, Sir
+Giles said, "A man might well be afraid to go anywhere alone in a night
+like this." Whereupon the captain cried, with an oath, that he would
+go down the underground stair, and into every vault on the way, for the
+wager of a guinea. And there the matter, according to William, dropped,
+for the fresh wine was put on the table. But after they had drunk
+the most of it--the captain, according to William, drinking less than
+usual--it was brought up again, he couldn't tell by which of them. And
+in five minutes after, they were all at my door, demanding the key of
+the room at the top of the stair. I was just going up to see poor Emily
+when I heard the noise of their unsteady feet coming along the passage
+to my door; and I gave the captain the key at once, wishing with all my
+heart he might get a good fright for his pains. He took a jug with him,
+too, to bring some water up from the well, as a proof he had been down.
+The rest of the gentlemen went with him into the little cellar-room;
+but they wouldn't stop there till he came up again, they said it was
+so cold. They all came into my room, where they talked as gentlemen
+wouldn't do if the wine hadn't got uppermost. It was some time before
+the captain returned. It's a good way down and back. When he came in at
+last, he looked as if he had got the fright I wished him, he had such a
+scared look. The candle in his lantern was out, and there was no water
+in the jug. "There's your guinea, Centlivre," says he, throwing it on
+the table. "You needn't ask me any questions, for I won't answer one of
+them."--"Captain," says I, as he turned to leave the room, and the other
+gentlemen rose to follow him, "I'll just hang up the key again."--" By
+all means," says he. "Where is it, then?" says I. He started and made
+as if he searched his pockets all over for it. "I must have dropped it,"
+says he; "but it's of no consequence; you can send William to look for
+it in the morning. It can't be lost, you know."--"Very well, captain,"
+said I. But I didn't like being without the key, because of course he
+hadn't locked the door, and that part of the house has a bad name, and
+no wonder. It wasn't exactly pleasant to have the door left open. All
+this time I couldn't get to see how Emily was. As often as I looked from
+my window, I saw her light in the old west turret out there, Samuel.
+You know the room where the bed is still. The rain and the wind will
+be blowing right through it to-night. That's the bed you was born upon,
+Samuel.'--It's all gone now, sir, turret and all, like a good deal more
+about the old place; but there's a story about that turret afterwards,
+only I mustn't try to tell you two things at once.--'Now I had told the
+Indian woman that if anything happened, if she was worse, or wanted to
+see me, she must put the candle on the right side of the window, and
+I should always be looking out, and would come directly, whoever might
+wait. For I was expecting you some time soon, and nobody knew anything
+about when you might come. But there the blind continued drawn down as
+before. So I thought all was going on right. And what with the storm
+keeping Sir Giles and so many more that would have gone home that night,
+there was no end of work, and some contrivance necessary, I can tell
+you, to get them all bedded for the night, for we were nothing too well
+provided with blankets and linen in the house. There was always more
+room than money in it. So it was past twelve o'clock before I had a
+minute to myself, and that was only after they had all gone to bed--the
+bride and bridegroom in the crimson chamber, of course. Well, at last I
+crept quietly into Emily's room. I ought to have told you that I had not
+let her know anything about the wedding being that day, and had enjoined
+the heathen woman not to say a word; for I thought she might as well die
+without hearing about it. But I believe the vile wretch did tell her.
+When I opened the room-door, there was no light there. I spoke, but no
+one answered. I had my own candle in my hand, but it had been blown out
+as I came up the stair. I turned and ran along the corridor to reach
+the main stair, which was the nearest way to my room, when all at once
+I heard such a shriek from the crimson chamber as I never heard in my
+life. It made me all creep like worms. And in a moment doors and doors
+were opened, and lights came out, everybody looking terrified; and what
+with drink, and horror, and sleep, some of the gentlemen were awful
+to look upon. And the door of the crimson chamber opened too, and the
+captain appeared in his dressing-gown, bawling out to know what was
+the matter; though I'm certain, to this day, the cry did come from that
+room, and that he knew more about it than any one else did. As soon as
+I got a light, however, which I did from Sir Giles's candle, I left
+them to settle it amongst them, and ran back to the west turret. When
+I entered the room, there was my dear girl lying white and motionless.
+There could be no doubt a baby had been born, but no baby was to be
+seen. I rushed to the bed; but though she was still warm, your poor
+mother was quite dead. There was no use in thinking about helping her;
+but what could have become of the child? As if by a light in my mind,
+I saw it all. I rushed down to my room, got my lantern, and, without
+waiting to be afraid, ran to the underground stairs, where I actually
+found the door standing open. I had not gone down more than three
+turnings, when I thought I heard a cry, and I sped faster still. And
+just about half-way down, there lay a bundle in a blanket. And how ever
+you got over the state I found you in, Samuel, I can't think. But I
+caught you up as you was, and ran to my own room with you; and I locked
+the door, and there being a kettle on the fire, and some conveniences in
+the place, I did the best for you I could. For the breath wasn't out
+of you, though it well might have been. And then I laid you before
+the fire, and by that time you had begun to cry a little, to my great
+pleasure, and then I got a blanket off my bed, and wrapt you up in it;
+and, the storm being abated by this time, made the best of my way with
+you through the snow to the lodge, where William's wife lived. It was
+not so far off then as it is now. But in the midst of my trouble the
+silly body did make me laugh when he opened the door to me, and saw the
+bundle in my arms. "Mrs Prendergast," says he, "I didn't expect it of
+you."--"Hold your tongue," I said. "You would never have talked such
+nonsense if you had had the grace to have any of your own," says I. And
+with that I into the bedroom and shut the door, and left him out there
+in his shirt. My sister and I soon got everything arranged, for there
+was no time to lose. And before morning I had all made tidy, and your
+poor mother lying as sweet a corpse as ever angel saw. And no one could
+say a word against her. And it's my belief that that villain made her
+believe somehow or other that she was as good as married to him. She was
+buried down there in the churchyard, close by the vestry-door,' said my
+aunt, sir; and all of our family have been buried there ever since, my
+son Tom's wife among them, sir."
+
+"But what was that cry in the house?" I asked "And what became of the
+black woman?"
+
+"The woman was never seen again in our quarter; and what the cry was my
+aunt never would say. She seemed to know though; notwithstanding, as she
+said, that Captain and Mrs Crowfoot denied all knowledge of it. But the
+lady looked dreadful, she said, and never was well again, and died
+at the birth of her first child. That was the present Mrs Oldcastle's
+father, sir."
+
+"But why should the woman have left you on the stair, instead of
+drowning you in the well at the bottom?"
+
+"My aunt evidently thought there was some mystery about that as well as
+the other, for she had no doubt about the woman's intention. But all she
+would ever say concerning it was, 'The key was never found, Samuel. You
+see I had to get a new one made.' And she pointed to where it hung on
+the wall. 'But that doesn't look new now,' she would say. 'The lock was
+very hard to fit again.' And so you see, sir, I was brought up as her
+nephew, though people were surprised, no doubt, that William Weir's wife
+should have a child, and nobody know she was expecting.--Well, with all
+the reports of the captain's money, none of it showed in this old place,
+which from that day began, as it were, to crumble away. There's been
+little repair done upon it since then. If it hadn't been a well-built
+place to begin with, it wouldn't be standing now, sir. But it's a very
+different place, I can tell you. Why, all behind was a garden with
+terraces, and fruit trees, and gay flowers, to no end. I remember it as
+well as yesterday; nay, a great deal better, for the matter of that. For
+I don't remember yesterday at all, sir."
+
+I have tried a little to tell the story as he told it. But I am aware
+that I have succeeded very badly; for I am not like my friend in London,
+who, I verily believe, could give you an exact representation of any
+dialect he ever heard. I wish I had been able to give a little more of
+the form of the old man's speech; all I have been able to do is to show
+a difference from my own way of telling a story. But in the main,
+I think, I have reported it correctly. I believe if the old man was
+correct in representing his aunt's account, the story is very little
+altered between us.
+
+But why should I tell such a story at all?
+
+I am willing to allow, at once, that I have very likely given it more
+room than it deserves in these poor Annals of mine; but the reason why I
+tell it at all is simply this, that, as it came from the old man's lips,
+it interested me greatly. It certainly did not produce the effect I had
+hoped to gain from an interview with him, namely, A REDUCTION TO THE
+COMMON AND PRESENT. For all this ancient tale tended to keep up the
+sense of distance between my day's experience at the Hall and the work
+I had to do amongst my cottagers and trades-people. Indeed, it came very
+strangely upon that experience.
+
+"But surely you did not believe such an extravagant tale? The old man
+was in his dotage, to begin with."
+
+Had the old man been in his dotage, which he was not, my answer would
+have been a more triumphant one. For when was dotage consistently and
+imaginatively inventive? But why should I not believe the story? There
+are people who can never believe anything that is not (I do not say
+merely in accordance with their own character, but) in accordance with
+the particular mood they may happen to be in at the time it is presented
+to them. They know nothing of human nature beyond their own immediate
+preference at the moment for port or sherry, for vice or virtue. To
+tell me there could not be a man so lost to shame, if to rectitude, as
+Captain Crowfoot, is simply to talk nonsense. Nay, gentle reader, if
+you--and let me suppose I address a lady--if you will give yourself up
+for thirty years to doing just whatever your lowest self and not your
+best self may like, I will warrant you capable, by the end of that
+time, of child murder at least. I do not think the descent to Avernus is
+always easy; but it is always possible. Many and many such a story was
+fact in old times; and human nature being the same still, though under
+different restraints, equally horrible things are constantly in progress
+towards the windows of the newspapers.
+
+"But the whole tale has such a melodramatic air!"
+
+That argument simply amounts to this: that, because such subjects are
+capable of being employed with great dramatic effect, and of being at
+the same time very badly represented, therefore they cannot take place
+in real life. But ask any physician of your acquaintance, whether a
+story is unlikely simply because it involves terrible things such as do
+not occur every day. The fact is, that such things, occurring monthly
+or yearly only, are more easily hidden away out of sight. Indeed we can
+have no sense of security for ourselves except in the knowledge that we
+are striving up and away, and therefore cannot be sinking nearer to the
+region of such awful possibilities.
+
+Yet, as I said before, I am afraid I have given it too large a space
+in my narrative. Only it so forcibly reminded me at the time of the
+expression I could not understand upon Miss Oldcastle's face, and since
+then has been so often recalled by circumstances and events, that I felt
+impelled to record it in full. And now I have done with it.
+
+I left the old man with thanks for the kind reception he had given me,
+and walked home, revolving many things with which I shall not detain the
+attention of my reader. Indeed my thoughts were confused and troubled,
+and would ill bear analysis or record. I shut myself up in my study,
+and tried to read a sermon of Jeremy Taylor. But it would not do. I fell
+fast asleep over it at last, and woke refreshed.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII. WHAT I PREACHED.
+
+
+During the suffering which accompanied the disappointment at which I
+have already hinted, I did not think it inconsistent with the manly
+spirit in which I was resolved to endure it, to seek consolation from
+such a source as the New Testament--if mayhap consolation for such a
+trouble was to be found there. Whereupon, a little to my surprise, I
+discovered that I could not read the Epistles at all. For I did not
+then care an atom for the theological discussions in which I had been
+interested before, and for the sake of which I had read those epistles.
+Now that I was in trouble, what to me was that philosophical theology
+staring me in the face from out the sacred page? Ah! reader, do not
+misunderstand me. All reading of the Book is not reading of the Word.
+And many that are first shall be last and the last first. I know NOW
+that it was Jesus Christ and not theology that filled the hearts of the
+men that wrote those epistles--Jesus Christ, the living, loving God-Man,
+whom I found--not in the Epistles, but in the Gospels. The Gospels
+contain what the apostles preached--the Epistles what they wrote after
+the preaching. And until we understand the Gospel, the good news of
+Jesus Christ our brother-king--until we understand Him, until we have
+His Spirit, promised so freely to them that ask it--all the Epistles,
+the words of men who were full of Him, and wrote out of that fulness,
+who loved Him so utterly that by that very love they were lifted into
+the air of pure reason and right, and would die for Him, and did die
+for Him, without two thoughts about it, in the very simplicity of NO
+CHOICE--the Letters, I say, of such men are to us a sealed book. Until
+we love the Lord so as to do what He tells us, we have no right to have
+an opinion about what one of those men meant; for all they wrote is
+about things beyond us. The simplest woman who tries not to judge her
+neighbour, or not to be anxious for the morrow, will better know what is
+best to know, than the best-read bishop without that one simple outgoing
+of his highest nature in the effort to do the will of Him who thus
+spoke.
+
+But I have, as is too common with me, been led away by my feelings from
+the path to the object before me. What I wanted to say was this: that,
+although I could make nothing of the epistles, could see no possibility
+of consolation for my distress springing from them, I found it
+altogether different when I tried the Gospel once more. Indeed, it then
+took such a hold of me as it had never taken before. Only that is simply
+saying nothing. I found out that I had known nothing at all about it;
+that I had only a certain surface-knowledge, which tended rather to
+ignorance, because it fostered the delusion that I did know. Know that
+man, Christ Jesus! Ah! Lord, I would go through fire and water to
+sit the last at Thy table in Thy kingdom; but dare I say now I KNOW
+Thee!--But Thou art the Gospel, for Thou art the Way, the Truth, and the
+Life; and I have found Thee the Gospel. For I found, as I read, that Thy
+very presence in my thoughts, not as the theologians show Thee, but
+as Thou showedst Thyself to them who report Thee to us, smoothed the
+troubled waters of my spirit, so that, even while the storm lasted, I
+was able to walk upon them to go to Thee. And when those waters became
+clear, I most rejoiced in their clearness because they mirrored Thy
+form--because Thou wert there to my vision--the one Ideal, the perfect
+man, the God perfected as king of men by working out His Godhood in the
+work of man; revealing that God and man are one; that to serve God, a
+man must be partaker of the Divine nature; that for a man's work to be
+done thoroughly, God must come and do it first Himself; that to help
+men, He must be what He is--man in God, God in man--visibly before their
+eyes, or to the hearing of their ears. So much I saw.
+
+And therefore, when I was once more in a position to help my fellows,
+what could I want to give them but that which was the very bread and
+water of life to me--the Saviour himself? And how was I to do this?--By
+trying to represent the man in all the simplicity of His life, of His
+sayings and doings, of His refusals to say or do.--I took the story from
+the beginning, and told them about the Baby; trying to make the fathers
+and mothers, and all whose love for children supplied the lack of
+fatherhood and motherhood, feel that it was a real baby-boy. And I
+followed the life on and on, trying to show them how He felt, as far as
+one might dare to touch such sacred things, when He did so and so,
+or said so and so; and what His relation to His father and mother and
+brothers and sisters was, and to the different kinds of people who came
+about Him. And I tried to show them what His sayings meant, as far as
+I understood them myself, and where I could not understand them I just
+told them so, and said I hoped for more light by and by to enable me
+to understand them; telling them that that hope was a sharp goad to my
+resolution, driving me on to do my duty, because I knew that only as I
+did my duty would light go up in my heart, making me wise to understand
+the precious words of my Lord. And I told them that if they would try
+to do their duty, they would find more understanding from that than from
+any explanation I could give them.
+
+And so I went on from Sunday to Sunday. And the number of people
+that slept grew less and less, until, at last, it was reduced to the
+churchwarden, Mr Brownrigg, and an old washerwoman, who, poor thing,
+stood so much all the week, that sitting down with her was like going to
+bed, and she never could do it, as she told me, without going to
+sleep. I, therefore, called upon her every Monday morning, and had five
+minutes' chat with her as she stood at her wash-tub, wishing to make
+up to her for her drowsiness; and thinking that if I could once get her
+interested in anything, she might be able to keep awake a little while
+at the beginning of the sermon; for she gave me no chance of interesting
+her on Sundays--going fast asleep the moment I stood up to preach. I
+never got so far as that, however; and the only fact that showed me
+I had made any impression upon her, beyond the pleasure she always
+manifested when I appeared on the Monday, was, that, whereas all my
+linen had been very badly washed at first, a decided improvement took
+place after a while, beginning with my surplice and bands, and gradually
+extending itself to my shirts and handkerchiefs; till at last even Mrs
+Pearson was unable to find any fault with the poor old sleepy woman's
+work. For Mr Brownrigg, I am not sure that the sense of any one sentence
+I ever uttered, down to the day of his death, entered into his brain--I
+dare not say his mind or heart. With regard to him, and millions
+besides, I am more than happy to obey my Lord's command, and not judge.
+
+But it was not long either before my congregations began to improve,
+whatever might be the cause. I could not help hoping that it was really
+because they liked to hear the Gospel, that is, the good news about
+Christ himself. And I always made use of the knowledge I had of my
+individual hearers, to say what I thought would do them good. Not that
+I ever preached AT anybody; I only sought to explain the principles of
+things in which I knew action of some sort was demanded from them. For I
+remembered how our Lord's sermon against covetousness, with the parable
+of the rich man with the little barn, had for its occasion the request
+of a man that our Lord would interfere to make his brother share with
+him; which He declining to do, yet gave both brothers a lesson such as,
+if they wished to do what was right, would help them to see clearly
+what was the right thing to do in this and every such matter. Clear the
+mind's eye, by washing away the covetousness, and the whole nature would
+be full of light, and the right walk would speedily follow.
+
+Before long, likewise, I was as sure of seeing the pale face of Thomas
+Weir perched, like that of a man beheaded for treason, upon the apex of
+the gablet of the old tomb, as I was of hearing the wonderful playing of
+that husky old organ, of which I have spoken once before. I continued
+to pay him a visit every now and then; and I assure you, never was the
+attempt to be thoroughly honest towards a man better understood or more
+appreciated than my attempt was by the ATHEISTICAL carpenter. The man
+was no more an atheist than David was when he saw the wicked spreading
+like a green bay-tree, and was troubled at the sight. He only wanted to
+see a God in whom he could trust. And if I succeeded at all in making
+him hope that there might be such a God, it is to me one of the most
+precious seals of my ministry.
+
+But it was now getting very near Christmas, and there was one person
+whom I had never yet seen at church: that was Catherine Weir. I thought,
+at first, it could hardly be that she shrunk from being seen; for how
+then could she have taken to keeping a shop, where she must be at the
+beck of every one? I had several times gone and bought tobacco of her
+since that first occasion; and I had told my housekeeper to buy whatever
+she could from her, instead of going to the larger shop in the place; at
+which Mrs Pearson had grumbled a good deal, saying how could the things
+be so good out of a poky shop like that? But I told her I did not
+care if the things were not quite as good; for it would be of more
+consequence to Catherine to have the custom, than it would be to me to
+have the one lump of sugar I put in my tea of a morning one shade
+or even two shades whiter. So I had contrived to keep up a kind of
+connexion with her, although I saw that any attempt at conversation was
+so distasteful to her, that it must do harm until something should
+have brought about a change in her feelings; though what feeling wanted
+changing, I could not at first tell. I came to the conclusion that she
+had been wronged grievously, and that this wrong operating on a nature
+similar to her father's, had drawn all her mind to brood over it. The
+world itself, the whole order of her life, everything about her, would
+seem then to have wronged her; and to speak to her of religion would
+only rouse her scorn, and make her feel as if God himself, if there
+were a God, had wronged her too. Evidently, likewise, she had that
+peculiarity of strong, undeveloped natures, of being unable, once
+possessed by one set of thoughts, to get rid of it again, or to see
+anything except in the shadow of those thoughts. I had no doubt,
+however, at last, that she was ashamed of her position in the eyes of
+society, although a hitherto indomitable pride had upheld her to face it
+so far as was necessary to secure her independence; both of which--pride
+and shame--prevented her from appearing where it was unnecessary, and
+especially in church. I could do nothing more than wait for a favourable
+opportunity. I could invent no way of reaching her yet; for I had soon
+found that kindness to her boy was regarded rather in the light of an
+insult to her. I should have been greatly puzzled to account for his
+being such a sweet little fellow, had I not known that he was a
+great deal with his aunt and grandfather. A more attentive and devout
+worshipper was not in the congregation than that little boy.
+
+Before going on to speak of another of the most remarkable of my
+parishioners, whom I have just once mentioned I believe already, I
+should like to say that on three several occasions before Christmas I
+had seen Judy look grave. She was always quite well-behaved in church,
+though restless, as one might expect. But on these occasions she was not
+only attentive, but grave, as if she felt something or other. I will not
+mention what subjects I was upon at those times, because the mention of
+them would not, in the minds of my readers, at all harmonise with the
+only notion of Judy they can yet by possibility have.
+
+For Mrs Oldcastle, I never saw her change countenance or even expression
+at anything--I mean in church.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX. THE ORGANIST.
+
+
+On the afternoon of my second Sunday at Marshmallows, I was standing in
+the churchyard, casting a long shadow in the light of the declining
+sun. I was reading the inscription upon an old headstone, for I thought
+everybody was gone; when I heard a door open, and shut again before I
+could turn. I saw at once that it must have been a little door in the
+tower, almost concealed from where I stood by a deep buttress. I had
+never seen the door open, and I had never inquired anything about it,
+supposing it led merely into the tower.
+
+After a moment it opened again, and, to my surprise, out came, stooping
+his tall form to get his gray head clear of the low archway, a man whom
+no one could pass without looking after him. Tall, and strongly built,
+he had the carriage of a military man, without an atom of that sternness
+which one generally finds in the faces of those accustomed to command.
+He had a large face, with large regular features, and large clear gray
+eyes, all of which united to express an exceeding placidity or repose.
+It shone with intelligence--a mild intelligence--no way suggestive of
+profundity, although of geniality. Indeed, there was a little too much
+expression. The face seemed to express ALL that lay beneath it.
+
+I was not satisfied with the countenance; and yet it looked quite
+good. It was somehow a too well-ordered face. It was quite Greek in its
+outline; and marvellously well kept and smooth, considering that
+the beard, to which razors were utterly strange, and which descended
+half-way down his breast, would have been as white as snow except for
+a slight yellowish tinge. His eyebrows were still very dark, only just
+touched with the frost of winter. His hair, too, as I saw when he lifted
+his hat, was still wonderfully dark for the condition of his beard.--It
+flashed into my mind, that this must be the organist who played so
+remarkably. Somehow I had not happened yet to inquire about him. But
+there was a stateliness in this man amounting almost to consciousness of
+dignity; and I was a little bewildered. His clothes were all of black,
+very neat and clean, but old-fashioned and threadbare. They bore signs
+of use, but more signs of time and careful keeping. I would have spoken
+to him, but something in the manner in which he bowed to me as he
+passed, prevented me, and I let him go unaccosted.
+
+The sexton coming out directly after, and proceeding to lock the door,
+I was struck by the action. "What IS he locking the door for?" I said
+to myself. But I said nothing to him, because I had not answered the
+question myself yet.
+
+"Who is that gentleman," I asked, "who came out just now?"
+
+"That is Mr Stoddart, sir," he answered.
+
+I thought I had heard the name in the neighbourhood before.
+
+"Is it he who plays the organ?" I asked.
+
+"That he do, sir. He's played our organ for the last ten year, ever
+since he come to live at the Hall."
+
+"What Hall?"
+
+"Why the Hall, to be sure,--Oldcastle Hall, you know."
+
+And then it dawned on my recollection that I had heard Judy mention her
+uncle Stoddart. But how could he be her uncle?
+
+"Is he a relation of the family?" I asked.
+
+"He's a brother-in-law, I believe, of the old lady, sir, but how ever
+he come to live there I don't know. It's no such binding connexion,
+you know, sir. He's been in the milintairy line, I believe, sir, in the
+Ingies, or somewheres."
+
+I do not think I shall have any more strange parishioners to present to
+my readers; at least I do not remember any more just at this moment. And
+this one, as the reader will see, I positively could not keep out.
+
+A military man from India! a brother-in-law of Mrs Oldcastle, choosing
+to live with her! an entrancing performer upon an old, asthmatic,
+dry-throated church organ! taking no trouble to make the clergyman's
+acquaintance, and passing him in the churchyard with a courteous bow,
+although his face was full of kindliness, if not of kindness! I could
+not help thinking all this strange. And yet--will the reader cease to
+accord me credit when I assert it?--although I had quite intended to
+inquire after him when I left the vicarage to go to the Hall, and had
+even thought of him when sitting with Mrs Oldcastle, I never thought of
+him again after going with Judy, and left the house without having made
+a single inquiry after him. Nor did I think of him again till just as I
+was passing under the outstretched neck of one of those serpivolants
+on the gate; and what made me think of him then, I cannot in the least
+imagine; but I resolved at once that I would call upon him the following
+week, lest he should think that the fact of his having omitted to call
+upon me had been the occasion of such an apparently pointed omission on
+my part. For I had long ago determined to be no further guided by
+the rules of society than as they might aid in bringing about true
+neighbourliness, and if possible friendliness and friendship. Wherever
+they might interfere with these, I would disregard them--as far on
+the other hand as the disregard of them might tend to bring about the
+results I desired.
+
+When, carrying out this resolution, I rang the doorbell at the Hall, and
+inquired whether Mr Stoddart was at home, the butler stared; and, as I
+simply continued gazing in return, and waiting, he answered at length,
+with some hesitation, as if he were picking and choosing his words:
+
+"Mr Stoddart never calls upon any one, sir."
+
+"I am not complaining of Mr Stoddart," I answered, wishing to put the
+man at his ease.
+
+"But nobody calls upon Mr Stoddart," he returned.
+
+"That's very unkind of somebody, surely," I said.
+
+"But he doesn't want anybody to call upon him, sir."
+
+"Ah! that's another matter. I didn't know that. Of course, nobody has a
+right to intrude upon anybody. However, as I happen to have come without
+knowing his dislike to being visited, perhaps you will take him my card,
+and say that if it is not disagreeable to him, I should like exceedingly
+to thank him in person for his sermon on the organ last Sunday."
+
+He had played an exquisite voluntary in the morning.
+
+"Give my message exactly, if you please," I said, as I followed the man
+into the hall.
+
+"I will try, sir," he answered. "But won't you come up-stairs to
+mistress's room, sir, while I take this to Mr Stoddart?"
+
+"No, I thank you," I answered. "I came to call upon Mr Stoddart only,
+and I will wait the result of you mission here in the hall."
+
+The man withdrew, and I sat down on a bench, and amused myself with
+looking at the portraits about me. I learned afterwards that they had
+hung, till some thirty years before, in a long gallery connecting the
+main part of the house with that portion to which the turret referred to
+so often in Old Weir's story was attached. One particularly pleased
+me. It was the portrait of a young woman--very lovely--but with an
+expression both sad and--scared, I think, would be the readiest word
+to communicate what I mean. It was indubitably, indeed remarkably, like
+Miss Oldcastle. And I learned afterwards that it was the portrait of
+Mrs Oldcastle's grandmother, that very Mrs Crowfoot mentioned in Weir's
+story. It had been taken about six months after her marriage, and about
+as many before her death.
+
+The butler returned, with the request that I would follow him. He led me
+up the grand staircase, through a passage at right angles to that which
+led to the old lady's room, up a narrow circular staircase at the end
+of the passage, across a landing, then up a straight steep narrow stair,
+upon which two people could not pass without turning sideways and then
+squeezing. At the top of this I found myself in a small cylindrical
+lobby, papered in blocks of stone. There was no door to be seen. It
+was lighted by a conical skylight. My conductor gave a push against the
+wall. Certain blocks yielded, and others came forward. In fact a door
+revolved on central pivots, and we were admitted to a chamber crowded
+with books from floor to ceiling, arranged with wonderful neatness and
+solidity. From the centre of the ceiling, whence hung a globular lamp,
+radiated what I took to be a number of strong beams supporting a floor
+above; for our ancestors put the ceiling above the beams, instead of
+below them, as we do, and gained in space if they lost in quietness.
+But I soon found out my mistake. Those radiating beams were in reality
+book-shelves. For on each side of those I passed under I could see the
+gilded backs of books standing closely ranged together. I had never seen
+the connivance before, nor, I presume, was it to be seen anywhere else.
+
+"How does Mr Stoddart reach those books?" I asked my conductor.
+
+"I don't exactly know, sir," whispered the butler. "His own man could
+tell you, I dare say. But he has a holiday to-day; and I do not think he
+would explain it either; for he says his master allows no interference
+with his contrivances. I believe, however, he does not use a ladder."
+
+There was no one in the room, and I saw no entrance but that by which
+we had entered. The next moment, however, a nest of shelves revolved in
+front of me, and there Mr Stoddart stood with outstretched hand.
+
+"You have found me at last, Mr Walton, and I am glad to see you," he
+said.
+
+He led me into an inner room, much larger than the one I had passed
+through.
+
+"I am glad," I replied, "that I did not know, till the butler told me,
+your unwillingness to be intruded upon; for I fear, had I known it, I
+should have been yet longer a stranger to you."
+
+"You are no stranger to me. I have heard you read prayers, and I have
+heard you preach."
+
+"And I have heard you play; so you are no stranger to me either."
+
+"Well, before we say another word," said Mr Stoddart, "I must just say
+one word about this report of my unsociable disposition.--I encourage
+it; but am very glad to see you, notwithstanding.--Do sit down."
+
+I obeyed, and waited for the rest of his word.
+
+"I was so bored with visits after I came, visits which were to me
+utterly uninteresting, that I was only too glad when the unusual nature
+of some of my pursuits gave rise to the rumour that I was mad. The
+more people say I am mad, the better pleased I am, so long as they are
+satisfied with my own mode of shutting myself up, and do not attempt to
+carry out any fancies of their own in regard to my personal freedom."
+
+Upon this followed some desultory conversation, during which I took some
+observations of the room. Like the outer room, it was full of books
+from floor to ceiling. But the ceiling was divided into compartments,
+harmoniously coloured.
+
+"What a number of books you have!" I observed.
+
+"Not a great many," he answered. "But I think there is hardly one of
+them with which I have not some kind of personal acquaintance. I think I
+could almost find you any one you wanted in the dark, or in the twilight
+at least, which would allow me to distinguish whether the top edge was
+gilt, red, marbled, or uncut. I have bound a couple of hundred or so of
+them myself. I don't think you could tell the work from a tradesman's.
+I'll give you a guinea for the poor-box if you pick out three of my
+binding consecutively."
+
+I accepted the challenge; for although I could not bind a book, I
+considered myself to have a keen eye for the outside finish. After
+looking over the backs of a great many, I took one down, examined a
+little further, and presented it.
+
+"You are right. Now try again."
+
+Again I was successful, although I doubted.
+
+"And now for the last," he said.
+
+Once more I was right.
+
+"There is your guinea," said he, a little mortified.
+
+"No," I answered. "I do not feel at liberty to take it, because, to tell
+the truth, the last was a mere guess, nothing more."
+
+Mr Stoddart looked relieved.
+
+"You are more honest than most of your profession," he said. "But I am
+far more pleased to offer you the guinea upon the smallest doubt of your
+having won it."
+
+"I have no claim upon it."
+
+"What! Couldn't you swallow a small scruple like that for the sake of
+the poor even? Well, I don't believe YOU could.--Oblige me by taking
+this guinea for some one or other of your poor people. But I AM glad you
+weren't sure of that last book. I am indeed."
+
+I took the guinea, and put it in my purse.
+
+"But," he resumed, "you won't do, Mr Walton. You're not fit for your
+profession. You won't tell a lie for God's sake. You won't dodge about
+a little to keep all right between Jove and his weary parishioners.
+You won't cheat a little for the sake of the poor! You wouldn't even
+bamboozle a little at a bazaar!"
+
+"I should not like to boast of my principles," I answered; "for the
+moment one does so, they become as the apples of Sodom. But assuredly I
+would not favour a fiction to keep a world out of hell. The hell that a
+lie would keep any man out of is doubtless the very best place for him
+to go to. It is truth, yes, The Truth that saves the world."
+
+"You are right, I daresay. You are more sure about it than I am though."
+
+"Let us agree where we can," I said, "first of all; and that will make
+us able to disagree, where we must, without quarrelling."
+
+"Good," he said--"Would you like to see my work shop?"
+
+"Very much, indeed," I answered, heartily.
+
+"Do you take any pleasure in applied mechanics?"
+
+"I used to do so as a boy. But of course I have little time now for
+anything of the sort."
+
+"Ah! of course."
+
+He pushed a compartment of books. It yielded, and we entered a small
+closet. In another moment I found myself leaving the floor, and in yet a
+moment we were on the floor of an upper room.
+
+"What a nice way of getting up-stairs!" I said.
+
+"There is no other way of getting to this room," answered Mr Stoddart.
+"I built it myself; and there was no room for stairs. This is my shop.
+In my library I only read my favourite books. Here I read anything I
+want to read; write anything I want to write; bind my books; invent
+machines; and amuse myself generally. Take a chair."
+
+I obeyed, and began to look about me.
+
+The room had many books in detached book-cases. There were various
+benches against the walls between,--one a bookbinder's; another a
+carpenter's; a third had a turning-lathe; a fourth had an iron vice
+fixed on it, and was evidently used for working in metal. Besides
+these, for it was a large room, there were several tables with chemical
+apparatus upon them, Florence-flasks, retorts, sand-baths, and such
+like; while in a corner stood a furnace.
+
+"What an accumulation of ways and means you have about you!" I said;
+"and all, apparently, to different ends."
+
+"All to the same end, if my object were understood."
+
+"I presume I must ask no questions as to that object?"
+
+"It would take time to explain. I have theories of education. I think
+a man has to educate himself into harmony. Therefore he must open every
+possible window by which the influences of the All may come in upon him.
+I do not think any man complete without a perfect development of his
+mechanical faculties, for instance, and I encourage them to develop
+themselves into such windows."
+
+"I do not object to your theory, provided you do not put it forward as
+a perfect scheme of human life. If you did, I should have some questions
+to ask you about it, lest I should misunderstand you."
+
+He smiled what I took for a self-satisfied smile. There was nothing
+offensive in it, but it left me without anything to reply to. No
+embarrassment followed, however, for a rustling motion in the room the
+same instant attracted my attention, and I saw, to my surprise, and I
+must confess, a little to my confusion, Miss Oldcastle. She was seated
+in a corner, reading from a quarto lying upon her knees.
+
+"Oh! you didn't know my niece was here? To tell the truth, I forgot her
+when I brought you up, else I would have introduced you."
+
+"That is not necessary, uncle," said Miss Oldcastle, closing her book.
+
+I was by her instantly. She slipped the quarto from her knee, and took
+my offered hand.
+
+"Are you fond of old books?" I said, not having anything better to say.
+
+"Some old books," she answered.
+
+"May I ask what book you were reading?"
+
+"I will answer you--under protest," she said, with a smile.
+
+"I withdraw the question at once," I returned.
+
+"I will answer it notwithstanding. It is a volume of Jacob Behmen."
+
+"Do you understand him?"
+
+"Yes. Don't you?"
+
+"Well, I have made but little attempt," I answered. "Indeed, it was only
+as I passed through London last that I bought his works; and I am sorry
+to find that one of the plates is missing from my copy."
+
+"Which plate is it? It is not very easy, I understand, to procure a
+perfect copy. One of my uncle's copies has no two volumes bound alike.
+Each must have belonged to a different set."
+
+"I can't tell you what the plate is. But there are only three of those
+very curious unfolding ones in my third volume, and there should be
+four."
+
+"I do not think so. Indeed, I am sure you are wrong."
+
+"I am glad to hear it--though to be glad that the world does not possess
+what I thought I only was deprived of, is selfishness, cover it over as
+one may with the fiction of a perfect copy."
+
+"I don't know," she returned, without any response to what I said. "I
+should always like things perfect myself."
+
+"Doubtless," I answered; and thought it better to try another direction.
+
+"How is Mrs Oldcastle?" I asked, feeling in its turn the reproach of
+hypocrisy; for though I could have suffered, I hope, in my person and
+goods and reputation, to make that woman other than she was, I could not
+say that I cared one atom whether she was in health or not. Possibly
+I should have preferred the latter member of the alternative; for the
+suffering of the lower nature is as a fire that drives the higher nature
+upwards. So I felt rather hypocritical when I asked Miss Oldcastle after
+her.
+
+"Quite well, thank you," she answered, in a tone of indifference, which
+implied either that she saw through me, or shared in my indifference. I
+could not tell which.
+
+"And how is Miss Judy?" I inquired.
+
+"A little savage, as usual."
+
+"Not the worse for her wetting, I hope."
+
+"Oh! dear no. There never was health to equal that child's. It belongs
+to her savage nature."
+
+"I wish some of us were more of savages, then," I returned; for I saw
+signs of exhaustion in her eyes which moved my sympathy.
+
+"You don't mean me, Mr Walton, I hope. For if you do, I assure you your
+interest is quite thrown away. Uncle will tell you I am as strong as an
+elephant."
+
+But here came a slight elevation of her person; and a shadow at the same
+moment passed over her face. I saw that she felt she ought not to have
+allowed herself to become the subject of conversation.
+
+Meantime her uncle was busy at one of his benches filing away at a piece
+of brass fixed in the vice. He had thick gloves on. And, indeed, it had
+puzzled me before to think how he could have so many kinds of work, and
+yet keep his hands so smooth and white as they were. I could not help
+thinking the results could hardly be of the most useful description if
+they were all accomplished without some loss of whiteness and smoothness
+in the process. Even the feet that keep the garments clean must be
+washed themselves in the end.
+
+When I glanced away from Miss Oldcastle in the embarrassment produced
+by the repulsion of her last manner, I saw Judy in the room. At the same
+moment Miss Oldcastle rose.
+
+"What is the matter, Judy?" she said.
+
+"Grannie wants you," said Judy.
+
+Miss Oldcastle left the room, and Judy turned to me. "How do you do, Mr
+Walton?" she said.
+
+"Quite well, thank you, Judy," I answered. "Your uncle admits you to his
+workshop, then?"
+
+"Yes, indeed. He would feel rather dull, sometimes, without me. Wouldn't
+you, Uncle Stoddart?"
+
+"Just as the horses in the field would feel dull without the gad-fly,
+Judy," said Mr Stoddart, laughing.
+
+Judy, however, did not choose to receive the laugh as a scholium
+explanatory of the remark, and was gone in a moment, leaving Mr
+Stoddart and myself alone. I must say he looked a little troubled at
+the precipitate retreat of the damsel; but he recovered himself with a
+smile, and said to me,
+
+"I wonder what speech I shall make next to drive you away, Mr Walton."
+
+"I am not so easily got rid of, Mr Stoddart," I answered. "And as for
+taking offence, I don't like it, and therefore I never take it. But tell
+me what you are doing now."
+
+"I have been working for some time at an attempt after a perpetual
+motion, but, I must confess, more from a metaphysical or logical point
+of view than a mechanical one."
+
+Here he took a drawing from a shelf, explanatory of his plan.
+
+"You see," he said, "here is a top made of platinum, the heaviest of
+metals, except iridium--which it would be impossible to procure enough
+of, and which would be difficult to work into the proper shape. It is
+surrounded you will observe, by an air-tight receiver, communicating by
+this tube with a powerful air-pump. The plate upon which the point of
+the top rests and revolves is a diamond; and I ought to have mentioned
+that the peg of the top is a diamond likewise. This is, of course, for
+the sake of reducing the friction. By this apparatus communicating with
+the top, through the receiver, I set the top in motion--after exhausting
+the air as far as possible. Still there is the difficulty of the
+friction of the diamond point upon the diamond plate, which must
+ultimately occasion repose. To obviate this, I have constructed here,
+underneath, a small steam-engine which shall cause the diamond plate to
+revolve at precisely the same rate of speed as the top itself. This, of
+course, will prevent all friction."
+
+"Not that with the unavoidable remnant of air, however," I ventured to
+suggest.
+
+"That is just my weak point," he answered. "But that will be so very
+small!"
+
+"Yes; but enough to deprive the top of PERPETUAL motion."
+
+"But suppose I could get over that difficulty, would the contrivance
+have a right to the name of a perpetual motion? For you observe that the
+steam-engine below would not be the cause of the motion. That comes from
+above, here, and is withdrawn, finally withdrawn."
+
+"I understand perfectly," I answered. "At least, I think I do. But I
+return the question to you: Is a motion which, although not caused, is
+ENABLED by another motion, worthy of the name of a perpetual motion;
+seeing the perpetuity of motion has not to do merely with time, but with
+the indwelling of self-generative power--renewing itself constantly with
+the process of exhaustion?"
+
+He threw down his file on the bench.
+
+"I fear you are right," he said. "But you will allow it would have made
+a very pretty machine."
+
+"Pretty, I will allow," I answered, "as distinguished from beautiful.
+For I can never dissociate beauty from use."
+
+"You say that! with all the poetic things you say in your sermons! For
+I am a sharp listener, and none the less such that you do not see me.
+I have a loophole for seeing you. And I flatter myself, therefore, I am
+the only person in the congregation on a level with you in respect of
+balancing advantages. I cannot contradict you, and you cannot address
+me."
+
+"Do you mean, then, that whatever is poetical is useless?" I asked.
+
+"Do you assert that whatever is useful is beautiful?" he retorted.
+
+"A full reply to your question would need a ream of paper and a quarter
+of quills," I answered; "but I think I may venture so far as to say that
+whatever subserves a noble end must in itself be beautiful."
+
+"Then a gallows must be beautiful because it subserves the noble end of
+ridding the world of malefactors?" he returned, promptly.
+
+I had to think for a moment before I could reply.
+
+"I do not see anything noble in the end," I answered.
+
+"If the machine got rid of malefaction, it would, indeed, have a noble
+end. But if it only compels it to move on, as a constable does--from
+this world into another--I do not, I say, see anything so noble in that
+end. The gallows cannot be beautiful."
+
+"Ah, I see. You don't approve of capital punishments."
+
+"I do not say that. An inevitable necessity is something very different
+from a noble end. To cure the diseased mind is the noblest of ends; to
+make the sinner forsake his ways, and the unrighteous man his thoughts,
+the loftiest of designs; but to punish him for being wrong, however
+necessary it may be for others, cannot, if dissociated from the object
+of bringing good out of evil, be called in any sense a NOBLE end. I
+think now, however, it would be but fair in you to give me some answer
+to my question. Do you think the poetic useless?"
+
+"I think it is very like my machine. It may exercise the faculties
+without subserving any immediate progress."
+
+"It is so difficult to get out of the region of the poetic, that I
+cannot think it other than useful: it is so widespread. The useless
+could hardly be so nearly universal. But I should like to ask you
+another question: What is the immediate effect of anything poetic upon
+your mind?"
+
+"Pleasure," he answered.
+
+"And is pleasure good or bad?"
+
+"Sometimes the one, sometimes the other."
+
+"In itself?"
+
+"I should say so."
+
+"I should not."
+
+"Are you not, then, by your very profession, more or less an enemy of
+pleasure?"
+
+"On the contrary, I believe that pleasure is good, and does good, and
+urges to good. CARE is the evil thing."
+
+"Strange doctrine for a clergyman."
+
+"Now, do not misunderstand me, Mr Stoddart. That might not hurt you, but
+it would distress me. Pleasure, obtained by wrong, is poison and horror.
+But it is not the pleasure that hurts, it is the wrong that is in it
+that hurts; the pleasure hurts only as it leads to more wrong. I almost
+think myself, that if you could make everybody happy, half the evil
+would vanish from the earth."
+
+"But you believe in God?"
+
+"I hope in God I do."
+
+"How can you then think that He would not destroy evil at such a cheap
+and pleasant rate."
+
+"Because He wants to destroy ALL the evil, not the half of it; and
+destroy it so that it shall not grow again; which it would be sure to do
+very soon if it had no antidote but happiness. As soon as men got used
+to happiness, they would begin to sin again, and so lose it all. But
+care is distrust. I wonder now if ever there was a man who did his duty,
+and TOOK NO THOUGHT. I wish I could get the testimony of such a man. Has
+anybody actually tried the plan?"
+
+But here I saw that I was not taking Mr Stoddart with me (as the
+old phrase was). The reason I supposed to be, that he had never been
+troubled with much care. But there remained the question, whether he
+trusted in God or the Bank?
+
+I went back to the original question.
+
+"But I should be very sorry you should think, that to give pleasure
+was my object in saying poetic things in the pulpit. If I do so, it
+is because true things come to me in their natural garments of poetic
+forms. What you call the POETIC is only the outer beauty that belongs
+to all inner or spiritual beauty--just as a lovely face--mind, I say
+LOVELY, not PRETTY, not HANDSOME--is the outward and visible presence of
+a lovely mind. Therefore, saying I cannot dissociate beauty from use, I
+am free to say as many poetic things--though, mind, I don't claim them:
+you attribute them to me--as shall be of the highest use, namely, to
+embody and reveal the true. But a machine has material use for its end.
+The most grotesque machine I ever saw that DID something, I felt to
+be in its own kind beautiful; as God called many fierce and grotesque
+things good when He made the world--good for their good end. But
+your machine does nothing more than raise the metaphysical doubt and
+question, whether it can with propriety be called a perpetual motion or
+not?"
+
+To this Mr Stoddart making no reply, I take the opportunity of the
+break in our conversation to say to my readers, that I know there was no
+satisfactory following out of an argument on either side in the passage
+of words I have just given. Even the closest reasoner finds it next to
+impossible to attend to all the suggestions in his own mind, not one of
+which he is willing to lose, to attend at the same time to everything
+his antagonist says or suggests, that he may do him justice, and to keep
+an even course towards his goal--each having the opposite goal in view.
+In fact, an argument, however simply conducted and honourable, must just
+resemble a game at football; the unfortunate question being the ball,
+and the numerous and sometimes conflicting thoughts which arise in each
+mind forming the two parties whose energies are spent in a succession of
+kicks. In fact, I don't like argument, and I don't care for the victory.
+If I had my way, I would never argue at all. I would spend my energy in
+setting forth what I believe--as like itself as I could represent it,
+and so leave it to work its own way, which, if it be the right way, it
+must work in the right mind,--for Wisdom is justified of her children;
+while no one who loves the truth can be other than anxious, that if he
+has spoken the evil thing it may return to him void: that is a defeat
+he may well pray for. To succeed in the wrong is the most dreadful
+punishment to a man who, in the main, is honest. But I beg to assure my
+reader I could write a long treatise on the matter between Mr Stoddart
+and myself; therefore, if he is not yet interested in such questions,
+let him be thankful to me for considering such a treatise out of place
+here. I will only say in brief, that I believe with all my heart that
+the true is the beautiful, and that nothing evil can be other than ugly.
+If it seems not so, it is in virtue of some good mingled with the evil,
+and not in the smallest degree in virtue of the evil.
+
+I thought it was time for me to take my leave. But I could not bear to
+run away with the last word, as it were: so I said,
+
+"You put plenty of poetry yourself into that voluntary you played last
+Sunday. I am so much obliged to you for it!"
+
+"Oh! that fugue. You liked it, did you?"
+
+"More than I can tell you."
+
+"I am very glad."
+
+"Do you know those two lines of Milton in which he describes such a
+performance on the organ?"
+
+"No. Can you repeat them?"
+
+"'His volant touch, Instinct through all proportions, low and high, Fled
+and pursued transverse the resonant fugue.'"
+
+"That is wonderfully fine. Thank you. That is better than my fugue by a
+good deal. You have cancelled the obligation."
+
+"Do you think doing a good turn again is cancelling an obligation? I
+don't think an obligation can ever be RETURNED in the sense of being got
+rid of. But I am being hypercritical."
+
+"Not at all.--Shall I tell you what I was thinking of while playing that
+fugue?"
+
+"I should like much to hear."
+
+"I had been thinking, while you were preaching, of the many fancies men
+had worshipped for the truth; now following this, now following that;
+ever believing they were on the point of laying hold upon her, and going
+down to the grave empty-handed as they came."
+
+"And empty-hearted, too?" I asked; but he went on without heeding me.
+
+"And I saw a vision of multitudes following, following where nothing
+was to be seen, with arms outstretched in all directions, some clasping
+vacancy to their bosoms, some reaching on tiptoe over the heads of their
+neighbours, and some with hanging heads, and hands clasped behind their
+backs, retiring hopeless from the chase."
+
+"Strange!" I said; "for I felt so full of hope while you played, that I
+never doubted it was hope you meant to express."
+
+"So I do not doubt I did; for the multitude was full of hope, vain hope,
+to lay hold upon the truth. And you, being full of the main expression,
+and in sympathy with it, did not heed the undertones of disappointment,
+or the sighs of those who turned their backs on the chase. Just so it is
+in life."
+
+"I am no musician," I returned, "to give you a musical counter to your
+picture. But I see a grave man tilling the ground in peace, and the form
+of Truth standing behind him, and folding her wings closer and closer
+over and around him as he works on at his day's labour."
+
+"Very pretty," said Mr Stoddart, and said no more.
+
+"Suppose," I went on, "that a person knows that he has not laid hold
+on the truth, is that sufficient ground for his making any further
+assertion than that he has not found it?"
+
+"No. But if he has tried hard and has not found ANYTHING that he can
+say is true, he cannot help thinking that most likely there is no such
+thing."
+
+"Suppose," I said, "that nobody has found the truth, is that sufficient
+ground for saying that nobody ever will find it? or that there is no
+such thing as truth to be found? Are the ages so nearly done that no
+chance yet remains? Surely if God has made us to desire the truth,
+He has got some truth to cast into the gulf of that desire. Shall God
+create hunger and no food? But possibly a man may be looking the wrong
+way for it. You may be using the microscope, when you ought to open both
+eyes and lift up your head. Or a man may be finding some truth which is
+feeding his soul, when he does not think he is finding any. You know the
+Fairy Queen. Think how long the Redcross Knight travelled with the Lady
+Truth--Una, you know--without learning to believe in her; and how much
+longer still without ever seeing her face. For my part, may God give me
+strength to follow till I die. Only I will venture to say this, that it
+is not by any agony of the intellect that I expect to discover her."
+
+Mr Stoddart sat drumming silently with his fingers, a half-smile on his
+face, and his eyes raised at an angle of forty-five degrees. I felt that
+the enthusiasm with which I had spoken was thrown away upon him. But
+I was not going to be ashamed therefore. I would put some faith in his
+best nature.
+
+"But does not," he said, gently lowering his eyes upon mine after a
+moment's pause--"does not your choice of a profession imply that you
+have not to give chase to a fleeting phantom? Do you not profess to
+have, and hold, and therefore teach the truth?"
+
+"I profess only to have caught glimpses of her white garments,--those,
+I mean, of the abstract truth of which you speak. But I have seen that
+which is eternally beyond her: the ideal in the real, the living truth,
+not the truth that I can THINK, but the truth that thinks itself, that
+thinks me, that God has thought, yea, that God is, the truth BEING true
+to itself and to God and to man--Christ Jesus, my Lord, who knows, and
+feels, and does the truth. I have seen Him, and I am both content
+and unsatisfied. For in Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and
+knowledge. Thomas a Kempis says: 'Cui aeternum Verbum loquitur, ille a
+multis opinionibus expeditur.'" (He to whom the eternal Word speaks, is
+set free from a press of opinions.)
+
+I rose, and held out my hand to Mr Stoddart. He rose likewise, and
+took it kindly, conducted me to the room below, and ringing the bell,
+committed me to the care of the butler.
+
+As I approached the gate, I met Jane Rogers coming back from the
+village. I stopped and spoke to her. Her eyes were very red.
+
+"Nothing amiss at home, Jane?" I said.
+
+"No, sir, thank you," answered Jane, and burst out crying.
+
+"What is the matter, then? Is your----"
+
+"Nothing's the matter with nobody, sir."
+
+"Something is the matter with you."
+
+"Yes, sir. But I'm quite well."
+
+"I don't want to pry into your affairs; but if you think I can be of any
+use to you, mind you come to me."
+
+"Thank you kindly, sir," said Jane; and, dropping a courtesy, walked on
+with her basket.
+
+I went to her parents' cottage. As I came near the mill, the young
+miller was standing in the door with his eyes fixed on the ground, while
+the mill went on hopping behind him. But when he caught sight of me, he
+turned, and went in, as if he had not seen me.
+
+"Has he been behaving ill to Jane?" thought I. As he evidently wished to
+avoid me, I passed the mill without looking in at the door, as I was
+in the habit of doing, and went on to the cottage, where I lifted the
+latch, and walked in. Both the old people were there, and both looked
+troubled, though they welcomed me none the less kindly.
+
+"I met Jane," I said, "and she looked unhappy; so I came on to hear what
+was the matter."
+
+"You oughtn't to be troubled with our small affairs," said Mrs. Rogers.
+
+"If the parson wants to know, why, the parson must be told," said Old
+Rogers, smiling cheerily, as if he, at least, would be relieved by
+telling me.
+
+"I don't want to know," I said, "if you don't want to tell me. But can I
+be of any use?"
+
+"I don't think you can, sir,--leastways, I'm afraid not," said the old
+woman.
+
+"I am sorry to say, sir, that Master Brownrigg and his son has come to
+words about our Jane; and it's not agreeable to have folk's daughter
+quarrelled over in that way," said Old Rogers. "What'll be the upshot on
+it, I don't know, but it looks bad now. For the father he tells the son
+that if ever he hear of him saying one word to our Jane, out of the mill
+he goes, as sure as his name's Dick. Now, it's rather a good chance, I
+think, to see what the young fellow's made of, sir. So I tells my old
+'oman here; and so I told Jane. But neither on 'em seems to see the
+comfort of it somehow. But the New Testament do say a man shall leave
+father and mother, and cleave to his wife."
+
+"But she ain't his wife yet," said Mrs Rogers to her husband, whose
+drift was not yet evident.
+
+"No more she can be, 'cept he leaves his father for her."
+
+"And what'll become of them then, without the mill?"
+
+"You and me never had no mill, old 'oman," said Rogers; "yet here we be,
+very nearly ripe now,--ain't us, wife?"
+
+"Medlar-like, Old Rogers, I doubt,--rotten before we're ripe," replied
+his wife, quoting a more humorous than refined proverb.
+
+"Nay, nay, old 'oman. Don't 'e say so. The Lord won't let us rot before
+we're ripe, anyhow. That I be sure on."
+
+"But, anyhow, it's all very well to talk. Thou knows how to talk,
+Rogers. But how will it be when the children comes, and no mill?"
+
+"To grind 'em in, old 'oman?"
+
+Mrs Rogers turned to me, who was listening with real interest, and much
+amusement.
+
+"I wish you would speak a word to Old Rogers, sir. He never will speak
+as he's spoken to. He's always over merry, or over serious. He either
+takes me up short with a sermon, or he laughs me out of countenance that
+I don't know where to look."
+
+Now I was pretty sure that Rogers's conduct was simple consistency, and
+that the difficulty arose from his always acting upon one or two of
+the plainest principles of truth and right; whereas his wife, good
+woman--for the bad, old leaven of the Pharisees could not rise much in
+her somehow--was always reminding him of certain precepts of behaviour
+to the oblivion of principles. "A bird in the hand," &c.--"Marry in
+haste," &c.--"When want comes in at the door love flies out at the
+window," were amongst her favourite sayings; although not one of them
+was supported by her own experience. For instance, she had married in
+haste herself, and never, I believe, had once thought of repenting of
+it, although she had had far more than the requisite leisure for doing
+so. And many was the time that want had come in at her door, and the
+first thing it always did was to clip the wings of Love, and make him
+less flighty, and more tender and serviceable. So I could not even
+pretend to read her husband a lecture.
+
+"He's a curious man, Old Rogers," I said. "But as far as I can see, he's
+in the right, in the main. Isn't he now?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I daresay. I think he's always right about the rights of the
+thing, you know. But a body may go too far that way. It won't do to
+starve, sir."
+
+Strange confusion--or, ought I not rather to say?--ordinary and
+commonplace confusion of ideas!
+
+"I don't think," I said, "any one can go too far in the right way."
+
+"That's just what I want my old 'oman to see, and I can't get it into
+her, sir. If a thing's right, it's right, and if a thing's wrong, why,
+wrong it is. The helm must either be to starboard or port, sir."
+
+"But why talk of starving?" I said. "Can't Dick work? Who could think of
+starting that nonsense?"
+
+"Why, my old 'oman here. She wants 'em to give it up, and wait for
+better times. The fact is, she don't want to lose the girl."
+
+"But she hasn't got her at home now."
+
+"She can have her when she wants her, though--leastways after a bit of
+warning. Whereas, if she was married, and the consequences a follerin'
+at her heels, like a man-o'-war with her convoy, she would find she was
+chartered for another port, she would."
+
+"Well, you see, sir, Rogers and me's not so young as we once was, and
+we're likely to be growing older every day. And if there's a difficulty
+in the way of Jane's marriage, why, I take it as a Godsend."
+
+"How would you have liked such a Godsend, Mrs Rogers, when you were
+going to be married to your sailor here? What would you have done?"
+
+"Why, whatever he liked to be sure. But then, you see, Dick's not my
+Rogers."
+
+"But your daughter thinks about him much in the same way as you did
+about this dear old man here when he was young."
+
+"Young people may be in the wrong, _I_ see nothing in Dick Brownrigg."
+
+"But young people may be right sometimes, and old people may be wrong
+sometimes."
+
+"I can't be wrong about Rogers."
+
+"No, but you may be wrong about Dick."
+
+"Don't you trouble yourself about my old 'oman, sir. She allus was
+awk'ard in stays, but she never missed them yet. When she's said her
+say, round she comes in the wind like a bird, sir."
+
+"There's a good old man to stick up for your old wife! Still, I say,
+they may as well wait a bit. It would be a pity to anger the old
+gentleman."
+
+"What does the young man say to it?"
+
+"Why, he says, like a man, he can work for her as well's the mill, and
+he's ready, if she is."
+
+"I am very glad to hear such a good account of him. I shall look in,
+and have a little chat with him. I always liked the look of him. Good
+morning, Mrs. Rogers."
+
+"I 'll see you across the stream, sir," said the old man, following me
+out of the house.
+
+"You see, sir," he resumed, as soon as we were outside, "I'm always
+afeard of taking things out of the Lord's hands. It's the right way,
+surely, that when a man loves a woman, and has told her so, he should
+act like a man, and do as is right. And isn't that the Lord's way? And
+can't He give them what's good for them. Mayhap they won't love each
+other the less in the end if Dick has a little bit of the hard work
+that many a man that the Lord loved none the less has had before him. I
+wouldn't like to anger the old gentleman, as my wife says; but if I was
+Dick, I know what I would do. But don't 'e think hard of my wife,
+sir, for I believe there's a bit of pride in it. She's afeard of bein'
+supposed to catch at Richard Brownrigg, because he's above us, you know,
+sir. And I can't altogether blame her, only we ain't got to do with the
+look o' things, but with the things themselves."
+
+"I understand you quite, and I'm very much of your mind. You can trust
+me to have a little chat with him, can't you?"
+
+"That I can, sir."
+
+Here we had come to the boundary of his garden--the busy stream that
+ran away, as if it was scared at the labour it had been compelled to
+go through, and was now making the best of its speed back to its
+mother-ocean, to tell sad tales of a world where every little brook must
+do some work ere it gets back to its rest. I bade him good day, jumped
+across it, and went into the mill, where Richard was tying the mouth of
+a sack, as gloomily as the brothers of Joseph must have tied their sacks
+after his silver cup had been found.
+
+"Why did you turn away from me, as I passed half-an-hour ago, Richard?"
+I said, cheerily.
+
+"I beg your pardon, sir. I didn't think you saw me."
+
+"But supposing I hadn't?--But I won't tease you. I know all about it.
+Can I do anything for you?"
+
+"No, sir. You can't move my father. It's no use talking to him. He never
+hears a word anybody says. He never hears a word you say o' Sundays,
+sir. He won't even believe the Mark Lane Express about the price of
+corn. It's no use talking to him, sir."
+
+"You wouldn't mind if I were to try?"
+
+"No, sir. You can't make matters worse. No more can you make them any
+better, sir."
+
+"I don't say I shall talk to him; but I may try it, if I find a fitting
+opportunity."
+
+"He's always worse--more obstinate, that is, when he's in a good temper.
+So you may choose your opportunity wrong. But it's all the same. It can
+make no difference."
+
+"What are you going to do, then?"
+
+"I would let him do his worst. But Jane doesn't like to go against
+her mother. I'm sure I can't think how she should side with my father
+against both of us. He never laid her under any such obligation, I'm
+sure."
+
+"There may be more ways than one of accounting for that. You must mind,
+however, and not be too hard upon your father. You're quite right in
+holding fast to the girl; but mind that vexation does not make you
+unjust."
+
+"I wish my mother were alive. She was the only one that ever could
+manage him. How she contrived to do it nobody could think; but manage
+him she did, somehow or other. There's not a husk of use in talking to
+HIM."
+
+"I daresay he prides himself on not being moved by talk. But has he ever
+had a chance of knowing Jane--of seeing what kind of a girl she is?"
+
+"He's seen her over and over."
+
+"But seeing isn't always believing."
+
+"It certainly isn't with him."
+
+"If he could only know her! But don't you be too hard upon him. And
+don't do anything in a hurry. Give him a little time, you know. Mrs
+Rogers won't interfere between you and Jane, I am pretty sure. But don't
+push matters till we see. Good-bye."
+
+"Good-bye, and thank you kindly, sir.--Ain't I to see Jane in the
+meantime?"
+
+"If I were you, I would make no difference. See her as often as you
+used, which I suppose was as often as you could. I don't think, I say,
+that her mother will interfere. Her father is all on your side."
+
+I called on Mr Brownrigg; but, as his son had forewarned me, I could
+make nothing of him. He didn't see, when the mill was his property, and
+Dick was his son, why he shouldn't have his way with them. And he was
+going to have his way with them. His son might marry any lady in the
+land; and he wasn't going to throw himself away that way.
+
+I will not weary my readers with the conversation we had together.
+All my missiles of argument were lost as it were in a bank of mud, the
+weight and resistance of which they only increased. My experience in the
+attempt, however, did a little to reconcile me to his going to sleep in
+church; for I saw that it could make little difference whether he was
+asleep or awake. He, and not Mr. Stoddart in his organ sentry-box, was
+the only person whom it was absolutely impossible to preach to. You
+might preach AT him; but TO him?--no.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X. MY CHRISTMAS PARTY.
+
+
+As Christmas Day drew nearer and nearer, my heart glowed with the more
+gladness; and the question came more and more pressingly--Could I not
+do something to make it more really a holiday of the Church for my
+parishioners? That most of them would have a little more enjoyment on
+it than they had had all the year through, I had ground to hope; but I
+wanted to connect this gladness--in their minds, I mean, for who could
+dissever them in fact?--with its source, the love of God, that love
+manifested unto men in the birth of the Human Babe, the Son of Man.
+But I would not interfere with the Christmas Day at home. I resolved to
+invite as many of my parishioners as would come, to spend Christmas Eve
+at the Vicarage.
+
+I therefore had a notice to that purport affixed to the church door; and
+resolved to send out no personal invitations whatever, so that I might
+not give offence by accidental omission. The only person thrown into
+perplexity by this mode of proceeding was Mrs. Pearson.
+
+"How many am I to provide for, sir?" she said, with an injured air.
+
+"For as many as you ever saw in church at one time," I said. "And if
+there should be too much, why so much the better. It can go to make
+Christmas Day the merrier at some of the poorer houses."
+
+She looked discomposed, for she was not of an easy temper. But she never
+ACTED from her temper; she only LOOKED or SPOKE from it.
+
+"I shall want help," she said, at length.
+
+"As much as you like, Mrs. Pearson. I can trust you entirely."
+
+Her face brightened; and the end showed that I had not trusted her
+amiss.
+
+I was a little anxious about the result of the invitation--partly as
+indicating the amount of confidence my people placed in me. But although
+no one said a word to me about it beforehand except Old Rogers, as soon
+as the hour arrived, the people began to come. And the first I welcomed
+was Mr. Brownrigg.
+
+I had had all the rooms on the ground-floor prepared for their
+reception. Tables of provision were set out in every one of them. My
+visitors had tea or coffee, with plenty of bread and butter, when they
+arrived; and the more solid supplies were reserved for a later part of
+the evening. I soon found myself with enough to do. But before long,
+I had a very efficient staff. For after having had occasion, once or
+twice, to mention something of my plans for the evening, I found my
+labours gradually diminish, and yet everything seemed to go right; the
+fact being that good Mr Boulderstone, in one part, had cast himself
+into the middle of the flood, and stood there immovable both in face and
+person, turning its waters into the right channel, namely, towards the
+barn, which I had fitted up for their reception in a body; while in
+another quarter, namely, in the barn, Dr Duncan was doing his best, and
+that was simply something first-rate, to entertain the people till all
+should be ready. From a kind of instinct these gentlemen had taken upon
+them to be my staff, almost without knowing it, and very grateful I was.
+I found, too, that they soon gathered some of the young and more active
+spirits about them, whom they employed in various ways for the good of
+the community.
+
+When I came in and saw the goodly assemblage, for I had been busy
+receiving them in the house, I could not help rejoicing that my
+predecessor had been so fond of farming that he had rented land in the
+neighbourhood of the vicarage, and built this large barn, of which I
+could make a hall to entertain my friends. The night was frosty--the
+stars shining brilliantly overhead--so that, especially for country
+people, there was little danger in the short passage to be made to it
+from the house. But, if necessary, I resolved to have a covered-way
+built before next time. For how can a man be THE PERSON of a parish, if
+he never entertains his parishioners? And really, though it was lighted
+only with candles round the walls, and I had not been able to do much
+for the decoration of the place, I thought it looked very well, and my
+heart was glad that Christmas Eve--just as if the Babe had been coming
+again to us that same night. And is He not always coming to us afresh in
+every childlike feeling that awakes in the hearts of His people?
+
+I walked about amongst them, greeting them, and greeted everywhere
+in turn with kind smiles and hearty shakes of the hand. As often as I
+paused in my communications for a moment, it was amusing to watch Mr.
+Boulderstone's honest, though awkward endeavours to be at ease with his
+inferiors; but Dr Duncan was just a sight worth seeing. Very tall and
+very stately, he was talking now to this old man, now to that young
+woman, and every face glistened towards which he turned. There was no
+condescension about him. He was as polite and courteous to one as to
+another, and the smile that every now and then lighted up his old face,
+was genuine and sympathetic. No one could have known by his behaviour
+that he was not at court. And I thought--Surely even the contact with
+such a man will do something to refine the taste of my people. I felt
+more certain than ever that a free mingling of all classes would do more
+than anything else towards binding us all into a wise patriotic nation;
+would tend to keep down that foolish emulation which makes one class ape
+another from afar, like Ben Jonson's Fungoso, "still lighting short a
+suit;" would refine the roughness of the rude, and enable the polished
+to see with what safety his just share in public matters might be
+committed into the hands of the honest workman. If we could once
+leave it to each other to give what honour is due; knowing that honour
+demanded is as worthless as insult undeserved is hurtless! What has
+one to do to honour himself? That is and can be no honour. When one has
+learned to seek the honour that cometh from God only, he will take the
+withholding of the honour that comes from men very quietly indeed.
+
+The only thing that disappointed me was, that there was no one there to
+represent Oldcastle Hall. But how could I have everything a success at
+once!--And Catherine Weir was likewise absent.
+
+After we had spent a while in pleasant talk, and when I thought nearly
+all were with us, I got up on a chair at the end of the barn, and
+said:--
+
+"Kind friends,--I am very grateful to you for honouring my invitation as
+you have done. Permit me to hope that this meeting will be the first
+of many, and that from it may grow the yearly custom in this parish of
+gathering in love and friendship upon Christmas Eve. When God comes to
+man, man looks round for his neighbour. When man departed from God in
+the Garden of Eden, the only man in the world ceased to be the friend of
+the only woman in the world; and, instead of seeking to bear her burden,
+became her accuser to God, in whom he saw only the Judge, unable to
+perceive that the Infinite love of the Father had come to punish him in
+tenderness and grace. But when God in Jesus comes back to men, brothers
+and sisters spread forth their arms to embrace each other, and so to
+embrace Him. This is, when He is born again in our souls. For, dear
+friends, what we all need is just to become little children like Him;
+to cease to be careful about many things, and trust in Him, seeking only
+that He should rule, and that we should be made good like Him. What else
+is meant by 'Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and
+all these things shall be added unto you?' Instead of doing so, we seek
+the things God has promised to look after for us, and refuse to seek the
+thing He wants us to seek--a thing that cannot be given us, except we
+seek it. We profess to think Jesus the grandest and most glorious of
+men, and yet hardly care to be like Him; and so when we are offered
+His Spirit, that is, His very nature within us, for the asking, we will
+hardly take the trouble to ask for it. But to-night, at least, let all
+unkind thoughts, all hard judgments of one another, all selfish desires
+after our own way, be put from us, that we may welcome the Babe into our
+very bosoms; that when He comes amongst us--for is He not like a child
+still, meek and lowly of heart?--He may not be troubled to find that we
+are quarrelsome, and selfish, and unjust."
+
+I came down from the chair, and Mr Brownrigg being the nearest of my
+guests, and wide awake, for he had been standing, and had indeed been
+listening to every word according to his ability, I shook hands with
+him. And positively there was some meaning in the grasp with which he
+returned mine.
+
+I am not going to record all the proceedings of the evening; but I think
+it may be interesting to my readers to know something of how we spent
+it. First of all, we sang a hymn about the Nativity. And then I read an
+extract from a book of travels, describing the interior of an Eastern
+cottage, probably much resembling the inn in which our Lord was born,
+the stable being scarcely divided fron the rest of the house. For I felt
+that to open the inner eyes even of the brain, enabling people to SEE in
+some measure the reality of the old lovely story, to help them to have
+what the Scotch philosophers call a true CONCEPTION of the external
+conditions and circumstances of the events, might help to open the yet
+deeper spiritual eyes which alone can see the meaning and truth dwelling
+in and giving shape to the outward facts. And the extract was listened
+to with all the attention I could wish, except, at first, from some
+youngsters at the further end of the barn, who became, however,
+perfectly still as I proceeded.
+
+After this followed conversation, during which I talked a good deal to
+Jane Rogers, paying her particular attention indeed, with the hope of a
+chance of bringing old Mr Brownrigg and her together in some way.
+
+"How is your mistress, Jane?" I said.
+
+"Quite well, sir, thank you. I only wish she was here."
+
+"I wish she were. But perhaps she will come next year."
+
+"I think she will. I am almost sure she would have liked to come
+to-night; for I heard her say"----
+
+"I beg your pardon, Jane, for interrupting you; but I would rather not
+be told anything you may have happened to overhear," I said, in a low
+voice.
+
+"Oh, sir!" returned Jane, blushing a dark crimson; "it wasn't anything
+particular."
+
+"Still, if it was anything on which a wrong conjecture might be
+built"--I wanted to soften it to her--"it is better that one should not
+be told it. Thank you for your kind intention, though. And now, Jane," I
+said, "will you do me a favour?"
+
+"That I will, sir, if I can."
+
+"Sing that Christmas carol I heard you sing last night to your mother."
+
+"I didn't know any one was listening, sir."
+
+"I know you did not. I came to the door with your father, and we stood
+and listened."
+
+She looked very frightened. But I would not have asked her had I not
+known that she could sing like a bird.
+
+"I am afraid I shall make a fool of myself," she said.
+
+"We should all be willing to run that risk for the sake of others," I
+answered.
+
+"I will try then, sir."
+
+So she sang, and her clear voice soon silenced the speech all round.
+
+   "Babe Jesus lay on Mary's lap;
+      The sun shone in His hair:
+    And so it was she saw, mayhap,
+      The crown already there.
+
+   "For she sang: 'Sleep on, my little King!
+      Bad Herod dares not come;
+    Before Thee, sleeping, holy thing,
+      Wild winds would soon be dumb.
+
+   "'I kiss Thy hands, I kiss Thy feet,
+      My King, so long desired;
+    Thy hands shall never be soil'd, my sweet,
+      Thy feet shall never be tired.
+
+   "'For Thou art the King of men, my son;
+      Thy crown I see it plain;
+    And men shall worship Thee, every one,
+      And cry, Glory! Amen."
+
+   "Babe Jesus open'd His eyes so wide!
+      At Mary look'd her Lord.
+    And Mary stinted her song and sigh'd.
+      Babe Jesus said never a word."
+
+When Jane had done singing, I asked her where she had learned the carol;
+and she answered,--
+
+"My mistress gave it me. There was a picture to it of the Baby on his
+mother's knee."
+
+"I never saw it," I said. "Where did you get the tune?"
+
+"I thought it would go with a tune I knew; and I tried it, and it did.
+But I was not fit to sing to you, sir."
+
+"You must have quite a gift of song, Jane!" I said.
+
+"My father and mother can both sing."
+
+Mr Brownrigg was seated on the other side of me, and had apparently
+listened with some interest. His face was ten degrees less stupid than
+it usually was. I fancied I saw even a glimmer of some satisfaction in
+it. I turned to Old Rogers.
+
+"Sing us a song, Old Rogers," I said.
+
+"I'm no canary at that, sir; and besides, my singing days be over. I
+advise you to ask Dr. Duncan there. He CAN sing."
+
+I rose and said to the assembly:
+
+"My friends, if I did not think God was pleased to see us enjoying
+ourselves, I should have no heart for it myself. I am going to ask our
+dear friend Dr. Duncan to give us a song.--If you please, Dr. Duncan."
+
+"I am very nearly too old," said the doctor; "but I will try."
+
+His voice was certainly a little feeble; but the song was not much
+the worse for it. And a more suitable one for all the company he could
+hardly have pitched upon.
+
+   "There is a plough that has no share,
+    But a coulter that parteth keen and fair.
+    But the furrows they rise
+    To a terrible size,
+    Or ever the plough hath touch'd them there.
+    'Gainst horses and plough in wrath they shake:
+    The horses are fierce; but the plough will break.
+
+   "And the seed that is dropt in those furrows of fear,
+    Will lift to the sun neither blade nor ear.
+    Down it drops plumb,
+    Where no spring times come;
+    And here there needeth no harrowing gear:
+    Wheat nor poppy nor any leaf
+    Will cover this naked ground of grief.
+
+   "But a harvest-day will come at last
+    When the watery winter all is past;
+    The waves so gray
+    Will be shorn away
+    By the angels' sickles keen and fast;
+    And the buried harvest of the sea
+    Stored in the barns of eternity."
+
+Genuine applause followed the good doctor's song. I turned to Miss
+Boulderstone, from whom I had borrowed a piano, and asked her to play a
+country dance for us. But first I said--not getting up on a chair this
+time:--
+
+"Some people think it is not proper for a clergyman to dance. I mean to
+assert my freedom from any such law. If our Lord chose to represent,
+in His parable of the Prodigal Son, the joy in Heaven over a repentant
+sinner by the figure of 'music and dancing,' I will hearken to Him
+rather than to men, be they as good as they may."
+
+For I had long thought that the way to make indifferent things bad, was
+for good people not to do them.
+
+And so saying, I stepped up to Jane Rogers, and asked her to dance with
+me. She blushed so dreadfully that, for a moment, I was almost sorry I
+had asked her. But she put her hand in mine at once; and if she was a
+little clumsy, she yet danced very naturally, and I had the satisfaction
+of feeling that I had an honest girl near me, who I knew was friendly to
+me in her heart.
+
+But to see the faces of the people! While I had been talking, Old Rogers
+had been drinking in every word. To him it was milk and strong meat in
+one. But now his face shone with a father's gratification besides. And
+Richard's face was glowing too. Even old Brownrigg looked with a curious
+interest upon us, I thought.
+
+Meantime Dr Duncan was dancing with one of his own patients, old Mrs
+Trotter, to whose wants he ministered far more from his table than
+his surgery. I have known that man, hearing of a case of want from his
+servant, send the fowl he was about to dine upon, untouched, to those
+whose necessity was greater than his.
+
+And Mr Boulderstone had taken out old Mrs Rogers; and young Brownrigg
+had taken Mary Weir. Thomas Weir did not dance at all, but looked on
+kindly.
+
+"Why don't you dance, Old Rogers?" I said, as I placed his daughter in a
+seat beside him.
+
+"Did your honour ever see an elephant go up the futtock-shrouds?"
+
+"No. I never did."
+
+"I thought you must, sir, to ask me why I don't dance. You won't take my
+fun ill, sir? I'm an old man-o'-war's man, you know, sir."
+
+"I should have thought, Rogers, that you would have known better by this
+time, than make such an apology to ME."
+
+"God bless you, sir. An old man's safe with you--or a young lass,
+either, sir," he added, turning with a smile to his daughter.
+
+I turned, and addressed Mr Boulderstone.
+
+"I am greatly obliged to you, Mr Boulderstone, for the help you have
+given me this evening. I've seen you talking to everybody, just as if
+you had to entertain them all."
+
+"I hope I haven't taken too much upon me. But the fact is, somehow or
+other, I don't know how, I got into the spirit of it."
+
+"You got into the spirit of it because you wanted to help me, and I
+thank you heartily."
+
+"Well, I thought it wasn't a time to mind one's peas and cues exactly.
+And really it's wonderful how one gets on without them. I hate formality
+myself."
+
+The dear fellow was the most formal man I had ever met.
+
+"Why don't you dance, Mr Brownrigg?"
+
+"Who'd care to dance with me, sir? I don't care to dance with an old
+woman; and a young woman won't care to dance with me."
+
+"I'll find you a partner, if you will put yourself in my hands."
+
+"I don't mind trusting myself to you, sir."
+
+So I led him to Jane Rogers. She stood up in respectful awe before
+the master of her destiny. There were signs of calcitration in the
+churchwarden, when he perceived whither I was leading him. But when
+he saw the girl stand trembling before him, whether it was that he was
+flattered by the signs of his own power, accepting them as homage, or
+that his hard heart actually softened a little, I cannot tell, but,
+after just a perceptible hesitation, he said:
+
+"Come along, my lass, and let's have a hop together."
+
+She obeyed very sweetly.
+
+"Don't be too shy," I whispered to her as she passed me.
+
+And the churchwarden danced very heartily with the lady's-maid.
+
+I then asked him to take her into the house, and give her something
+to eat in return for her song. He yielded somewhat awkwardly, and what
+passed between them I do not know. But when they returned, she seemed
+less frightened at him than when she heard me make the proposal. And
+when the company was parting, I heard him take leave of her with the
+words--
+
+"Give us a kiss, my girl, and let bygones be bygones."
+
+Which kiss I heard with delight. For had I not been a peacemaker in
+this matter? And had I not then a right to feel blessed?--But
+the understanding was brought about simply by making the people
+meet--compelling them, as it were, to know something of each other
+really. Hitherto this girl had been a mere name, or phantom at best, to
+her lover's father; and it was easy for him to treat her as such, that
+is, as a mere fancy of his son's. The idea of her had passed through his
+mind; but with what vividness any idea, notion, or conception could be
+present to him, my readers must judge from my description of him. So
+that obstinacy was a ridiculously easy accomplishment to him. For he
+never had any notion of the matter to which he was opposed--only of that
+which he favoured. It is very easy indeed for such people to stick to
+their point.
+
+But I took care that we should have dancing in moderation. It would not
+do for people either to get weary with recreation, or excited with
+what was not worthy of producing such an effect. Indeed we had only six
+country dances during the evening. That was all. And between the dances
+I read two or three of Wordsworth's ballads to them, and they listened
+even with more interest than I had been able to hope for. The fact
+was, that the happy and free hearted mood they were in "enabled the
+judgment." I wish one knew always by what musical spell to produce the
+right mood for receiving and reflecting a matter as it really is. Every
+true poem carries this spell with it in its own music, which it sends
+out before it as a harbinger, or properly a HERBERGER, to prepare a
+harbour or lodging for it. But then it needs a quiet mood first of all,
+to let this music be listened to.
+
+For I thought with myself, if I could get them to like poetry and
+beautiful things in words, it would not only do them good, but help them
+to see what is in the Bible, and therefore to love it more. For I never
+could believe that a man who did not find God in other places as well as
+in the Bible ever found Him there at all. And I always thought, that to
+find God in other books enabled us to see clearly that he was MORE in
+the Bible than in any other book, or all other books put together.
+
+After supper we had a little more singing. And to my satisfaction
+nothing came to my eyes or ears, during the whole evening, that was
+undignified or ill-bred. Of course, I knew that many of them must have
+two behaviours, and that now they were on their good behaviour. But I
+thought the oftener such were put on their good behaviour, giving them
+the opportunity of finding out how nice it was, the better. It might
+make them ashamed of the other at last.
+
+There were many little bits of conversation I overheard, which I should
+like to give my readers; but I cannot dwell longer upon this part of my
+Annals. Especially I should have enjoyed recording one piece of talk, in
+which Old Rogers was evidently trying to move a more directly religious
+feeling in the mind of Dr Duncan. I thought I could see that THE
+difficulty with the noble old gentleman was one of expression. But after
+all the old foremast-man was a seer of the Kingdom; and the other, with
+all his refinement, and education, and goodness too, was but a child in
+it.
+
+Before we parted, I gave to each of my guests a sheet of Christmas
+Carols, gathered from the older portions of our literature. For most
+of the modern hymns are to my mind neither milk nor meat--mere wretched
+imitations. There were a few curious words and idioms in these, but I
+thought it better to leave them as they were; for they might set them
+inquiring, and give me an opportunity of interesting them further, some
+time or other, in the history of a word; for, in their ups and downs of
+fortune, words fare very much like human beings.
+
+And here is my sheet of Carols:--
+
+    AN HYMNE OF HEAVENLY LOVE.
+
+    O blessed Well of Love! O Floure of Grace!
+    O glorious Morning-Starre! O Lampe of Light!
+    Most lively image of thy Father's face,
+    Eternal King of Glorie, Lord of Might,
+    Meeke Lambe of God, before all worlds behight,
+    How can we Thee requite for all this good?
+    Or what can prize that Thy most precious blood?
+
+    Yet nought Thou ask'st in lieu of all this love,
+    But love of us, for guerdon of Thy paine:
+    Ay me! what can us lesse than that behove?
+    Had He required life of us againe,
+    Had it beene wrong to ask His owne with gaine?
+    He gave us life, He it restored lost;
+    Then life were least, that us so little cost.
+
+    But He our life hath left unto us free,
+    Free that was thrall, and blessed that was bann'd;
+    Ne ought demaunds but that we loving bee,
+    As He himselfe hath lov'd us afore-hand,
+    And bound therto with an eternall band,
+    Him first to love that us so dearely bought,
+    And next our brethren, to His image wrought.
+
+    Him first to love great right and reason is,
+    Who first to us our life and being gave,
+    And after, when we fared had amisse,
+    Us wretches from the second death did save;
+    And last, the food of life, which now we have,
+    Even He Himselfe, in His dear sacrament,
+    To feede our hungry soules, unto us lent.
+
+    Then next, to love our brethren, that were made
+    Of that selfe mould, and that self Maker's hand,
+    That we, and to the same againe shall fade,
+    Where they shall have like heritage of land,
+    However here on higher steps we stand,
+    Which also were with self-same price redeemed
+    That we, however of us light esteemed.
+
+    Then rouze thy selfe, O Earth! out of thy soyle,
+    In which thou wallowest like to filthy swyne,
+    And doest thy mynd in durty pleasures moyle,
+    Unmindfull of that dearest Lord of thyne;
+    Lift up to Him thy heavie clouded eyne,
+    That thou this soveraine bountie mayst behold,
+    And read, through love, His mercies manifold.
+
+    Beginne from first, where He encradled was
+    In simple cratch, wrapt in a wad of hay,
+    Betweene the toylfull oxe and humble asse,
+    And in what rags, and in how base array,
+    The glory of our heavenly riches lay,
+    When Him the silly shepheards came to see,
+    Whom greatest princes sought on lowest knee.
+
+    From thence reade on the storie of His life,
+    His humble carriage, His unfaulty wayes,
+    His cancred foes, His fights, His toyle, His strife,
+    His paines, His povertie, His sharpe assayes,
+    Through which He past His miserable dayes,
+    Offending none, and doing good to all,
+    Yet being malist both by great and small.
+
+    With all thy hart, with all thy soule and mind,
+    Thou must Him love, and His beheasts embrace;
+    All other loves, with which the world doth blind
+    Weake fancies, and stirre up affections base,
+    Thou must renounce and utterly displace,
+    And give thy selfe unto Him full and free,
+    That full and freely gave Himselfe to thee.
+
+    Then shall thy ravisht soul inspired bee
+    With heavenly thoughts farre above humane skil,
+    And thy bright radiant eyes shall plainly see
+    Th' idee of His pure glorie present still
+    Before thy face, that all thy spirits shall fill
+    With sweet enragement of celestial love,
+    Kindled through sight of those faire things above.
+
+    Spencer
+
+    NEW PRINCE, NEW POMP.
+
+    Behold a silly tender Babe,
+      In freezing winter night,
+    In homely manger trembling lies;
+      Alas! a piteous sight.
+
+    The inns are full, no man will yield
+      This little Pilgrim bed;
+    But forced He is with silly beasts
+      In crib to shroud His head.
+
+    Despise Him not for lying there,
+      First what He is inquire;
+    An orient pearl is often found
+      In depth of dirty mire.
+
+    Weigh not His crib, His wooden dish,
+      Nor beast that by Him feed;
+    Weigh not his mother's poor attire,
+      Nor Joseph's simple weed.
+
+    This stable is a Prince's court,
+      The crib His chair of state;
+    The beasts are parcel of His pomp,
+      The wooden dish His plate.
+
+    The persons in that poor attire
+      His royal liveries wear;
+    The Prince himself is come from heaven--
+      This pomp is praised there.
+
+    With joy approach, O Christian wight!
+      Do homage to thy King;
+    And highly praise this humble pomp
+      Which He from heaven doth bring.
+
+                             SOUTHWELL.
+
+    A DIALOGUE BETWEEN THREE SHEPHERDS.
+
+    1. Where is this blessed Babe
+         That hath made
+       All the world so full of joy
+         And expectation;
+       That glorious Boy
+         That crowns each nation
+       With a triumphant wreath of blessedness?
+
+    2. Where should He be but in the throng,
+         And among
+       His angel-ministers, that sing
+         And take wing
+       Just as may echo to His voice,
+         And rejoice,
+       When wing and tongue and all
+         May so procure their happiness?
+
+    3. But He hath other waiters now.
+         A poor cow,
+       An ox and mule stand and behold,
+         And wonder
+       That a stable should enfold
+         Him that can thunder.
+
+    Chorus. O what a gracious God have we!
+    How good! How great! Even as our misery.
+
+     Jeremy Taylor.
+
+    A SONG OF PRAISE FOR THE BIRTH OF CHRIST.
+
+    Away, dark thoughts; awake, my joy;
+      Awake, my glory; sing;
+    Sing songs to celebrate the birth
+      Of Jacob's God and King.
+    O happy night, that brought forth light,
+      Which makes the blind to see!
+    The day spring from on high came down
+      To cheer and visit thee.
+
+    The wakeful shepherds, near their flocks,
+      Were watchful for the morn;
+    But better news from heaven was brought,
+      Your Saviour Christ is born.
+    In Bethlem-town the infant lies,
+      Within a place obscure,
+    O little Bethlem, poor in walls,
+      But rich in furniture!
+
+    Since heaven is now come down to earth,
+      Hither the angels fly!
+    Hark, how the heavenly choir doth sing
+      Glory to God on High!
+    The news is spread, the church is glad,
+      SIMEON, o'ercome with joy,
+    Sings with the infant in his arms,
+      NOW LET THY SERVANT DIE.
+
+    Wise men from far beheld the star,
+      Which was their faithful guide,
+    Until it pointed forth the Babe,
+      And Him they glorified.
+    Do heaven and earth rejoice and sing--
+      Shall we our Christ deny?
+    He's born for us, and we for Him:
+      GLORY TO GOD ON HIGH.
+
+                          JOHN MASON.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI. SERMON ON GOD AND MAMMON.
+
+
+I never asked questions about the private affairs of any of my
+parishioners, except of themselves individually upon occasion of their
+asking me for advice, and some consequent necessity for knowing more
+than they told me. Hence, I believe, they became the more willing that
+I should know. But I heard a good many things from others,
+notwithstanding, for I could not be constantly closing the lips of the
+communicative as I had done those of Jane Rogers. And amongst other
+things, I learned that Miss Oldcastle went most Sundays to the
+neighbouring town of Addicehead to church. Now I had often heard of the
+ability of the rector, and although I had never met him, was prepared
+to find him a cultivated, if not an original man. Still, if I must be
+honest, which I hope I must, I confess that I heard the news with
+a pang, in analysing which I discovered the chief component to be
+jealousy. It was no use asking myself why I should be jealous: there the
+ugly thing was. So I went and told God I was ashamed, and begged Him to
+deliver me from the evil, because His was the kingdom and the power
+and the glory. And He took my part against myself, for He waits to be
+gracious. Perhaps the reader may, however, suspect a deeper cause for
+this feeling (to which I would rather not give the true name again) than
+a merely professional one.
+
+But there was one stray sheep of my flock that appeared in church for
+the first time on the morning of Christmas Day--Catherine Weir. She
+did not sit beside her father, but in the most shadowy corner of the
+church--near the organ loft, however. She could have seen her father if
+she had looked up, but she kept her eyes down the whole time, and never
+even lifted them to me. The spot on one cheek was much brighter than
+that on the other, and made her look very ill.
+
+I prayed to our God to grant me the honour of speaking a true word to
+them all; which honour I thought I was right in asking, because the Lord
+reproached the Pharisees for not seeking the honour that cometh from
+God. Perhaps I may have put a wrong interpretation on the passage. It
+is, however, a joy to think that He will not give you a stone, even if
+you should take it for a loaf, and ask for it as such. Nor is He, like
+the scribes, lying in wait to catch poor erring men in their words or
+their prayers, however mistaken they may be.
+
+I took my text from the Sermon on the Mount. And as the magazine for
+which these Annals were first written was intended chiefly for Sunday
+reading, I wrote my sermon just as if I were preaching it to my unseen
+readers as I spoke it to my present parishioners. And here it is now:
+
+The Gospel according to St Matthew, the sixth chapter, and part of the
+twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth verses:--
+
+"'YE CANNOT SERVE GOD AND MAMMON. THEREFORE I SAY TO YOU, TAKE NO
+THOUGHT FOR YOUR LIFE.'
+
+"When the Child whose birth we celebrate with glad hearts this day, grew
+up to be a man, He said this. Did He mean it?--He never said what He did
+not mean. Did He mean it wholly?--He meant it far beyond what the words
+could convey. He meant it altogether and entirely. When people do not
+understand what the Lord says, when it seems to them that His advice is
+impracticable, instead of searching deeper for a meaning which will be
+evidently true and wise, they comfort themselves by thinking He could
+not have meant it altogether, and so leave it. Or they think that if He
+did mean it, He could not expect them to carry it out. And in the fact
+that they could not do it perfectly if they were to try, they take
+refuge from the duty of trying to do it at all; or, oftener, they do not
+think about it at all as anything that in the least concerns them. The
+Son of our Father in heaven may have become a child, may have led the
+one life which belongs to every man to lead, may have suffered because
+we are sinners, may have died for our sakes, doing the will of His
+Father in heaven, and yet we have nothing to do with the words He spoke
+out of the midst of His true, perfect knowledge, feeling, and action! Is
+it not strange that it should be so? Let it not be so with us this day.
+Let us seek to find out what our Lord means, that we may do it; trying
+and failing and trying again--verily to be victorious at last--what
+matter WHEN, so long as we are trying, and so coming nearer to our end!
+
+"MAMMON, you know, means RICHES. Now, riches are meant to be the
+slave--not even the servant of man, and not to be the master. If a man
+serve his own servant, or, in a word, any one who has no just claim to
+be his master, he is a slave. But here he serves his own slave. On the
+other hand, to serve God, the source of our being, our own glorious
+Father, is freedom; in fact, is the only way to get rid of all bondage.
+So you see plainly enough that a man cannot serve God and Mammon. For
+how can a slave of his own slave be the servant of the God of freedom,
+of Him who can have no one to serve Him but a free man? His service
+is freedom. Do not, I pray you, make any confusion between service and
+slavery. To serve is the highest, noblest calling in creation. For even
+the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, yea,
+with Himself.
+
+"But how can a man SERVE riches? Why, when he says to riches, 'Ye are my
+good.' When he feels he cannot be happy without them. When he puts forth
+the energies of his nature to get them. When he schemes and dreams and
+lies awake about them. When he will not give to his neighbour for fear
+of becoming poor himself. When he wants to have more, and to know he has
+more, than he can need. When he wants to leave money behind him, not for
+the sake of his children or relatives, but for the name of the wealth.
+When he leaves his money, not to those who NEED it, even of his
+relations, but to those who are rich like himself, making them yet more
+of slaves to the overgrown monster they worship for his size. When he
+honours those who have money because they have money, irrespective of
+their character; or when he honours in a rich man what he would not
+honour in a poor man. Then is he the slave of Mammon. Still more is
+he Mammon's slave when his devotion to his god makes him oppressive to
+those over whom his wealth gives him power; or when he becomes unjust
+in order to add to his stores.--How will it be with such a man when on
+a sudden he finds that the world has vanished, and he is alone with God?
+There lies the body in which he used to live, whose poor necessities
+first made money of value to him, but with which itself and its
+fictitious value are both left behind. He cannot now even try to bribe
+God with a cheque. The angels will not bow down to him because his
+property, as set forth in his will, takes five or six figures to express
+its amount It makes no difference to them that he has lost it, though;
+for they never respected him. And the poor souls of Hades, who envied
+him the wealth they had lost before, rise up as one man to welcome
+him, not for love of him--no worshipper of Mammon loves another--but
+rejoicing in the mischief that has befallen him, and saying, 'Art thou
+also become one of us?' And Lazarus in Abraham's bosom, however sorry
+he may be for him, however grateful he may feel to him for the broken
+victuals and the penny, cannot with one drop of the water of Paradise
+cool that man's parched tongue.
+
+"Alas, poor Dives! poor server of Mammon, whose vile god can pretend to
+deliver him no longer! Or rather, for the blockish god never pretended
+anything--it was the man's own doing--Alas for the Mammon-worshipper! he
+can no longer deceive himself in his riches. And so even in hell he is
+something nobler than he was on earth; for he worships his riches no
+longer. He cannot. He curses them.
+
+"Terrible things to say on Christmas Day! But if Christmas Day teaches
+us anything, it teaches us to worship God and not Mammon; to worship
+spirit and not matter; to worship love and not power.
+
+"Do I now hear any of my friends saying in their hearts: Let the rich
+take that! It does not apply to us. We are poor enough? Ah, my friends,
+I have known a light-hearted, liberal rich man lose his riches, and be
+liberal and light-hearted still. I knew a rich lady once, in giving a
+large gift of money to a poor man, say apologetically, 'I hope it is no
+disgrace in me to be rich, as it is none in you to be poor.' It is not
+the being rich that is wrong, but the serving of riches, instead of
+making them serve your neighbour and yourself--your neighbour for this
+life, yourself for the everlasting habitations. God knows it is hard for
+the rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven; but the rich man does
+sometimes enter in; for God hath made it possible. And the greater the
+victory, when it is the rich man that overcometh the world. It is easier
+for the poor man to enter into the kingdom, yet many of the poor have
+failed to enter in, and the greater is the disgrace of their defeat. For
+the poor have more done for them, as far as outward things go, in the
+way of salvation than the rich, and have a beatitude all to themselves
+besides. For in the making of this world as a school of salvation, the
+poor, as the necessary majority, have been more regarded than the rich.
+Do not think, my poor friend, that God will let you off. He lets nobody
+off. You, too, must pay the uttermost farthing. He loves you too well
+to let you serve Mammon a whit more than your rich neighbour. 'Serve
+Mammon!' do you say? 'How can I serve Mammon? I have no Mammon to
+serve.'--Would you like to have riches a moment sooner than God gives
+them? Would you serve Mammon if you had him?--'Who can tell?' do
+you answer? 'Leave those questions till I am tried.' But is there no
+bitterness in the tone of that response? Does it not mean, 'It will be
+a long time before I have a chance of trying THAT?'--But I am not
+driven to such questions for the chance of convicting some of you of
+Mammon-worship. Let us look to the text. Read it again.
+
+"'YE CANNOT SERVE GOD AND MAMMON. THEREFORE I SAY UNTO YOU, TAKE NO
+THOUGHT FOR YOUR LIFE.'
+
+"Why are you to take no thought? Because you cannot serve God and
+Mammon. Is taking thought, then, a serving of Mammon? Clearly.--Where
+are you now, poor man? Brooding over the frost? Will it harden the
+ground, so that the God of the sparrows cannot find food for His sons?
+Where are you now, poor woman? Sleepless over the empty cupboard and
+to-morrow's dinner? 'It is because we have no bread?' do you answer?
+Have you forgotten the five loaves among the five thousand, and the
+fragments that were left? Or do you know nothing of your Father in
+heaven, who clothes the lilies and feeds the birds? O ye of little
+faith? O ye poor-spirited Mammon-worshippers! who worship him not even
+because he has given you anything, but in the hope that he may some
+future day benignantly regard you. But I may be too hard upon you. I
+know well that our Father sees a great difference between the man who is
+anxious about his children's dinner, or even about his own, and the man
+who is only anxious to add another ten thousand to his much goods laid
+up for many years. But you ought to find it easy to trust in God for
+such a matter as your daily bread, whereas no man can by any possibility
+trust in God for ten thousand pounds. The former need is a God-ordained
+necessity; the latter desire a man-devised appetite at best--possibly
+swinish greed. Tell me, do you long to be rich? Then you worship Mammon.
+Tell me, do you think you would feel safer if you had money in the bank?
+Then you are Mammon-worshippers; for you would trust the barn of
+the rich man rather than the God who makes the corn to grow. Do you
+say--'What shall we eat? and what shall we drink? and wherewithal
+shall we be clothedl?' Are ye thus of doubtful mind?--Then you are
+Mammon-worshippers. "But how is the work of the world to be done if we
+take no thought?--We are nowhere told not to take thought. We MUST take
+thought. The question is--What are we to take or not to take thought
+about? By some who do not know God, little work would be done if they
+were not driven by anxiety of some kind. But you, friends, are you
+content to go with the nations of the earth, or do you seek a better
+way--THE way that the Father of nations would have you walk in?
+
+"WHAT then are we to take thought about? Why, about our work. What
+are we not to take thought about? Why, about our life. The one is our
+business: the other is God's. But you turn it the other way. You take
+no thought of earnestness about the doing of your duty; but you take
+thought of care lest God should not fulfil His part in the goings on
+of the world. A man's business is just to do his duty: God takes upon
+Himself the feeding and the clothing. Will the work of the world be
+neglected if a man thinks of his work, his duty, God's will to be done,
+instead of what he is to eat, what he is to drink, and wherewithal he
+is to be clothed? And remember all the needs of the world come back to
+these three. You will allow, I think, that the work of the world will
+be only so much the better done; that the very means of procuring the
+raiment or the food will be the more thoroughly used. What, then, is the
+only region on which the doubt can settle? Why, God. He alone remains to
+be doubted. Shall it be so with you? Shall the Son of man, the baby now
+born, and for ever with us, find no faith in you? Ah, my poor friend,
+who canst not trust in God--I was going to say you DESERVE--but what do
+I know of you to condemn and judge you?--I was going to say, you deserve
+to be treated like the child who frets and complains because his mother
+holds him on her knee and feeds him mouthful by mouthful with her own
+loving hand. I meant--you deserve to have your own way for a while; to
+be set down, and told to help yourself, and see what it will come to; to
+have your mother open the cupboard door for you, and leave you alone to
+your pleasures. Alas! poor child! When the sweets begin to pall, and the
+twilight begins to come duskily into the chamber, and you look about all
+at once and see no mother, how will your cupboard comfort you then? Ask
+it for a smile, for a stroke of the gentle hand, for a word of love. All
+the full-fed Mammon can give you is what your mother would have given
+you without the consequent loathing, with the light of her countenance
+upon it all, and the arm of her love around you.--And this is what God
+does sometimes, I think, with the Mammon-worshippers amongst the
+poor. He says to them, Take your Mammon, and see what he is worth. Ah,
+friends, the children of God can never be happy serving other than Him.
+The prodigal might fill his belly with riotous living or with the husks
+that the swine ate. It was all one, so long as he was not with his
+father. His soul was wretched. So would you be if you had wealth, for I
+fear you would only be worse Mammon-worshippers than now, and might well
+have to thank God for the misery of any swine-trough that could bring
+you to your senses.
+
+"But we do see people die of starvation sometimes,--Yes. But if you
+did your work in God's name, and left the rest to Him, that would not
+trouble you. You would say, If it be God's will that I should starve,
+I can starve as well as another. And your mind would be at ease. "Thou
+wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed upon Thee, because
+he trusteth in Thee." Of that I am sure. It may be good for you to go
+hungry and bare-foot; but it must be utter death to have no faith in
+God. It is not, however, in God's way of things that the man who does
+his work shall not live by it. We do not know why here and there a man
+may be left to die of hunger, but I do believe that they who wait upon
+the Lord shall not lack any good. What it may be good to deprive a
+man of till he knows and acknowledges whence it comes, it may be still
+better to give him when he has learned that every good and every perfect
+gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights.
+
+"I SHOULD like to know a man who just minded his duty and troubled
+himself about nothing; who did his own work and did not interfere with
+God's. How nobly he would work--working not for reward, but because it
+was the will of God! How happily he would receive his food and clothing,
+receiving them as the gifts of God! What peace would be his! What a
+sober gaiety! How hearty and infectious his laughter! What a friend
+he would be! How sweet his sympathy! And his mind would be so clear he
+would understand everything His eye being single, his whole body would
+be full of light. No fear of his ever doing a mean thing. He would
+die in a ditch, rather. It is this fear of want that makes men do mean
+things. They are afraid to part with their precious lord--Mammon. He
+gives no safety against such a fear. One of the richest men in England
+is haunted with the dread of the workhouse. This man whom I should like
+to know, would be sure that God would have him liberal, and he would be
+what God would have him. Riches are not in the least necessary to that.
+Witness our Lord's admiration of the poor widow with her great farthing.
+
+"But I think I hear my troubled friend who does not love money, and yet
+cannot trust in God out and out, though she fain would,--I think I hear
+her say, "I believe I could trust Him for myself, or at least I should
+be ready to dare the worst for His sake; but my children--it is the
+thought of my children that is too much for me." Ah, woman! she whom the
+Saviour praised so pleasedly, was one who trusted Him for her daughter.
+What an honour she had! "Be it unto thee even as thou wilt." Do you
+think you love your children better than He who made them? Is not your
+love what it is because He put it into your heart first? Have not you
+often been cross with them? Sometimes unjust to them? Whence came the
+returning love that rose from unknown depths in your being, and swept
+away the anger and the injustice! You did not create that love. Probably
+you were not good enough to send for it by prayer. But it came. God sent
+it. He makes you love your children; be sorry when you have been cross
+with them; ashamed when you have been unjust to them; and yet you won't
+trust Him to give them food and clothes! Depend upon it, if He ever
+refuses to give them food and clothes, and you knew all about it, the
+why and the wherefore, you would not dare to give them food or clothes
+either. He loves them a thousand times better than you do--be sure of
+that--and feels for their sufferings too, when He cannot give them just
+what He would like to give them--cannot for their good, I mean.
+
+"But as your mistrust will go further, I can go further to meet it. You
+will say, 'Ah! yes'--in your feeling, I mean, not in words,--you will
+say, 'Ah! yes--food and clothing of a sort! Enough to keep life in and
+too much cold out! But I want my children to have plenty of GOOD food,
+and NICE clothes.'
+
+"Faithless mother! Consider the birds of the air. They have so much
+that at least they can sing! Consider the lilies--they were red lilies,
+those. Would you not trust Him who delights in glorious colours--more
+at least than you, or He would never have created them and made us to
+delight in them? I do not say that your children shall be clothed in
+scarlet and fine linen; but if not, it is not because God despises
+scarlet and fine linen or does not love your children. He loves them,
+I say, too much to give them everything all at once. But He would make
+them such that they may have everything without being the worse, and
+with being the better for it. And if you cannot trust Him yet, it begins
+to be a shame, I think.
+
+"It has been well said that no man ever sank under the burden of the
+day. It is when to-morrow's burden is added to the burden of to-day,
+that the weight is more than a man can bear. Never load yourselves so,
+my friends. If you find yourselves so loaded, at least remember this:
+it is your own doing, not God's. He begs you to leave the future to Him,
+and mind the present. What more or what else could He do to take the
+burden off you? Nothing else would do it. Money in the bank wouldn't
+do it. He cannot do to-morrow's business for you beforehand to save you
+from fear about it. That would derange everything. What else is there
+but to tell you to trust in Him, irrespective of the fact that nothing
+else but such trust can put our heart at peace, from the very nature of
+our relation to Him as well as the fact that we need these things.
+We think that we come nearer to God than the lower animals do by our
+foresight. But there is another side to it. We are like to Him with whom
+there is no past or future, with whom a day is as a thousand years, and
+a thousand years as one day, when we live with large bright spiritual
+eyes, doing our work in the great present, leaving both past and future
+to Him to whom they are ever present, and fearing nothing, because He
+is in our future, as much as He is in our past, as much as, and far more
+than, we can feel Him to be in our present. Partakers thus of the divine
+nature, resting in that perfect All-in-all in whom our nature is eternal
+too, we walk without fear, full of hope and courage and strength to do
+His will, waiting for the endless good which He is always giving as fast
+as He can get us able to take it in. Would not this be to be more of
+gods than Satan promised to Eve? To live carelessly-divine, duty-doing,
+fearless, loving, self-forgetting lives--is not that more than to know
+both good and evil--lives in which the good, like Aaron's rod, has
+swallowed up the evil, and turned it into good? For pain and hunger are
+evils, but if faith in God swallows them up, do they not so turn into
+good? I say they do. And I am glad to believe that I am not alone in my
+parish in this conviction. I have never been too hungry, but I have
+had trouble which I would gladly have exchanged for hunger and cold and
+weariness. Some of you have known hunger and cold and weariness. Do
+you not join with me to say: It is well, and better than well--whatever
+helps us to know the love of Him who is our God?
+
+"But there HAS BEEN just one man who has acted thus. And it is His
+Spirit in our hearts that makes us desire to know or to be another
+such--who would do the will of God for God, and let God do God's will
+for Him. For His will is all. And this man is the baby whose birth we
+celebrate this day. Was this a condition to choose--that of a baby--by
+one who thought it part of a man's high calling to take care of the
+morrow? Did He not thus cast the whole matter at once upor the hands and
+heart of His Father? Sufficient unto the baby's day is the need thereof;
+he toils not, neither does he spin, and yet he if fed and clothed, and
+loved, and rejoiced in. Do you remind me that sometimes even his mother
+forgets him--a mother, most likely, to whose self-indulgence or weakness
+the child owes his birth as hers? Ah! but he is not therefore forgotten,
+however like things it may look to our half-seeing eyes, by his Father
+in heaven. One of the highest benefits we can reap from understanding
+the way of God with ourselves is, that we become able thus to trust Him
+for others with whom we do not understand His ways.
+
+"But let us look at what will be more easily shown--how, namely, He
+did the will of His Father, and took no thought for the morrow after He
+became a man. Remember how He forsook His trade when the time came
+for Him to preach. Preaching was not a profession then. There were no
+monasteries, or vicarages, or stipends, then. Yet witness for the Father
+the garment woven throughout; the ministering of women; the purse in
+common! Hard-working men and rich ladies were ready to help Him, and did
+help Him with all that He needed.--Did He then never want? Yes; once at
+least--for a little while only.
+
+"He was a-hungered in the wilderness. 'Make bread,' said Satan. 'No,'
+said our Lord.--He could starve; but He could not eat bread that His
+Father did not give Him, even though He could make it Himself. He had
+come hither to be tried. But when the victory was secure, lo! the angels
+brought Him food from His Father.--Which was better? To feed Himself, or
+be fed by His Father? Judg? yourselves, jinxious people, He sought the
+kingdom of God and His righteousness, and the bread was added unto Him.
+
+"And this gives me occasion to remark that the same truth holds with
+regard to any portion of the future as well as the morrow. It is a
+principle, not a command, or an encouragement, or a promise merely. In
+respect of it there is no difference between next day and next year,
+next hour and next century. You will see at once the absurdity of taking
+no thought for the morrow, and taking thought for next year. But do you
+see likewise that it is equally reasonable to trust God for the next
+moment, and equally unreasonable not to trust Him? The Lord was hungry
+and needed food now, though He could still go without for a while. He
+left it to His Father. And so He told His disciples to do when they were
+called to answer before judges and rulers. 'Take no thought. It shall
+be given you what ye shall say.' You have a disagreeable duty to do at
+twelve o'clock. Do not blacken nine and ten and eleven, and all between,
+with the colour of twelve. Do the work of each, and reap your reward in
+peace. So when the dreaded moment in the future becomes the present,
+you shall meet it walking in the light, and that light will overcome its
+darkness. How often do men who have made up their minds what to say and
+do under certain expected circumstances, forget the words and reverse
+the actions! The best preparation is the present well seen to, the last
+duty done. For this will keep the eye so clear and the body so full of
+light that the right action will be perceived at once, the right words
+will rush from the heart to the lips, and the man, full of the Spirit
+of God because he cares for nothing but the will of God, will trample on
+the evil thing in love, and be sent, it may be, in a chariot of fire to
+the presence of his Father, or stand unmoved amid the cruel mockings of
+the men he loves.
+
+"Do you feel inclined to say in your hearts: 'It was easy for Him to
+take no thought, for He had the matter in His own hands?' But observe,
+there is nothing very noble in a man's taking no thought except it be
+from faith. If there were no God to take thought for us, we should have
+no right to blame any one for taking thought. You may fancy the Lord had
+His own power to fall back upon. But that would have been to Him just
+the one dreadful thing. That His Father should forget Him!--no power in
+Himself could make up for that. He feared nothing for Himself; and never
+once employed His divine power to save Him from His human fate. Let God
+do that for Him if He saw fit. He did not come into the world to take
+care of Himself. That would not be in any way divine. To fall back on
+Himself, God failing Him--how could that make it easy for Him to avoid
+care? The very idea would be torture. That would be to declare heaven
+void, and the world without a God. He would not even pray to His Father
+for what He knew He should have if He did ask it. He would just wait His
+will.
+
+"But see how the fact of His own power adds tenfold significance to the
+fact that He trusted in God. We see that this power would not serve His
+need--His need not being to be fed and clothed, but to be one with the
+Father, to be fed by His hand, clothed by His care. This was what the
+Lord wanted--and we need, alas! too often without wanting it. He never
+once, I repeat, used His power for Himself. That was not his business.
+He did not care about it. His life was of no value to Him but as His
+Father cared for it. God would mind all that was necessary for Him, and
+He would mind the work His Father had given Him to do. And, my friends,
+this is just the one secret of a blessed life, the one thing every man
+comes into this world to learn. With what authority it comes to us from
+the lips of Him who knew all about it, and ever did as He said!
+
+"Now you see that He took no thought for the morrow. And, in the name of
+the holy child Jesus, I call upon you, this Christmas day, to cast care
+to the winds, and trust in God; to receive the message of peace and
+good-will to men; to yield yourselves to the Spirit of God, that you
+may be taught what He wants you to know; to remember that the one
+gift promised without reserve to those who ask it--the one gift worth
+having--the gift which makes all other gifts a thousand-fold in value,
+is the gift of the Holy Spirit, the spirit of the child Jesus, who will
+take of the things of Jesus, and show them to you--make you understand
+them, that is--so that you shall see them to be true, and love Him with
+all your heart and soul, and your neighbour as yourselves."
+
+And here, having finished my sermon, I will give my reader some lines
+with which he may not be acquainted, from a writer of the Elizabethan
+time. I had meant to introduce them into my sermon, but I was so
+carried away with my subject that I forgot them. For I always preached
+extempore, which phrase I beg my reader will not misinterpret as meaning
+ON THE SPUR OF THE MOMENT, OF WITHOUT THE DUE PREPARATION OF MUCH
+THOUGHT.
+
+   "O man! thou image of thy Maker's good,
+    What canst thou fear, when breathed into thy blood
+    His Spirit is that built thee? What dull sense
+    Makes thee suspect, in need, that Providence
+    Who made the morning, and who placed the light
+    Guide to thy labours; who called up the night,
+    And bid her fall upon thee like sweet showers,
+    In hollow murmurs, to lock up thy powers;
+    Who gave thee knowledge; who so trusted thee
+    To let thee grow so near Himself, the Tree?
+    Must He then be distrusted? Shall His frame
+    Discourse with Him why thus and thus I am?
+    He made the Angels thine, thy fellows all;
+    Nay even thy servants, when devotions call.
+    Oh! canst thou be so stupid then, so dim,
+    To seek a saving* influence, and lose Him?
+    Can stars protect thee? Or can poverty,
+    Which is the light to heaven, put out His eye!
+    He is my star; in Him all truth I find,
+    All influence, all fate. And when my mind
+    Is furnished with His fulness, my poor story
+    Shall outlive all their age, and all their glory.
+    The hand of danger cannot fall amiss,
+    When I know what, and in whose power, it is,
+    Nor want, the curse of man, shall make me groan:
+    A holy hermit is a mind alone.
+
+    * * * *
+
+    Affliction, when I know it, is but this,
+    A deep alloy whereby man tougher is
+    To bear the hammer; and the deeper still,
+    We still arise more image of His will;
+    Sickness, an humorous cloud 'twixt us and light;
+    And death, at longest, but another night."
+
+[Footnote *: Many, in those days, believed in astrology.]
+
+I had more than ordinary attention during my discourse, at one point in
+which I saw the down-bent head of Catherine Weir sink yet lower upon her
+hands. After a moment, however, she sat more erect than before, though
+she never lifted her eyes to meet mine. I need not assure my reader that
+she was not present to my mind when I spoke the words that so far had
+moved her. Indeed, had I thought of her, I could not have spoken them.
+
+As I came out of the church, my people crowded about me with
+outstretched hands and good wishes. One woman, the aged wife of a more
+aged labourer, who could not get near me, called from the outskirts of
+the little crowd--
+
+"May the Lord come and see ye every day, sir. And may ye never know the
+hunger and cold as me and Tomkins has come through."
+
+"Amen to the first of your blessing, Mrs Tomkins, and hearty thanks to
+you. But I daren't say AMEN to the other part of it, after what I've
+been preaching, you know."
+
+"But there'll be no harm if I say it for ye, sir?"
+
+"No, for God will give me what is good, even if your kind heart should
+pray against it."
+
+"Ah, sir, ye don't know what it is to be hungry AND cold."
+
+"Neither shall you any more, if I can help it."
+
+"God bless ye, sir. But we're pretty tidy just in the meantime."
+
+I walked home, as usual on Sunday mornings, by the road. It was a lovely
+day. The sun shone so warm that you could not help thinking of what he
+would be able to do before long--draw primroses and buttercups out of
+the earth by force of sweet persuasive influences. But in the shadows
+lay fine webs and laces of ice, so delicately lovely that one could not
+but be glad of the cold that made the water able to please itself by
+taking such graceful forms. And I wondered over again for the hundredth
+time what could be the principle which, in the wildest, most lawless,
+fantastically chaotic, apparently capricious work of nature, always kept
+it beautiful. The beauty of holiness must be at the heart of it
+somehow, I thought. Because our God is so free from stain, so loving,
+so unselfish, so good, so altogether what He wants us to be, so holy,
+therefore all His works declare Him in beauty; His fingers can touch
+nothing but to mould it into loveliness; and even the play of His
+elements is in grace and tenderness of form.
+
+And then I thought how the sun, at the farthest point from us, had begun
+to come back towards us; looked upon us with a hopeful smile; was like
+the Lord when He visited His people as a little one of themselves, to
+grow upon the earth till it should blossom as the rose in the light
+of His presence. "Ah! Lord," I said, in my heart, "draw near unto Thy
+people. It is spring-time with Thy world, but yet we have cold winds
+and bitter hail, and pinched voices forbidding them that follow Thee
+and follow not with us. Draw nearer, Sun of Righteousness, and make the
+trees bourgeon, and the flowers blossom, and the voices grow mellow and
+glad, so that all shall join in praising Thee, and find thereby that
+harmony is better than unison. Let it be summer, O Lord, if it ever may
+be summer in this court of the Gentiles. But Thou hast told us that Thy
+kingdom cometh within us, and so Thy joy must come within us too.
+Draw nigh then, Lord, to those to whom Thou wilt draw nigh; and others
+beholding their welfare will seek to share therein too, and seeing their
+good works will glorify their Father in heaven."
+
+So I walked home, hoping in my Saviour, and wondering to think how
+pleasant I had found it to be His poor servant to this people. Already
+the doubts which had filled my mind on that first evening of gloom,
+doubts as to whether I had any right to the priest's office, had utterly
+vanished, slain by the effort to perform the priest's duty. I never
+thought about the matter now.--And how can doubt ever be fully met but
+by action? Try your theory; try your hypothesis; or if it is not worth
+trying, give it up, pull it down. And I hoped that if ever a cloud
+should come over me again, however dark and dismal it might be, I might
+be able, notwithstanding, to rejoice that the sun was shining on others
+though not on me, and to say with all my heart to my Father in heaven,
+"Thy will be done."
+
+When I reached my own study, I sat down by a blazing fire, and poured
+myself out a glass of wine; for I had to go out again to see some of my
+poor friends, and wanted some luncheon first.--It is a great thing to
+have the greetings of the universe presented in fire and food. Let me,
+if I may, be ever welcomed to my room in winter by a glowing hearth, in
+summer by a vase of flowers; if I may not, let me then think how nice
+they would be, and bury myself in my work. I do not think that the
+road to contentment lies in despising what we have not got. Let us
+acknowledge all good, all delight that the world holds, and be content
+without it. But this we can never be except by possessing the one thing,
+without which I do not merely say no man ought to be content, but no man
+CAN be content--the Spirit of the Father.
+
+If any young people read my little chronicle, will they not be inclined
+to say, "The vicar has already given us in this chapter hardly anything
+but a long sermon; and it is too bad of him to go on preaching in his
+study after we saw him safe out of the pulpit"? Ah, well! just one
+word, and I drop the preaching for a while. My word is this: I may speak
+long-windedly, and even inconsiderately as regards my young readers;
+what I say may fail utterly to convey what I mean; I may be actually
+stupid sometimes, and not have a suspicion of it; but what I mean is
+true; and if you do not know it to be true yet, some of you at least
+suspect it to be true, and some of you hope it is true; and when you
+all see it as I mean it and as you can take it, you will rejoice with
+a gladness you know nothing about now There, I have done for a little
+while. I won't pledge myself for more, I assure you. For to speak about
+such things is the greatest delight of my age, as it was of my early
+manhood, next to that of loving God and my neighbour. For as these are
+THE two commandments of life, so they are in themselves THE pleasures
+of life. But there I am at it again. I beg your pardon now, for I have
+already inadvertently broken my promise.
+
+I had allowed myself a half-hour before the fire with my glass of wine
+and piece of bread, and I soon fell into a dreamy state called REVERIE,
+which I fear not a few mistake for THINKING, because it is the nearest
+approach they ever make to it. And in this reverie I kept staring about
+my book-shelves. I am an old man now, and you do not know my name; and
+if you should ever find it out, I shall very soon hide it under
+some daisies, I hope, and so escape; and therefore, I am going to be
+egotistic in the most unpardonable manner. I am going to tell you one of
+my faults, for it continues, I fear, to be one of my faults still, as it
+certainly was at the period of which I am now writing. I am very fond
+of books. Do not mistake me. I do not mean that I love reading. I hope
+I do. That is no fault--a virtue rather than a fault. But, as the old
+meaning of the word FOND was FOOLISH, I use that word: I am foolishly
+fond of the bodies of books as distinguished from their souls, or
+thought-element. I do not say I love their bodies as DIVIDED from their
+souls; I do not say I should let a book stand upon my shelves for which
+I felt no respect, except indeed it happened to be useful to me in some
+inferior way. But I delight in seeing books about me, books even of
+which there seems to be no prospect that I shall have time to read a
+single chapter before I lay this old head down for the last time. Nay,
+more: I confess that if they are nicely bound, so as to glow and shine
+in such a fire-light as that by which I was then sitting, I like them
+ever so much the better. Nay, more yet--and this comes very near to
+showing myself worse than I thought I was when I began to tell you my
+fault: there are books upon my shelves which certainly at least would
+not occupy the place of honour they do occupy, had not some previous
+owner dressed them far beyond their worth, making modern apples of Sodom
+of them. Yet there I let them stay, because they are pleasant to the
+eye, although certainly not things to be desired to make one wise. I
+could say a great deal more about the matter, pro and con, but it would
+be worse than a sermon, I fear. For I suspect that by the time books,
+which ought to be loved for the truth that is in them, of one sort or
+another, come to be loved as articles of furniture, the mind has gone
+through a process more than analogous to that which the miser's mind
+goes through--namely, that of passing from the respect of money because
+of what it can do, to the love of money because it is money. I have
+not yet reached the furniture stage, and I do not think I ever shall.
+I would rather burn them all. Meantime, I think one safeguard is to
+encourage one's friends to borrow one's books--not to offer individual
+books, which is much the same as OFFERING advice. That will probably
+take some of the shine off them, and put a few thumb-marks in them,
+which both are very wholesome towards the arresting of the furniture
+declension. For my part, thumb-marks I find very obnoxious--far more so
+than the spoiling of the binding.--I know that some of my readers, who
+have had sad experience of the sort, will be saying in themselves, "He
+might have mentioned a surer antidote resulting from this measure,
+than either rubbed Russia or dirty GLOVE-marks even--that of utter
+disappearance and irreparable loss." But no; that has seldom happened to
+me--because I trust my pocketbook, and never my memory, with the names
+of those to whom the individual books are committed.--There, then, is a
+little bit of practical advice in both directions for young book-lovers.
+
+Again I am reminded that I am getting old. What digressions!
+
+Gazing about on my treasures, the thought suddenly struck me that I had
+never done as I had promised Judy; had never found out what her aunt's
+name meant in Anglo-Saxon. I would do so now. I got down my dictionary,
+and soon discovered that Ethelwyn meant Home-joy, or Inheritance.
+
+"A lovely meaning," I said to myself.
+
+And then I went off into another reverie, with the composition of which
+I shall not trouble my reader; and with the mention of which I had,
+perhaps, no right to occupy the fragment of his time spent in reading
+it, seeing I did not intend to tell him how it was made up. I will tell
+him something else instead.
+
+Several families had asked me to take my Christmas dinner with them;
+but, not liking to be thus limited, I had answered each that I would
+not, if they would excuse me, but would look in some time or other in
+the course of the evening.
+
+When my half-hour was out, I got up and filled my pockets with little
+presents for my poor people, and set out to find them in their own
+homes.
+
+I was variously received, but unvaryingly with kindness; and my little
+presents were accepted, at least in most instances, with a gratitude
+which made me ashamed of them and of myself too for a few moments. Mrs.
+Tomkins looked as if she had never seen so much tea together before,
+though there was only a couple of pounds of it; and her husband received
+a pair of warm trousers none the less cordially that they were not
+quite new, the fact being that I found I did not myself need such warm
+clothing this winter as I had needed the last. I did not dare to
+offer Catherine Weir anything, but I gave her little boy a box of
+water-colours--in remembrance of the first time I saw him, though I said
+nothing about that. His mother did not thank me. She told little Gerard
+to do so, however, and that was something. And, indeed, the boy's
+sweetness would have been enough for both.
+
+Gerard--an unusual name in England; specially not to be looked for in
+the class to which she belonged.
+
+When I reached Old Rogers's cottage, whither I carried a few yards of
+ribbon, bought by myself, I assure my lady friends, with the special
+object that the colour should be bright enough for her taste, and pure
+enough of its kind for mine, as an offering to the good dame, and a
+small hymn-book, in which were some hymns of my own making, for the good
+man--
+
+But do forgive me, friends, for actually describing my paltry presents.
+I can dare to assure you it comes from a talking old man's love of
+detail, and from no admiration of such small givings as those. You see
+I trust you, and I want to stand well with you. I never could be
+indifferent to what people thought of me; though I have had to fight
+hard to act as freely as if I were indifferent, especially when upon
+occasion I found myself approved of. It is more difficult to walk
+straight then, than when men are all against you.--As I have already
+broken a sentence, which will not be past setting for a while yet, I may
+as well go on to say here, lest any one should remark that a clergyman
+ought not to show off his virtues, nor yet teach his people bad habits
+by making them look out for presents--that my income not only seemed to
+me disproportioned to the amount of labour necessary in the parish,
+but certainly was larger than I required to spend upon myself; and the
+miserly passion for books I contrived to keep a good deal in check; for
+I had no fancy for gliding devil-wards for the sake of a few books after
+all. So there was no great virtue--was there?--in easing my heart by
+giving a few of the good things people give their children to my poor
+friends, whose kind reception of them gave me as much pleasure as the
+gifts gave them. They valued the kindness in the gift, and to look out
+for kindness will not make people greedy.
+
+When I reached the cottage, I found not merely Jane there with her
+father and mother, which was natural on Christmas Day, seeing there
+seemed to be no company at the Hall, but my little Judy as well, sitting
+in the old woman's arm-chair, (not that she Used it much, but it was
+called hers,) and looking as much at home as--as she did in the pond.
+
+"Why, Judy!" I exclaimed, "you here?"
+
+"Yes. Why not, Mr Walton?" she returned, holding out her hand without
+rising, for the chair was such a large one, and she was set so far back
+in it that the easier way was not to rise, which, seeing she was not
+greatly overburdened with reverence, was not, I presume, a cause of much
+annoyance to the little damsel.
+
+"I know no reason why I shouldn't see a Sandwich Islander here. Yet I
+might express surprise if I did find one, might I not?"
+
+Judy pretended to pout, and muttered something about comparing her to a
+cannibal. But Jane took up the explanation.
+
+"Mistress had to go off to London with her mother to-day, sir, quite
+unexpected, on some banking business, I fancy, from what I--I beg your
+pardon, sir. They're gone anyhow, whatever the reason may be; and so I
+came to see my father and mother, and Miss Judy would come with me."
+
+"She's very welcome," said Mrs Rogers.
+
+"How could I stay up there with nobody but Jacob, and that old wolf
+Sarah? I wouldn't be left alone with her for the world. She'd have me in
+the Bishop's Pool before you came back, Janey dear."
+
+"That wouldn't matter much to you, would it, Judy?" I said.
+
+"She's a white wolf, that old Sarah, I know?" was all her answer.
+
+"But what will the old lady say when she finds you brought the young
+lady here?" asked Mrs Rogers.
+
+"I didn't bring her, mother. She would come."
+
+"Besides, she'll never know it," said Judy.
+
+I did not see that it was my part to read Judy a lecture here, though
+perhaps I might have done so if I had had more influence over her than I
+had. I wanted to gain some influence over her, and knew that the way to
+render my desire impossible of fulfilment would be, to find fault with
+what in her was a very small affair, whatever it might be in one who had
+been properly brought up. Besides, a clergyman is not a moral policeman.
+So I took no notice of the impropriety.
+
+"Had they actually to go away on the morning of Christmas Day?" I said.
+
+"They went anyhow, whether they had to do it or not, sir," answered
+Jane.
+
+"Aunt Ethelwyn didn't want to go till to-morrow," said Judy. "She said
+something about coming to church this morning. But grannie said
+they must go at once. It was very cross of old grannie. Think what a
+Christmas Day to me without auntie, and with Sarah! But I don't mean
+to go home till it's quite dark. I mean to stop here with dear Old
+Rogers--that I do." The latch was gently lifted, and in came young
+Brownrigg. So I thought it was time to leave my best Christmas wishes
+and take myself away. Old Rogers came with me to the mill-stream as
+usual.
+
+"It 'mazes me, sir," he said, "a gentleman o' your age and bringin' up
+to know all that you tould us this mornin'. It 'ud be no wonder now for
+a man like me, come to be the shock o' corn fully ripe--leastways yallow
+and white enough outside if there bean't much more than milk inside it
+yet,--it 'ud be no mystery for a man like me who'd been brought up hard,
+and tossed about well-nigh all the world over--why, there's scarce a
+wave on the Atlantic but knows Old Rogers!"
+
+He made the parenthesis with a laugh, and began anew.
+
+"It 'ud be a shame of a man like me not to know all as you said this
+mornin', sir--leastways I don't mean able to say it right off as you do,
+sir; but not to know it, after the Almighty had been at such pains to
+beat it into my hard head just to trust in Him and fear nothing and
+nobody--captain, bosun, devil, sunk rock, or breakers ahead; but just
+to mind Him and stand by halliard, brace, or wheel, or hang on by the
+leeward earing for that matter. For, you see, what does it signify
+whether I go to the bottom or not, so long as I didn't skulk? or
+rather," and here the old man took off his hat and looked up, "so long
+as the Great Captain has His way, and things is done to His mind? But
+how ever a man like you, goin' to the college, and readin' books, and
+warm o' nights, and never, by your own confession this blessed mornin',
+sir, knowin' what it was to be downright hungry, how ever you come to
+know all those things, is just past my comprehension, except by a double
+portion o' the Spirit, sir. And that's the way I account for it, sir."
+
+Although I knew enough about a ship to understand the old man, I am not
+sure that I have properly represented his sea-phrase. But that is of
+small consequence, so long as I give his meaning. And a meaning can
+occasionally be even better CONVEYED by less accurate words.
+
+"I will try to tell you how I come to know about these things as I do,"
+I returned. "How my knowledge may stand the test of further and severer
+trials remains to be seen. But if I should fail any time, old friend,
+and neither trust in God nor do my duty, what I have said to you remains
+true all the same."
+
+"That it do, sir, whoever may come short."
+
+"And more than that: failure does not necessarily prove any one to be a
+hypocrite of no faith. He may be still a man of little faith."
+
+"Surely, surely, sir. I remember once that my faith broke down--just
+for one moment, sir. And then the Lord gave me my way lest I should
+blaspheme Him in thy wicked heart."
+
+"How was that, Rogers?"
+
+"A scream came from the quarter-deck, and then the cry: 'Child
+overboard!' There was but one child, the captain's, aboard. I was
+sitting just aft the foremast, herring-boning a split in a spare jib. I
+sprang to the bulwark, and there, sure enough, was the child, going fast
+astarn, but pretty high in the water. How it happened I can't think to
+this day, sir, but I suppose my needle, in the hurry, had got into my
+jacket, so as to skewer it to my jersey, for we were far south of the
+line at the time, sir, and it was cold. However that may be, as soon
+as I was overboard, which you may be sure didn't want the time I take
+tellin' of it, I found that I ought to ha' pulled my jacket off afore
+I gave the bulwark the last kick. So I rose on the water, and began to
+pull it over my head--for it was wide, and that was the easiest way, I
+thought, in the water. But when I had got it right over my head, there
+it stuck. And there was I, blind as a Dutchman in a fog, and in as
+strait a jacket as ever poor wretch in Bedlam, for I could only just wag
+my flippers. Mr Walton, I believe I swore--the Lord forgive me!--but it
+was trying. And what was far worse, for one moment I disbelieved in Him;
+and I do say that's worse than swearing--in a hurry I mean. And that
+moment something went, the jacket was off, and there was I feelin' as
+if every stroke I took was as wide as the mainyard. I had no time to
+repent, only to thank God. And wasn't it more than I deserved, sir? Ah!
+He can rebuke a man for unbelief by giving him the desire of his heart.
+And that's a better rebuke than tying him up to the gratings."
+
+"And did you save the child?"
+
+"Oh yes, sir."
+
+"And wasn't the captain pleased?"
+
+"I believe he was, sir. He gave me a glass o' grog, sir. But you was a
+sayin' of something, sir, when I interrupted of you."
+
+"I am very glad you did interrupt me."
+
+"I'm not though, sir. I Ve lost summat I 'll never hear more."
+
+"No, you shan't lose it. I was going to tell you how I think I came to
+understand a little about the things I was talking of to-day."
+
+"That's it, sir; that's it. Well, sir, if you please?"
+
+"You've heard of Sir Philip Sidney, haven't you, Old Rogers?"
+
+"He was a great joker, wasn't he, sir?"
+
+"No, no; you're thinking of Sydney Smith, Rogers."
+
+"It may be, sir. I am an ignorant man."
+
+"You are no more ignorant than you ought to be.--But it is time you
+should know him, for he was just one of your sort. I will come down some
+evening and tell you about him."
+
+I may as well mention here that this led to week-evening lectures in
+the barn, which, with the help of Weir the carpenter, was changed into
+a comfortable room, with fixed seats all round it, and plenty of
+cane-chairs besides--for I always disliked forms in the middle of a
+room. The object of these lectures was to make the people acquainted
+with the true heroes of their own country--men great in themselves. And
+the kind of choice I made may be seen by those who know about both, from
+the fact that, while my first two lectures were on Philip Sidney, I did
+not give one whole lecture even to Walter Raleigh, grand fellow as he
+was. I wanted chiefly to set forth the men that could rule themselves,
+first of all, after a noble fashion. But I have not finished these
+lectures yet, for I never wished to confine them to the English heroes;
+I am going on still, old man as I am--not however without retracing
+passed ground sometimes, for a new generation has come up since I
+came here, and there is a new one behind coming up now which I may be
+honoured to present in its turn to some of this grand company--this
+cloud of witnesses to the truth in our own and other lands, some of whom
+subdued kingdoms, and others were tortured to death, for the same cause
+and with the same result.
+
+"Meantime," I went on, "I only want to tell you one little thing he says
+in a letter to a younger brother whom he wanted to turn out as fine
+a fellow as possible. It is about horses, or rather, riding--for Sir
+Philip was the best horseman in Europe in his day, as, indeed,
+all things taken together, he seems to have really been the most
+accomplished man generally of his time in the world. Writing to this
+brother he says--"
+
+I could not repeat the words exactly to Old Rogers, but I think it
+better to copy them exactly, in writing this account of our talk:
+
+"At horsemanship, when you exercise it, read Crison Claudio, and a
+book that is called La Gloria del Cavallo, withal that you may join the
+thorough contemplation of it with the exercise; and so shall you profit
+more in a month than others in a year."
+
+"I think I see what you mean, sir. I had got to learn it all without
+book, as it were, though you know I had my old Bible, that my mother
+gave me, and without that I should not have learned it at all."
+
+"I only mean it comparatively, you know. You have had more of the
+practice, and I more of the theory. But if we had not both had both, we
+should neither of us have known anything about the matter. I never was
+content without trying at least to understand things; and if they are
+practical things, and you try to practise them at the same time as far
+as you do understand them, there is no end to the way in which the one
+lights up the other. I suppose that is how, without your experience,
+I have more to say about such things than you could expect. You know
+besides that a small matter in which a principle is involved will reveal
+the principle, if attended to, just as well as a great one containing
+the same principle. The only difference, and that a most important one,
+is that, though I've got my clay and my straw together, and they stick
+pretty well as yet, my brick, after all, is not half so well baked as
+yours, old friend, and it may crumble away yet, though I hope not."
+
+"I pray God to make both our bricks into stones of the New Jerusalem,
+sir. I think I understand you quite well. To know about a thing is of no
+use, except you do it. Besides, as I found out when I went to sea, you
+never can know a thing till you do do it, though I thought I had a tidy
+fancy about some things beforehand. It's better not to be quite sure
+that all your seams are caulked, and so to keep a look-out on the
+bilge-pump; isn't it, sir?"
+
+During the most of this conversation, we were standing by the
+mill-water, half frozen over. The ice from both sides came towards
+the middle, leaving an empty space between, along which the dark water
+showed itself, hurrying away as if in fear of its life from the white
+death of the frost. The wheel stood motionless, and the drip from the
+thatch of the mill over it in the sun, had frozen in the shadow into
+icicles, which hung in long spikes from the spokes and the floats,
+making the wheel--soft green and mossy when it revolved in the gentle
+sun-mingled summer-water--look like its own gray skeleton now. The sun
+was getting low, and I should want all my time to see my other friends
+before dinner, for I would not willingly offend Mrs Pearson on Christmas
+Day by being late, especially as I guessed she was using extraordinary
+skill to prepare me a more than comfortable meal.
+
+"I must go, Old Rogers," I said; "but I will leave you something to
+think about till we meet again. Find out why our Lord was so much
+displeased with the disciples, whom He knew to be ignorant men, for
+not knowing what He meant when He warned them against the leaven of the
+Pharisees. I want to know what you think about it. You'll find the story
+told both in the sixteenth chapter of St Matthew and the eighth of St
+Mark."
+
+"Well, sir, I'll try; that is, if you will tell me what you think about
+it afterwards, so as to put me right, if I'm wrong."
+
+"Of course I will, if I can find out an explanation to satisfy me. But
+it is not at all clear to me now. In fact, I do not see the connecting
+links of our Lord's logic in the rebuke He gives them."
+
+"How am I to find out then, sir--knowing nothing of logic at all?"
+said the old man, his rough worn face summered over with his child-like
+smile.
+
+"There are many things which a little learning, while it cannot really
+hide them, may make you less ready to see all at once," I answered,
+shaking hands with Old Rogers, and then springing across the brook with
+my carpet-bag in my hand.
+
+By the time I had got through the rest of my calls, the fogs were rising
+from the streams and the meadows to close in upon my first Christmas
+Day in my own parish. How much happier I was than when I came such a
+few months before! The only pang I felt that day was as I passed the
+monsters on the gate leading to Oldcastle Hall. Should I be honoured to
+help only the poor of the flock? Was I to do nothing for the rich, for
+whom it is, and has been, and doubtless will be so hard to enter into
+the kingdom of heaven? And it seemed to me at the moment that the world
+must be made for the poor: they had so much more done for them to enable
+them to inherit it than the rich had.--To these people at the Hall, I
+did not seem acceptable. I might in time do something with Judy, but
+the old lady was still so dreadfully repulsive to me that it troubled my
+conscience to feel how I disliked her. Mr Stoddart seemed nothing
+more than a dilettante in religion, as well as in the arts and
+sciences--music always excepted; while for Miss Oldcastle, I simply did
+not understand her yet. And she was so beautiful! I thought her more,
+beautiful every time I saw her. But I never appeared to make the
+least progress towards any real acquaintance with her thoughts and
+feelings.--It seemed to me, I say, for a moment, coming from the houses
+of the warm-hearted poor, as if the rich had not quite fair play, as it
+were--as if they were sent into the world chiefly for the sake of the
+cultivation of the virtues of the poor, and without much chance for the
+cultivation of their own. I knew better than this you know, my reader;
+but the thought came, as thoughts will come sometimes. It vanished the
+moment I sought to lay hands upon it, as if it knew quite well it had
+no business there. But certainly I did believe that it was more like
+the truth to say the world was made for the poor than to say that it was
+made for the rich. And therefore I longed the more to do something for
+these whom I considered the rich of my flock; for it was dreadful to
+think of their being poor inside instead of outside.
+
+Perhaps my reader will say, and say with justice, that I ought to have
+been as anxious about poor Farmer Brownrigg as about the beautiful lady.
+But the farmer liai given me good reason to hope some progress in him
+after the way he had given in about Jane Rogers. Positively I had caught
+his eye during the sermon that very day. And, besides--but I will not be
+a hypocrite; and seeing I did not certainly take the same interest in Mr
+Brownrigg, I will at least be honest and confess it. As far as regards
+the discharge of my duties, I trust I should have behaved impartially
+had the necessity for any choice arisen. But my feelings were not quite
+under my own control. And we are nowhere, told to love everybody alike,
+only to love every one who comes within our reach as ourselves.
+
+I wonder whether my old friend Dr Duncan was right. He had served on
+shore in Egypt under General Abercrombie, and had of course, after the
+fighting was over on each of the several occasions--the French being
+always repulsed--exercised his office amongst the wounded left on the
+field of battle.--"I do not know," he said, "whether I did right or not;
+but I always took the man I came to first--French or English."--I
+only know that my heart did not wait for the opinion of my head on the
+matter. I loved the old man the more that he did as he did. But as a
+question of casuistry, I am doubtful about its answer.
+
+This digression is, I fear, unpardonable.
+
+I made Mrs Pearson sit down with me to dinner, for Christmas Day was not
+one to dine alone upon. And I have ever since had my servants to dine
+with me on Christmas Day.
+
+Then I went out again, and made another round of visits, coming in for a
+glass of wine at one table, an orange at another, and a hot chestnut
+at a third. Those whom I could not see that day, I saw on the following
+days between it and the new year. And so ended my Christmas holiday with
+my people.
+
+But there is one little incident which I ought to relate before I close
+this chapter, and which I am ashamed of having so nearly forgotten.
+
+When we had finished our dinner, and I was sitting alone drinking a
+class of claret before going out again, Mrs Pearson came in and told me
+that little Gerard Weir wanted to see me. I asked her to show him in;
+and the little fellow entered, looking very shy, and clinging first to
+the door and then to the wall.
+
+"Come, my dear boy," I said, "and sit down by me."
+
+He came directly and stood before me.
+
+"Would you like a little wine and water?" I said; for unhappily there
+was no dessert, Mrs Pearson knowing that I never eat such things.
+
+"No, thank you, sir; I never tasted wine."
+
+"I did not press him to take it.
+
+"Please, sir," he went on after a pause, putting his nand in his pocket,
+"mother gave me some goodies, and I kept them till I saw you come back,
+and here they are, sir."
+
+Does any reader doubt what I did or said upon this?
+
+I said, "Thank you, my darling," and I ate them up every one of them,
+that he might see me eat them before he left the house. And the dear
+child went off radiant.
+
+If anybody cannot understand why I did so, I beg him to consider the
+matter. If then he cannot come to a conclusion concerning it, I doubt
+if any explanation of mine would greatly subserve his enlightenment.
+Meantime, I am forcibly restraining myself from yielding to the
+temptation to set forth my reasons, which would result in a half-hour's
+sermon on the Jewish dispensation, including the burnt offering, and the
+wave and heave offerings, with an application to the ignorant nurses and
+mothers of English babies, who do the best they can to make original sin
+an actual fact by training children down in the way they should not go.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII. THE AVENUE.
+
+
+It will not appear strange that I should linger so long upon the first
+few months of my association with a people who, now that I am an old
+man, look to me like my own children. For those who were then older than
+myself are now "old dwellers in those high countries" where there is no
+age, only wisdom; and I shall soon go to them. How glad I shall be to
+see my Old Rogers again, who, as he taught me upon earth, will teach
+me yet niore, I thank my God, in heaven! But I must not let the reverie
+which' always gathers about the feather-end of my pen the moment I take
+it up to write these recollections, interfere with the work before me.
+
+After this Christmas-tide, I found myself in closer relationship to my
+parishioners. No doubt I was always in danger of giving unknown offence
+to those who were ready to fancy that I neglected them, and did not
+distribute my FAVOURS equally. But as I never took offence, the offence
+I gave was easily got rid of. A clergyman, of all men, should be slow to
+take offence, for if he does, he will never be free or strong to reprove
+sin. And it must sometimes be his duty to speak severely to those,
+especially the good, who are turning their faces the wrong way. It is
+of little use to reprove the sinner, but it is worth while sometimes
+to reprove those who have a regard for righteousness, however imperfect
+they may be. "Reprove not a scorner, lest he hate thee; rebuke a wise
+man, and he will love thee."
+
+But I took great care about INTERFERING; though I would interfere upon
+request--not always, however, upon the side whence the request came,
+and more seldom still upon either side. The clergyman must never be
+a partisan. When our Lord was requested to act as umpire between two
+brothers, He refused. But He spoke and said, "Take heed, and beware
+of covetousness." Now, though the best of men is unworthy to loose the
+latchet of His shoe, yet the servant must be as his Master. Ah me! while
+I write it, I remember that the sinful woman might yet do as she would
+with His sacred feet. I bethink me: Desert may not touch His shoe-tie:
+Love may kiss His feet.
+
+I visited, of course, at the Hall, as at the farmhouses in the country,
+and the cottages in the village. I did not come to like Mrs Oldcastle
+better. And there was one woman in the house whom I disliked still more:
+that Sarah whom Judy had called in my hearing a white wolf. Her face was
+yet whiter than that of her mistress, only it was not smooth like hers;
+for its whiteness came apparently from the small-pox, which had so
+thickened the skin that no blood, if she had any, could shine through. I
+seldom saw her--only, indeed, caught a glimpse of her now and then as I
+passed through the house.
+
+Nor did I make much progress with Mr Stoddart. He had always something
+friendly to say, and often some theosophical theory to bring forward,
+which, I must add, never seemed to me to mean, or, at least, to reveal,
+anything. He was a great reader of mystical books, and yet the man's
+nature seemed cold. It was sunshiny, but not sunny. His intellect was
+rather a lambent flame than a genial warmth. He could make things, but
+he could not grow anything. And when I came to see that he had had
+more than any one else to do with the education of Miss Oldcastle, I
+understood her a little better, and saw that her so-called education had
+been in a great measure repression--of a negative sort, no doubt, but
+not therefore the less mischievous. For to teach speculation instead
+of devotion, mysticism instead of love, word instead of deed, is surely
+ruinously repressive to the nature that is meant for sunbright activity
+both of heart and hand. My chief perplexity continued to be how he could
+play the organ as he did.
+
+My reader will think that I am always coming round to Miss Oldcastle;
+but if he does, I cannot help it. I began, I say, to understand her a
+little better. She seemed to me always like one walking in a "watery
+sunbeam," without knowing that it was but the wintry pledge of a summer
+sun at hand. She took it, or was trying to take it, for THE sunlight;
+trying to make herself feel all the glory people said was in the light,
+instead of making haste towards the perfect day. I found afterwards that
+several things had combined to bring about this condition; and I know
+she will forgive me, should I, for the sake of others, endeavour to make
+it understood by and by.
+
+I have not much more to tell my readers about this winter. As but of a
+whole changeful season only one day, or, it may be, but one moment in
+which the time seemed to burst into its own blossom, will cling to the
+memory; so of the various interviews with my friends, and the whole flow
+of the current of my life, during that winter, nothing more of nature or
+human nature occurs to me worth recording. I will pass on to the summer
+season as rapidly as I may, though the early spring will detain me with
+the relation of just a single incident.
+
+I was on my way to the Hall to see Mr Stoddart. I wanted to ask him
+whether something could not be done beyond his exquisite playing to
+rouse the sense of music in my people. I believed that nothing helps you
+so much to feel as the taking of what share may, from the nature of the
+thing, be possible to you; because, for one reason, in order to feel, it
+is necessary that the mind should rest upon the matter, whatever it is.
+The poorest success, provided the attempt has been genuine, will enable
+one to enter into any art ten times better than before. Now I had,
+I confess, little hope of moving Mr Stoddart in the matter; but if I
+should succeed, I thought it would do himself more good to mingle with
+his humble fellows in the attempt to do them a trifle of good, than the
+opening of any number of intellectual windows towards the circumambient
+truth.
+
+It was just beginning to grow dusk. The wind was blustering in gusts
+among the trees, swaying them suddenly and fiercely like a keen passion,
+now sweeping them all one way as if the multitude of tops would break
+loose and rush away like a wild river, and now subsiding as suddenly,
+and allowing them to recover themselves and stand upright, with tones
+and motions of indignant expostulation. There was just one cold bar of
+light in the west, and the east was one gray mass, while overhead the
+stars were twinkling. The grass and all the ground about the trees were
+very wet. The time seemed more dreary somehow than the winter. Rigour
+was past, and tenderness had not come. For the wind was cold without
+being keen, and bursting from the trees every now and then with a roar
+as of a sea breaking on distant sands, whirled about me as if it wanted
+me to go and join in its fierce play.
+
+Suddenly I saw, to my amazement, in a walk that ran alongside of the
+avenue, Miss Oldcastle struggling against the wind, which blew straight
+down the path upon her. The cause of my amazement was twofold. First, I
+had supposed her with her mother in London, whither their journeys had
+been not infrequent since Christmas-tide; and next--why should she be
+fighting with the wind, so far from the house, with only a shawl drawn
+over her head?
+
+The reader may wonder how I should know her in this attire in the dusk,
+and where there was not the smallest probability of finding her. Suffice
+it to say that I did recognise her at once; and passing between two
+great tree-trunks, and through an opening in some under-wood, was by
+her side in a moment. But the noise of the wind had prevented her from
+hearing my approach, and when I uttered her name, she started violently,
+and, turning, drew herself up very haughtily, in part, I presume,
+to hide her tremor.--She was always a little haughty with me, I must
+acknowledge. Could there have been anything in my address, however
+unconscious of it I was, that made her fear I was ready to become
+intrusive? Or might it not be that, hearing of my footing with my
+parishioners generally, she was prepared to resent any assumption
+of clerical familiarity with her; and so, in my behaviour, any poor
+innocent "bush was supposed a bear." For I need not tell my reader that
+nothing was farther from my intention, even with the lowliest of my
+flock, than to presume upon my position as clergyman. I think they all
+GAVE me the relation I occupied towards them personally.--But I had
+never seen her look so haughty as now. If I had been watching her very
+thoughts she could hardly have looked more indignant.
+
+"I beg your pardon," I said, distressed; "I have startled you
+dreadfully."
+
+"Not in the least," she replied, but without moving, and still with a
+curve in her form like the neck of a frayed horse.
+
+I thought it better to leave apology, which was evidently disagreeable
+to her, and speak of indifferent things.
+
+"I was on my way to call on Mr Stoddart," I said.
+
+"You will find him at home, I believe."
+
+"I fancied you and Mrs Oldcastle in London."
+
+"We returned yesterday."
+
+Still she stood as before. I made a movement in the direction of the
+house. She seemed as if she would walk in the opposite direction.
+
+"May I not walk with you to the house?"
+
+"I am not going in just yet."
+
+"Are you protected enough for sucn a night?"
+
+"I enjoy the wind."
+
+I bowed and walked on; for what else could I do?
+
+I cannot say that I enjoyed leaving her behind me in the gathering dark,
+the wind blowing her about with no more reverence than if she had been a
+bush of privet. Nor was it with a light heart that I bore her repulse
+as I slowly climbed the hill to the house. However, a little personal
+mortification is wholesome--though I cannot say either that I derived
+much consolation from the reflection.
+
+Sarah opened the glass door, her black, glossy, restless eyes looking
+out of her white face from under gray eyebrows. I knew at once by her
+look beyond me that she had expected to find me accompanied by her young
+mistress. I did not volunteer any information, as my reader may suppose.
+
+I found, as I had feared, that, although Mr. Stoddart seemed to listen
+with some interest to what I said, I could not bring him to the point of
+making any practical suggestion, or of responding to one made by me; and
+I left him with the conviction that he would do nothing to help me. Yet
+during the whole of our interview he had not opposed a single word I
+said. He was like clay too much softened with water to keep the form
+into which it has been modelled. He would take SOME kind of form easily,
+and lose it yet more easily. I did not show all my dissatisfaction,
+however, for that would only have estranged us; and it is not required,
+nay, it may be wrong, to show all you feel or think: what is required
+of us is, not to show what we do not feel or think; for that is to be
+false.
+
+I left the house in a gloomy mood. I know I ought to have looked up to
+God and said: "These things do not reach to Thee, my Father. Thou art
+ever the same; and I rise above my small as well as my great troubles
+by remembering Thy peace, and Thy unchangeable Godhood to me and all Thy
+creatures." But I did not come to myself all at once. The thought of God
+had not come, though it was pretty sure to come before I got home. I
+was brooding over the littleness of all I could do; and feeling that
+sickness which sometimes will overtake a man in the midst of the work he
+likes best, when the unpleasant parts of it crowd upon him, and his own
+efforts, especially those made from the will without sustaining impulse,
+come back upon him with a feeling of unreality, decay, and bitterness,
+as if he had been unnatural and untrue, and putting himself in
+false relations by false efforts for good. I know this all came
+from selfishness--thinking about myself instead of about God and my
+neighbour. But so it was.--And so I was walking down the avenue, where
+it was now very dark, with my head bent to the ground, when I in my
+turn started at the sound of a woman's voice, and looking up, saw by the
+starlight the dim form of Miss Oldcastle standing before me.
+
+She spoke first.
+
+"Mr Walton, I was very rude to you. I beg your pardon."
+
+"Indeed, I did not think so. I only thought what a blundering awkward
+fellow I was to startle you as I did. You have to forgive me."
+
+"I fancy"--and here I know she smiled, though how I know I do not
+know--"I fancy I have made that even," she said, pleasantly; "for you
+must confess I startled you now."
+
+"You did; but it was in a very different way. I annoyed you with my
+rudeness. You only scattered a swarm of bats that kept flapping their
+skinny wings in my face."
+
+"What do you mean? There are no bats at this time of the year."
+
+"Not outside. In 'winter and rough weather' they creep inside, you
+know."
+
+"Ah! I ought to understand you. But I did not think you were ever like
+that. I thought you were too good."
+
+"I wish I were. I hope to be some day. I am not yet, anyhow. And I thank
+you for driving the bats away in the meantime."
+
+"You make me the more ashamed of myself to think that perhaps my
+rudeness had a share in bringing them.--Yours is no doubt thankless
+labour sometimes."
+
+She seemed to make the last remark just to prevent the conversation from
+returning to her as its subject. And now all the bright portions of my
+work came up before me.
+
+"You are quite mistaken in that, Miss Oldcastle. On the contrary, the
+thanks I get are far more than commensurate with the labour. Of course
+one meets with a disappointment sometimes, but that is only when they
+don't know what you mean. And how should they know what you mean till
+they are different themselves?--You remember what Wordsworth says on
+this very subject in his poem of Simon Lee?"--
+
+"I do not know anything of Wordsworth."
+
+"'I've heard of hearts unkind, kind deeds With coldness still returning;
+Alas! the gratitude of men Hath oftener left me mourning.'"
+
+"I do not quite see what he means."
+
+"May I recommend you to think about it? You will be sure to find it out
+for yourself, and that will be ten times more satisfactory than if I
+were to explain it to you. And, besides, you will never forget it, if
+you do."
+
+"Will you repeat the lines again?"
+
+I did so.
+
+All this time the wind had been still. Now it rose with a slow gush in
+the trees. Was it fancy? Or, as the wind moved the shrubbery, did I see
+a white face? And could it be the White Wolf, as Judy called her?
+
+I spoke aloud:
+
+"But it is cruel to keep you standing here in such a night. You must be
+a real lover of nature to walk in the dark wind."
+
+"I like it. Good night."
+
+So we parted. I gazed into the darkness after her, though she
+disappeared at the distance of a yard or two; and would have stood
+longer had I not still suspected the proximity of Judy's Wolf, which
+made me turn and go home, regardless now of Mr Stoddart's DOUGHINESS.
+
+I met Miss Oldcastle several times before the summer, but her old manner
+remained, or rather had returned, for there had been nothing of it in
+the tone of her voice in that interview, if INTERVIEW it could be called
+where neither could see more than the other's outline.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII. YOUNG WEIR.
+
+
+By slow degrees the summer bloomed. Green came instead of white;
+rainbows instead of icicles. The grounds about the Hall seemed
+the incarnation of a summer which had taken years to ripen to its
+perfection. The very grass seemed to have aged into perfect youth in
+that "haunt of ancient peace;" for surely nowhere else was such thick,
+delicate-bladed, delicate-coloured grass to be seen. Gnarled old
+trees of may stood like altars of smoking perfume, or each like one
+million-petalled flower of upheaved whiteness--or of tender rosiness,
+as if the snow which had covered it in winter had sunk in and gathered
+warmth from the life of the tree, and now crept out again to adorn the
+summer. The long loops of the laburnum hung heavy with gold towards the
+sod below; and the air was full of the fragrance of the young leaves
+of the limes. Down in the valley below, the daisies shone in all the
+meadows, varied with the buttercup and the celandine; while in damp
+places grew large pimpernels, and along the sides of the river, the
+meadow-sweet stood amongst the reeds at the very edge of the water,
+breathing out the odours of dreamful sleep. The clumsy pollards were
+each one mass of undivided green. The mill wheel had regained its knotty
+look, with its moss and its dip and drip, as it yielded to the slow
+water, which would have let it alone, but that there was no other way
+out of the land to the sea.
+
+I used now to wander about in the fields and woods, with a book in my
+hand, at which I often did not look the whole day, and which yet I liked
+to have with me. And I seemed somehow to come back with most upon those
+days in which I did not read. In this manner I prepared almost all my
+sermons that summer. But, although I prepared them thus in the open
+country, I had another custom, which perhaps may appear strange to some,
+before I preached them. This was, to spend the Saturday evening, not in
+my study, but in the church. This custom of mine was known to the sexton
+and his wife, and the church was always clean and ready for me after
+about mid-day, so that I could be alone there as soon as I pleased. It
+would take more space than my limits will afford to explain thoroughly
+why I liked to do this. But I will venture to attempt a partial
+explanation in a few words.
+
+This fine old church in which I was honoured to lead the prayers of
+my people, was not the expression of the religious feeling of my time.
+There was a gloom about it--a sacred gloom, I know, and I loved it;
+but such gloom as was not in my feeling when I talked to my flock. I
+honoured the place; I rejoiced in its history; I delighted to think that
+even by the temples made with hands outlasting these bodies of ours, we
+were in a sense united to those who in them had before us lifted up holy
+hands without wrath or doubting; and with many more who, like us, had
+lifted up at least prayerful hands without hatred or despair. The place
+soothed me, tuned me to a solemn mood--one of self-denial, and gentle
+gladness in all sober things. But, had I been an architect, and had
+I had to build a church--I do not in the least know how I should have
+built it--I am certain it would have been very different from this.
+Else I should be a mere imitator, like all the church-architects I know
+anything about in the present day. For I always found the open air the
+most genial influence upon me for the production of religious feeling
+and thought. I had been led to try whether it might not be so with me
+by the fact that our Lord seemed so much to delight in the open air, and
+late in the day as well as early in the morning would climb the mountain
+to be alone with His Father. I found that it helped to give a reality
+to everything that I thought about, if I only contemplated it under the
+high untroubled blue, with the lowly green beneath my feet, and the wind
+blowing on me to remind me of the Spirit that once moved on the face of
+the waters, bringing order out of disorder and light out of darkness,
+and was now seeking every day a fuller entrance into my heart, that
+there He might work the one will of the Father in heaven.
+
+My reader will see then that there was, as it were, not so much a
+discord, as a lack of harmony between the surroundings wherein my
+thoughts took form, or, to use a homelier phrase, my sermon was studied,
+and the surroundings wherein I had to put these forms into the garments
+of words, or preach that sermon. I therefore sought to bridge over this
+difference (if I understood music, I am sure I could find an expression
+exactly fitted to my meaning),--to find an easy passage between the
+open-air mood and the church mood, so as to be able to bring into
+the church as much of the fresh air, and the tree-music, and the
+colour-harmony, and the gladness over all, as might be possible; and, in
+order to this, I thought all my sermon over again in the afternoon sun
+as it shone slantingly through the stained window over Lord Eagleye's
+tomb, and in the failing light thereafter and the gathering dusk of the
+twilight, pacing up and down the solemn old place, hanging my thoughts
+here on a crocket, there on a corbel; now on the gable-point over which
+Weir's face would gaze next morning, and now on the aspiring peaks of
+the organ. I thus made the place a cell of thought and prayer. And when
+the next day came, I found the forms around me so interwoven with the
+forms of my thought, that I felt almost like one of the old monks who
+had built the place, so little did I find any check to my thought
+or utterance from its unfitness for the expression of my individual
+modernism. But not one atom the more did I incline to the evil fancy
+that God was more in the past than in the present; that He is more
+within the walls of the church, than in the unwalled sky and earth; or
+seek to turn backwards one step from a living Now to an entombed and
+consecrated Past.
+
+One lovely Saturday, I had been out all the morning. I had not walked
+far, for I had sat in the various places longer than I had walked, my
+path lying through fields and copses, crossing a country road only now
+and then. I had my Greek Testament with me, and I read when I sat, and
+thought when I walked. I remember well enough that I was going to preach
+about the cloud of witnesses, and explain to my people that this did
+not mean persons looking at, witnessing our behaviour--not so could any
+addition be made to the awfulness of the fact that the eye of God was
+upon us--but witnesses to the truth, people who did what God wanted
+them to do, come of it what might, whether a crown or a rack, scoffs or
+applause; to behold whose witnessing might well rouse all that was human
+and divine in us to chose our part with them and their Lord.--When
+I came home, I had an early dinner, and then betook myself to my
+Saturday's resort.--I had never had a room large enough to satisfy me
+before. Now my study was to my mind.
+
+All through the slowly-fading afternoon, the autumn of the day, when
+the colours are richest and the shadows long and lengthening, I paced my
+solemn old-thoughted church. Sometimes I went up into the pulpit and sat
+there, looking on the ancient walls which had grown up under men's hands
+that men might be helped to pray by the visible symbol of unity which
+the walls gave, and that the voice of the Spirit of God might be heard
+exhorting men to forsake the evil and choose the good. And I thought how
+many witnesses to the truth had knelt in those ancient pews. For as
+the great church is made up of numberless communities, so is the great
+shining orb of witness-bearers made up of millions of lesser orbs. All
+men and women of true heart bear individual testimony to the truth of
+God, saying, "I have trusted and found Him faithful." And the feeble
+light of the glowworm is yet light, pure, and good, and with a
+loveliness of its own. "So, O Lord," I said, "let my light shine before
+men." And I felt no fear of vanity in such a prayer, for I knew that the
+glory to come of it is to God only--"that men may glorify their Father
+in heaven." And I knew that when we seek glory for ourselves, the light
+goes out, and the Horror that dwells in darkness breathes cold upon our
+spirits. And I remember that just as I thought thus, my eye was caught
+first by a yellow light that gilded the apex of the font-cover, which
+had been wrought like a flame or a bursting blossom: it was so old and
+worn, I never could tell which; and then by a red light all over a white
+marble tablet in the wall--the red of life on the cold hue of the grave.
+And this red light did not come from any work of man's device, but from
+the great window of the west, which little Gerard Weir wanted to help
+God to paint. I must have been in a happy mood that Saturday afternoon,
+for everything pleased me and made me happier; and all the church-forms
+about me blended and harmonised graciously with the throne and footstool
+of God which I saw through the windows. And I lingered on till the night
+had come; till the church only gloomed about me, and had no shine; and
+then I found my spirit burning up the clearer, as a lamp which has been
+flaming all the day with light unseen becomes a glory in the room when
+the sun is gone down.
+
+At length I felt tired, and would go home. Yet I lingered for a few
+moments in the vestry, thinking what hymns would harmonize best with the
+things I wanted to make my people think about. It was now almost quite
+dark out of doors--at least as dark as it would be.
+
+Suddenly through the gloom I thought I heard a moan and a sob. I
+sat upright in my chair and listened. But I heard nothing more, and
+concluded I had deceived myself. After a few moments, I rose to go home
+and have some tea, and turn my mind rather away from than towards the
+subject of witness-bearing any more for that night, lest I should burn
+the fuel of it out before I came to warm the people with it, and should
+have to blow its embers instead of flashing its light and heat upon
+them in gladness. So I left the church by my vestry-door, which I closed
+behind me, and took my way along the path through the clustering group
+of graves.
+
+Again I heard a sob. This time I was sure of it. And there lay something
+dark upon one of the grassy mounds. I approached it, but it did not
+move. I spoke.
+
+"Can I be of any use to you?" I said.
+
+"No," returned an almost inaudible voice.
+
+Though I did not know whose was the grave, I knew that no one had been
+buried there very lately, and if the grief were for the loss of the
+dead, it was more than probably aroused to fresh vigour by recent
+misfortune.
+
+I stooped, and taking the figure by the arm, said, "Come with me, and
+let us see what can be done for you."
+
+I then saw that it was a youth--perhaps scarcely more than a boy. And as
+soon as I saw that, I knew that his grief could hardly be incurable. He
+returned no answer, but rose at once to his feet, and submitted to
+be led away. I took him the shortest road to my house through the
+shrubbery, brought him into the study, made him sit down in my
+easy-chair, and rang for lights and wine; for the dew had been falling
+heavily, and his clothes were quite dank. But when the wine came, he
+refused to take any.
+
+"But you want it," I said.
+
+"No, sir, I don't, indeed."
+
+"Take some for my sake, then."
+
+"I would rather not, sir."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"I promised my father a year ago, when I left home that I would not
+drink anything stronger than water.[sic] And I can't break my promise
+now."
+
+"Where is your home?"
+
+"In the village, sir."
+
+"That wasn't your father's grave I found you upon, was it?"
+
+"No, sir. It was my mother's."
+
+"Then your father is still alive?"
+
+"Yes, sir. You know him very well--Thomas Weir."
+
+"Ah! He told me he had a son in London. Are you that son?"
+
+"Yes, sir," answered the youth, swallowing a rising sob.
+
+"Then what is the matter? Your father is a good friend of mine, and
+would tell you you might trust me."
+
+"I don't doubt it, sir. But you won't believe me any more than my
+father."
+
+By this time I had perused his person, his dress, and his countenance.
+He was of middle size, but evidently not full grown. His dress was
+very decent. His face was pale and thin, and revealed a likeness to his
+father. He had blue eyes that looked full at me, and, as far as I could
+judge, betokened, along with the whole of his expression, an honest and
+sensitive nature. I found him very attractive, and was therefore the
+more emboldened to press for the knowledge of his story.
+
+"I cannot promise to believe whatever you say; but almost I could. And
+if you tell me the truth, I like you too much already to be in great
+danger of doubting you, for you know the truth has a force of its own."
+
+"I thought so till to-night," he answered. "But if my father would not
+believe me, how can I expect you to do so, sir?"
+
+"Your father may have been too much troubled by your story to be able to
+do it justice. It is not a bit like your father to be unfair."
+
+"No, sir. And so much the less chance of your believing me."
+
+Somehow his talk prepossessed me still more in his favour. There was a
+certain refinement in it, a quality of dialogue which indicated thought,
+as I judged; and I became more and more certain that, whatever I might
+have to think of it when told, he would yet tell me the truth.
+
+"Come, try me," I said.
+
+"I will, sir. But I must begin at the beginning."
+
+"Begin where you like. I have nothing more to do to-night, and you may
+take what time you please. But I will ring for tea first; for I dare say
+you have not made any promise about that."
+
+A faint smile flickered on his face. He was evidently beginning to feel
+a little more comfortable.
+
+"When did you arrive from London?" I asked.
+
+"About two hours ago, I suppose."
+
+"Bring tea, Mrs Pearson, and that cold chicken and ham, and plenty of
+toast. We are both hungry."
+
+Mrs Pearson gave a questioning look at the lad, and departed to do her
+duty.
+
+When she returned with the tray, I saw by the unconsciously eager way in
+which he looked at the eatables, that he had had nothing for some time;
+and so, even after we were left alone, I would not let him say a word
+till he had made a good meal. It was delightful to see how he ate. Few
+troubles will destroy a growing lad's hunger; and indeed it has always
+been to me a marvel how the feelings and the appetites affect each
+other. I have known grief actually make people, and not sensual people
+at all, quite hungry. At last I thought I had better not offer him any
+more.
+
+After the tea-things had been taken away, I put the candles out; and the
+moon, which had risen, nearly full, while we were at tea, shone into the
+room. I had thought that he might possibly find it easier to tell his
+story in the moonlight, which, if there were any shame in the recital,
+would not, by too much revelation, reduce him to the despair of Macbeth,
+when, feeling that he could contemplate his deed, but not his deed and
+himself together, he exclaimed,
+
+"To know my deed, 'twere best not know myself."
+
+So, sitting by the window in the moonlight, he told his tale. The
+moon lighted up his pale face as he told it, and gave rather a wild
+expression to his eyes, eager to find faith in me.--I have not much of
+the dramatic in me, I know; and I am rather a flat teller of stories on
+that account. I shall not, therefore, seeing there is no necessity for
+it, attempt to give the tale in his own words. But, indeed, when I think
+of it, they did not differ so much from the form of my own, for he had,
+I presume, lost his provincialisms, and being, as I found afterwards,
+a reader of the best books that came in his way, had not caught up many
+cockneyisms instead.
+
+He had filled a place in the employment of Messrs----& Co., large
+silk-mercers, linen-drapers, etc., etc., in London; for all the trades
+are mingled now. His work at first was to accompany one of the carts
+which delivered the purchases of the day; but, I presume because he
+showed himself to be a smart lad, they took him at length into the shop
+to wait behind the counter. This he did not like so much, but, as it was
+considered a rise in life, made no objection to the change.
+
+He seemed to himself to get on pretty well. He soon learned all the
+marks on the goods intended to be understood by the shopmen, and within
+a few months believed that he was found generally useful. He had as yet
+had no distinct department allotted to him, but was moved from place to
+place, according as the local pressure of business might demand.
+
+"I confess," he said, "that I was not always satisfied with what was
+going on about me. I mean I could not help doubting if everything was
+done on the square, as they say. But nothing came plainly in my way,
+and so I could honestly say it did not concern me. I took care to be
+straightforward for my part, and, knowing only the prices marked for the
+sale of the goods, I had nothing to do with anything else. But one
+day, while I was showing a lady some handkerchiefs which were marked as
+mouchoirs de Paris--I don't know if I pronounce it right, sir--she said
+she did not believe they were French cambric; and I, knowing nothing
+about it, said nothing. But, happening to look up while we both stood
+silent, the lady examining the handkerchiefs, and I doing nothing till
+she should have made up her mind, I caught sight of the eyes of the
+shop-walker, as they call the man who shows customers where to go for
+what they want, and sees that they are attended to. He is a fat man,
+dressed in black, with a great gold chain, which they say in the shop
+is only copper gilt. But that doesn't matter, only it would be the liker
+himself. He was standing staring at me. I could not tell what to make of
+it; but from that day I often caught him watching me, as if I had been
+a customer suspected of shop-lifting. Still I only thought he was very
+disagreeable, and tried to forget him.
+
+"One day--the day before yesterday--two ladies, an old lady and a young
+one, came into the shop, and wanted to look at some shawls. It was
+dinner-time, and most of the men were in the house at their dinner. The
+shop-walker sent me to them, and then, I do believe, though I did not
+see him, stood behind a pillar to watch me, as he had been in the way of
+doing more openly. I thought I had seen the ladies before, and though I
+could not then tell where, I am now almost sure they were Mrs and Miss
+Oldcastle, of the Hall. They wanted to buy a cashmere for the young
+lady. I showed them some. They wanted better. I brought the best we had,
+inquiring, that I might make no mistake. They asked the price. I told
+them. They said they were not good enough, and wanted to see some more.
+I told them they were the best we had. They looked at them again; said
+they were sorry, but the shawls were not good enough, and left the shop
+without buying anything. I proceeded to take the shawls up-stairs again,
+and, as I went, passed the shop walker, whom I had not observed while
+I was attending to the ladies. 'YOU're for no good, young man!' he said
+with a nasty sneer. 'What do you mean by that, Mr B.?' I asked, for his
+sneer made me angry. 'You 'll know before to-morrow,' he answered, and
+walked away. That same evening, as we were shutting up shop, I was sent
+for to the principal's room. The moment I entered, he said, 'You won't
+suit us, young man, I find. You had better pack up your box to-night,
+and be off to-morrow. There's your quarter's salary.' 'What have I
+done?' I asked in astonishment, and yet with a vague suspicion of the
+matter. 'It's not what you've done, but what you don't do,' he answered.
+'Do you think we can afford to keep you here and pay you wages to send
+people away from the shop without buying? If you do, you're mistaken,
+that's all. You may go.' 'But what could I do?' I said. 'I suppose that
+spy, B---,'--I believe I said so, sir. 'Now, now, young man, none of
+your sauce!' said Mr---. 'Honest people don't think about spies.'
+'I thought it was for honesty you were getting rid of me,' I said.
+Mr---rose to his feet, his lips white, and pointed to the door. 'Take
+your money and be off. And mind you don't refer to me for a character.
+After such impudence I couldn't in conscience give you one.' Then,
+calming down a little when he saw I turned to go, 'You had better take
+to your hands again, for your head will never keep you. There, be off!'
+he said, pushing the money towards me, and turning his back to me. I
+could not touch it. 'Keep the money, Mr---,' I said. 'It'll make up for
+what you've lost by me.' And I left the room at once without waiting for
+an answer.
+
+"While I was packing my box, one of my chums came in, and I told him
+all about it. He is rather a good fellow that, sir; but he laughed, and
+said, 'What a fool you are, Weir! YOU'll never make your daily bread,
+and you needn't think it. If you knew what I know, you'd have known
+better. And it's very odd it was about shawls, too. I'll tell you. As
+you're going away, you won't let it out. Mr---' (that was the same who
+had just turned me away) 'was serving some ladies himself, for he wasn't
+above being in the shop, like his partner. They wanted the best Indian
+shawl they could get. None of those he showed them were good enough, for
+the ladies really didn't know one from another. They always go by the
+price you ask, and Mr---knew that well enough. He had sent me up-stairs
+for the shawls, and as I brought them he said, "These are the best
+imported, madam." There were three ladies; and one shook her head,
+and another shook her head, and they all shook their heads. And then
+Mr---was sorry, I believe you, that he had said they were the best. But
+you won't catch him in a trap! He's too old a fox for that.' I'm telling
+you, sir, what Johnson told me. 'He looked close down at the shawls, as
+if he were short-sighted, though he could see as far as any man. "I beg
+your pardon, ladies," said he, "you're right. I am quite wrong. What a
+stupid blunder to make! And yet they did deceive me. Here, Johnson, take
+these shawls away. How could you be so stupid? I will fetch the thing
+you want myself, ladies." So I went with him. He chose out three or four
+shawls, of the nicest patterns, from the very same lot, marked in the
+very same way, folded them differently, and gave them to me to carry
+down. "Now, ladies, here they are!" he said. "These are quite a
+different thing, as you will see; and, indeed, they cost half as much
+again." In five minutes they had bought two of them, and paid just half
+as much more than he had asked for them the first time. That's Mr---!
+and that's what you should have done if you had wanted to keep your
+place.'--But I assure you, sir, I could not help being glad to be out of
+it."
+
+"But there is nothing in all this to be miserable about," I said. "You
+did your duty."
+
+"It would be all right, sir, if father believed me. I don't want to be
+idle, I'm sure."
+
+"Does your father think you do?"
+
+"I don't know what he thinks. He won't speak to me. I told my story--as
+much of it as he would let me, at least--but he wouldn't listen to me.
+He only said he knew better than that. I couldn't bear it. He always was
+rather hard upon us. I'm sure if you hadn't been so kind to me, sir,
+I don't know what I should have done by this time. I haven't another
+friend in the world."
+
+"Yes, you have. Your Father in heaven is your friend."
+
+"I don't know that, sir. I'm not good enough."
+
+"That's quite true. But you would never have done your duty if He had
+not been with you."
+
+"DO you think so, sir?" he returned, eagerly.
+
+"Indeed, I do. Everything good comes from the Father of lights. Every
+one that walks in any glimmering of light walks so far in HIS light. For
+there is no light--only darkness--comes from below. And man apart from
+God can generate no light. He's not meant to be separated from God, you
+see. And only think then what light He can give you if you will turn to
+Him and ask for it. What He has given you should make you long for more;
+for what you have is not enough--ah! far from it."
+
+"I think I understand. But I didn't feel good at all in the matter. I
+didn't see any other way of doing."
+
+"So much the better. We ought never to feel good. We are but
+unprofitable servants at best. There is no merit in doing your duty;
+only you would have been a poor wretched creature not to do as you did.
+And now, instead of making yourself miserable over the consequences of
+it, you ought to bear them like a man, with courage and hope, thanking
+God that He has made you suffer for righteousness' sake, and denied
+you the success and the praise of cheating. I will go to your father at
+once, and find out what he is thinking about it. For no doubt Mr---has
+written to him with his version of the story. Perhaps he will be more
+inclined to believe you when he finds that I believe you."
+
+"Oh, thank you, sir!" cried the lad, and jumped up from his seat to go
+with me.
+
+"No," I said; "you had better stay where you are. I shall be able
+to speak more freely if you are not present. Here is a book to amuse
+yourself with. I do not think I shall be long gone."
+
+But I was longer gone than I thought I should be.
+
+When I reached the carpenter's house, I found, to my surprise, that he
+was still at work. By the light of a single tallow candle placed beside
+him on the bench, he was ploughing away at a groove. His pale face, of
+which the lines were unusually sharp, as I might have expected after
+what had occurred, was the sole object that reflected the light of
+the candle to my eyes as I entered the gloomy place. He looked up, but
+without even greeting me, dropped his face again and went on with his
+work.
+
+"What!" I said, cheerily,--for I believed that, like Gideon's pitcher, I
+held dark within me the light that would discomfit his Midianites, which
+consciousness may well make the pitcher cheery inside, even while the
+light as yet is all its own--worthless, till it break out upon the
+world, and cease to illuminate only glazed pitcher-sides--"What!" I
+said, "working so late?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"It is not usual with you, I know."
+
+"It's all a humbug!" he said fiercely, but coldly notwithstanding, as
+he stood erect from his work, and turned his white face full on me--of
+which, however, the eyes drooped--"It's all a humbug; and I don't mean
+to be humbugged any more."
+
+"Am I a humbug?" I returned, not quite taken by surprise.
+
+"I don't say that. Don't make a personal thing of it, sir. You're taken
+in, I believe, like the rest of us. Tell me that a God governs the
+world! What have I done, to be used like this?"
+
+I thought with myself how I could retort for his young son: "What has
+he done to be used like this?" But that was not my way, though it might
+work well enough in some hands. Some men are called to be prophets. I
+could only "stand and wait."
+
+"It would be wrong in me to pretend ignorance," I said, "of what you
+mean. I know all about it."
+
+"Do you? He has been to you, has he? But you don't know all about it,
+sir. The impudence of the young rascal!"
+
+He paused for a moment.
+
+"A man like me!" he resumed, becoming eloquent in his indignation, and,
+as I thought afterwards, entirely justifying what Wordsworth says about
+the language of the so-called uneducated,--"A man like me, who was as
+proud of his honour as any aristocrat in the country--prouder than any
+of them would grant me the right to be!"
+
+"Too proud of it, I think--not too careful of it," I said. But I was
+thankful he did not heed me, for the speech would only have irritated
+him. He went on.
+
+"Me to be treated like this! One child a ..."
+
+Here came a terrible break in his speech. But he tried again.
+
+"And the other a ..."
+
+Instead of finishing the sentence, however, he drove his plough fiercely
+through the groove, splitting off some inches of the wall of it at the
+end.
+
+"If any one has treated you so," I said, "it must be the devil, not
+God."
+
+"But if there was a God, he could have prevented it all."
+
+"Mind what I said to you once before: He hasn't done yet. And there is
+another enemy in His way as bad as the devil--I mean our SELVES. When
+people want to walk their own way without God, God lets them try it. And
+then the devil gets a hold of them. But God won't let him keep them. As
+soon as they are 'wearied in the greatness of their way,' they begin to
+look about for a Saviour. And then they find God ready to pardon, ready
+to help, not breaking the bruised reed--leading them to his own self
+manifest--with whom no man can fear any longer, Jesus Christ, the
+righteous lover of men--their elder brother--what we call BIG BROTHER,
+you know--one to help them and take their part against the devil, the
+world, and the flesh, and all the rest of the wicked powers. So you
+see God is tender--just like the prodigal son's father--only with this
+difference, that God has millions of prodigals, and never gets tired of
+going out to meet them and welcome them back, every one as if he were
+the only prodigal son He had ever had. There's a father indeed! Have you
+been such a father to your son?"
+
+"The prodigal didn't come with a pack of lies. He told his father the
+truth, bad as it was."
+
+"How do you know that your son didn't tell you the truth? All the young
+men that go from home don't do as the prodigal did. Why should you not
+believe what he tells you?"
+
+"I'm not one to reckon without my host. Here's my bill."
+
+And so saying, he handed me a letter. I took it and read:--
+
+"SIR,--It has become our painful duty to inform you that your son has
+this day been discharged from the employment of Messrs---and Co., his
+conduct not being such as to justify the confidence hitherto reposed in
+him. It would have been contrary to the interests of the establishment
+to continue him longer behind the counter, although we are not prepared
+to urge anything against him beyond the fact that he has shown himself
+absolutely indifferent to the interests of his employers. We trust that
+the chief blame will be found to lie with certain connexions of a kind
+easy to be formed in large cities, and that the loss of his situation
+may be punishment sufficient, if not for justice, yet to make him
+consider his ways and be wise. We enclose his quarter's salary, which
+the young man rejected with insult, and,
+
+                      "We remain, &c.,
+
+                                    "---and Co."
+
+"And," I exclaimed, "this is what you found your judgment of your own
+son upon! You reject him unheard, and take the word of a stranger! I
+don't wonder you cannot believe in your Father when you behave so to
+your son. I don't say your conclusion is false, though I don't believe
+it. But I do say the grounds you go upon are anything but sufficient."
+
+"You don't mean to tell me that a man of Mr---'s standing, who has
+one of the largest shops in London, and whose brother is Mayor of
+Addicehead, would slander a poor lad like that!"
+
+"Oh you mammon-worshipper!" I cried. "Because a man has one of the
+largest shops in London, and his brother is Mayor of Addicehead, you
+take his testimony and refuse your son's! I did not know the boy till
+this evening; but I call upon you to bring back to your memory all that
+you have known of him from his childhood, and then ask yourself whether
+there is not, at least, as much probability of his having remained
+honest as of the master of a great London shop being infallible in his
+conclusions--at which conclusions, whatever they be, I confess no
+man can wonder, after seeing how readily his father listens to his
+defamation."
+
+I spoke with warmth. Before I had done, the pale face of the carpenter
+was red as fire; for he had been acting contrary to all his own theories
+of human equality, and that in a shameful manner. Still, whether
+convinced or not, he would not give in. He only drove away at his work,
+which he was utterly destroying. His mouth was closed so tight, he
+looked as if he had his jaw locked; and his eyes gleamed over the ruined
+board with a light which seemed to me to have more of obstinacy in it
+than contrition.
+
+"Ah, Thomas!" I said, taking up the speech once more, "if God had
+behaved to us as you have behaved to your boy--be he innocent, be he
+guilty--there's not a man or woman of all our lost race would have
+returned to Him from the time of Adam till now. I don't wonder that you
+find it difficult to believe in Him."
+
+And with those words I left the shop, determined to overwhelm the
+unbeliever with proof, and put him to shame before his own soul, whence,
+I thought, would come even more good to him than to his son. For there
+was a great deal of self-satisfaction mixed up with the man's honesty,
+and the sooner that had a blow the better--it might prove a death-blow
+in the long run. It was pride that lay at the root of his hardness. He
+visited the daughter's fault upon the son. His daughter had disgraced
+him; and he was ready to flash into wrath with his son upon any
+imputation which recalled to him the torture he had undergone when his
+daughter's dishonour came first to the light. Her he had never forgiven,
+and now his pride flung his son out after her upon the first suspicion.
+His imagination had filled up all the blanks in the wicked insinuations
+of Mr---. He concluded that he had taken money to spend in the worst
+company, and had so disgraced him beyond forgiveness. His pride
+paralysed his love. He thought more about himself than about his
+children. His own shame outweighed in his estimation the sadness of
+their guilt. It was a less matter that they should be guilty, than that
+he, their father, should be disgraced.
+
+Thinking over all this, and forgetting how late it was, I found myself
+half-way up the avenue of the Hall. I wanted to find out whether young
+Weir's fancy that the ladies he had failed in serving, or rather whom
+he had really served with honesty, were Mrs and Miss Oldcastle, was
+correct. What a point it would be if it was! I should not then be
+satisfied except I could prevail on Miss Oldcastle to accompany me to
+Thomas Weir, and shame the faithlessness out of him. So eager was I
+after certainty, that it was not till I stood before the house that I
+saw clearly the impropriety of attempting anything further that night.
+One light only was burning in the whole front, and that was on the first
+floor.
+
+Glancing up at it, I knew not why, as I turned to go down the hill
+again, I saw a corner of the blind drawn aside and a face peeping
+out--whose, I could not tell. This was uncomfortable--for what could be
+taking me there at such a time? But I walked steadily away, certain
+I could not escape recognition, and determining to refer to this
+ill-considered visit when I called the next day. I would not put it off
+till Monday, I was resolved.
+
+I lingered on the bridge as I went home. Not a light was to be seen in
+the village, except one over Catherine Weir's shop. There were not
+many restless souls in my parish--not so many as there ought to be. Yet
+gladly would I see the troubled in peace--not a moment, though, before
+their troubles should have brought them where the weary and heavy-laden
+can alone find rest to their souls--finding the Father's peace in the
+Son--the Father himself reconciling them to Himself.
+
+How still the night was! My soul hung, as it were, suspended in
+stillness; for the whole sphere of heaven seemed to be about me,
+the stars above shining as clear below in the mirror of the all but
+motionless water. It was a pure type of the "rest that remaineth"--rest,
+the one immovable centre wherein lie all the stores of might, whence
+issue all forces, all influences of making and moulding. "And, indeed,"
+I said to myself, "after all the noise, uproar, and strife that there
+is on the earth, after all the tempests, earthquakes, and volcanic
+outbursts, there is yet more of peace than of tumult in the world. How
+many nights like this glide away in loveliness, when deep sleep hath
+fallen upon men, and they know neither how still their own repose, nor
+how beautiful the sleep of nature! Ah, what must the stillness of the
+kingdom be? When the heavenly day's work is done, with what a gentle
+wing will the night come down! But I bethink me, the rest there, as
+here, will be the presence of God; and if we have Him with us, the
+battle-field itself will be--if not quiet, yet as full of peace as this
+night of stars." So I spoke to myself, and went home.
+
+I had little immediate comfort to give my young guest, but I had plenty
+of hope. I told him he must stay in the house to-morrow; for it would
+be better to have the reconciliation with his father over before he
+appeared in public. So the next day neither Weir was at church.
+
+As soon as the afternoon service was over, I went once more to the Hall,
+and was shown into the drawing-room--a great faded room, in which the
+prevailing colour was a dingy gold, hence called the yellow drawing-room
+when the house had more than one. It looked down upon the lawn, which,
+although little expense was now laid out on any of the ornamental
+adjuncts of the Hall, was still kept very nice. There sat Mrs Oldcastle
+reading, with her face to the house. A little way farther on, Miss
+Oldcastle sat, with a book on her knee, but her gaze fixed on the
+wide-spread landscape before her, of which, however, she seemed to be
+as inobservant as of her book. I caught glimpses of Judy flitting hither
+and thither among the trees, never a moment in one place.
+
+Fearful of having an interview with the old lady alone, which was not
+likely to lead to what I wanted, I stepped from a window which was open,
+out upon the terrace, and thence down the steps to the lawn below. The
+servant had just informed Mrs Oldcastle of my visit when I came near.
+She drew herself up in her chair, and evidently chose to regard my
+approach as an intrusion.
+
+"I did not expect a visit from you to-day, Mr Walton, you will allow me
+to say."
+
+"I am doing Sunday work," I answered. "Will you kindly tell me whether
+you were in London on Thursday last? But stay, allow me to ask Miss
+Oldcastle to join us."
+
+Without waiting for answer, I went to Miss Oldcastle, and begged her
+to come and listen to something in which I wanted her help. She rose
+courteously though without cordiality, and accompanied me to her mother,
+who sat with perfect rigidity, watching us.
+
+"Again let me ask," I said, "if you were in London on Thursday."
+
+Though I addressed the old lady, the answer came from her daughter.
+
+"Yes, we were."
+
+"Were you in---& Co.'s, in---Street?"
+
+But now before Miss Oldcastle could reply, her mother interposed.
+
+"Are we charged with shoplifting, Mr Walton? Really, one is not
+accustomed to such cross-questioning--except from a lawyer."
+
+"Have patience with me for a moment," I returned. "I am not going to be
+mysterious for more than two or three questions. Please tell me whether
+you were in that shop or not."
+
+"I believe we were," said the mother.
+
+"Yes, certainly," said the daughter.
+
+"Did you buy anything?"
+
+"No. We--" Miss Oldcastle began.
+
+"Not a word more," I exclaimed eagerly. "Come with me at once."
+
+"What DO you mean, Mr Walton?" said the mother, with a sort of cold
+indignation, while the daughter looked surprised, but said nothing.
+
+"I beg your pardon for my impetuosity; but much is in your power at this
+moment. The son of one of my parishioners has come home in trouble. His
+father, Thomas Weir--"
+
+"Ah!" said Mrs Oldcastle, in a tone considerably at strife with
+refinement. But I took no notice.
+
+"His father will not believe his story. The lad thinks you were the
+ladies in serving whom he got into trouble. I am so confident he tells
+the truth, that I want Miss Oldcastle to be so kind as to accompany me
+to Weir's house--"
+
+"Really, Mr Walton, I am astonished at your making such a request!"
+exclaimed Mrs Oldcastle, with suitable emphasis on every salient
+syllable, while her white face flushed with anger. "To ask Miss
+Oldcastle to accompany you to the dwelling of the ringleader of all the
+canaille of the neighbourhood!"
+
+"It is for the sake of justice," I interposed.
+
+"That is no concern of ours. Let them fight it out between them, I am
+sure any trouble that comes of it is no more than they all deserve. A
+low family--men and women of them."
+
+"I assure you, I think very differently."
+
+"I daresay you do."
+
+"But neither your opinion nor mine has anything to do with the matter."
+
+Here I turned to Miss Oldcastle and went on--
+
+"It is a chance which seldom occurs in one's life, Miss Oldcastle--a
+chance of setting wrong right by a word; and as a minister of the gospel
+of truth and love, I beg you to assist me with your presence to that
+end."
+
+I would have spoken more strongly, but I knew that her word given to me
+would be enough without her presence. At the same time, I felt not only
+that there would be a propriety in her taking a personal interest in
+the matter, but that it would do her good, and tend to create a favour
+towards each other in some of my flock between whom at present there
+seemed to be nothing in common.
+
+But at my last words, Mrs Oldcastle rose to her feet no longer red--now
+whiter than her usual whiteness with passion.
+
+"You dare to persist! You take advantage of your profession to persist
+in dragging my daughter into a vile dispute between mechanics of the
+lowest class--against the positive command of her only parent! Have you
+no respect for her position in society?--for her sex? MISTER WALTON, you
+act in a manner unworthy of your cloth."
+
+I had stood looking in her eyes with as much self-possession as I could
+muster. And I believe I should have borne it all quietly, but for that
+last word.
+
+If there is one epithet I hate more than another, it is that execrable
+word CLOTH--used for the office of a clergyman. I have no time to set
+forth its offence now. If my reader cannot feel it, I do not care to
+make him feel it. Only I am sorry to say it overcame my temper.
+
+"Madam," I said, "I owe nothing to my tailor. But I owe God my whole
+being, and my neighbour all I can do for him. 'He that loveth not his
+brother is a murderer,' or murderess, as the case may be."
+
+At that word MURDERESS, her face became livid, and she turned away
+without reply. By this time her daughter was half way to the house. She
+followed her. And here was I left to go home, with the full knowledge
+that, partly from trying to gain too much, and partly from losing my
+temper, I had at best but a mangled and unsatisfactory testimony to
+carry back to Thomas Weir. Of course I walked away--round the end of the
+house and down the avenue; and the farther I went the more mortified I
+grew. It was not merely the shame of losing my temper, though that was
+a shame--and with a woman too, merely because she used a common
+epithet!--but I saw that it must appear very strange to the carpenter
+that I was not able to give a more explicit account of some sort, what
+I had learned not being in the least decisive in the matter. It only
+amounted to this, that Mrs and Miss Oldcastle were in the shop on the
+very day on which Weir was dismissed. It proved that so much of what
+he had told me was correct--nothing more. And if I tried to better the
+matter by explaining how I had offended them, would it not deepen the
+very hatred I had hoped to overcome? In fact, I stood convicted before
+the tribunal of my own conscience of having lost all the certain good
+of my attempt, in part at least from the foolish desire to produce a
+conviction OF Weir rather than IN Weir, which should be triumphant after
+a melodramatic fashion, and--must I confess it?--should PUNISH him
+for not believing in his son when _I_ did; forgetting in my miserable
+selfishness that not to believe in his son was an unspeakably worse
+punishment in itself than any conviction or consequent shame brought
+about by the most overwhelming of stage-effects. I assure my reader, I
+felt humiliated.
+
+Now I think humiliation is a very different condition of mind from
+humility. Humiliation no man can desire: it is shame and torture.
+Humility is the true, right condition of humanity--peaceful, divine. And
+yet a man may gladly welcome humiliation when it comes, if he finds that
+with fierce shock and rude revulsion it has turned him right round,
+with his face away from pride, whither he was travelling, and towards
+humility, however far away upon the horizon's verge she may sit waiting
+for him. To me, however, there came a gentle and not therefore less
+effective dissolution of the bonds both of pride and humiliation; and
+before Weir and I met, I was nearly as anxious to heal his wounded
+spirit, as I was to work justice for his son.
+
+I was walking slowly, with burning cheek and downcast eyes, the one
+of conflict, the other of shame and defeat, away from the great house,
+which seemed to be staring after me down the avenue with all its
+window-eyes, when suddenly my deliverance came. At a somewhat sharp
+turn, where the avenue changed into a winding road, Miss Oldcastle stood
+waiting for me, the glow of haste upon her cheek, and the firmness
+of resolution upon her lips. Once more I was startled by her sudden
+presence, but she did not smile.
+
+"Mr Walton, what do you want me to do? I would not willing refuse, if it
+is, as you say, really my duty to go with you."
+
+"I cannot be positive about that," I answered. "I think I put it too
+strongly. But it would be a considerable advantage, I think, if you
+WOULD go with me and let me ask you a few questions in the presence of
+Thomas Weir. It will have more effect if I am able to tell him that
+I have only learned as yet that you were in the shop on that day, and
+refer him to you for the rest."
+
+"I will go."
+
+"A thousand thanks. But how did you manage to--?"
+
+Here I stopped, not knowing how to finish the question.
+
+"You are surprised that I came, notwithstanding mamma's objection to my
+going?"
+
+"I confess I am. I should not have been surprised at Judy's doing so,
+now."
+
+She was silent for a moment.
+
+"Do you think obedience to parents is to last for ever? The honour
+is, of course. But I am surely old enough to be right in following my
+conscience at least."
+
+"You mistake me. That is not the difficulty at all. Of course you ought
+to do what is right against the highest authority on earth, which I take
+to be just the parental. What I am surprised at is your courage."
+
+"Not because of its degree, only that it is mine!"
+
+And she sighed.--She was quite right, and I did not know what to answer.
+But she resumed.
+
+"I know I am cowardly. But if I cannot dare, I can bear. Is it not
+strange?--With my mother looking at me, I dare not say a word, dare
+hardly move against her will. And it is not always a good will. I cannot
+honour my mother as I would. But the moment her eyes are off me, I can
+do anything, knowing the consequences perfectly, and just as regardless
+of them; for, as I tell you, Mr Walton, I can endure; and you do not
+know what that might COME to mean with my mother. Once she kept me shut
+up in my room, and sent me only bread and water, for a whole week to
+the very hour. Not that I minded that much, but it will let you know a
+little of my position in my own home. That is why I walked away before
+her. I saw what was coming."
+
+And Miss Oldcastle drew herself up with more expression of pride than I
+had yet seen in her, revealing to me that perhaps I had hitherto quite
+misunderstood the source of her apparent haughtiness. I could not reply
+for indignation. My silence must have been the cause of what she said
+next.
+
+"Ah! you think I have no right to speak so about my own mother! Well!
+well! But indeed I would not have done so a month ago."
+
+"If I am silent, Miss Oldcastle, it is that my sympathy is too strong
+for me. There are mothers and mothers. And for a mother not to be a
+mother is too dreadful."
+
+She made no reply. I resumed.
+
+"It will seem cruel, perhaps;--certainly in saying it, I lay myself open
+to the rejoinder that talk is SO easy;--still I shall feel more honest
+when I have said it: the only thing I feel should be altered in your
+conduct--forgive me--is that you should DARE your mother. Do not think,
+for it is an unfortunate phrase, that my meaning is a vulgar one. If it
+were, I should at least know better than to utter it to you. What I mean
+is, that you ought to be able to be and do the same before your mother's
+eyes, that you are and do when she is out of sight. I mean that you
+should look in your mother's eyes, and do what is RIGHT."
+
+"I KNOW that--know it WELL." (She emphasized the words as I do.) "But
+you do not know what a spell she casts upon me; how impossible it is to
+do as you say."
+
+"Difficult, I allow. Impossible, not. You will never be free till you do
+so."
+
+"You are too hard upon me. Besides, though you will scarcely be able to
+believe it now, I DO honour her, and cannot help feeling that by doing
+as I do, I avoid irreverence, impertinence, rudeness--whichever is the
+right word for what I mean."
+
+"I understand you perfectly. But the truth is more than propriety of
+behaviour, even to a parent; and indeed has in it a deeper reverence, or
+the germ of it at least, than any adherence to the mere code of respect.
+If you once did as I want you to do, you would find that in reality you
+both revered and loved your mother more than you do now."
+
+"You may be right. But I am certain you speak without any real idea of
+the difficulty."
+
+"That may be. And yet what I say remains just as true."
+
+"How could I meet VIOLENCE, for instance?"
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+She returned no reply. We walked in silence for some minutes. At length
+she said,
+
+"My mother's self-will amounts to madness, I do believe. I have yet to
+learn where she would stop of herself."
+
+"All self-will is madness," I returned--stupidly enough For what is the
+use of making general remarks when you have a terrible concrete before
+you? "To want one's own way just and only because it is one's own way is
+the height of madness."
+
+"Perhaps. But when madness has to be encountered as if it were sense, it
+makes it no easier to know that it is madness."
+
+"Does your uncle give you no help?"
+
+"He! Poor man! He is as frightened at her as I am. He dares not even go
+away. He did not know what he was coming to when he came to Oldcastle
+Hall. Dear uncle! I owe him a great deal. But for any help of that sort,
+he is of no more use than a child. I believe mamma looks upon him as
+half an idiot. He can do anything or everything but help one to live, to
+BE anything. Oh me! I AM so tired!"
+
+And the PROUD lady, as I had thought her, perhaps not incorrectly, burst
+out crying.
+
+What was I to do? I did not know in the least. What I said, I do not
+even now know. But by this time we were at the gate, and as soon as
+we had passed the guardian monstrosities, we found the open road an
+effectual antidote to tears. When we came within sight of the old house
+where Weir lived, Miss Oldcastle became again a little curious as to
+what I required of her.
+
+"Trust me," I said. "There is nothing mysterious about it. Only I prefer
+the truth to come out fresh in the ears of the man most concerned."
+
+"I do trust you," she answered. And we knocked at the house-door.
+
+Thomas Weir himself opened the door, with a candle in his hand. He
+looked very much astonished to see his lady-visitor. He asked us,
+politely enough, to walk up-stairs, and ushered us into the large room I
+have already described. There sat the old man, as I had first seen him,
+by the side of the fire. He received us with more than politeness--with
+courtesy; and I could not help glancing at Miss Oldcastle to see what
+impression this family of "low, free-thinking republicans" made upon
+her. It was easy to discover that the impression was of favourable
+surprise. But I was as much surprised at her behaviour as she was at
+theirs. Not a haughty tone was to be heard in her voice; not a haughty
+movement to be seen in her form. She accepted the chair offered her,
+and sat down, perfectly at home, by the fireside, only that she turned
+towards me, waiting for what explanation I might think proper to give.
+
+Before I had time to speak, however, old Mr Weir broke the silence.
+
+"I've been telling Tom, sir, as I've told him many a time afore, as how
+he's a deal too hard with his children."
+
+"Father!" interrupted Thomas, angrily.
+
+"Have patience a bit, my boy," persisted the old man, turning again
+towards me.--"Now, sir, he won't even hear young Tom's side of the
+story; and I say that boy won't tell him no lie if he's the same boy he
+went away."
+
+"I tell you, father," again began Thomas; but this time I interposed, to
+prevent useless talk beforehand.
+
+"Thomas," I said, "listen to me. I have heard your son's side of the
+story. Because of something he said I went to Miss Oldcastle, and asked
+her whether she was in his late master's shop last Thursday. That is
+all I have asked her, and all she has told me is that she was. I know no
+more than you what she is going to reply to my questions now, but I have
+no doubt her answers will correspond to your son's story."
+
+I then put my questions to Miss Oldcastle, whose answers amounted to
+this:--That they had wanted to buy a shawl; that they had seen none good
+enough; that they had left the shop without buying anything; and that
+they had been waited upon by a young man, who, while perfectly polite
+and attentive to their wants, did not seem to have the ways or manners
+of a London shop-lad.
+
+I then told them the story as young Tom had related it to me, and asked
+if his sister was not in the house and might not go to fetch him. But
+she was with her sister Catherine.
+
+"I think, Mr Walton, if you have done with me, I ought to go home now,"
+said Miss Oldcastle.
+
+"Certainly," I answered. "I will take you home at once. I am greatly
+obliged to you for coming."
+
+"Indeed, sir," said the old man, rising with difficulty, "we're obliged
+both to you and the lady more than we can tell. To take such a deal of
+trouble for us! But you see, sir, you're one of them as thinks a man's
+got his duty to do one way or another, whether he be clergyman or
+carpenter. God bless you, Miss. You're of the right sort, which you'll
+excuse an old man, Miss, as'll never see ye again till ye've got the
+wings as ye ought to have."
+
+Miss Oldcastle smiled very sweetly, and answered nothing, but shook
+hands with them both, and bade them good-night. Weir could not speak a
+word; he could hardly even lift his eyes. But a red spot glowed on each
+of his pale cheeks, making him look very like his daughter Catherine,
+and I could see Miss Oldcastle wince and grow red too with the gripe he
+gave her hand. But she smiled again none the less sweetly.
+
+"I will see Miss Oldcastle home, and then go back to my house and bring
+the boy with me," I said, as we left.
+
+It was some time before either of us spoke. The sun was setting, the sky
+the earth and the air lovely with rosy light, and the world full of that
+peculiar calm which belongs to the evening of the day of rest. Surely
+the world ought to wake better on the morrow.
+
+"Not very dangerous people, those, Miss Oldcastle?" I said, at last.
+
+"I thank you very much for taking me to see them," she returned,
+cordially.
+
+"You won't believe all you may happen to hear against the working people
+now?"
+
+"I never did."
+
+"There are ill-conditioned, cross-grained, low-minded, selfish,
+unbelieving people amongst them. God knows it. But there are ladies and
+gentlemen amongst them too."
+
+"That old man is a gentleman."
+
+"He is. And the only way to teach them all to be such, is to be such
+to them. The man who does not show himself a gentleman to the working
+people--why should I call them the poor? some of them are better off
+than many of the rich, for they can pay their debts, and do it--"
+
+I had forgot the beginning of my sentence.
+
+"You were saying that the man who does not show himself a gentleman to
+the poor--"
+
+"Is no gentleman at all--only a gentle without the man; and if you
+consult my namesake old Izaak, you will find what that is."
+
+"I will look. I know your way now. You won't tell me anything I can find
+out for myself."
+
+"Is it not the best way?"
+
+"Yes. Because, for one thing, you find out so much more than you look
+for."
+
+"Certainly that has been my own experience."
+
+"Are you a descendant of Izaak Walton?"
+
+"No. I believe there are none. But I hope I have so much of his spirit
+that I can do two things like him."
+
+"Tell me."
+
+"Live in the country, though I was not brought up in it; and know a good
+man when I see him."
+
+"I am very glad you asked me to go to-night."
+
+"If people only knew their own brothers and sisters, the kingdom of
+heaven would not be far off."
+
+I do not think Miss Oldcastle quite liked this, for she was silent
+thereafter; though I allow that her silence was not conclusive. And we
+had now come close to the house.
+
+"I wish I could help you," I said.
+
+"In what?"
+
+"To bear what I fear is waiting you."
+
+"I told you I was equal to that. It is where we are unequal that we want
+help. You may have to give it me some day--who knows?"
+
+I left her most unwillingly in the porch, just as Sarah (the white wolf)
+had her hand on the door, rejoicing in my heart, however, over her last
+words.
+
+My reader will not be surprised, after all this, if, before I get
+very much further with my story, I have to confess that I loved Miss
+Oldcastle.
+
+When young Tom and I entered the room, his grandfather rose and tottered
+to meet him. His father made one step towards him and then hesitated. Of
+all conditions of the human mind, that of being ashamed of himself must
+have been the strangest to Thomas Weir. The man had never in his life, I
+believe, done anything mean or dishonest, and therefore he had had less
+frequent opportunities than most people of being ashamed of himself.
+Hence his fall had been from another pinnacle--that of pride. When a man
+thinks it such a fine thing to have done right, he might almost as well
+have done wrong, for it shows he considers right something EXTRA, not
+absolutely essential to human existence, not the life of a man. I call
+it Thomas Weir's fall; for surely to behave in an unfatherly manner to
+both daughter and son--the one sinful, and therefore needing the
+more tenderness--the other innocent, and therefore claiming
+justification--and to do so from pride, and hurt pride, was fall enough
+in one history, worse a great deal than many sins that go by harder
+names; for the world's judgment of wrong does not exactly correspond
+with the reality. And now if he was humbled in the one instance, there
+would be room to hope he might become humble in the other. But I had
+soon to see that, for a time, his pride, driven from its entrenchment
+against his son, only retreated, with all its forces, into the other
+against his daughter.
+
+Before a moment had passed, justice overcame so far that he held out his
+hand and said:--
+
+"Come, Tom, let by-gones be by-gones."
+
+But I stepped between.
+
+"Thomas Weir," I said, "I have too great a regard for you--and you know
+I dare not flatter you--to let you off this way, or rather leave you to
+think you have done your duty when you have not done the half of it.
+You have done your son a wrong, a great wrong. How can you claim to be
+a gentleman--I say nothing of being a Christian, for therein you make
+no claim--how, I say, can you claim to act like a gentleman, if, having
+done a man wrong--his being your own son has nothing to do with the
+matter one way or other, except that it ought to make you see your duty
+more easily--having done him wrong, why don't you beg his pardon, I say,
+like a man?"
+
+He did not move a step. But young Tom stepped hurriedly forward, and
+catching his father's hand in both of his, cried out:
+
+"My father shan't beg my pardon. I beg yours, father, for everything
+I ever did to displease you, but I WASN'T to blame in this. I wasn't,
+indeed."
+
+"Tom, I beg your pardon," said the hard man, overcome at last. "And
+now, sir," he added, turning to me, "will you let by-gones be by-gones
+between my boy and me?"
+
+There was just a touch of bitterness in his tone.
+
+"With all my heart," I replied. "But I want just a word with you in the
+shop before I go."
+
+"Certainly," he answered, stiffly; and I bade the old and the young man
+good night, and followed him down stairs.
+
+"Thomas, my friend," I said, when we got into the shop, laying my hand
+on his shoulder, "will you after this say that God has dealt hardly with
+you? There's a son for any man God ever made to give thanks for on his
+knees! Thomas, you have a strong sense of fair play in your heart, and
+you GIVE fair play neither to your own son nor yet to God himself. You
+close your doors and brood over your own miseries, and the wrongs people
+have done you; whereas, if you would but open those doors, you might
+come out into the light of God's truth, and see that His heart is as
+clear as sunlight towards you. You won't believe this, and therefore
+naturally you can't quite believe that there is a God at all; for,
+indeed, a being that was not all light would be no God at all. If you
+would but let Him teach you, you would find your perplexities melt away
+like the snow in spring, till you could hardly believe you had ever felt
+them. No arguing will convince you of a God; but let Him once come in,
+and all argument will be tenfold useless to convince you that there is
+no God. Give God justice. Try Him as I have said.--Good night."
+
+He did not return my farewell with a single word. But the grasp of his
+strong rough hand was more earnest and loving even than usual. I could
+not see his face, for it was almost dark; but, indeed, I felt that it
+was better I could not see it.
+
+I went home as peaceful in my heart as the night whose curtains God had
+drawn about the earth that it might sleep till the morrow.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV. MY PUPIL.
+
+
+Although I do happen to know how Miss Oldcastle fared that night after
+I left her, the painful record is not essential to my story. Besides, I
+have hitherto recorded only those things "quorum pars magna"--or minima,
+as the case may be--"fui." There is one exception, old Weir's story, for
+the introduction of which my reader cannot yet see the artistic reason.
+For whether a story be real in fact, or only real in meaning, there must
+always be an idea, or artistic model in the brain, after which it is
+fashioned: in the latter case one of invention, in the former case one
+of choice.
+
+In the middle of the following week I was returning from a visit I had
+paid to Tomkins and his wife, when I met, in the only street of the
+village, my good and honoured friend Dr Duncan. Of course I saw him
+often--and I beg my reader to remember that this is no diary, but only
+a gathering together of some of the more remarkable facts of my history,
+admitting of being ideally grouped--but this time I recall distinctly
+because the interview bore upon many things.
+
+"Well, Dr Duncan," I said, "busy as usual fighting the devil."
+
+"Ah, my dear Mr Walton," returned the doctor--and a kind word from him
+went a long way into my heart--"I know what you mean. You fight the
+devil from the inside, and I fight him from the outside. My chance is a
+poor one."
+
+"It would be, perhaps, if you were confined to outside remedies. But
+what an opportunity your profession gives you of attacking the enemy
+from the inside as well! And you have this advantage over us, that
+no man can say it belongs to your profession to say such things, and
+THEREFORE disregard them."
+
+"Ah, Mr Walton, I have too great a respect for your profession to dare
+to interfere with it. The doctor in 'Macbeth,' you know, could
+
+      'not minister to a mind diseased,
+    Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,
+    Raze out the written troubles of the brain,
+    And with some sweet oblivious antidote
+    Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff
+    Which weighs upon the heart.'"
+
+"What a memory you have! But you don't think I can do that any more than
+you?"
+
+"You know the best medicine to give, anyhow. I wish I always did. But
+you see we have no theriaca now."
+
+"Well, we have. For the Lord says, 'Come unto me, and I will give you
+rest.'"
+
+"There! I told you! That will meet all diseases."
+
+"Strangely now, there comes into my mind a line of Chaucer, with which
+I will make a small return for your quotation from Shakespeare; you have
+mentioned theriaca; and I, without thinking of this line, quoted our
+Lord's words. Chaucer brings the two together, for the word triacle is
+merely a corruption of theriaca, the unfailing cure for every thing.
+
+   'Crist, which that is to every harm triacle.'"
+
+"That is delightful: I thank you. And that is in Chaucer?"
+
+"Yes. In the Man-of-Law's Tale."
+
+"Shall I tell you how I was able to quote so correctly from Shakespeare?
+I have just come from referring to the passage. And I mention that
+because I want to tell you what made me think of the passage. I had been
+to see poor Catherine Weir. I think she is not long for this world. She
+has a bad cough, and I fear her lungs are going."
+
+"I am concerned to hear that. I considered her very delicate, and am not
+surprised. But I wish, I do wish, I had got a little hold of her before,
+that I might be of some use to her now. Is she in immediate danger, do
+you think?"
+
+"No. I do not think so. But I have no expectation of her recovery. Very
+likely she will just live through the winter and die in the spring.
+Those patients so often go as the flowers come! All her coughing, poor
+woman, will not cleanse her stuffed bosom. The perilous stuff weighs on
+her heart, as Shakespeare says, as well as on her lungs."
+
+"Ah, dear! What is it, doctor, that weighs upon her heart? Is it shame,
+or what is it? for she is so uncommunicative that I hardly know anything
+at all about her yet."
+
+"I cannot tell. She has the faculty of silence."
+
+"But do not think I complain that she has not made me her confessor.
+I only mean that if she would talk at all, one would have a chance of
+knowing something of the state of her mind, and so might give her some
+help."
+
+"Perhaps she will break down all at once, and open her mind to you. I
+have not told her she is dying. I think a medical man ought at least to
+be quite sure before he dares to say such a thing. I have known a long
+life injured, to human view at least, by the medical verdict in youth of
+ever imminent death."
+
+"Certainly one has no right to say what God is going to do with any one
+till he knows it beyond a doubt. Illness has its own peculiar mission,
+independent of any association with coming death, and may often work
+better when mingled with the hope of life. I mean we must take care of
+presumption when we measure God's plans by our theories. But could you
+not suggest something, Doctor Duncan, to guide me in trying to do my
+duty by her?"
+
+"I cannot. You see you don't know what she is THINKING; and till you
+know that, I presume you will agree with me that all is an aim in the
+dark. How can I prescribe, without SOME diagnosis? It is just one of
+those few cases in which one would like to have the authority of the
+Catholic priests to urge confession with. I do not think anything will
+save her life, as we say, but you have taught some of us to think of the
+life that belongs to the spirit as THE life; and I do believe confession
+would do everything for that."
+
+"Yes, if made to God. But I will grant that communication of one's
+sorrows or even sins to a wise brother of mankind may help to a deeper
+confession to the Father in heaven. But I have no wish for AUTHORITY in
+the matter. Let us see whether the Spirit of God working in her may not
+be quite as powerful for a final illumination of her being as the fiat
+confessio of a priest. I have no confidence in FORCING in the moral or
+spiritual garden. A hothouse development must necessarily be a sickly
+one, rendering the plant unfit for the normal life of the open air.
+Wait. We must not hurry things. She will perhaps come to me of herself
+before long. But I will call and inquire after her."
+
+We parted; and I went at once to Catherine Weir's shop. She received me
+much as usual, which was hardly to be called receiving at all. Perhaps
+there was a doubtful shadow, not of more cordiality, but of less
+repulsion in it. Her eyes were full of a stony brilliance, and the flame
+of the fire that was consuming her glowed upon her cheeks more brightly,
+I thought, than ever; but that might be fancy, occasioned by what the
+doctor had said about her. Her hand trembled, but her demeanour was
+perfectly calm.
+
+"I am sorry to hear you are complaining, Miss Weir," I said.
+
+"I suppose Dr Duncan told you so, sir. But I am quite well. I did not
+send for him. He called of himself, and wanted to persuade me I was
+ill."
+
+I understood that she felt injured by his interference.
+
+"You should attend to his advice, though. He is a prudent man, and not
+in the least given to alarming people without cause."
+
+She returned no answer. So I tried another subject.
+
+"What a fine fellow your brother is!"
+
+"Yes; he grows very much."
+
+"Has your father found another place for him yet?"
+
+"I don't know. My father never tells me about any of his doings."
+
+"But don't you go and talk to him, sometimes?"
+
+"No. He does not care to see me."
+
+"I am going there now: will you come with me?"
+
+"Thank you. I never go where I am not wanted."
+
+"But it is not right that father and daughter should live as you do.
+Suppose he may not have been so kind to you as he ought, you should not
+cherish resentment against him for it. That only makes matters worse,
+you know."
+
+"I never said to human being that he had been unkind to me."
+
+"And yet you let every person in the village know it."
+
+"How?"
+
+Her eye had no longer the stony glitter. It flashed now.
+
+"You are never seen together. You scarcely speak when you meet. Neither
+of you crosses the other's threshold."
+
+"It is not my fault."
+
+"It is not ALL your fault, I know. But do you think you can go to a
+heaven at last where you will be able to keep apart from each other, he
+in his house and you in your house, without any sign that it was through
+this father on earth that you were born into the world which the Father
+in heaven redeemed by the gift of His own Son?"
+
+She was silent; and, after a pause, I went on.
+
+"I believe, in my heart, that you love your father. I could not believe
+otherwise of you. And you will never be happy till you have made it up
+with him. Have you done him no wrong?"
+
+At these words, her face turned white--with anger, I could see--all but
+those spots on her cheek-bones, which shone out in dreadful contrast to
+the deathly paleness of the rest of her face. Then the returning blood
+surged violently from her heart, and the red spots were lost in one
+crimson glow. She opened her lips to speak, but apparently changing her
+mind, turned and walked haughtily out of the shop and closed the door
+behind her.
+
+I waited, hoping she would recover herself and return; but, after ten
+minutes had passed, I thought it better to go away.
+
+As I had told her, I was going to her father's shop.
+
+There I was received very differently. There was a certain softness in
+the manner of the carpenter which I had not observed before, with the
+same heartiness in the shake of his hand which had accompanied my last
+leave-taking. I had purposely allowed ten days to elapse before I called
+again, to give time for the unpleasant feelings associated with my
+interference to vanish. And now I had something in my mind about young
+Tom.
+
+"Have you got anything for your boy yet, Thomas?"
+
+"Not yet, sir. There's time enough. I don't want to part with him just
+yet. There he is, taking his turn at what's going. Tom!"
+
+And from the farther end of the large shop, where I had not observed
+him, now approached young Tom, in a canvas jacket, looking quite like a
+workman.
+
+"Well, Tom, I am glad to find you can turn your hand to anything."
+
+"I must be a stupid, sir, if I couldn't handle my father's tools,"
+returned the lad.
+
+"I don't know that quite. I am not just prepared to admit it for my own
+sake. My father is a lawyer, and I never could read a chapter in one of
+his books--his tools, you know."
+
+"Perhaps you never tried, sir."
+
+"Indeed, I did; and no doubt I could have done it if I had made up
+my mind to it. But I never felt inclined to finish the page. And that
+reminds me why I called to-day. Thomas, I know that lad of yours is fond
+of reading. Can you spare him from his work for an hour or so before
+breakfast?"
+
+"To-morrow, sir?"
+
+"To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow," I answered; "and there's
+Shakespeare for you."
+
+"Of course, sir, whatever you wish," said Thomas, with a perplexed look,
+in which pleasure seemed to long for confirmation, and to be, till that
+came, afraid to put its "native semblance on."
+
+"I want to give him some direction in his reading. When a man is fond
+of any tools, and can use them, it is worth while showing him how to use
+them better."
+
+"Oh, thank you, sir!" exclaimed Tom, his face beaming with delight.
+
+"That IS kind of you, sir! Tom, you're a made man!" cried the father.
+
+"So," I went on, "if you will let him come to me for an hour every
+morning, till he gets another place, say from eight to nine, I will see
+what I can do for him."
+
+Tom's face was as red with delight as his sister's had been with
+anger. And I left the shop somewhat consoled for the pain I had
+given Catherine, which grieved me without making me sorry that I had
+occasioned it.
+
+I had intended to try to do something from the father's side towards
+a reconciliation with his daughter. But no sooner had I made up my
+proposal for Tom than I saw I had blocked up my own way towards my more
+important end. For I could not bear to seem to offer to bribe him even
+to allow me to do him good. Nor would he see that it was for his good
+and his daughter's--not at first. The first impression would be that
+I had a PROFESSIONAL end to gain, that the reconciling of father and
+daughter was a sort of parish business of mine, and that I had smoothed
+the way to it by offering a gift--an intellectual one, true, but not,
+therefore, the less a gift in the eyes of Thomas, who had a great
+respect for books. This was just what would irritate such a man, and I
+resolved to say nothing about it, but bide my time.
+
+When Tom came, I asked him if he had read any of Wordsworth. For I
+always give people what I like myself, because that must be wherein I
+can best help them. I was anxious, too, to find out what he was capable
+of. And for this, anything that has more than a surface meaning will do.
+I had no doubt about the lad's intellect, and now I wanted to see what
+there was deeper than the intellect in him.
+
+He said he had not.
+
+I therefore chose one of Wordsworth's sonnets, not one of his best by
+any means, but suitable for my purpose--the one entitled, "Composed
+during a Storm." This I gave him to read, telling him to let me know
+when he considered that he had mastered the meaning of it, and sat
+down to my own studies. I remember I was then reading the Anglo-Saxon
+Gospels. I think it was fully half-an-hour before Tom rose and gently
+approached my place. I had not been uneasy about the experiment after
+ten minutes had passed, and after that time was doubled, I felt certain
+of some measure of success. This may possibly puzzle my reader; but I
+will explain. It was clear that Tom did not understand the sonnet
+at first; and I was not in the least certain that he would come
+to understand it by any exertion of his intellect, without further
+experience. But what I was delighted to be made sure of was that Tom
+at least knew that he did not know. For that is the very next step to
+knowing. Indeed, it may be said to be a more valuable gift than
+the other, being of general application; for some quick people will
+understand many things very easily, but when they come to a thing that
+is beyond their present reach, will fancy they see a meaning in it, or
+invent one, or even--which is far worse--pronounce it nonsense; and,
+indeed, show themselves capable of any device for getting out of the
+difficulty, except seeing and confessing to themselves that they are
+not able to understand it. Possibly this sonnet might be beyond Tom now,
+but, at least, there was great hope that he saw, or believed, that there
+must be something beyond him in it. I only hoped that he would not fall
+upon some wrong interpretation, seeing he was brooding over it so long.
+
+"Well, Tom," I said, "have you made it out?"
+
+"I can't say I have, sir. I'm afraid I'm very stupid, for I've tried
+hard. I must just ask you to tell me what it means. But I must tell you
+one thing, sir: every time I read it over--twenty times, I daresay--I
+thought I was lying on my mother's grave, as I lay that terrible night;
+and then at the end there you were standing over me and saying, 'Can I
+do anything to help you?'"
+
+I was struck with astonishment. For here, in a wonderful manner, I saw
+the imagination outrunning the intellect, and manifesting to the heart
+what the brain could not yet understand. It indicated undeveloped
+gifts of a far higher nature than those belonging to the mere power of
+understanding alone. For there was a hidden sympathy of the deepest kind
+between the life experience of the lad, and the embodiment of such life
+experience on the part of the poet. But he went on:
+
+"I am sure, sir, I ought to have been at my prayers, then, but I wasn't;
+so I didn't deserve you to come. But don't you think God is sometimes
+better to us than we deserve?"
+
+"He is just everything to us, Tom; and we don't and can't deserve
+anything. Now I will try to explain the sonnet to you."
+
+I had always had an impulse to teach; not for the teaching's sake, for
+that, regarded as the attempt to fill skulls with knowledge, had always
+been to me a desolate dreariness; but the moment I saw a sign of hunger,
+an indication of readiness to receive, I was invariably seized with
+a kind of passion for giving. I now proceeded to explain the sonnet.
+Having done so, nearly as well as I could, Tom said:
+
+"It is very strange, sir; but now that I have heard you say what the
+poem means, I feel as if I had known it all the time, though I could not
+say it."
+
+Here at least was no common mind. The reader will not be surprised
+to hear that the hour before breakfast extended into two hours after
+breakfast as well. Nor did this take up too much of my time, for the lad
+was capable of doing a great deal for himself under the sense of help at
+hand. His father, so far from making any objection to the arrangement,
+was delighted with it. Nor do I believe that the lad did less work in
+the shop for it: I learned that he worked regularly till eight o'clock
+every night.
+
+Now the good of the arrangement was this: I had the lad fresh in the
+morning, clear-headed, with no mists from the valley of labour to cloud
+the heights of understanding. From the exercise of the mind it was a
+pleasant and relieving change to turn to bodily exertion. I am certain
+that he both thought and worked better, because he both thought
+and worked. Every literary man ought to be MECHANICAL (to use a
+Shakespearean word) as well. But it would have been quite a different
+matter, if he had come to me after the labour of the day. He would not
+then have been able to think nearly so well. But LABOUR, SLEEP, THOUGHT,
+LABOUR AGAIN, seems to me to be the right order with those who, earning
+their bread by the sweat of the brow, would yet remember that man shall
+not live by bread alone. Were it possible that our mechanics could
+attend the institutions called by their name in the morning instead of
+the evening, perhaps we should not find them so ready to degenerate into
+places of mere amusement. I am not objecting to the amusement; only to
+cease to educate in order to amuse is to degenerate. Amusement is a good
+and sacred thing; but it is not on a par with education; and, indeed,
+if it does not in any way further the growth of the higher nature, it
+cannot be called good at all.
+
+Having exercised him in the analysis of some of the best portions of
+our home literature,--I mean helped him to take them to pieces, that,
+putting them together again, he might see what kind of things they
+were--for who could understand a new machine, or find out what it was
+meant for, without either actually or in his mind taking it to pieces?
+(which pieces, however, let me remind my reader, are utterly useless,
+except in their relation to the whole)--I resolved to try something
+fresh with him.
+
+At this point I had intended to give my readers a theory of mine about
+the teaching and learning of a language; and tell them how I had found
+the trial of it succeed in the case of Tom Weir. But I think this would
+be too much of a digression from the course of my narrative, and would,
+besides, be interesting to those only who had given a good deal of
+thought to subjects belonging to education. I will only say, therefore,
+that, by the end of three months, my pupil, without knowing any other
+Latin author, was able to read any part of the first book of the
+AEneid--to read it tolerably in measure, and to enjoy the poetry
+of it--and this not without a knowledge of the declensions and
+conjugations. As to the syntax, I made the sentences themselves teach
+him that. Now I know that, as an end, all this was of no great value;
+but as a beginning, it was invaluable, for it made and KEPT him hungry
+for more; whereas, in most modes of teaching, the beginnings are such
+that without the pressure of circumstances, no boy, especially after an
+interval of cessation, will return to them. Such is not Nature's mode,
+for the beginnings with her are as pleasant as the fruition, and that
+without being less thorough than they can be. The knowledge a child
+gains of the external world is the foundation upon which all his
+future philosophy is built. Every discovery he makes is fraught with
+pleasure--that is the secret of his progress, and the essence of my
+theory: that learning should, in each individual case, as in the first
+case, be DISCOVERY--bringing its own pleasure with it. Nor is this to be
+confounded with turning study into play. It is upon the moon itself that
+the infant speculates, after the moon itself--that he stretches out his
+eager hands--to find in after years that he still wants her, but that in
+science and poetry he has her a thousand-fold more than if she had been
+handed him down to suck.
+
+So, after all, I have bored my reader with a shadow of my theory,
+instead of a description. After all, again, the description would have
+plagued him more, and that must be both his and my comfort.
+
+So through the whole of that summer and the following winter, I went on
+teaching Tom Weir. He was a lad of uncommon ability, else he could not
+have effected what I say he had within his first three months of Latin,
+let my theory be not only perfect in itself, but true as well--true to
+human nature, I mean. And his father, though his own book-learning was
+but small, had enough of insight to perceive that his son was something
+out of the common, and that any possible advantage he might lose by
+remaining in Marshmallows was considerably more than counterbalanced by
+the instruction he got from the vicar. Hence, I believe, it was that not
+a word was said about another situation for Tom. And I was glad of it;
+for it seemed to me that the lad had abilities equal to any profession
+whatever.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV. DR DUNCAN'S STORY.
+
+
+On the next Sunday but one--which was surprising to me when I considered
+the manner of our last parting--Catherine Weir was in church, for the
+second time since I had come to the place. As it happened, only as
+Spenser says--
+
+     "It chanced--eternal God that chance did guide,"
+
+--and why I say this, will appear afterwards--I had, in preaching upon,
+that is, in endeavouring to enforce the Lord's Prayer by making them
+think about the meaning of the words they were so familiar with, come
+to the petition, "Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors;" with
+which I naturally connected the words of our Lord that follow: "For if
+ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive
+you; but if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your
+Father forgive your trespasses." I need not tell my reader more of what
+I said about this, than that I tried to show that even were it possible
+with God to forgive an unforgiving man, the man himself would not be
+able to believe for a moment that God did forgive him, and therefore
+could get no comfort or help or joy of any kind from the forgiveness;
+so essentially does hatred, or revenge, or contempt, or anything that
+separates us from man, separate us from God too. To the loving soul
+alone does the Father reveal Himself; for love alone can understand Him.
+It is the peace-makers who are His children.
+
+This I said, thinking of no one more than another of my audience. But as
+I closed my sermon, I could not help fancying that Mrs Oldcastle looked
+at me with more than her usual fierceness. I forgot all about it,
+however, for I never seemed to myself to have any hold of, or relation
+to, that woman. I know I was wrong in being unable to feel my relation
+to her because I disliked her. But not till years after did I begin to
+understand how she felt, or recognize in myself a common humanity with
+her. A sin of my own made me understand her condition. I can hardly
+explain now; I will tell it when the time comes. When I called upon her
+next, after the interview last related, she behaved much as if she had
+forgotten all about it, which was not likely.
+
+In the end of the week after the sermon to which I have alluded, I was
+passing the Hall-gate on my usual Saturday's walk, when Judy saw me from
+within, as she came out of the lodge. She was with me in a moment.
+
+"Mr Walton," she said, "how could you preach at Grannie as you did last
+Sunday?"
+
+"I did not preach at anybody, Judy."
+
+"Oh, Mr Walton!"
+
+"You know I didn't, Judy. You know that if I had, I would not say I had
+not."
+
+"Yes, yes; I know that perfectly," she said, seriously. "But Grannie
+thinks you did."
+
+"How do you know that?"
+
+"By her face."
+
+"That is all, is it?"
+
+"You don't think Grannie would say so?"
+
+"No. Nor yet that you could know by her face what she was thinking."
+
+"Oh! can't I just? I can read her face--not so well as plain print; but,
+let me see, as well as what Uncle Stoddart calls black-letter, at least.
+I know she thought you were preaching at her; and her face said, 'I
+shan't forgive YOU, anyhow. I never forgive, and I won't for all your
+preaching.' That's what her face said."
+
+"I am sure she would not say so, Judy," I said, really not knowing what
+to say.
+
+"Oh, no; she would not say so. She would say, 'I always forgive, but I
+never forget.' That's a favourite saying of hers."
+
+"But, Judy, don't you think it is rather hypocritical of you to say all
+this to me about your grandmother when she is so kind to you, and you
+seem such good friends with her?"
+
+She looked up in my face with an expression of surprise.
+
+"It is all TRUE, Mr Walton," she said.
+
+"Perhaps. But you are saying it behind her back."
+
+"I will go home and say it to her face directly."
+
+She turned to go.
+
+"No, no, Judy. I did not mean that," I said, taking her by the arm.
+
+"I won't say you told me to do it. I thought there was no harm in
+telling you. Grannie is kind to me, and I am kind to her. But Grannie
+is afraid of my tongue, and I mean her to be afraid of it. It's the only
+way to keep her in order. Darling Aunt Winnie! it's all she's got to
+defend her. If you knew how she treats her sometimes, you would be cross
+with Grannie yourself, Mr Walton, for all your goodness and your white
+surplice."
+
+And to my yet greater surprise, the wayward girl burst out crying, and,
+breaking away from me, ran through the gate, and out of sight amongst
+the trees, without once looking back.
+
+I pursued my walk, my meditations somewhat discomposed by the recurring
+question:--Would she go home and tell her grandmother what she had said
+to me? And, if she did, would it not widen the breach upon the opposite
+side of which I seemed to see Ethelwyn stand, out of the reach of my
+help?
+
+I walked quickly on to reach a stile by means of which I should soon
+leave the little world of Marshmallows quite behind me, and be alone
+with nature and my Greek Testament. Hearing the sound of horse-hoofs on
+the road from Addicehead, I glanced up from my pocket-book, in which I
+had been looking over the thoughts that had at various moments passed
+through my mind that week, in order to choose one (or more, if they
+would go together) to be brooded over to-day for my people's spiritual
+diet to-morrow--I say I glanced up from my pocket-book, and saw a young
+man, that is, if I could call myself young still, of distinguished
+appearance, approaching upon a good serviceable hack. He turned into my
+road and passed me. He was pale, with a dark moustache, and large dark
+eyes; sat his horse well and carelessly; had fine features of the
+type commonly considered Grecian, but thin, and expressive chiefly
+of conscious weariness. He wore a white hat with crape upon it, white
+gloves, and long, military-looking boots. All this I caught as he passed
+me; and I remember them, because, looking after him, I saw him stop at
+the lodge of the Hall, ring the bell, and then ride through the gate. I
+confess I did not quite like this; but I got over the feeling so far as
+to be able to turn to my Testament when I had reached and crossed the
+stile.
+
+I came home another way, after one of the most delightful days I had
+ever spent. Having reached the river in the course of my wandering, I
+came down the side of it towards Old Rogers's cottage, loitering and
+looking, quiet in heart and soul and mind, because I had committed my
+cares to Him who careth for us. The earth was round me--I was rooted, as
+it were, in it, but the air of a higher life was about me. I was swayed
+to and fro by the motions of a spiritual power; feelings and desires and
+hopes passed through me, passed away, and returned; and still my head
+rose into the truth, and the will of God was the regnant sunlight upon
+it. I might change my place and condition; new feelings might come
+forth, and old feelings retire into the lonely corners of my being; but
+still my heart should be glad and strong in the one changeless thing, in
+the truth that maketh free; still my head should rise into the sunlight
+of God, and I should know that because He lived I should live also, and
+because He was true I should remain true also, nor should any change
+pass upon me that should make me mourn the decadence of humanity. And
+then I found that I was gazing over the stump of an old pollard, on
+which I was leaning, down on a great bed of white water-lilies, that lay
+in the broad slow river, here broader and slower than in most places.
+The slanting yellow sunlight shone through the water down to the very
+roots anchored in the soil, and the water swathed their stems with
+coolness and freshness, and a universal sense, I doubt not, of watery
+presence and nurture. And there on their lovely heads, as they lay on
+the pillow of the water, shone the life-giving light of the summer sun,
+filling all the spaces between their outspread petals of living silver
+with its sea of radiance, and making them gleam with the whiteness which
+was born of them and the sun. And then came a hand on my shoulder,
+and, turning, I saw the gray head and the white smock of my old friend
+Rogers, and I was glad that he loved me enough not to be afraid of the
+parson and the gentleman.
+
+"I've found it, sir, I do think," he said, his brown furrowed old
+face shining with a yet lovelier light than that which shone from the
+blossoms of the water-lilies, though, after what I had been thinking
+about them, it was no wonder that they seemed both to mean the same
+thing,--both to shine in the light of His countenance.
+
+"Found what, Old Rogers?" I returned, raising myself, and laying my hand
+in return on his shoulder.
+
+"Why He was displeased with the disciples for not knowing--"
+
+"What He meant about the leaven of the Pharisees," I interrupted. "Yes,
+yes, of course. Tell me then."
+
+"I will try, sir. It was all dark to me for days. For it appeared to me
+very nat'ral that, seeing they had no bread in the locker, and hearing
+tell of leaven which they weren't to eat, they should think it had
+summat to do with their having none of any sort. But He didn't seem to
+think it was right of them to fall into the blunder. For why then? A
+man can't be always right. He may be like myself, a foremast-man with
+no schoolin' but what the winds and the waves puts into him, and I'm
+thinkin' those fishermen the Lord took to so much were something o' that
+sort. 'How could they help it?' I said to myself, sir. And from that I
+came to ask myself, 'Could they have helped it?' If they couldn't, He
+wouldn't have been vexed with them. Mayhap they ought to ha' been able
+to help it. And all at once, sir, this mornin', it came to me. I don't
+know how, but it was give to me, anyhow. And I flung down my rake, and
+I ran in to the old woman, but she wasn't in the way, and so I went back
+to my work again. But when I saw you, sir, a readin' upon the lilies o'
+the field, leastways, the lilies o' the water, I couldn't help runnin'
+out to tell you. Isn't it a satisfaction, sir, when yer dead reckonin'
+runs ye right in betwixt the cheeks of the harbour? I see it all now."
+
+"Well, I want to know, old Rogers. I'm not so old as you, and so I MAY
+live longer; and every time I read that passage, I should like to be
+able to say to myself, 'Old Rogers gave me this.'"
+
+"I only hope I'm right, sir. It was just this: their heads was full of
+their dinner because they didn't know where it was to come from. But
+they ought to ha' known where it always come from. If their hearts had
+been full of the dinner He gave the five thousand hungry men and women
+and children, they wouldn't have been uncomfortable about not having
+a loaf. And so they wouldn't have been set upon the wrong tack when He
+spoke about the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees; and they would
+have known in a moment what He meant. And if I hadn't been too much of
+the same sort, I wouldn't have started saying it was but reasonable
+to be in the doldrums because they were at sea with no biscuit in the
+locker."
+
+"You're right; you must be right, old Rogers. It's as plain as
+possible," I cried, rejoiced at the old man's insight. "Thank you. I'll
+preach about it to-morrow. I thought I had got my sermon in Foxborough
+Wood, but I was mistaken: you had got it."
+
+But I was mistaken again. I had not got my sermon yet.
+
+I walked with him to his cottage and left him, after a greeting with the
+"old woman." Passing then through the village, and seeing by the light
+of her candle the form of Catherine Weir behind her counter, I went in.
+I thought old Rogers's tobacco must be nearly gone, and I might safely
+buy some more. Catherine's manner was much the same as usual. But as she
+was weighing my purchase, she broke out all at once:
+
+"It's no use your preaching at me, Mr Walton. I cannot, I WILL not
+forgive. I will do anything BUT forgive. And it's no use."
+
+"It is not I that say it, Catherine. It is the Lord himself."
+
+I saw no great use in protesting my innocence, yet I thought it better
+to add--
+
+"And I was not preaching AT you. I was preaching to you, as much as to
+any one there, and no more."
+
+Of this she took no notice, and I resumed:
+
+"Just think of what HE says; not what I say."
+
+"I can't help it. If He won't forgive me, I must go without it. I can't
+forgive."
+
+I saw that good and evil were fighting in her, and felt that no words of
+mine could be of further avail at the moment. The words of our Lord had
+laid hold of her; that was enough for this time. Nor dared I ask her any
+questions. I had the feeling that it would hurt, not help. All I could
+venture to say, was:
+
+"I won't trouble you with talk, Catherine. Our Lord wants to talk to
+you. It is not for me to interfere. But please to remember, if ever you
+think I can serve you in any way, you have only to send for me."
+
+She murmured a mechanical thanks, and handed me my parcel. I paid for
+it, bade her good night, and left the shop.
+
+"O Lord," I said in my heart, as I walked away, "what a labour Thou hast
+with us all! Shall we ever, some day, be all, and quite, good like Thee?
+Help me. Fill me with Thy light, that my work may all go to bring about
+the gladness of Thy kingdom--the holy household of us brothers and
+sisters--all Thy children."
+
+And now I found that I wanted very much to see my friend Dr Duncan. He
+received me with his stately cordiality, and a smile that went farther
+than all his words of greeting.
+
+"Come now, Mr Walton, I am just going to sit down to my dinner, and
+you must join me. I think there will be enough for us both. There is, I
+believe, a chicken a-piece for us, and we can make up with cheese and
+a glass of--would you believe it?--my own father's port. He was fond
+of port--the old man--though I never saw him with one glass more aboard
+than the registered tonnage. He always sat light on the water. Ah, dear
+me! I'm old myself now."
+
+"But what am I to do with Mrs Pearson?" I said. "There's some
+chef-d'oeuvre of hers waiting for me by this time. She always treats me
+particularly well on Saturdays and Sundays."
+
+"Ah! then, you must not stop with me. You will fare better at home."
+
+"But I should much prefer stopping with you. Couldn't you send a message
+for me?"
+
+"To be sure. My boy will run with it at once."
+
+Now, what is the use of writing all this? I do not know. Only that
+even a tete-a-tete dinner with an old friend, now that I am an old man
+myself, has such a pearly halo about it in the mists of the past, that
+every little circumstance connected with it becomes interesting, though
+it may be quite unworthy of record. So, kind reader, let it stand.
+
+We sat down to our dinner, so simple and so well-cooked that it was just
+what I liked. I wanted very much to tell my friend what had occurred
+in Catherine's shop, but I would not begin till we were safe from
+interruption; and so we chatted away concerning many things, he
+telling me about his seafaring life, and I telling him some of the
+few remarkable things that had happened to me in the course of my
+life-voyage. There is no man but has met with some remarkable things
+that other people would like to know, and which would seem stranger to
+them than they did at the time to the person to whom they happened.
+
+At length I brought our conversation round to my interview with
+Catherine Weir.
+
+"Can you understand," I said, "a woman finding it so hard to forgive her
+own father?"
+
+"Are you sure it is her father?" he returned.
+
+"Surely she has not this feeling towards more than one. That she has it
+towards her father, I know."
+
+"I don't know," he answered. "I have known resentment preponderate over
+every other feeling and passion--in the mind of a woman too. I once
+heard of a good woman who cherished this feeling against a good man
+because of some distrustful words he had once addressed to herself. She
+had lived to a great age, and was expressing to her clergyman her desire
+that God would take her away: she had been waiting a long time. The
+clergyman--a very shrewd as well as devout man, and not without a touch
+of humour, said: 'Perhaps God doesn't mean to let you die till you've
+forgiven Mr---.' She was as if struck with a flash of thought, sat
+silent during the rest of his visit, and when the clergyman called the
+next day, he found Mr ---- and her talking together very quietly over a
+cup of tea. And she hadn't long to wait after that, I was told, but was
+gathered to her fathers--or went home to her children, whichever is the
+better phrase."
+
+"I wish I had had your experience, Dr Duncan," I said.
+
+"I have not had so much experience as a general practitioner, because
+I have been so long at sea. But I am satisfied that until a medical
+man knows a good deal more about his patient than most medical men give
+themselves the trouble to find out, his prescriptions will partake a
+good deal more than is necessary of haphazard.--As to this question of
+obstinate resentment, I know one case in which it is the ruling presence
+of a woman's life--the very light that is in her is resentment. I think
+her possessed myself.
+
+"Tell me something about her."
+
+"I will. But even to you I will mention no names. Not that I have her
+confidence in the least. But I think it is better not. I was called to
+attend a lady at a house where I had never yet been."
+
+"Was it in---?" I began, but checked myself. Dr Duncan smiled and went
+on without remark. I could see that he told his story with great care,
+lest, I thought, he should let anything slip that might give a clue to
+the place or people.
+
+"I was led up into an old-fashioned, richly-furnished room. A great
+wood-fire burned on the hearth. The bed was surrounded with heavy dark
+curtains, in which the shadowy remains of bright colours were just
+visible. In the bed lay one of the loveliest young creatures I had ever
+seen. And, one on each side, stood two of the most dreadful-looking
+women I had ever beheld. Still as death, while I examined my patient,
+they stood, with moveless faces, one as white as the other. Only the
+eyes of both of them were alive. One was evidently mistress, and the
+other servant. The latter looked more self-contained than the former,
+but less determined and possibly more cruel. That both could be unkind
+at least, was plain enough. There was trouble and signs of inward
+conflict in the eyes of the mistress. The maid gave no sign of any
+inside to her at all, but stood watching her mistress. A child's toy was
+lying in a corner of the room."
+
+I may here interrupt my friend's story to tell my reader that I may be
+mingling some of my own conclusions with what the good man told me of
+his. For he will see well enough already that I had in a moment attached
+his description to persons I knew, and, as it turned out, correctly,
+though I could not be certain about it till the story had advanced a
+little beyond this early stage of its progress.
+
+"I found the lady very weak and very feverish--a quick feeble pulse, now
+bounding, and now intermitting--and a restlessness in her eye which
+I felt contained the secret of her disorder. She kept glancing, as
+if involuntarily, towards the door, which would not open for all her
+looking, and I heard her once murmur to herself--for I was still quick
+of hearing then--'He won't come!' Perhaps I only saw her lips move to
+those words--I cannot be sure, but I am certain she said them in her
+heart. I prescribed for her as far as I could venture, but begged a word
+with her mother. She went with me into an adjoining room.
+
+"'The lady is longing for something,' I said, not wishing to be so
+definite as I could have been.
+
+"The mother made no reply. I saw her lips shut yet closer than before.
+
+"'She is your daughter, is she not?'
+
+"'Yes,'--very decidedly.
+
+"'Could you not find out what she wishes?'
+
+"'Perhaps I could guess.'
+
+"'I do not think I can do her any good till she has what she wants.'
+
+"'Is that your mode of prescribing, doctor?' she said, tartly.
+
+"'Yes, certainly,' I answered--'in the present case. Is she married?'
+
+"'Yes.'
+
+"'Has she any children?'
+
+"'One daughter.'
+
+"'Let her see her, then.'
+
+"'She does not care to see her.'
+
+"'Where is her husband?'
+
+"'Excuse me, doctor; I did not send for you to ask questions, but to
+give advice.'
+
+"'And I came to ask questions, in order that I might give advice. Do
+you think a human being is like a clock, that can be taken to pieces,
+cleaned, and put together again?'
+
+"'My daughter's condition is not a fit subject for jesting.'
+
+"'Certainly not. Send for her husband, or the undertaker, whichever you
+please,' I said, forgetting my manners and my temper together, for I was
+more irritable then than I am now, and there was something so repulsive
+about the woman, that I felt as if I was talking to an evil creature
+that for her own ends, though what I could not tell, was tormenting the
+dying lady.
+
+"'I understood you were a GENTLEMAN--of experience and breeding.'
+
+"'I am not in the question, madam. It is your daughter.'
+
+"'She shall take your prescription.'
+
+"'She must see her husband if it be possible.'
+
+"'It is not possible.'
+
+"'Why?'
+
+"'I say it is not possible, and that is enough. Good morning.'
+
+"I could say no more at that time. I called the next day. She was just
+the same, only that I knew she wanted to speak to me, and dared not,
+because of the presence of the two women. Her troubled eyes seemed
+searching mine for pity and help, and I could not tell what to do for
+her. There are, indeed, as some one says, strongholds of injustice and
+wrong into which no law can enter to help.
+
+"One afternoon, about a week after my first visit, I was sitting by her
+bedside, wondering what could be done to get her out of the clutches of
+these tormentors, who were, evidently to me, consuming her in the slow
+fire of her own affections, when I heard a faint noise, a rapid foot in
+the house so quiet before; heard doors open and shut, then a dull sound
+of conflict of some sort. Presently a quick step came up the oak-stair.
+The face of my patient flushed, and her eyes gleamed as if her soul
+would come out of them. Weak as she was she sat up in bed, almost
+without an effort, and the two women darted from the room, one after the
+other.
+
+"'My husband!' said the girl--for indeed she was little more in age,
+turning her face, almost distorted with eagerness, towards me.
+
+"'Yes, my dear,' I said, 'I know. But you must be as still as you can,
+else you will be very ill. Do keep quiet.'
+
+"'I will, I will,' she gasped, stuffing her pocket-handkerchief actually
+into her mouth to prevent herself from screaming, as if that was what
+would hurt her. 'But go to him. They will murder him.'
+
+"That moment I heard a cry, and what sounded like an articulate
+imprecation, but both from a woman's voice; and the next, a young
+man--as fine a fellow as I ever saw--dressed like a game-keeper, but
+evidently a gentleman, walked into the room with a quietness that
+strangely contrasted with the dreadful paleness of his face and with his
+disordered hair; while the two women followed, as red as he was white,
+and evidently in fierce wrath from a fruitless struggle with the
+powerful youth. He walked gently up to his wife, whose outstretched arms
+and face followed his face as he came round the bed to where she was at
+the other side, till arms, and face, and head, fell into his embrace.
+
+"I had gone to the mother.
+
+"'Let us have no scene now,' I said, 'or her blood will be on your
+head.'
+
+"She took no notice of what I said, but stood silently glaring, not
+gazing, at the pair. I feared an outburst, and had resolved, if it came,
+to carry her at once from the room, which I was quite able to do then,
+Mr Walton, though I don't look like it now. But in a moment more the
+young man, becoming uneasy at the motionlessness of his wife, lifted up
+her head, and glanced in her face. Seeing the look of terror in his, I
+hastened to him, and lifting her from him, laid her down--dead. Disease
+of the heart, I believe. The mother burst into a shriek--not of horror,
+or grief, or remorse, but of deadly hatred.
+
+"'Look at your work!' she cried to him, as he stood gazing in stupor on
+the face of the girl. 'You said she was yours, not mine; take her. You
+may have her now you have killed her.'
+
+"'He may have killed her; but you have MURDERED her, madam,' I said, as
+I took the man by the arm, and led him away, yielding like a child. But
+the moment I got him out of the house, he gave a groan, and, breaking
+away from me, rushed down a road leading from the back of the house
+towards the home-farm. I followed, but he had disappeared. I went on;
+but before I could reach the farm, I heard the gallop of a horse, and
+saw him tearing away at full speed along the London road. I never heard
+more of him, or of the story. Some women can be secret enough, I assure
+you."
+
+I need not follow the rest of our conversation. I could hardly doubt
+whose was the story I had heard. It threw a light upon several things
+about which I had been perplexed. What a horror of darkness seemed to
+hang over that family! What deeds of wickedness! But the reason was
+clear: the horror came from within; selfishness, and fierceness of
+temper were its source--no unhappy DOOM. The worship of one's own will
+fumes out around the being an atmosphere of evil, an altogether abnormal
+condition of the moral firmament, out of which will break the very
+flames of hell. The consciousness of birth and of breeding, instead of
+stirring up to deeds of gentleness and "high emprise," becomes then but
+an incentive to violence and cruelty; and things which seem as if they
+could not happen in a civilized country and a polished age, are proved
+as possible as ever where the heart is unloving, the feelings unrefined,
+self the centre, and God nowhere in the man or woman's vision.
+The terrible things that one reads in old histories, or in modern
+newspapers, were done by human beings, not by demons.
+
+I did not let my friend know that I knew all that he concealed; but I
+may as well tell my reader now, what I could not have told him then. I
+know all the story now, and, as no better place will come, as far as I
+can see, I will tell it at once, and briefly.
+
+Dorothy--a wonderful name, THE GIFT OF GOD, to be so treated, faring in
+this, however, like many other of God's gifts--Dorothy Oldcastle was the
+eldest daughter of Jeremy and Sibyl Oldcastle, and the sister therefore
+of Ethelwyn. Her father, who was an easy-going man, entirely under the
+dominion of his wife, died when she was about fifteen, and her mother
+sent her to school, with especial recommendation to the care of
+a clergyman in the neighbourhood, whom Mrs Oldcastle knew; for,
+somehow--and the fact is not so unusual as to justify especial inquiry
+here--though she paid no attention to what our Lord or His apostles
+said, nor indeed seemed to care to ask herself if what she did was
+right, or what she accepted (I cannot say BELIEVED) was true, she had
+yet a certain (to me all but incomprehensible) leaning to the clergy. I
+think it belongs to the same kind of superstition which many of our own
+day are turning to. Offered the Spirit of God for the asking, offered
+it by the Lord himself, in the misery of their unbelief they betake
+themselves to necromancy instead, and raise the dead to ask their
+advice, AND FOLLOW IT, and will find some day that Satan had not
+forgotten how to dress like an angel of light. Nay, he can be more
+cunning with the demands of the time. We are clever: he will be
+cleverer. Why should he dress and not speak like an angel of light? Why
+should he not give good advice if that will help to withdraw people by
+degrees from regarding the source of all good? He knows well enough that
+good advice goes for little, but that what fills the heart and mind goes
+for much. What religion is there in being convinced of a future state?
+Is that to worship God? It is no more religion than the belief that the
+sun will rise to-morrow is religion. It may be a source of happiness
+to those who could not believe it before, but it is not religion. Where
+religion comes that will certainly be likewise, but the one is not the
+other. The devil can afford a kind of conviction of that. It costs
+him little. But to believe that the spirits of the departed are the
+mediators between God and us is essential paganism--to call it nothing
+worse; and a bad enough name too since Christ has come and we have heard
+and seen the only-begotten of the Father. Thus the instinctive desire
+for the wonderful, the need we have of a revelation from above us,
+denied its proper food and nourishment, turns in its hunger to feed
+upon garbage. As a devout German says--I do not quote him quite
+correctly--"Where God rules not, demons will." Let us once see with our
+spiritual eyes the Wonderful, the Counsellor, and surely we shall not
+turn from Him to seek elsewhere the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
+
+Those who sympathize with my feeling in regard to this form of the
+materialism of our day, will forgive this divergence. I submit to the
+artistic blame of such as do not, and return to my story.
+
+Dorothy was there three or four years. I said I would be brief. She and
+the clergyman's son fell in love with each other. The mother heard of
+it, and sent for her home. She had other views for her. Of course,
+in such eyes, a daughter's FANCY was, irrespective of its object
+altogether, a thing to be sneered at. But she found, to her fierce
+disdain, that she had not been able to keep all her beloved obstinacy to
+herself: she had transmitted a portion of it to her daughter. But in her
+it was combined with noble qualities, and, ceasing to be the evil thing
+it was in her mother, became an honourable firmness, rendering her able
+to withstand her mother's stormy importunities. Thus Nature had begun
+to right herself--the right in the daughter turning to meet and defy the
+wrong in the mother, and that in the same strength of character which
+the mother had misused for evil and selfish ends. And thus the bad
+breed was broken. She was and would be true to her lover. The consequent
+SCENES were dreadful. The spirit but not the will of the girl was all
+but broken. She felt that she could not sustain the strife long. By some
+means, unknown to my informant, her lover contrived to communicate with
+her. He had, through means of relations who had great influence with
+Government, procured a good appointment in India, whither he must sail
+within a month. The end was that she left her mother's house. Mr Gladwyn
+was waiting for her near, and conducted her to his father's, who had
+constantly refused to aid Mrs Oldcastle by interfering in the matter.
+They were married next day by the clergyman of a neighbouring parish.
+But almost immediately she was taken so ill, that it was impossible for
+her to accompany her husband, and she was compelled to remain behind at
+the rectory, hoping to join him the following year.
+
+Before the time arrived, she gave birth to my little friend Judy;
+and her departure was again delayed by a return of her old complaint,
+probably the early stages of the disease of which she died. Then, just
+as she was about to set sail for India, news arrived that Mr Gladwyn had
+had a sunstroke, and would have leave of absence and come home as soon
+as he was able to be moved; so that instead of going out to join him,
+she must wait for him where she was. His mother had been dead for some
+time. His father, an elderly man of indolent habits, was found dead
+in his chair one Sunday morning soon after the news had arrived of the
+illness of his son, to whom he was deeply attached. And so the poor
+young creature was left alone with her child, without money, and in weak
+health. The old man left nothing behind him but his furniture and books.
+And nothing could be done in arranging his affairs till the arrival
+of his son, of whom the last accounts had been that he was slowly
+recovering. In the meantime his wife was in want of money, without
+a friend to whom she could apply. I presume that one of the few
+parishioners who visited at the rectory had written to acquaint Mrs
+Oldcastle with the condition in which her daughter was left, for,
+influenced by motives of which I dare not take upon me to conjecture an
+analysis, she wrote, offering her daughter all that she required in her
+old home. Whether she fore-intended her following conduct, or old habit
+returned with the return of her daughter, I cannot tell; but she had
+not been more than a few days in the house before she began to tyrannise
+over her, as in old times, and although Mrs Gladwyn's health, now always
+weak, was evidently failing in consequence, she either did not see
+the cause, or could not restrain her evil impulses. At length the news
+arrived of Mr Gladwyn's departure for home. Perhaps then for the first
+time the temptation entered her mind to take her revenge upon him, by
+making her daughter's illness a pretext for refusing him admission to
+her presence. She told her she should not see him till she was better,
+for that it would make her worse; persisted in her resolution after his
+arrival; and effected, by the help of Sarah, that he should not gain
+admittance to the house, keeping all the doors locked except one. It was
+only by the connivance of Ethelwyn, then a girl about fifteen, that he
+was admitted by the underground way, of which she unlocked the upper
+door for his entrance. She had then guided him as far as she dared, and
+directed him the rest of the way to his wife's room.
+
+My reader will now understand how it came about in the process of
+writing these my recollections, that I have given such a long chapter
+chiefly to that one evening spent with my good friend, Dr Duncan; for he
+will see, as I have said, that what he told me opened up a good deal to
+me.
+
+I had very little time for the privacy of the church that night. Dark
+as it was, however, I went in before I went home: I had the key of the
+vestry-door always in my pocket. I groped my way into the pulpit, and
+sat down in the darkness, and thought. Nor did my personal interest in
+Dr Duncan's story make me forget poor Catherine Weir and the terrible
+sore in her heart, the sore of unforgivingness. And I saw that of
+herself she would not, could not, forgive to all eternity; that all the
+pains of hell could not make her forgive, for that it was a divine glory
+to forgive, and must come from God. And thinking of Mrs Oldcastle, I saw
+that in ourselves we could be sure of no safety, not from the worst
+and vilest sins; for who could tell how he might not stupify himself by
+degrees, and by one action after another, each a little worse than the
+former, till the very fires of Sinai would not flash into eyes blinded
+with the incense arising to the golden calf of his worship? A man may
+come to worship a devil without knowing it. Only by being filled with
+a higher spirit than our own, which, having caused our spirits, is one
+with our spirits, and is in them the present life principle, are we or
+can we be safe from this eternal death of our being. This spirit was
+fighting the evil spirit in Catherine Weir: how was I to urge her to
+give ear to the good? If will would but side with God, the forces
+of self, deserted by their leader, must soon quit the field; and
+the woman--the kingdom within her no longer torn by conflicting
+forces--would sit quiet at the feet of the Master, reposing in that rest
+which He offered to those who could come to Him. Might she not be roused
+to utter one feeble cry to God for help? That would be one step towards
+the forgiveness of others. To ask something for herself would be a great
+advance in such a proud nature as hers. And to ask good heartily is the
+very next step to giving good heartily.
+
+Many thoughts such as these passed through my mind, chiefly associated
+with her. For I could not think how to think about Mrs Oldcastle yet.
+And the old church gloomed about me all the time. And I kept lifting up
+my heart to the God who had cared to make me, and then drew me to be a
+preacher to my fellows, and had surely something to give me to say
+to them; for did He not choose so to work by the foolishness of
+preaching?--Might not my humble ignorance work His will, though my
+wrath could not work His righteousness? And I descended from the pulpit
+thinking with myself, "Let Him do as He will. Here I am. I will say what
+I see: let Him make it good."
+
+And the next morning, I spoke about the words of our Lord:
+
+"If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children,
+how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them
+that ask Him!"
+
+And I looked to see. And there Catherine Weir sat, looking me in the
+face.
+
+There likewise sat Mrs Oldcastle, looking me in the face too.
+
+And Judy sat there, also looking me in the face, as serious as man could
+wish grown woman to look.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI. THE ORGAN.
+
+
+One little matter I forgot to mention as having been talked about
+between Dr Duncan and myself that same evening. I happened to refer to
+Old Rogers.
+
+"What a fine old fellow that is!" said Dr Duncan.
+
+"Indeed he is," I answered. "He is a great comfort and help to me. I
+don't think anybody but myself has an idea what there is in that old
+man."
+
+"The people in the village don't quite like him, though, I find. He is
+too ready to be down upon them when he sees things going amiss. The fact
+is, they are afraid of him."
+
+"Something as the Jews were afraid of John the Baptist, because he was
+an honest man, and spoke not merely his own mind, but the mind of God in
+it."
+
+"Just so. I believe you're quite right. Do you know, the other day,
+happening to go into Weir's shop to get him to do a job for me, I found
+him and Old Rogers at close quarters in an argument? I could not well
+understand the drift of it, not having been present at the beginning,
+but I soon saw that, keen as Weir was, and far surpassing Rogers in
+correctness of speech, and precision as well, the old sailor carried too
+heavy metal for the carpenter. It evidently annoyed Weir; but such was
+the good humour of Rogers, that he could not, for very shame, lose his
+temper, the old man's smile again and again compelling a response on the
+thin cheeks of ihe other."
+
+"I know how he would talk exactly," I returned. "He has a kind of
+loving banter with him, if you will allow me the expression, that is
+irresistible to any man with a heart in his bosom. I am very glad to
+hear there is anything like communion begun between them. Weir will get
+good from him."
+
+"My man-of-all-work is going to leave me. I wonder if the old man would
+take his place?"
+
+"I do not know whether he is fit for it. But of one thing you may be
+sure--if Old Rogers does not honestly believe he is fit for it, he will
+not take it. And he will tell you why, too."
+
+"Of that, however, I think I may be a better judge than he. There is
+nothing to which a good sailor cannot turn his hand, whatever he may
+think himself. You see, Mr Walton, it is not like a routine trade.
+Things are never twice the same at sea. The sailor has a thousand
+chances of using his judgment, if he has any to use; and that Old Rogers
+has in no common degree. So I should have no fear of him. If he won't
+let me steer him, you must put your hand to the tiller for me."
+
+"I will do what I can," I answered; "for nothing would please me more
+than to see him in your service. It would be much better for him, and
+his wife too, than living by uncertain jobs as he does now."
+
+The result of it all was, that Old Rogers consented to try for a month;
+but when the end of the month came, nothing was said on either side, and
+the old man remained. And I could see several little new comforts about
+the cottage, in consequence of the regularity of his wages.
+
+Now I must report another occurrence in regular sequence.
+
+To my surprise, and, I must confess, not a little to my discomposure,
+when I rose in the reading-desk on the day after this dinner with Dr
+Duncan, I saw that the Hall-pew was full. Miss Oldcastle was there for
+the first time, and, by her side, the gentleman whom the day before
+I had encountered on horseback. He sat carelessly, easily,
+contentedly--indifferently; for, although I never that morning looked up
+from my Prayer-book, except involuntarily in the changes of posture,
+I could not help seeing that he was always behind the rest of the
+congregation, as if he had no idea of what was coming next, or did not
+care to conform. Gladly would I, that day, have shunned the necessity
+of preaching that was laid upon me. "But," I said to myself, "shall the
+work given me to do fare ill because of the perturbation of my spirit?
+No harm is done, though I suffer; but much harm if one tone fails of its
+force because I suffer." I therefore prayed God to help me; and feeling
+the right, because I felt the need, of looking to Him for aid, I cast
+my care upon Him, kept my thoughts strenuously away from that which
+discomposed me, and never turned my eyes towards the Hall-pew from the
+moment I entered the pulpit. And partly, I presume, from the freedom
+given by the sense of irresponsibility for the result, I being weak
+and God strong, I preached, I think, a better sermon than I had ever
+preached before. But when I got into the vestry I found that I could
+scarcely stand for trembling; and I must have looked ill, for when my
+attendant came in he got me a glass of wine without even asking me if
+I would have it, although it was not my custom to take any there. But
+there was one of my congregation that morning who suffered more than I
+did from the presence of one of those who filled the Hall-pew.
+
+I recovered in a few moments from my weakness, but, altogether
+disinclined to face any of my congregation, went out at my vestry-door,
+and home through the shrubbery--a path I seldom used, because it had a
+separatist look about it. When I got to my study, I threw myself on a
+couch, and fell fast asleep. How often in trouble have I had to thank
+God for sleep as for one of His best gifts! And how often when I have
+awaked refreshed and calm, have I thought of poor Sir Philip Sidney,
+who, dying slowly and patiently in the prime of life and health, was
+sorely troubled in his mind to know how he had offended God, because,
+having prayed earnestly for sleep, no sleep came in answer to his cry!
+
+I woke just in time for my afternoon service; and the inward peace in
+which I found my heart was to myself a marvel and a delight. I felt
+almost as if I was walking in a blessed dream come from a world of
+serener air than this of ours. I found, after I was already in the
+reading-desk, that I was a few minutes early; and while, with bowed
+head, I was simply living in the consciousness of the presence of a
+supreme quiet, the first low notes of the organ broke upon my stillness
+with the sense of a deeper delight. Never before had I felt, as I felt
+that afternoon, the triumph of contemplation in Handel's rendering of "I
+know that my Redeemer liveth." And I felt how through it all ran a cold
+silvery quiver of sadness, like the light in the east after the sun is
+gone down, which would have been pain, but for the golden glow of
+the west, which looks after the light of the world with a patient
+waiting.--Before the music ceased, it had crossed my mind that I had
+never before heard that organ utter itself in the language of Handel.
+But I had no time to think more about it just then, for I rose to read
+the words of our Lord, "I will arise and go to my Father."
+
+There was no one in the Hall-pew; indeed it was a rare occurrence if any
+one was there in the afternoon.
+
+But for all the quietness of my mind during that evening service, I
+felt ill before I went to bed, and awoke in the morning with a headache,
+which increased along with other signs of perturbation of the system,
+until I thought it better to send for Dr Duncan. I have not yet got so
+imbecile as to suppose that a history of the following six weeks would
+be interesting to my readers--for during so long did I suffer from low
+fever; and more weeks passed during which I was unable to meet my flock.
+Thanks to the care of Mr Brownrigg, a clever young man in priest's
+orders, who was living at Addicehead while waiting for a curacy, kindly
+undertook my duty for me, and thus relieved me from all anxiety about
+supplying my place.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII. THE CHURCH-RATE.
+
+
+But I cannot express equal satisfaction in regard to everything that Mr
+Brownrigg took upon his own responsibility, as my reader will see.
+He, and another farmer, his neighbour, had been so often re-elected
+churchwardens, that at last they seemed to have gained a prescriptive
+right to the office, and the form of election fell into disuse; so much
+so, that after Mr Summer's death, which took place some year and a
+half before I became Vicar of Marshmallows, Mr Brownrigg continued to
+exercise the duty in his own single person, and nothing had as yet been
+said about the election of a colleague. So little seemed to fall to the
+duty of the churchwarden that I regarded the neglect as a trifle, and
+was remiss in setting it right. I had, therefore, to suffer, as was
+just. Indeed, Mr Brownrigg was not the man to have power in his hands
+unchecked.
+
+I had so far recovered that I was able to rise about noon and go into
+my study, though I was very weak, and had not yet been out, when one
+morning Mrs Pearson came into the room and said,--
+
+"Please, sir, here's young Thomas Weir in a great way about something,
+and insisting upon seeing you, if you possibly can."
+
+I had as yet seen very few of my friends, except the Doctor, and those
+only for two or three minutes; but although I did not feel very fit for
+seeing anybody just then, I could not but yield to his desire, confident
+there must be a good reason for it, and so told Mrs Pearson to show him
+in.
+
+"Oh, sir, I know you would be vexed if you hadn't been told," he
+exclaimed, "and I am sure you will not be angry with me for troubling
+you."
+
+"What is the matter, Tom?" I said. "I assure you I shall not be angry
+with you."
+
+"There's Farmer Brownrigg, at this very moment, taking away Mr
+Templeton's table because he won't pay the church-rate."
+
+"What church-rate?" I cried, starting up from the sofa. "I never heard
+of a church-rate."
+
+Now, before I go farther, it is necessary to explain some things. One
+day before I was taken ill, I had had a little talk with Mr Brownrigg
+about some repairs of the church which were necessary, and must be done
+before another winter. I confess I was rather pleased; for I wanted my
+people to feel that the church was their property, and that it was their
+privilege, if they could regard it as a blessing to have the church, to
+keep it in decent order and repair. So I said, in a by-the-by way, to my
+churchwarden, "We must call a vestry before long, and have this
+looked to." Now my predecessor had left everything of the kind to his
+churchwardens; and the inhabitants from their side had likewise left the
+whole affair to the churchwardens. But Mr Brownrigg, who, I must say,
+had taken more pains than might have been expected of him to make
+himself acquainted with the legalities of his office, did not fail to
+call a vestry, to which, as usual, no one had responded; whereupon he
+imposed a rate according to his own unaided judgment. This, I believe,
+he did during my illness, with the notion of pleasing me by the
+discovery that the repairs had been already effected according to my
+mind. Nor did any one of my congregation throw the least difficulty in
+the churchwarden's way.--And now I must refer to another circumstance in
+the history of my parish.
+
+I think I have already alluded to the fact that there were Dissenters
+in Marshmallows. There was a little chapel down a lane leading from the
+main street of the village, in which there was service three times every
+Sunday. People came to it from many parts of the parish, amongst whom
+were the families of two or three farmers of substance, while the
+village and its neighbourhood contributed a portion of the poorest of
+the inhabitants. A year or two before I came, their minister died, and
+they had chosen another, a very worthy man, of considerable erudition,
+but of extreme views, as I heard, upon insignificant points, and moved
+by a great dislike to national churches and episcopacy. This, I say, is
+what I had made out about him from what I had heard; and my reader will
+very probably be inclined to ask, "But why, with principles such as
+yours, should you have only hearsay to go upon? Why did you not make the
+honest man's acquaintance? In such a small place, men should not keep
+each other at arm's length." And any reader who says so, will say right.
+All I have to suggest for myself is simply a certain shyness, for which
+I cannot entirely account, but which was partly made up of fear to
+intrude, or of being supposed to arrogate to myself the right of
+making advances, partly of a dread lest we should not be able to get
+on together, and so the attempt should result in something unpleasantly
+awkward. I daresay, likewise, that the natural SHELLINESS of the
+English had something to do with it. At all events, I had not made his
+acquaintance.
+
+Mr Templeton, then, had refused, as a point of conscience, to pay
+the church-rate when the collector went round to demand it; had been
+summoned before a magistrate in consequence; had suffered a default;
+and, proceedings being pushed from the first in all the pride of
+Mr Brownrigg's legality, had on this very day been visited by the
+churchwarden, accompanied by a broker from the neighbouring town of
+Addicehead, and at the very time when I was hearing of the fact was
+suffering distraint of his goods. The porcine head of the churchwarden
+was not on his shoulders by accident, nor without significance.
+
+But I did not wait to understand all this now. It was enough for me that
+Tom bore witness to the fact that at that moment proceedings were
+thus driven to extremity. I rang the bell for my boots, and, to the
+open-mouthed dismay of Mrs Pearson, left the vicarage leaning on Tom's
+arm. But such was the commotion in my mind, that I had become quite
+unconscious of illness or even feebleness. Hurrying on in more terror
+than I can well express lest I should be too late, I reached Mr
+Templeton's house just as a small mahogany table was being hoisted into
+a spring-cart which stood at the door. Breathless with haste, I was yet
+able to call out,--
+
+"Put that table down directly."
+
+At the same moment Mr Brownrigg appeared from within the door. He
+approached with the self-satisfied look of a man who has done his duty,
+and is proud of it. I think he had not heard me.
+
+"You see I'm prompt, Mr Walton," he said. "But, bless my soul, how ill
+you look!"
+
+Without answering him--for I was more angry with him than I ought to
+have been--I repeated--
+
+"Put that table down, I tell you."
+
+They did so.
+
+"Now," I said, "carry it back into the house."
+
+"Why, sir," interposed Mr Brownrigg, "it's all right."
+
+"Yes," I said, "as right as the devil would have it."
+
+"I assure you, sir, I have done everything according to law."
+
+"I'm not so sure of that. I believe I had the right to be chairman
+at the vestry-meeting; but, instead of even letting me know, you took
+advantage of my illness to hurry on matters to this shameful and wicked
+excess."
+
+I did the poor man wrong in this, for I believe he had hurried things
+really to please me. His face had lengthened considerably by this time,
+and its rubicund hue declined.
+
+"I did not think you would stand upon ceremony about it, sir. You never
+seemed to care for business."
+
+"If you talk about legality, so will I. Certainly YOU don't stand upon
+ceremony."
+
+"I didn't expect you would turn against your own churchwarden in the
+execution of his duty, sir," he said in an offended tone. "It's bad
+enough to have a meetin'-house in the place, without one's own parson
+siding with t'other parson as won't pay a lawful church-rate."
+
+"I would have paid the church-rate for the whole parish ten times over
+before such a thing should have happened. I feel so disgraced, I am
+ashamed to look Mr Templeton in the face. Carry that table into the
+house again, directly."
+
+"It's my property, now," interposed the broker. "I've bought it of the
+churchwarden, and paid for it."
+
+I turned to Mr Brownrigg.
+
+"How much did he give you for it?" I asked.
+
+"Twenty shillings," returned he, sulkily, "and it won't pay expenses."
+
+"Twenty shillings!" I exclaimed; "for a table that cost three times as
+much at least!--What do you expect to sell it for?"
+
+"That's my business," answered the broker.
+
+I pulled out my purse, and threw a sovereign and a half on the table,
+saying--
+
+"FIFTY PER CENT. will be, I think, profit enough even on such a
+transaction."
+
+"I did not offer you the table," returned the broker. "I am not bound to
+sell except I please, and at my own price."
+
+"Possibly. But I tell you the whole affair is illegal. And if you carry
+away that table, I shall see what the law will do for me. I assure you I
+will prosecute you myself. You take up that money, or I will. It will
+go to pay counsel, I give you my word, if you do not take it to quench
+strife."
+
+I stretched out my hand. But the broker was before me. Without another
+word, he pocketed the money, jumped into his cart with his man, and
+drove off, leaving the churchwarden and the parson standing at the door
+of the dissenting minister with his mahogany table on the path between
+them.
+
+"Now, Mr Brownrigg," I said, "lend me a hand to carry this table in
+again."
+
+He yielded, not graciously,--that could not be expected,--but in
+silence.
+
+"Oh! sir," interposed young Tom, who had stood by during the dispute,
+"let me take it. You're not able to lift it."
+
+"Nonsense! Tom. Keep away," I said. "It is all the reparation I can
+make."
+
+And so Mr Brownrigg and I blundered into the little parlour with our
+burden--not a great one, but I began to find myself failing.
+
+Mr Templeton sat in a Windsor chair in the middle of the room. Evidently
+the table had been carried away from before him, leaving his position
+uncovered. The floor was strewed with the books which had lain upon it.
+He sat reading an old folio, as if nothing had happened. But when we
+entered he rose.
+
+He was a man of middle size, about forty, with short black hair and
+overhanging bushy eyebrows. His mouth indicated great firmness, not
+unmingled with sweetness, and even with humour. He smiled as he rose,
+but looked embarrassed, glancing first at the table, then at me, and
+then at Mr Brownrigg, as if begging somebody to tell him what to say.
+But I did not leave him a moment in this perplexity.
+
+"Mr Templeton," I said, quitting the table, and holding out my hand,
+"I beg your pardon for myself and my friend here, my churchwarden"--Mr
+Brownrigg gave a grunt--"that you should have been annoyed like this. I
+have--"
+
+Mr Templeton interrupted me.
+
+"I assure you it was a matter of conscience with me," he said. "On no
+other ground--"
+
+"I know it, I know it," I said, interrupting him in my turn. "I beg your
+pardon; and I have done my best to make amends for it. Offences must
+come, you know, Mr Templeton; but I trust I have not incurred the woe
+that follows upon them by means of whom they come, for I knew nothing of
+it, and indeed was too ill--"
+
+Here my strength left me altogether, and I sat down. The room began to
+whirl round me, and I remember nothing more till I knew that I was lying
+on a couch, with Mrs Templeton bathing my forehead, and Mr Templeton
+trying to get something into my mouth with a spoon.
+
+Ashamed to find myself in such circumstances, I tried to rise; but Mr
+Templeton, laying his hand on mine, said--
+
+"My dear sir, add to your kindness this day, by letting my wife and me
+minister to you."
+
+Now, was not that a courteous speech? He went on--
+
+"Mr Brownrigg has gone for Dr Duncan, and will be back in a few moments.
+I beg you will not exert yourself."
+
+I yielded and lay still. Dr Duncan came. His carriage followed, and I
+was taken home. Before we started, I said to Mr Brownrigg--for I could
+not rest till I had said it--
+
+"Mr Brownrigg, I spoke in heat when I came up to you, and I am sure I
+did you wrong. I am certain you had no improper motive in not making me
+acquainted with your proceedings. You meant no harm to me. But you did
+very wrong towards Mr Templeton. I will try to show you that when I am
+well again; but--"
+
+"But you mustn't talk more now," said Dr Duncan.
+
+So I shook hands with Mr Brownrigg, and we parted. I fear, from what I
+know of my churchwarden, that he went home with the conviction that he
+had done perfectly right; and that the parson had made an apology for
+interfering with a churchwarden who was doing his best to uphold the
+dignity of Church and State. But perhaps I may be doing him wrong again.
+
+I went home to a week more of bed, and a lengthened process of recovery,
+during which many were the kind inquiries made after me by my friends,
+and amongst them by Mr Templeton.
+
+And here I may as well sketch the result of that strange introduction to
+the dissenting minister.
+
+After I was tolerably well again, I received a friendly letter from
+him one day, expostulating with me on the inconsistency of my remaining
+within the pale of the ESTABLISHED CHURCH. The gist of the letter lay in
+these words:--
+
+"I confess it perplexes me to understand how to reconcile your Christian
+and friendly behaviour to one whom most of your brethren would consider
+as much beneath their notice as inferior to them in social position,
+with your remaining the minister of a Church in which such enormities
+as you employed your private influence to counteract in my case, are
+not only possible, but certainly lawful, and recognized by most of its
+members as likewise expedient."
+
+To this I replied:--
+
+"MY DEAR SIR,--I do not like writing letters, especially on subjects of
+importance. There are a thousand chances of misunderstanding. Whereas,
+in a personal interview, there is a possibility of controversy being
+hallowed by communion. Come and dine with me to-morrow, at any hour
+convenient to you, and make my apologies to Mrs Templeton for not
+inviting her with you, on the ground that we want to have a long
+talk with each other without the distracting influence which even her
+presence would unavoidably occasion.
+
+                                                "I am," &c. &c.
+
+He accepted my invitation at once. During dinner we talked away, not
+upon indifferent, but upon the most interesting subjects--connected
+with the poor, and parish work, and the influence of the higher upon the
+lower classes of society. At length we sat down on opposite sides of the
+fire; and as soon as Mrs Pearson had shut the door, I said,--
+
+"You ask me, Mr Templeton, in your very kind letter--" and here I put my
+hand in my pocket to find it.
+
+"I asked you," interposed Mr Templeton, "how you could belong to
+a Church which authorizes things of which you yourself so heartily
+disapprove."
+
+"And I answer you," I returned, "that just to such a Church our Lord
+belonged."
+
+"I do not quite understand you."
+
+"Our Lord belonged to the Jewish Church."
+
+"But ours is His Church."
+
+"Yes. But principles remain the same. I speak of Him as belonging to
+a Church. His conduct would be the same in the same circumstances,
+whatever Church He belonged to, because He would always do right. I
+want, if you will allow me, to show you the principle upon which He
+acted with regard to church-rates."
+
+"Certainly. I beg your pardon for interrupting you."
+
+"The Pharisees demanded a tribute, which, it is allowed, was for the
+support of the temple and its worship. Our Lord did not refuse to
+acknowledge their authority, notwithstanding the many ways in which
+they had degraded the religious observances of the Jewish Church. He
+acknowledged himself a child of the Church, but said that, as a child,
+He ought to have been left to contribute as He pleased to the support of
+its ordinances, and not to be compelled after such a fashion."
+
+"There I have you," exclaimed Mr Templeton. "He said they were wrong to
+make the tribute, or church-rate, if it really was such, compulsory."
+
+"I grant it: it is entirely wrong--a very unchristian proceeding. But
+our Lord did not therefore desert the Church, as you would have me do.
+HE PAID THE MONEY, lest He should offend. And not having it of His own,
+He had to ask His Father for it; or, what came to the same thing, make
+a servant of His Father, namely, a fish in the sea of Galilee, bring Him
+the money. And there I have YOU, Mr Templeton. It is wrong to compel,
+and wrong to refuse, the payment of a church-rate. I do not say equally
+wrong: it is much worse to compel than to refuse."
+
+"You are very generous," returned Mr Templeton. "May I hope that you
+will do me the credit to believe that if I saw clearly that they were
+the same thing, I would not hesitate a moment to follow our Lord's
+example."
+
+"I believe it perfectly. Therefore, however we may differ, we are in
+reality at no strife."
+
+"But is there not this difference, that our Lord was, as you say, a
+child of the Jewish Church, which was indubitably established by God?
+Now, if I cannot conscientiously belong to the so-called English Church,
+why should I have to pay church-rate or tribute?"
+
+"Shall I tell you the argument the English Church might then use? The
+Church might say, 'Then you are a stranger, and no child; therefore,
+like the kings of the earth, we MAY take tribute of you.' So you see
+it would come to this, that Dissenters alone should be COMPELLED to pay
+church-rates."
+
+We both laughed at this pushing of the argument to illegitimate
+conclusions. Then I resumed:
+
+"But the real argument is that not for such faults should we separate
+from each other; not for such faults, or any faults, so long as it is
+the repository of the truth, should you separate from the Church."
+
+"I will yield the point when you can show me the same ground for
+believing the Church of England THE NATIONAL CHURCH, appointed such by
+God, that I can show you, and you know already, for receiving the Jewish
+Church as the appointment of God."
+
+"That would involve a long argument, upon which, though I have little
+doubt upon the matter myself, I cannot say I am prepared to enter
+at this moment. Meantime, I would just ask you whether you are not
+sufficiently a child of the Church of England, having received from it
+a thousand influences for good, if in no other way, yet through your
+fathers, to find it no great hardship, and not very unreasonable, to
+pay a trifle to keep in repair one of the tabernacles in which our
+forefathers worshipped together, if, as I hope you will allow, in some
+imperfect measure God is worshipped, and the truth is preached in it?"
+
+"Most willingly would I pay the money. I object simply because the rate
+is compulsory."
+
+"And therein you have our Lord's example to the contrary."
+
+A silence followed; for I had to deal with an honest man, who was
+thinking. I resumed:--
+
+"A thousand difficulties will no doubt come up to be considered in the
+matter. Do not suppose I am anxious to convince you. I believe that our
+Father, our Elder Brother, and the Spirit that proceedeth from them, is
+teaching you, as I believe I too am being taught by the same. Why, then,
+should I be anxious to convince you of anything? Will you not in His
+good time come to see what He would have you see? I am relieved to speak
+my mind, knowing He would have us speak our minds to each other; but I
+do not want to proselytize. If you change your mind, you will probably
+do so on different grounds from any I give you, on grounds which show
+themselves in the course of your own search after the foundations of
+truth in regard perhaps to some other question altogether."
+
+Again a silence followed. Then Mr Templeton spoke:--
+
+"Don't think I am satisfied," he said, "because I don't choose to say
+anything more till I have thought about it. I think you are wrong
+in your conclusions about the Church, though surely you are right in
+thinking we ought to have patience with each other. And now tell
+me true, Mr Walton,--I'm a blunt kind of man, descended from an old
+Puritan, one of Cromwell's Ironsides, I believe, and I haven't been to a
+university like you, but I'm no fool either, I hope,--don't be offended
+at my question: wouldn't you be glad to see me out of your parish now?"
+
+I began to speak, but he went on.
+
+"Don't you regard me as an interloper now--one who has no right to speak
+because he does not belong to the Church?"
+
+"God forbid!" I answered. "If a word of mine would make you leave my
+parish to-morrow, I dare not say it. I do not want to incur the rebuke
+of our Lord--for surely the words 'Forbid him not' involved some rebuke.
+Would it not be a fearful thing that one soul, because of a deed of
+mine, should receive a less portion of elevation or comfort in his
+journey towards his home? Are there not countless modes of saying the
+truth? You have some of them. I hope I have some. People will hear you
+who will not hear me. Preach to them in the name and love of God, Mr
+Templeton. Speak that you do know and testify that you have seen. You
+and I will help each other, in proportion as we serve the Master. I only
+say that in separating from us you are in effect, and by your conduct,
+saying to us, "Do not preach, for you follow not with us." I will not
+be guilty of the same towards you. Your fathers did the Church no end of
+good by leaving it. But it is time to unite now."
+
+Once more followed a silence.
+
+"If people could only meet, and look each other in the face," said Mr
+Templeton at length, "they might find there was not such a gulf between
+them as they had fancied."
+
+And so we parted.
+
+Now I do not write all this for the sake of the church-rate question. I
+write it to commemorate the spirit in which Mr Templeton met me. For it
+is of consequence that two men who love their Master should recognize
+each that the other does so, and thereupon, if not before, should
+cease to be estranged because of difference of opinion, which surely,
+inevitable as offence, does not involve the same denunciation of woe.
+
+After this Mr Templeton and I found some opportunities of helping each
+other. And many a time ere his death we consulted together about things
+that befell. Once he came to me about a legal difficulty in connexion
+with the deed of trust of his chapel; and although I could not help
+him myself, I directed him to such help as was thorough and cost him
+nothing.
+
+I need not say he never became a churchman, or that I never expected he
+would. All his memories of a religious childhood, all the sources of
+the influences which had refined and elevated him, were surrounded with
+other associations than those of the Church and her forms. The
+Church was his grandmother, not his mother, and he had not made any
+acquaintance with her till comparatively late in life.
+
+But while I do not say that his intellectual objections to the Church
+were less strong than they had been, I am sure that his feelings were
+moderated, even changed towards her. And though this may seem of no
+consequence to one who loves the Church more than the brotherhood, it
+does not seem of little consequence to me who love the Church because of
+the brotherhood of which it is the type and the restorer.
+
+It was long before another church-rate was levied in Marshmallows. And
+when the circumstance did take place, no one dreamed of calling on
+Mr Templeton for his share in it. But, having heard of it, he called
+himself upon the churchwarden--Mr Brownrigg still--and offered the money
+cheerfully. AND MR BROWRIGG REFUSED TO TAKE IT TILL HE HAD CONSULTED ME!
+I told him to call on Mr Templeton, and say he would be much obliged to
+him for his contribution, and give him a receipt for it.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. JUDY'S NEWS.
+
+
+Perhaps my reader may be sufficiently interested in the person, who,
+having once begun to tell his story, may possibly have allowed his
+feelings, in concert with the comfortable confidence afforded by the
+mask of namelessness, to run away with his pen, and so have babbled of
+himself more than he ought--may be sufficiently interested, I say, in
+my mental condition, to cast a speculative thought upon the state of my
+mind, during my illness, with regard to Miss Oldcastle and the stranger
+who was her mother's guest at the Hall. Possibly, being by nature
+gifted, as I have certainly discovered, with more of hope than is
+usually mingled with the other elements composing the temperament of
+humanity, I did not suffer quite so much as some would have suffered
+during such an illness. But I have reason to fear that when I was
+light-headed from fever, which was a not uncommon occurrence, especially
+in the early mornings during the worst of my illness--when Mrs Pearson
+had to sit up with me, and sometimes an old woman of the village who was
+generally called in upon such occasions--I may have talked a good deal
+of nonsense about Miss Oldcastle. For I remember that I was haunted
+with visions of magnificent conventual ruins which I had discovered,
+and which, no one seeming to care about them but myself, I was left to
+wander through at my own lonely will. Would I could see with the waking
+eye such a grandeur of Gothic arches and "long-drawn aisles" as then
+arose upon my sick sense! Within was a labyrinth of passages in the
+walls, and "long-sounding corridors," and sudden galleries, whence I
+looked down into the great church aching with silence. Through these
+I was ever wandering, ever discovering new rooms, new galleries, new
+marvels of architecture; ever disappointed and ever dissatisfied,
+because I knew that in one room somewhere in the forgotten mysteries of
+the pile sat Ethelwyn reading, never lifting those sea-blue eyes of hers
+from the great volume on her knee, reading every word, slowly turning
+leaf after leaf; knew that she would sit there reading, till, one by
+one, every leaf in the huge volume was turned, and she came to the last
+and read it from top to bottom--down to the finis and the urn with a
+weeping willow over it; when she would close the book with a sigh, lay
+it down on the floor, rise and walk slowly away, and leave the glorious
+ruin dead to me as it had so long been to every one else; knew that if I
+did not find her before that terrible last page was read, I should never
+find her at all; but have to go wandering alone all my life through
+those dreary galleries and corridors, with one hope only left--that I
+might yet before I died find the "palace-chamber far apart," and see the
+read and forsaken volume lying on the floor where she had left it, and
+the chair beside it upon which she had sat so long waiting for some one
+in vain.
+
+And perhaps to words spoken under these impressions may partly be
+attributed the fact, which I knew nothing of till long afterwards, that
+the people of the village began to couple my name with that of Miss
+Oldcastle.
+
+When all this vanished from me in the returning wave of health that
+spread through my weary brain, I was yet left anxious and thoughtful.
+There was no one from whom I could ask any information about the family
+at the Hall, so that I was just driven to the best thing--to try to cast
+my care upon Him who cared for my care. How often do we look upon God
+as our last and feeblest resource! We go to Him because we have nowhere
+else to go. And then we learn that the storms of life have driven
+us, not upon the rocks, but into the desired haven; that we have been
+compelled, as to the last remaining, so to the best, the only, the
+central help, the causing cause of all the helps to which we had turned
+aside as nearer and better.
+
+One day when, having considerably recovered from my second attack, I was
+sitting reading in my study, who should be announced but my friend Judy!
+
+"Oh, dear Mr Walton, I am so sorry you have been so ill!" exclaimed the
+impulsive girl, taking my hand in both of hers, and sitting down beside
+me. "I haven't had a chance of coming to see you before; though we've
+always managed--I mean auntie and I--to hear about you. I would have
+come to nurse you, but it was no use thinking of it."
+
+I smiled as I thanked her.
+
+"Ah! you think because I'm such a tom-boy, that I couldn't nurse you. I
+only wish I had had a chance of letting you see. I am so sorry for you!"
+
+"But I'm nearly well now, Judy, and I have been taken good care of."
+
+"By that frumpy old thing, Mrs Pearson, and--"
+
+"Mrs Pearson is a very kind woman, and an excellent nurse," I said; but
+she would not heed me.
+
+"And that awful old witch, Mother Goose. She was enough to give you bad
+dreams all night she sat by you."
+
+"I didn't dream about Mother Goose, as you call her, Judy. I assure you.
+But now I want to hear how everybody is at the Hall."
+
+"What, grannie, and the white wolf, and all?"
+
+"As many as you please to tell me about."
+
+"Well, grannie is gracious to everybody but auntie."
+
+"Why isn't she gracious to auntie?"
+
+"I don't know. I only guess."
+
+"Is your visitor gone?"
+
+"Yes, long ago. Do you know, I think grannie wants auntie to marry him,
+and auntie doesn't quite like it? But he's very nice. He's so funny! He
+'ll be back again soon, I daresay. I don't QUITE like him--not so well
+as you by a whole half, Mr Walton. I wish you would marry auntie; but
+that would never do. It would drive grannie out of her wits."
+
+To stop the strange girl, and hide some confusion, I said:
+
+"Now tell me about the rest of them."
+
+"Sarah comes next. She's as white and as wolfy as ever. Mr Walton, I
+hate that woman. She walks like a cat. I am sure she is bad."
+
+"Did you ever think, Judy, what an awful thing it is to be bad? If you
+did, I think you would be so sorry for her, you could not hate her."
+
+At the same time, knowing what I knew now, and remembering that
+impressions can date from farther back than the memory can reach, I was
+not surprised to hear that Judy hated Sarah, though I could not believe
+that in such a child the hatred was of the most deadly description.
+
+"I am afraid I must go on hating in the meantime," said Judy. "I wish
+some one would marry auntie, and turn Sarah away. But that couldn't be,
+so long as grannie lives."
+
+"How is Mr Stoddart?"
+
+"There now! That's one of the things auntie said I was to be sure to
+tell you."
+
+"Then your aunt knew you were coming to see me?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I told her. Not grannie, you know.--You mustn't let it out."
+
+"I shall be careful. How is Mr Stoddart, then?"
+
+"Not well at all. He was taken ill before you, and has been in bed and
+by the fireside ever since. Auntie doesn't know what to do with him, he
+is so out of spirits."
+
+"If to-morrow is fine, I shall go and see him."
+
+"Thank you. I believe that's just what auntie wanted. He won't like it
+at first, I daresay. But he'll come to, and you'll do him good. You do
+everybody good you come near."
+
+"I wish that were true, Judy. I fear it is not. What good did I ever do
+you, Judy?"
+
+"Do me!" she exclaimed, apparently half angry at the question. "Don't
+you know I have been an altered character ever since I knew you?"
+
+And here the odd creature laughed, leaving me in absolute ignorance of
+how to interpret her. But presently her eyes grew clearer, and I could
+see the slow film of a tear gathering.
+
+"Mr Walton," she said, "I HAVE been trying not to be selfish. You have
+done me that much good."
+
+"I am very glad, Judy. Don't forget who can do you ALL good. There is
+One who can not only show you what is right, but can make you able to do
+and be what is right. You don't know how much you have got to learn yet,
+Judy; but there is that one Teacher ever ready to teach if you will only
+ask Him."
+
+Judy did not answer, but sat looking fixedly at the carpet. She was
+thinking, though, I saw.
+
+"Who has played the organ, Judy, since your uncle was taken ill?" I
+asked, at length.
+
+"Why, auntie, to be sure. Didn't you hear?"
+
+"No," I answered, turning almost sick at the idea of having been
+away from church for so many Sundays while she was giving voice and
+expression to the dear asthmatic old pipes. And I did feel very ready
+to murmur, like a spoilt child that had not had his way. Think of HER
+there, and me here!
+
+"Then," I said to myself at last, "it must have been she that played
+I know that my Redeemer liveth, that last time I was in church! And
+instead of thanking God for that, here I am murmuring that He did not
+give me more! And this child has just been telling me that I have taught
+her to try not to be selfish. Certainly I should be ashamed of myself."
+
+"When was your uncle taken ill?"
+
+"I don't exactly remember. But you will come and see him to-morrow? And
+then we shall see you too. For we are always out and in of his room just
+now."
+
+"I will come if Dr Duncan will let me. Perhaps he will take me in his
+carriage."
+
+"No, no. Don't you come with him. Uncle can't bear doctors. He never was
+ill in his life before, and he behaves to Dr Duncan just as if he had
+made him ill. I wish I could send the carriage for you. But I can't, you
+know."
+
+"Never mind, Judy. I shall manage somehow.--What is the name of the
+gentleman who was staying with you?"
+
+"Don't you know? Captain George Everard. He would change his name to
+Oldcastle, you know."
+
+What a foolish pain, like a spear-thrust, they sent through me--those
+words spoken in such a taken-for-granted way!
+
+"He's a relation--on grannie's side mostly, I believe. But I never
+could understand the explanation. What makes it harder is, that all the
+husbands and wives in our family, for a hundred and fifty years, have
+been more or less of cousins, or half-cousins, or second or third
+cousins. Captain Everard has what grandmamma calls a neat little
+property of his own from his mother, some where in Northumberland; for
+he IS only a third son, one of a class grannie does not in general feel
+very friendly to, I assure you, Mr Walton. But his second brother is
+dead, and the eldest something the worse for the wear, as grannie says;
+so that the captain comes just within sight of the coronet of an old
+uncle who ought to have been dead long ago. Just the match for auntie!"
+
+"But you say auntie doesn't like him."
+
+"Oh! but you know that doesn't matter," returned Judy, with bitterness.
+"What will grannie care for that? It's nothing to anybody but auntie,
+and she must get used to it. Nobody makes anything of her."
+
+It was only after she had gone that I thought how astounding it would
+have been to me to hear a girl of her age show such an acquaintance with
+worldliness and scheming, had I not been personally so much concerned
+about one of the objects of her remarks. She certainly was a strange
+girl. But strange as she was it was a satisfaction to think that the
+aunt had such a friend and ally in her wild niece. Evidently she had
+inherited her father's fearlessness; and if only it should turn out that
+she had likewise inherited her mother's firmness, she might render the
+best possible service to her aunt against the oppression of her wilful
+mother.
+
+"How were you able to get here to-day?" I asked, as she rose to go.
+
+"Grannie is in London, and the wolf is with her. Auntie wouldn't leave
+uncle."
+
+"They have been a good deal in London of late, have they not?"
+
+"Yes. They say it's about money of auntie's. But I don't understand. _I_
+think it's that grannie wants to make the captain marry her; for they
+sometimes see him when they go to London."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX. THE INVALID.
+
+
+The following day being very fine, I walked to Oldcastle Hall; but I
+remember well how much slower I was forced to walk than I was willing. I
+found to my relief that Mrs Oldcastle had not yet returned. I was
+shown at once to Mr Stoddart's library. There I found the two ladies in
+attendance upon him. He was seated by a splendid fire, for the autumn
+days were now chilly on the shady side, in the most luxurious of easy
+chairs, with his furred feet buried in the long hair of the hearth-rug.
+He looked worn and peevish. All the placidity of his countenance had
+vanished. The smooth expanse of his forehead was drawn into fifty
+wrinkles, like a sea over which the fretting wind has been blowing all
+night. Nor was it only suffering that his face expressed. He looked like
+a man who strongly suspected that he was ill-used.
+
+After salutation,--
+
+"You are well off, Mr Stoddart," I said, "to have two such nurses."
+
+"They are very kind," sighed the patient
+
+"You would recommend Mrs Pearson and Mother Goose instead, would you
+not, Mr Walton?" said Judy, her gray eyes sparkling with fun.
+
+"Judy, be quiet," said the invalid, languidly and yet sharply.
+
+Judy reddened and was silent.
+
+"I am sorry to find you so unwell," I said.
+
+"Yes; I am very ill," he returned.
+
+Aunt and niece rose and left the room quietly.
+
+"Do you suffer much, Mr Stoddart?"
+
+"Much weariness, worse than pain. I could welcome death."
+
+"I do not think, from what Dr Duncan says of you, that there is reason
+to apprehend more than a lingering illness," I said--to try him, I
+confess.
+
+"I hope not indeed," he exclaimed angrily, sitting up in his chair.
+"What right has Dr Duncan to talk of me so?"
+
+"To a friend, you know," I returned, apologetically, "who is much
+interested in your welfare."
+
+"Yes, of course. So is the doctor. A sick man belongs to you both by
+prescription."
+
+"For my part I would rather talk about religion to a whole man than a
+sick man. A sick man is not a WHOLE man. He is but part of a man, as it
+were, for the time, and it is not so easy to tell what he can take."
+
+"Thank you. I am obliged to you for my new position in the social scale.
+Of the tailor species, I suppose."
+
+I could not help wishing he were as far up as any man that does such
+needful honest work.
+
+"My dear sir, I beg your pardon. I meant only a glance at the peculiar
+relation of the words WHOLE and HEAL."
+
+"I do not find etymology interesting at present."
+
+"Not seated in such a library as this?"
+
+"No; I am ill."
+
+Satisfied that, ill as he was, he might be better if he would, I
+resolved to make another trial.
+
+"Do you remember how Ligarius, in Julius Caesar, discards his
+sickness?--
+
+"'I am not sick, if Brutus have in hand Any exploit worthy the name of
+honour.'"
+
+"I want to be well because I don't like to be ill. But what there is in
+this foggy, swampy world worth being well for, I'm sure I haven't found
+out yet."
+
+"If you have not, it must be because you have never tried to find
+out. But I'm not going to attack you when you are not able to defend
+yourself. We shall find a better time for that. But can't I do something
+for you? Would you like me to read to you for half an hour?"
+
+"No, thank you. The girls tire me out with reading to me. I hate the
+very sound of their voices."
+
+"I have got to-day's Times in my pocket."
+
+"I've heard all the news already."
+
+"Then I think I shall only bore you if I stay."
+
+He made me no answer. I rose. He just let me take his hand, and returned
+my good morning as if there was nothing good in the world, least of all
+this same morning.
+
+I found the ladies in the outer room. Judy was on her knees on the
+floor occupied with a long row of books. How the books had got there I
+wondered; but soon learned the secret which I had in vain asked of the
+butler on my first visit--namely, how Mr Stoddart reached the volumes
+arranged immediately under the ceiling, in shelves, as my reader may
+remember, that looked like beams radiating from the centre. For Judy
+rose from the floor, and proceeded to put in motion a mechanical
+arrangement concealed in one of the divisions of the book-shelves along
+the wall; and I now saw that there were strong cords reaching from the
+ceiling, and attached to the shelf or rather long box sideways open
+which contained the books.
+
+"Do take care, Judy," said Ethelwyn. "You know it is very venturous of
+you to let that shelf down, when uncle is as jealous of his books as a
+hen of her chickens. I oughtn't to have let you touch the cords."
+
+"You couldn't help it, auntie, dear; for I had the shelf half-way down
+before you saw me," returned Judy, proceeding to raise the books to
+their usual position under the ceiling.
+
+But in another moment, either from Judy's awkwardness, or from the
+gradual decay and final fracture of some cord, down came the whole shelf
+with a thundering noise, and the books were scattered hither and thither
+in confusion about the floor. Ethelwyn was gazing in dismay, and Judy
+had built up her face into a defiant look, when the door of the inner
+room opened and Mr Stoddart appeared. His brow was already flushed; but
+when he saw the condition of his idols, (for the lust of the eye had its
+full share in his regard for his books,) he broke out in a passion to
+which he could not have given way but for the weak state of his health.
+
+"How DARE you?" he said, with terrible emphasis on the word DARE. "Judy,
+I beg you will not again show yourself in my apartment till I send for
+you."
+
+"And then," said Judy, leaving the room, "I am not in the least likely
+to be otherwise engaged."
+
+"I am very sorry, uncle," began Miss Oldcastle.
+
+But Mr Stoddart had already retreated and banged the door behind him. So
+Miss Oldcastle and I were left standing together amid the ruins.
+
+She glanced at me with a distressed look. I smiled. She smiled in
+return.
+
+"I assure you," she said, "uncle is not a bit like himself."
+
+"And I fear in trying to rouse him, I have done him no good,--only made
+him more irritable," I said. "But he will be sorry when he comes to
+himself, and so we must take the reversion of his repentance now, and
+think nothing more of the matter than if he had already said he was
+sorry. Besides, when books are in the case, I, for one, must not be too
+hard upon my unfortunate neighbour."
+
+"Thank you, Mr Walton. I am so much obliged to you for taking my uncle's
+part. He has been very good to me; and that dear Judy is provoking
+sometimes. I am afraid I help to spoil her; but you would hardly believe
+how good she really is, and what a comfort she is to me--with all her
+waywardness."
+
+"I think I understand Judy," I replied; "and I shall be more mistaken
+than I am willing to confess I have ever been before, if she does
+not turn out a very fine woman. The marvel to me is that with all the
+various influences amongst which she is placed here, she is not really,
+not seriously, spoiled after all. I assure you I have the greatest
+regard for, as well as confidence in, my friend Judy."
+
+Ethelwyn--Miss Oldcastle, I should say--gave me such a pleased look that
+I was well recompensed--if justice should ever talk of recompense--for
+my defence of her niece.
+
+"Will you come with me?" she said; "for I fear our talk may continue
+to annoy Mr Stoddart. His hearing is acute at all times, and has been
+excessively so since his illness."
+
+"I am at your service," I returned, and followed her from the room.
+
+"Are you still as fond of the old quarry as you used to be, Miss
+Oldcastle?" I said, as we caught a glimpse of it from the window of a
+long passage we were going through.
+
+"I think I am. I go there most days. I have not been to-day, though.
+Would you like to go down?"
+
+"Very much," I said.
+
+"Ah! I forgot, though. You must not go; it is not a fit place for an
+invalid."
+
+"I cannot call myself an invalid now."
+
+"Your face, I am sorry to say, contradicts your words."
+
+And she looked so kindly at me, that I almost broke out into thanks for
+the mere look.
+
+"And indeed," she went on, "it is too damp down there, not to speak of
+the stairs."
+
+By this time we had reached the little room in which I was received the
+first time I visited the Hall. There we found Judy.
+
+"If you are not too tired already, I should like to show you my little
+study. It has, I think, a better view than any other room in the house,"
+said Miss Oldcastle.
+
+"I shall be delighted," I replied.
+
+"Come, Judy," said her aunt.
+
+"You don't want me, I am sure, auntie."
+
+"I do, Judy, really. You mustn't be cross to us because uncle has been
+cross to you. Uncle is not well, you know, and isn't a bit like himself;
+and you know you should not have meddled with his machinery."
+
+And Miss Oldcastle put her arm round Judy, and kissed her. Whereupon
+Judy jumped from her seat, threw her book down, and ran to one of
+the several doors that opened from the room. This disclosed a little
+staircase, almost like a ladder, only that it wound about, up which we
+climbed, and reached a charming little room, whose window looked down
+upon the Bishop's Basin, glimmering slaty through the tops of the trees
+between. It was panelled in small panels of dark oak, like the room
+below, but with more of carving. Consequently it was sombre, and its
+sombreness was unrelieved by any mirror. I gazed about me with a kind of
+awe. I would gladly have carried away the remembrance of everything and
+its shadow.--Just opposite the window was a small space of brightness
+formed by the backs of nicely-bound books. Seeing that these attracted
+my eye--
+
+"Those are almost all gifts from my uncle," said Miss Oldcastle. "He
+is really very kind, and you will not think of him as you have seen him
+to-day ?"
+
+"Indeed I will not," I replied.
+
+My eye fell upon a small pianoforte.
+
+"Do sit down," said Miss Oldcastle.--"You have been very ill, and I
+could do nothing for you who have been so kind to me."
+
+She spoke as if she had wanted to say this.
+
+"I only wish I had a chance of doing anything for you," I said, as I
+took a chair in the window. "But if I had done all I ever could hope to
+do, you have repaid me long ago, I think."
+
+"How? I do not know what you mean, Mr Walton. I have never done you the
+least service."
+
+"Tell me first, did you play the organ in church that afternoon
+when--after--before I was taken ill--I mean the same day you had--a
+friend with you in the pew in the morning ?"
+
+I daresay my voice was as irregular as my construction. I ventured just
+one glance. Her face was flushed. But she answered me at once.
+
+"I did."
+
+"Then I am in your debt more than you know or I can tell you."
+
+"Why, if that is all, I have played the organ every Sunday since uncle
+was taken ill," she said, smiling.
+
+"I know that now. And I am very glad I did not know it till I was better
+able to bear the disappointment. But it is only for what I heard that I
+mean now to acknowledge my obligation. Tell me, Miss Oldcastle,--what is
+the most precious gift one person can give another?"
+
+She hesitated; and I, fearing to embarrass her, answered for her.
+
+"It must be something imperishable,--something which in its own nature
+IS. If instead of a gem, or even of a flower, we could cast the gift of
+a lovely thought into the heart of a friend, that would be giving, as
+the angels, I suppose, must give. But you did more and better for me
+than that. I had been troubled all the morning; and you made me know
+that my Redeemer liveth. I did not know you were playing, mind, though I
+felt a difference. You gave me more trust in God; and what other gift so
+great could one give? I think that last impression, just as I was taken
+ill, must have helped me through my illness. Often when I was most
+oppressed, 'I know that my Redeemer liveth' would rise up in the
+troubled air of my mind, and sung by a voice which, though I never heard
+you sing, I never questioned to be yours."
+
+She turned her face towards me: those sea-blue eyes were full of tears.
+
+"I was troubled myself," she said, with a faltering voice, "when I
+sang--I mean played--that. I am so glad it did somebody good! I fear it
+did not do me much.--I will sing it to you now, if you like."
+
+And she rose to get the music. But that instant Judy, who, I then found,
+had left the room, bounded into it, with the exclamation,--
+
+"Auntie, auntie! here's grannie!"
+
+Miss Oldcastle turned pale. I confess I felt embarrassed, as if I had
+been caught in something underhand.
+
+"Is she come in?" asked Miss Oldcastle, trying to speak with
+indifference.
+
+"She is just at the door,--must be getting out of the fly now. What
+SHALL we do?"
+
+"What DO you mean, Judy?" said her aunt.
+
+"Well you know, auntie, as well as I do, that grannie will look as black
+as a thunder-cloud to find Mr Walton here; and if she doesn't speak as
+loud, it will only be because she can't. _I_ don't care for myself, but
+you know on whose head the storm will fall. Do, dear Mr Walton, come
+down the back-stair. Then she won't be a bit the wiser. I'll manage it
+all."
+
+Here was a dilemma for me; either to bring suffering on her, to save
+whom I would have borne any pain, or to creep out of the house as if I
+were and ought to be ashamed of myself. I believe that had I been in
+any other relation to my fellows, I would have resolved at once to lay
+myself open to the peculiarly unpleasant reproach of sneaking out of
+the house, rather than that she should innocently suffer for my being
+innocently there. But I was a clergyman; and I felt, more than I had
+ever felt before, that therefore I could not risk ever the appearance of
+what was mean. Miss Oldcastle, however, did not leave it to me to settle
+the matter. All that I have just written had but flashed through my mind
+when she said:--
+
+"Judy, for shame to propose such a thing to Mr Walton! I am very sorry
+that he may chance to have an unpleasant meeting with mamma; but we
+can't help it. Come, Judy, we will show Mr Walton out together."
+
+"It wasn't for Mr Walton's sake," returned Judy, pouting. "You are very
+troublesome, auntie dear. Mr Walton, she is so hard to take care of! and
+she's worse since you came. I shall have to give her up some day. Do be
+generous, Mr Walton, and take my side--that is, auntie's."
+
+"I am afraid, Judy, I must thank your aunt for taking the part of my
+duty against my inclination. But this kindness, at least," I said to
+Miss Oldcastle, "I can never hope to return."
+
+It was a stupid speech, but I could not be annoyed that I had made it.
+
+"All obligations are not burdens to be got rid of, are they?" she
+replied, with a sweet smile on such a pale troubled face, that I was
+more moved for her, deliberately handing her over to the torture for the
+truth's sake, than I care definitely to confess.
+
+Thereupon, Miss Oldcastle led the way down the stairs, I followed, and
+Judy brought up the rear. The affair was not so bad as it might have
+been, inasmuch as, meeting the mistress of the house in no penetralia
+of the same, I insisted on going out alone, and met Mrs Oldcastle in
+the hall only. She held out no hand to greet me. I bowed, and said I was
+sorry to find Mr Stoddart so far from well.
+
+"I fear he is far from well," she returned; "certainly in my opinion too
+ill to receive visitors."
+
+So saying, she bowed and passed on. I turned and walked out, not
+ill-pleased, as my readers will believe, with my visit.
+
+From that day I recovered rapidly, and the next Sunday had the pleasure
+of preaching to my flock; Mr Aikin, the gentleman already mentioned as
+doing duty for me, reading prayers. I took for my subject one of our
+Lord's miracles of healing, I forget which now, and tried to show my
+people that all healing and all kinds of healing come as certainly and
+only from His hand as those instances in which He put forth His bodily
+hand and touched the diseased, and told them to be whole.
+
+And as they left the church the organ played, "Comfort ye, comfort ye,
+my people, saith your God."
+
+I tried hard to prevent my new feelings from so filling my mind as to
+make me fail of my duty towards my flock. I said to myself, "Let me be
+the more gentle, the more honourable, the more tender, towards these
+my brothers and sisters, forasmuch as they are her brothers and sisters
+too." I wanted to do my work the better that I loved her.
+
+Thus week after week passed, with little that I can remember worthy of
+record. I seldom saw Miss Oldcastle, and during this period never alone.
+True, she played the organ still, for Mr Stoddart continued too unwell
+to resume his ministry of sound, but I never made any attempt to see her
+as she came to or went from the organ-loft. I felt that I ought not,
+or at least that it was better not, lest an interview should trouble my
+mind, and so interfere with my work, which, if my calling meant anything
+real, was a consideration of vital import. But one thing I could not
+help noting--that she seemed, by some intuition, to know the music I
+liked best; and great help she often gave me by so uplifting my heart
+upon the billows of the organ-harmony, that my thinking became free and
+harmonious, and I spoke, as far as my own feeling was concerned, like
+one upheld on the unseen wings of ministering cherubim. How it might
+be to those who heard me, or what the value of the utterance in itself
+might be, I cannot tell. I only speak of my own feelings, I say.
+
+Does my reader wonder why I did not yet make any further attempt to gain
+favour in the lady's eyes? He will see, if he will think for a moment.
+First of all, I could not venture until she had seen more of me; and how
+to enjoy more of her society while her mother was so unfriendly, both
+from instinctive dislike to me, and because of the offence I had given
+her more than once, I did not know; for I feared that to call oftener
+might only occasion measures upon her part to prevent me from seeing
+her daughter at all; and I could not tell how far such measures might
+expedite the event I most dreaded, or add to the discomfort to which
+Miss Oldcastle was already so much exposed. Meantime I heard nothing of
+Captain Everard; and the comfort that flowed from such a negative source
+was yet of a very positive character. At the same time--will my reader
+understand me?--I was in some measure deterred from making further
+advances by the doubt whether her favour for Captain Everard might not
+be greater than Judy had represented it. For I had always shrunk, I can
+hardly say with invincible dislike, for I had never tried to conquer
+it, from rivalry of every kind: it was, somehow, contrary to my nature.
+Besides, Miss Oldcastle was likely to be rich some day--apparently
+had money of her own even now; and was it a weakness? was it not a
+weakness?--I cannot tell--I writhed at the thought of being supposed to
+marry for money, and being made the object of such remarks as, "Ah! you
+see! That's the way with the clergy! They talk about poverty and faith,
+pretending to despise riches and to trust in God; but just put money in
+their way, and what chance will a poor girl have beside a rich one! It's
+all very well in the pulpit. It's their business to talk so. But does
+one of them believe what he says? or, at least, act upon it?" I think I
+may be a little excused for the sense of creeping cold that passed over
+me at the thought of such remarks as these, accompanied by compressed
+lips and down-drawn corners of the mouth, and reiterated nods of the
+head of KNOWINGNESS. But I mention this only as a repressing influence,
+to which I certainly should not have been such a fool as to yield, had I
+seen the way otherwise clear. For a man by showing how to use money, or
+rather simply by using money aright, may do more good than by refusing
+to possess it, if it comes to him in an entirely honourable way, that
+is, in such a case as mine, merely as an accident of his history. But I
+was glad to feel pretty sure that if I should be so blessed as to marry
+Miss Oldcastle--which at the time whereof I now write, seemed far too
+gorgeous a castle in the clouds ever to descend to the earth for me
+to enter it--the POOR of my own people would be those most likely to
+understand my position and feelings, and least likely to impute to me
+worldly motives, as paltry as they are vulgar, and altogether unworthy
+of a true man.
+
+So the time went on. I called once or twice on Mr Stoddart, and found
+him, as I thought, better. But he would not allow that he was. Dr Duncan
+said he was better, and would be better still, if he would only believe
+it and exert himself.
+
+He continued in the same strangely irritable humour.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX. MOOD AND WILL.
+
+
+Winter came apace. When we look towards winter from the last borders
+of autumn, it seems as if we could not encounter it, and as if it never
+would go over. So does threatened trouble of any kind seem to us as we
+look forward upon its miry ways from the last borders of the pleasant
+greensward on which we have hitherto been walking. But not only do both
+run their course, but each has its own alleviations, its own pleasures;
+and very marvellously does the healthy mind fit itself to the new
+circumstances; while to those who will bravely take up their burden
+and bear it, asking no more questions than just, "Is this my burden?"
+a thousand ministrations of nature and life will come with gentle
+comfortings. Across a dark verdureless field will blow a wind through
+the heart of the winter which will wake in the patient mind not a memory
+merely, but a prophecy of the spring, with a glimmer of crocus, or
+snow-drop, or primrose; and across the waste of tired endeavour will
+a gentle hope, coming he knows not whence, breathe springlike upon the
+heart of the man around whom life looks desolate and dreary. Well do I
+remember a friend of mine telling me once--he was then a labourer in
+the field of literature, who had not yet begun to earn his penny a day,
+though he worked hard--telling me how once, when a hope that had kept
+him active for months was suddenly quenched--a book refused on which he
+had spent a passion of labour--the weight of money that must be paid and
+could not be had, pressing him down like the coffin-lid that had lately
+covered the ONLY friend to whom he could have applied confidently for
+aid--telling me, I say, how he stood at the corner of a London street,
+with the rain, dripping black from the brim of his hat, the dreariest
+of atmospheres about him in the closing afternoon of the City, when
+the rich men were going home, and the poor men who worked for them were
+longing to follow; and how across this waste came energy and hope into
+his bosom, swelling thenceforth with courage to fight, and yield no ear
+to suggested failure. And the story would not be complete--though it is
+for the fact of the arrival of unexpected and apparently unfounded HOPE
+that I tell it--if I did not add, that, in the morning, his wife gave
+him a letter which their common trouble of yesterday had made her
+forget, and which had lain with its black border all night in the
+darkness unopened, waiting to tell him how the vanished friend had not
+forgotten him on her death-bed, but had left him enough to take him
+out of all those difficulties, and give him strength and time to do far
+better work than the book which had failed of birth.--Some of my readers
+may doubt whether I am more than "a wandering voice," but whatever I am,
+or may be thought to be, my friend's story is true.
+
+And all this has come out of the winter that I, in the retrospect of
+my history, am looking forward to. It came, with its fogs, and dripping
+boughs, and sodden paths, and rotting leaves, and rains, and skies
+of weary gray; but also with its fierce red suns, shining aslant upon
+sheets of manna-like hoarfrost, and delicate ice-films over prisoned
+waters, and those white falling chaoses of perfect forms--called
+snow-storms--those confusions confounded of infinite symmetries.
+
+And when the hard frost came, it brought a friend to my door. It was Mr
+Stoddart.
+
+He entered my room with something of the countenance Naaman must have
+borne, after his flesh had come again like unto the flesh of a little
+child. He did not look ashamed, but his pale face looked humble and
+distressed. Its somewhat self-satisfied placidity had vanished, and
+instead of the diffused geniality which was its usual expression, it now
+showed traces of feeling as well as plain signs of suffering. I gave him
+as warm a welcome as I could, and having seated him comfortably by the
+fire, and found that he would take no refreshment, began to chat about
+the day's news, for I had just been reading the newspaper. But he showed
+no interest beyond what the merest politeness required. I would try
+something else.
+
+"The cold weather, which makes so many invalids creep into bed, seems to
+have brought you out into the air, Mr Stoddart," I said.
+
+"It has revived me, certainly."
+
+"Indeed, one must believe that winter and cold are as beneficent, though
+not so genial, as summer and its warmth. Winter kills many a disease and
+many a noxious influence. And what is it to have the fresh green leaves
+of spring instead of the everlasting brown of some countries which have
+no winter!"
+
+I talked thus, hoping to rouse him to conversation, and I was
+successful.
+
+"I feel just as if I were coming out of a winter. Don't you think
+illness is a kind of human winter?"
+
+"Certainly--more or less stormy. With some a winter of snow and hail and
+piercing winds; with others of black frosts and creeping fogs, with now
+and then a glimmer of the sun."
+
+"The last is more like mine. I feel as if I had been in a wet hole in
+the earth."
+
+"And many a man," I went on, "the foliage of whose character had been
+turning brown and seared and dry, rattling rather than rustling in the
+faint hot wind of even fortunes, has come out of the winter of a weary
+illness with the fresh delicate buds of a new life bursting from the
+sun-dried bark."
+
+"I wish it would be so with me. I know you mean me. But I don't feel my
+green leaves coming."
+
+"Facts are not always indicated by feelings."
+
+"Indeed, I hope not; nor yet feelings indicated by facts."
+
+"I do not quite understand you."
+
+"Well, Mr Walton, I will explain myself. I have come to tell you how
+sorry and ashamed I am that I behaved so badly to you every time you
+came to see me."
+
+"Oh, nonsense!" I said. "It was your illness, not you."
+
+"At least, my dear sir, the facts of my behaviour did not really
+represent my feelings towards you."
+
+"I know that as well as you do. Don't say another word about it. You
+had the best excuse for being cross; I should have had none for being
+offended."
+
+"It was only the outside of me."
+
+"Yes, yes; I acknowledge it heartily."
+
+"But that does not settle the matter between me and myself, Mr Walton;
+although, by your goodness, it settles it between me and you. It is
+humiliating to think that illness should so completely 'overcrow' me,
+that I am no more myself--lose my hold, in fact, of what I call ME--so
+that I am almost driven to doubt my personal identity."
+
+"You are fond of theories, Mr Stoddart--perhaps a little too much so."
+
+"Perhaps."
+
+"Will you listen to one of mine?"
+
+"With pleasure."
+
+"It seems to me sometimes--I know it is a partial representation--as if
+life were a conflict between the inner force of the spirit, which lies
+in its faith in the unseen--and the outer force of the world, which lies
+in the pressure of everything it has to show us. The material, operating
+upon our senses, is always asserting its existence; and if our inner
+life is not equally vigorous, we shall be moved, urged, what is called
+actuated, from without, whereas all our activity ought to be from
+within. But sickness not only overwhelms the mind, but, vitiating all
+the channels of the senses, causes them to represent things as they
+are not, of which misrepresentations the presence, persistency, and
+iteration seduce the man to act from false suggestions instead of from
+what he knows and believes."
+
+"Well, I understand all that. But what use am I to make of your theory?"
+
+"I am delighted, Mr Stoddart, to hear you put the question. That is
+always the point.--The inward holy garrison, that of faith, which
+holds by the truth, by sacred facts, and not by appearances, must be
+strengthened and nourished and upheld, and so enabled to resist the
+onset of the powers without. A friend's remonstrance may appear an
+unkindness--a friend's jest an unfeelingness--a friend's visit an
+intrusion; nay, to come to higher things, during a mere headache it will
+appear as if there was no truth in the world, no reality but that of
+pain anywhere, and nothing to be desired but deliverance from it. But
+all such impressions caused from without--for, remember, the body and
+its innermost experiences are only OUTSIDE OF THE MAN--have to be met by
+the inner confidence of the spirit, resting in God and resisting every
+impulse to act according to that which APPEARS TO IT instead of that
+which IT BELIEVES. Hence, Faith is thus allegorically represented: but
+I had better give you Spenser's description of her--Here is the 'Fairy
+Queen':--
+
+   'She was arrayed all in lily white,
+    And in her right hand bore a cup of gold,
+    With wine and water filled up to the height,
+    In which a serpent did himself enfold,
+    That horror made to all that did behold;
+    But she no whit did change her constant mood.'
+
+This serpent stands for the dire perplexity of things about us, at which
+yet Faith will not blench, acting according to what she believes, and
+not what shows itself to her by impression and appearance."
+
+"I admit all that you say," returned Mr Stoddart. "But still the
+practical conclusion--which I understand to be, that the inward garrison
+must be fortified--is considerably incomplete unless we buttress it with
+the final HOW. How is it to be fortified? For,
+
+   'I have as much of this in art as you,
+    But yet my nature could not bear it so.'
+
+(You see I read Shakespeare as well as you, Mr Walton.) I daresay, from
+a certain inclination to take the opposite side, and a certain dislike
+to the dogmatism of the clergy--I speak generally--I may have appeared
+to you indifferent, but I assure you that I have laboured much to
+withdraw my mind from the influence of money, and ambition, and
+pleasure, and to turn it to the contemplation of spiritual things. Yet
+on the first attack of a depressing illness I cease to be a gentleman, I
+am rude to ladies who do their best and kindest to serve me, and I talk
+to the friend who comes to cheer and comfort me as if he were an idle
+vagrant who wanted to sell me a worthless book with the recommendation
+of the pretence that he wrote it himself. Now that I am in my right
+mind, I am ashamed of myself, ashamed that it should be possible for
+me to behave so, and humiliated yet besides that I have no ground of
+assurance that, should my illness return to-morrow, I should not behave
+in the same manner the day after. I want to be ALWAYS in my right mind.
+When I am not, I know I am not, and yet yield to the appearance of
+being."
+
+"I understand perfectly what you mean, for I fancy I know a little more
+of illness than you do. Shall I tell you where I think the fault of your
+self-training lies?"
+
+"That is just what I want. The things which it pleased me to contemplate
+when I was well, gave me no pleasure when I was ill. Nothing seemed the
+same."
+
+"If we were always in a right mood, there would be no room for the
+exercise of the will. We should go by our mood and inclination only. But
+that is by the by.--Where you have been wrong is--that you have
+sought to influence your feelings only by thought and argument with
+yourself--and not also by contact with your fellows. Besides the ladies
+of whom you have spoken, I think you have hardly a friend in this
+neighbourhood but myself. One friend cannot afford you half experience
+enough to teach you the relations of life and of human needs. At best,
+under such circumstances, you can only have right theories: practice for
+realising them in yourself is nowhere. It is no more possible for a
+man in the present day to retire from his fellows into the cave of his
+religion, and thereby leave the world of his own faults and follies
+behind, than it was possible for the eremites of old to get close to God
+in virtue of declining the duties which their very birth of human father
+and mother laid upon them. I do not deny that you and the eremite may
+both come NEARER to God, in virtue of whatever is true in your desires
+and your worship; 'but if a man love not his brother whom he hath seen,
+how can he love God whom he hath not seen?'--which surely means to imply
+at least that to love our neighbour is a great help towards loving God.
+How this love is to come about without intercourse, I do not see. And
+how without this love we are to bear up from within against the thousand
+irritations to which, especially in sickness, our unavoidable relations
+with humanity will expose us, I cannot tell either."
+
+"But," returned Mr Stoddart, "I had had a true regard for you, and
+some friendly communication with you. If human intercourse were what is
+required in my case, how should I fail just with respect to the only man
+with whom I had held such intercourse?"
+
+"Because the relations in which you stood with me were those of the
+individual, not of the race. You like me, because I am fortunate enough
+to please you--to be a gentleman, I hope--to be a man of some education,
+and capable of understanding, or at least docile enough to try to
+understand, what you tell me of your plans and pursuits. But you do not
+feel any relation to me on the ground of my humanity--that God made me,
+and therefore I am your brother. It is not because we grow out of the
+same stem, but merely because my leaf is a little like your own that you
+draw to me. Our Lord took on Him the nature of man: you will only
+regard your individual attractions. Disturb your liking and your love
+vanishes."
+
+"You are severe."
+
+"I don't mean really vanishes, but disappears for the time. Yet you will
+confess you have to wait till, somehow, you know not how, it comes back
+again--of itself, as it were."
+
+"Yes, I confess. To my sorrow, I find it so."
+
+"Let me tell you the truth, Mr Stoddart. You seem to me to have been
+hitherto only a dilettante or amateur in spiritual matters. Do not
+imagine I mean a hypocrite. Very far from it. The word amateur itself
+suggests a real interest, though it may be of a superficial nature. But
+in religion one must be all there. You seem to me to have taken much
+interest in unusual forms of theory, and in mystical speculations, to
+which in themselves I make no objection. But to be content with those,
+instead of knowing God himself, or to substitute a general amateur
+friendship towards the race for the love of your neighbour, is a mockery
+which will always manifest itself to an honest mind like yours in
+such failure and disappointment in your own character as you are now
+lamenting, if not indeed in some mode far more alarming, because gross
+and terrible."
+
+"Am I to understand you, then, that intercourse with one's neighbours
+ought to take the place of meditation?"
+
+"By no means: but ought to go side by side with it, if you would have
+at once a healthy mind to judge and the means of either verifying your
+speculations or discovering their falsehood."
+
+"But where am I to find such friends besides yourself with whom to hold
+spiritual communion?"
+
+"It is the communion of spiritual deeds, deeds of justice, of mercy,
+of humility--the kind word, the cup of cold water, the visitation in
+sickness, the lending of money--not spiritual conference or talk, that I
+mean: the latter will come of itself where it is natural. You would soon
+find that it is not only to those whose spiritual windows are of the
+same shape as your own that you are neighbour: there is one poor man
+in my congregation who knows more--practically, I mean, too--of
+spirituality of mind than any of us. Perhaps you could not teach him
+much, but he could teach you. At all events, our neighbours are just
+those round about us. And the most ignorant man in a little place like
+Marshmallows, one like you with leisure ought to know and understand,
+and have some good influence upon: he is your brother whom you are
+bound to care for and elevate--I do not mean socially, but really, in
+himself--if it be possible. You ought at least to get into some simple
+human relation with him, as you would with the youngest and most
+ignorant of your brothers and sisters born of the same father and
+mother; approaching him, not with pompous lecturing or fault-finding,
+still less with that abomination called condescension, but with the
+humble service of the elder to the younger, in whatever he may be helped
+by you without injury to him. Never was there a more injurious mistake
+than that it is the business of the clergy only to have the care of
+souls."
+
+"But that would be endless. It would leave me no time for myself."
+
+"Would that be no time for yourself spent in leading a noble, Christian
+life; in verifying the words of our Lord by doing them; in building your
+house on the rock of action instead of the sands of theory; in widening
+your own being by entering into the nature, thoughts, feelings, even
+fancies of those around you? In such intercourse you would find health
+radiating into your own bosom; healing sympathies springing up in the
+most barren acquaintance; channels opened for the in-rush of truth
+into your own mind; and opportunities afforded for the exercise of that
+self-discipline, the lack of which led to the failures which you now
+bemoan. Soon then would you have cause to wonder how much some of your
+speculations had fallen into the background, simply because the truth,
+showing itself grandly true, had so filled and occupied your mind that
+it left no room for anxiety about such questions as, while secured in
+the interest all reality gives, were yet dwarfed by the side of it.
+Nothing, I repeat, so much as humble ministration to your neighbours,
+will help you to that perfect love of God which casteth out fear;
+nothing but the love of God--that God revealed in Christ--will make you
+able to love your neighbour aright; and the Spirit of God, which
+alone gives might for any good, will by these loves, which are life,
+strengthen you at last to believe in the light even in the midst of
+darkness; to hold the resolution formed in health when sickness has
+altered the appearance of everything around you; and to feel tenderly
+towards your fellow, even when you yourself are plunged in dejection or
+racked with pain.--But," I said, "I fear I have transgressed the bounds
+of all propriety by enlarging upon this matter as I have done. I can
+only say I have spoken in proportion to my feeling of its weight and
+truth."
+
+"I thank you, heartily," returned Mr Stoddart, rising. "And I promise
+you at least to think over what you have been saying--I hope to be in my
+old place in the organ-loft next Sunday."
+
+So he was. And Miss Oldcastle was in the pew with her mother. Nor did
+she go any more to Addicehead to church.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI. THE DEVIL IN THOMAS WEIR.
+
+
+As the winter went on, it was sad to look on the evident though slow
+decline of Catherine Weir. It seemed as if the dead season was dragging
+her to its bosom, to lay her among the leaves of past summers. She was
+still to be found in the shop, or appeared in it as often as the bell
+suspended over the door rang to announce the entrance of a customer; but
+she was terribly worn, and her step indicated much weakness. Nor had
+the signs of restless trouble diminished as these tide-marks indicated
+ebbing strength. There was the same dry fierce fire in her eyes; the
+same forceful compression of her lips; the same evidences of brooding
+over some one absorbing thought or feeling. She seemed to me, and to Dr
+Duncan as well, to be dying of resentment. Would nobody do anything for
+her? I thought. Would not her father help her? He had got more gentle
+now; whence I had reason to hope that Christian principles and feelings
+had begun to rise and operate in him; while surely the influence of
+his son must, by this time, have done something not only to soften his
+character generally, but to appease the anger he had cherished towards
+the one ewe-lamb, against which, having wandered away into the desert
+place, he had closed and barred the door of the sheep-fold. I would go
+and see him, and try what could be done for her.
+
+I may be forgiven here if I make the remark that I cannot help thinking
+that what measure of success I had already had with my people, was
+partly owing to this, that when I thought of a thing and had concluded
+it might do, I very seldom put off the consequent action. I found I was
+wrong sometimes, and that the particular action did no good; but thus
+movement was kept up in my operative nature, preventing it from sinking
+towards the inactivity to which I was but too much inclined. Besides, to
+find out what will not do, is a step towards finding out what will do.
+Moreover, an attempt in itself unsuccessful may set something or other
+in motion that will help.
+
+My present attempt turned out one of my failures, though I cannot think
+that it would have been better left unmade.
+
+A red rayless sun, which one might have imagined sullen and disconsolate
+because he could not make the dead earth smile into flowers, was looking
+through the frosty fog of the winter morning as I walked across the
+bridge to find Thomas Weir in his workshop. The poplars stood like
+goblin sentinels, with black heads, upon which the long hair stood on
+end, all along the dark cold river. Nature looked like a life out of
+which the love has vanished. I turned from it and hastened on.
+
+Thomas was busy working with a spoke-sheave at the spoke of a
+cart-wheel. How curiously the smallest visual fact will sometimes
+keep its place in the memory, when it cannot with all earnestness of
+endeavour recall a thought--a far more important fact! That will come
+again only when its time comes first.
+
+"A cold morning, Thomas," I called from the door.
+
+"I can always keep myself warm, sir," returned Thomas, cheerfully.
+
+"What are you doing, Tom?" I said, going up to him first.
+
+"A little job for myself, sir. I'm making a few bookshelves."
+
+"I want to have a little talk with your father. Just step out in a
+minute or so, and let me have half-an-hour."
+
+"Yes, sir, certainly."
+
+I then went to the other end of the shop, for, curiously, as it seemed
+to me, although father and son were on the best of terms, they always
+worked as far from each other as the shop would permit, and it was a
+very large room.
+
+"It is not easy always to keep warm through and through, Thomas," I
+said.
+
+I suppose my tone revealed to his quick perceptions that "more was meant
+than met the ear." He looked up from his work, his tool filled with an
+uncompleted shaving.
+
+"And when the heart gets cold," I went on, "it is not easily warmed
+again. The fire's hard to light there, Thomas."
+
+Still he looked at me, stooping over his work, apparently with a
+presentiment of what was coming.
+
+"I fear there is no way of lighting it again, except the blacksmith's
+way."
+
+"Hammering the iron till it is red-hot, you mean, sir?"
+
+"I do. When a man's heart has grown cold, the blows of affliction
+must fall thick and heavy before the fire can be got that will light
+it.--When did you see your daughter Catherine, Thomas?"
+
+His head dropped, and he began to work as if for bare life. Not a word
+came from the form now bent over his tool as if he had never lifted
+himself up since he first began in the morning. I could just see that
+his face was deadly pale, and his lips compressed like those of one of
+the violent who take the kingdom of heaven by force. But it was for no
+such agony of effort that his were thus closed. He went on working
+till the silence became so lengthened that it seemed settled into the
+endless. I felt embarrassed. To break a silence is sometimes as hard as
+to break a spell. What Thomas would have done or said if he had not had
+this safety-valve of bodily exertion, I cannot even imagine.
+
+"Thomas," I said, at length, laying my hand on his shoulder, "you are
+not going to part company with me, I hope?"
+
+"You drive a man too far, sir. I've given in more to you than ever I did
+to man, sir; and I don't know that I oughtn't to be ashamed of it. But
+you don't know where to stop. If we lived a thousand years you would be
+driving a man on to the last. And there's no good in that, sir. A man
+must be at peace somewhen."
+
+"The question is, Thomas, whether I would be driving you ON or BACK. You
+and I too MUST go on or back. I want to go on myself, and to make you go
+on too. I don't want to be parted from you now or then."
+
+"That's all very well, sir, and very kind, I don't doubt; but, as I said
+afore, a man must be at peace SOMEWHEN."
+
+"That's what I want so much that I want you to go on. Peace! I trust in
+God we shall both have it one day, SOMEWHEN, as you say. Have you got
+this peace so plentifully now that you are satisfied as you are? You
+will never get it but by going on."
+
+"I do not think there is any good got in stirring a puddle. Let by-gones
+be by-gones. You make a mistake, sir, in rousing an anger which I would
+willingly let sleep."
+
+"Better a wakeful anger, and a wakeful conscience with it, than an anger
+sunk into indifference, and a sleeping dog of a conscience that will
+not bark. To have ceased to be angry is not one step nearer to your
+daughter. Better strike her, abuse her, with the chance of a kiss to
+follow. Ah, Thomas, you are like Jonas with his gourd."
+
+"I don't see what that has to do with it."
+
+"I will tell you. You are fierce in wrath at the disgrace to your
+family. Your pride is up in arms. You don't care for the misery of your
+daughter, who, the more wrong she has done, is the more to be pitied
+by a father's heart. Your pride, I say, is all that you care about. The
+wrong your daughter has done, you care nothing about; or you would have
+taken her to your arms years ago, in the hope that the fervour of your
+love would drive the devil out of her and make her repent. I say it is
+not the wrong, but the disgrace you care for. The gourd of your pride is
+withered, and yet you will water it with your daughter's misery."
+
+"Go out of my shop," he cried; "or I may say what I should be sorry
+for."
+
+I turned at once and left him. I found young Tom round the corner,
+leaning against the wall, and reading his Virgil.
+
+"Don't speak to your father, Tom," I said, "for a while. I've put him
+out of temper. He will be best left alone."
+
+He looked frightened.
+
+"There's no harm done, Tom, my boy. I've been talking to him about your
+sister. He must have time to think over what I have said to him."
+
+"I see, sir; I see."
+
+"Be as attentive to him as you can."
+
+"I will, sir."
+
+It was not alone resentment at my interference that had thus put the
+poor fellow beside himself, I was certain: I had called up all the old
+misery--set the wound bleeding again. Shame was once more wide awake and
+tearing at his heart. That HIS daughter should have done so! For she had
+been his pride. She had been the belle of the village, and very lovely;
+but having been apprenticed to a dressmaker in Addicehead, had, after
+being there about a year and a half, returned home, apparently in a
+decline. After the birth of her child, however, she had, to her own
+disappointment, and no doubt to that of her father as well, begun to
+recover. What a time of wretchedness it must have been to both of them
+until she left his house, one can imagine. Most likely the misery of the
+father vented itself in greater unkindness than he felt, which, sinking
+into the proud nature she had derived from him, roused such a resentment
+as rarely if ever can be thoroughly appeased until Death comes in to
+help the reconciliation. How often has an old love blazed up again under
+the blowing of his cold breath, and sent the spirit warm at heart into
+the regions of the unknown! She never would utter a word to reveal the
+name or condition of him by whom she had been wronged. To his child, as
+long as he drew his life from her, she behaved with strange alternations
+of dislike and passionate affection; after which season the latter began
+to diminish in violence, and the former to become more fixed, till at
+length, by the time I had made their acquaintance, her feelings seemed
+to have settled into what would have been indifference but for the
+constant reminder of her shame and her wrong together, which his very
+presence necessarily was.
+
+They were not only the gossips of the village who judged that the fact
+of Addicehead's being a garrison town had something to do with the fate
+that had befallen her; a fate by which, in its very spring-time, when
+its flowers were loveliest, and hope was strongest for its summer, her
+life was changed into the dreary wind-swept, rain-sodden moor. The man
+who can ACCEPT such a sacrifice from a woman,--I say nothing of
+WILING it from her--is, in his meanness, selfishness, and dishonour,
+contemptible as the Pharisee who, with his long prayers, devours the
+widow's house. He leaves her desolate, while he walks off free. Would to
+God a man like the great-hearted, pure-bodied Milton, a man whom young
+men are compelled to respect, would in this our age, utter such a word
+as, making "mad the guilty," if such grace might be accorded them, would
+"appal the free," lest they too should fall into such a mire of selfish
+dishonour!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII. THE DEVIL IN CATHERINE WEIR.
+
+
+About this time my father was taken ill, and several journeys to London
+followed. It is only as vicar that I am writing these memorials--for
+such they should be called, rather than ANNALS, though certainly the
+use of the latter word has of late become vague enough for all
+convenience--therefore I have said nothing about my home-relations; but
+I must just mention here that I had a half-sister, about half my own
+age, whose anxiety during my father's illness rendered my visits more
+frequent than perhaps they would have been from my own. But my sister
+was right in her anxiety. My father grew worse, and in December he died.
+I will not eulogize one so dear to me. That he was no common man will
+appear from the fact of his unconventionality and justice in leaving his
+property to my sister, saying in his will that he had done all I could
+require of him, in giving me a good education; and that, men having
+means in their power which women had not, it was unjust to the latter
+to make them, without a choice, dependent upon the former. After the
+funeral, my sister, feeling it impossible to remain in the house any
+longer, begged me to take her with me. So, after arranging affairs, we
+set out, and reached Marshmallows on New Year's Day.
+
+My sister being so much younger than myself, her presence in my house
+made very little change in my habits. She came into my ways without any
+difficulty, so that I did not experience the least restraint from having
+to consider her. And I soon began to find her of considerable service
+among the poor and sick of my flock, the latter class being more
+numerous this winter on account of the greater severity of the weather.
+
+I now began to note a change in the habits of Catherine Weir. As far as
+I remember, I had never up to this time seen her out of her own house,
+except in church, at which she had been a regular attendant for
+many weeks. Now, however, I began to meet her when and where I least
+expected--I do not say often, but so often as to make me believe she
+went wandering about frequently. It was always at night, however, and
+always in stormy weather. The marvel was, not that a sick woman could be
+there--for a sick woman may be able to do anything; but that she could
+do so more than once--that was the marvel. At the same time, I began to
+miss her from church.
+
+Possibly my reader may wonder how I came to have the chance of meeting
+any one again and again at night and in stormy weather. I can relieve
+him from the difficulty. Odd as it will appear to some readers, I had
+naturally a predilection for rough weather. I think I enjoyed fighting
+with a storm in winter nearly as much as lying on the grass under a
+beech-tree in summer. Possibly this assertion may seem strange to one
+likewise who has remarked the ordinary peaceableness of my disposition.
+But he may have done me the justice to remark at the same time, that I
+have some considerable pleasure in fighting the devil, though none in
+fighting my fellow-man, even in the ordinary form of disputation in
+which it is not heart's blood, but soul's blood, that is so often shed.
+Indeed there are many controversies far more immoral, as to the manner
+in which they are conducted, than a brutal prize-fight. There
+is, however, a pleasure of its own in conflict; and I have always
+experienced a certain indescribable, though I believe not at all unusual
+exaltation, even in struggling with a well-set, thoroughly roused
+storm of wind and snow or rain. The sources of this by no means unusual
+delight, I will not stay to examine, indicating only that I believe the
+sources are deep.--I was now quite well, and had no reason to fear bad
+consequences from the indulgence of this surely innocent form of the
+love of strife.
+
+But I find I must give another reason as well, if I would be thoroughly
+honest with my reader. The fact was, that as I had recovered strength, I
+had become more troubled and restless about Miss Oldcastle. I could not
+see how I was to make any progress towards her favour. There seemed a
+barrier as insurmountable as intangible between her and me. The will
+of one woman came between and parted us, and that will was as the magic
+line over which no effort of will or strength could enable the enchanted
+knight to make a single stride. And this consciousness of being fettered
+by insensible and infrangible bonds, this need of doing something with
+nothing tangible in the reach of the outstretched hand, so worked upon
+my mind, that it naturally sought relief, as often as the elemental
+strife arose, by mingling unconstrained with the tumult of the
+night.--Will my readers find it hard to believe that this disquietude
+of mind should gradually sink away as the hours of Saturday glided
+down into night, and the day of my best labour drew nigh? Or will they
+answer, "We believe it easily; for then you could at least see the lady,
+and that comforted you?" Whatever it was that quieted me, not the less
+have I to thank God for it.
+
+All might have been so different. What a fearful thing would it have
+been for me to have found my mind so full of my own cares, that I was
+unable to do God's work and bear my neighbour's burden! But even then I
+would have cried to Him, and said, "I know Thee that Thou art NOT a hard
+master."
+
+Now, however, that I have quite accounted, as I believe, by the
+peculiarity both of my disposition and circumstances, for unusual
+wanderings under conditions when most people consider themselves
+fortunate within doors, I must return to Catherine Weir, the
+eccentricity of whose late behaviour, being in the particulars discussed
+identical with that of mine, led to the necessity for the explanation of
+my habits given above.
+
+One January afternoon, just as twilight was folding her gray cloak
+about her, and vanishing in the night, the wind blowing hard from the
+south-west, melting the snow under foot, and sorely disturbing the
+dignity of the one grand old cedar which stood before my study window,
+and now filled my room with the great sweeps of its moaning, I felt as
+if the elements were calling me, and rose to obey the summons. My sister
+was, by this time, so accustomed to my going out in all weathers, that
+she troubled me with no expostulation. My spirits began to rise the
+moment I was in the wind. Keen, and cold, and unsparing, it swept
+through the leafless branches around me, with a different hiss for every
+tree that bent, and swayed, and tossed in its torrent. I made my way
+to the gate and out upon the road, and then, turning to the right, away
+from the village, I sought a kind of common, open and treeless, the
+nearest approach to a moor that there was in the county, I believe,
+over which a wind like this would sweep unstayed by house, or shrub,
+or fence, the only shelter it afforded lying in the inequalities of its
+surface.
+
+I had walked with my head bent low against the blast, for the better
+part of a mile, fighting for every step of the way, when, coming to a
+deep cut in the common, opening at right angles from the road, whence
+at some time or other a large quantity of sand had been carted, I turned
+into its defence to recover my breath, and listen to the noise of the
+wind in the fierce rush of its sea over the open channel of the common.
+And I remember I was thinking with myself: "If the air would only become
+faintly visible for a moment, what a sight it would be of waste grandeur
+with its thousands of billowing eddies, and self-involved, conflicting,
+and swallowing whirlpools from the sea-bottom of this common!" when,
+with my imagination resting on the fancied vision, I was startled by
+such a moan as seemed about to break into a storm of passionate cries,
+but was followed by the words:
+
+"O God! I cannot bear it longer. Hast thou NO help for me?"
+
+Instinctively almost I knew that Catherine Weir was beside me, though
+I could not see where she was. In a moment more, however, I thought I
+could distinguish through the darkness--imagination no doubt filling
+up the truth of its form--a figure crouching in such an attitude of
+abandoned despair as recalled one of Flaxman's outlines, the body bent
+forward over the drawn-up knees, and the face thus hidden even from the
+darkness. I could not help saying to myself, as I took a step or two
+towards her, "What is thy trouble to hers!"
+
+I may here remark that I had come to the conclusion, from pondering
+over her case, that until a yet deeper and bitterer resentment than
+that which she bore to her father was removed, it would be of no use
+attacking the latter. For the former kept her in a state of hostility
+towards her whole race: with herself at war she had no gentle thoughts,
+no love for her kind; but ever
+
+"She fed her wound with fresh-renewed bale"
+
+from every hurt that she received from or imagined to be offered her
+by anything human. So I had resolved that the next time I had an
+opportunity of speaking to her, I would make an attempt to probe the
+evil to its root, though I had but little hope, I confess, of doing any
+good. And now when I heard her say, "Hast thou NO help for me?" I went
+near her with the words:
+
+"God has, indeed, help for His own offspring. Has He not suffered that
+He might help? But you have not yet forgiven."
+
+When I began to speak, she gave a slight start: she was far too
+miserable to be terrified at anything. Before I had finished, she stood
+erect on her feet, facing me with the whiteness of her face glimmering
+through the blackness of the night.
+
+"I ask Him for peace," she said, "and He sends me more torment."
+
+And I thought of Ahab when he said, "Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?"
+
+"If we had what we asked for always, we should too often find it was not
+what we wanted, after all."
+
+"You will not leave me alone," she said. "It is too bad."
+
+Poor woman! It was well for her she could pray to God in her trouble;
+for she could scarcely endure a word from her fellow-man. She,
+despairing before God, was fierce as a tigress to her fellow-sinner who
+would stretch a hand to help her out of the mire, and set her beside him
+on the rock which he felt firm under his own feet.
+
+"I will not leave you alone, Catherine," I said, feeling that I must at
+length assume another tone of speech with her who resisted gentleness.
+"Scorn my interference as you will," I said, "I have yet to give an
+account of you. And I have to fear lest my Master should require your
+blood at my hands. I did not follow you here, you may well believe me;
+but I have found you here, and I must speak."
+
+All this time the wind was roaring overhead. But in the hollow was
+stillness, and I was so near her, that I could hear every word she said,
+although she spoke in a low compressed tone.
+
+"Have you a right to persecute me," she said, "because I am unhappy?"
+
+"I have a right, and, more than a right, I have a duty to aid your
+better self against your worse. You, I fear, are siding with your worse
+self."
+
+"You judge me hard. I have had wrongs that--"
+
+And here she stopped in a way that let me know she WOULD say no more.
+
+"That you have had wrongs, and bitter wrongs, I do not for a moment
+doubt. And him who has done you most wrong, you will not forgive."
+
+"No."
+
+"No. Not even for the sake of Him who, hanging on the tree, after all
+the bitterness of blows and whipping, and derision, and rudest gestures
+and taunts, even when the faintness of death was upon Him, cried to
+His Father to forgive their cruelty. He asks you to forgive the man
+who wronged you, and you will not--not even for Him! Oh, Catherine,
+Catherine!"
+
+"It is very easy to talk, Mr Walton," she returned with forced but cool
+scorn.
+
+"Tell me, then," I said, "have YOU nothing to repent of? Have YOU done
+no wrong in this same miserable matter?"
+
+"I do not understand you, sir," she said, freezingly, petulantly, not
+sure, perhaps, or unwilling to believe, that I meant what I did mean.
+
+I was fully resolved to be plain with her now.
+
+"Catherine Weir," I said, "did not God give you a house to keep fair and
+pure for Him? Did you keep it such?"
+
+"He told me lies," she cried fiercely, with a cry that seemed to pierce
+through the storm over our heads, up towards the everlasting justice.
+"He lied, and I trusted. For his sake I sinned, and he threw me from
+him."
+
+"You gave him what was not yours to give. What right had you to cast
+your pearl before a swine? But dare you say it was ALL FOR HIS SAKE you
+did it? Was it ALL self-denial? Was there no self-indulgence?"
+
+She made a broken gesture of lifting her hands to her head, let them
+drop by her side, and said nothing.
+
+"You knew you were doing wrong. You felt it even more than he did. For
+God made you with a more delicate sense of purity, with a shrinking from
+the temptation, with a womanly foreboding of disgrace, to help you to
+hold the cup of your honour steady, which yet you dropped on the ground.
+Do not seek refuge in the cant about a woman's weakness. The strength of
+the woman is as needful to her womanhood as the strength of the man is
+to his manhood; and a woman is just as strong as she will be. And now,
+instead of humbling yourself before your Father in heaven, whom you have
+wronged more even than your father on earth, you rage over your injuries
+and cherish hatred against him who wronged you. But I will go yet
+further, and show you, in God's name, that you wronged your seducer.
+For you were his keeper, as he was yours. What if he had found a
+noble-hearted girl who also trusted him entirely--just until she knew
+she ought not to listen to him a moment longer? who, when his love
+showed itself less than human, caring but for itself, rose in the
+royalty of her maidenhood, and looked him in the face? Would he not have
+been ashamed before her, and so before himself, seeing in the glass of
+her dignity his own contemptibleness? But instead of such a woman he
+found you, who let him do as he would. No redemption for him in you.
+And now he walks the earth the worse for you, defiled by your spoil,
+glorying in his poor victory over you, despising all women for your
+sake, unrepentant and proud, ruining others the easier that he has
+already ruined you."
+
+"He does! he does!" she shrieked; "but I will have my revenge. I can and
+I will."
+
+And, darting past me, she rushed out into the storm. I followed, and
+could just see that she took the way to the village. Her dim shape
+went down the wind before me into the darkness. I followed in the same
+direction, fast and faster, for the wind was behind me, and a vague fear
+which ever grew in my heart urged me to overtake her. What had I done?
+To what might I not have driven her? And although all I had said was
+true, and I had spoken from motives which, as far as I knew my own
+heart, I could not condemn, yet, as I sped after her, there came a
+reaction of feeling from the severity with which I had displayed her own
+case against her. "Ah! poor sister," I thought, "was it for me thus
+to reproach thee who had suffered already so fiercely? If the Spirit
+speaking in thy heart could not win thee, how should my words of hard
+accusation, true though they were, every one of them, rouse in thee
+anything but the wrath that springs from shame? Should I not have tried
+again, and yet again, to waken thy love; and then a sweet and healing
+shame, like that of her who bathed the Master's feet with her tears,
+would have bred fresh love, and no wrath."
+
+But again I answered for myself, that my heart had not been the less
+tender towards her that I had tried to humble her, for it was that she
+might slip from under the net of her pride. Even when my tongue spoke
+the hardest things I could find, my heart was yearning over her. If I
+could but make her feel that she too had been wrong, would not the sense
+of common wrong between them help her to forgive? And with the first
+motion of willing pardon, would not a spring of tenderness, grief, and
+hope, burst from her poor old dried-up heart, and make it young and
+fresh once more! Thus I reasoned with myself as I followed her back
+through the darkness.
+
+The wind fell a little as we came near the village, and the rain began
+to come down in torrents. There must have been a moon somewhere behind
+the clouds, for the darkness became less dense, and I began to fancy I
+could again see the dim shape which had rushed from me. I increased my
+speed, and became certain of it. Suddenly, her strength giving way, or
+her foot stumbling over something in the road, she fell to the earth
+with a cry.
+
+I was beside her in a moment. She was insensible. I did what I could for
+her, and in a few minutes she began to come to herself.
+
+"Where am I? Who is it?" she asked, listlessly.
+
+When she found who I was, she made a great effort to rise, and
+succeeded.
+
+"You must take my arm," I said, "and I will help you to the vicarage."
+
+"I will go home," she answered.
+
+"Lean on me now, at least; for you must get somewhere."
+
+"What does it matter?" she said, in such a tone of despair, that it went
+to my very heart.
+
+A wild half-cry, half-sob followed, and then she took my arm, and said
+nothing more. Nor did I trouble her with any words, except, when we
+readied the gate, to beg her to come into the vicarage instead of going
+home. But she would not listen to me, and so I took her home.
+
+She pulled the key of the shop from her pocket. Her hand trembled so
+that I took it from her, and opened the door. A candle with a long snuff
+was flickering on the counter; and stretched out on the counter, with
+his head about a foot from the candle, lay little Gerard, fast asleep.
+
+"Ah, little darling!" I said in my heart, "this is not much like
+painting the sky yet. But who knows?" And as I uttered the commonplace
+question in my mind, in my mind it was suddenly changed into the half
+of a great dim prophecy by the answer which arose to it there, for the
+answer was "God."
+
+I lifted the little fellow in my arms. He had fallen asleep weeping,
+and his face was dirty, and streaked with the channels of his tears.
+Catherine had snuffed the candle, and now stood with it in her hand,
+waiting for me to go. But, without heeding her, I bore my child to
+the door that led to their dwelling. I had never been up those stairs
+before, and therefore knew nothing of the way. But without offering
+any opposition, his mother followed, and lighted me. What a sad face of
+suffering and strife it was upon which that dim light fell! She set the
+candle down upon the table of a small room at the top of the stairs,
+which might have been comfortable enough but that it was neglected and
+disordered; and now I saw that she did not even have her child to sleep
+with her, for his crib stood in a corner of this their sitting-room.
+
+I sat down on a haircloth couch, and proceeded to undress little
+Gerard, trying as much as I could not to wake him. In this I was almost
+successful. Catherine stood staring at me without saying a word. She
+looked dazed, perhaps from the effects of her fall. But she brought me
+his nightgown notwithstanding. Just as I had finished putting it on, and
+was rising to lay him in his crib, he opened his eyes, and looked at
+me; then gave a hurried look round, as if for his mother; then threw his
+arms about my neck and kissed me. I laid him down and the same moment he
+was fast asleep. In the morning it would not be even a dream to him.
+
+"Now," I thought, "you are safe for the night, poor fatherless child.
+Even your mother's hardness will not make you sad now. Perhaps the
+heavenly Father will send you loving dreams."
+
+I turned to Catherine, and bade her good-night. She just put her hand in
+mine; but, instead of returning my leave-taking, said:
+
+"Do not fancy you will get the better of me, Mr Walton, by being kind to
+that boy. I will have my revenge, and I know how. I am only waiting my
+time. When he is just going to drink, I will dash it from his hand. I
+will. At the altar I will."
+
+Her eyes were flashing almost with madness, and she made fierce gestures
+with her arm. I saw that argument was useless.
+
+"You loved him once, Catherine," I said. "Love him again. Love him
+better. Forgive him. Revenge is far worse than anything you have done
+yet."
+
+"What do I care? Why should I care?"
+
+And she laughed terribly.
+
+I made haste to leave the room and the house; but I lingered for nearly
+an hour about the place before I could make up my mind to go home, so
+much was I afraid lest she should do something altogether insane.
+
+But at length I saw the candle appear in the shop, which was some relief
+to my anxiety; and reflecting that her one consuming thought of revenge
+was some security for her conduct otherwise, I went home.
+
+That night my own troubles seemed small to me, and I did not brood over
+them at all. My mind was filled with the idea of the sad misery which,
+rather than in which, that poor woman was; and I prayed for her as for
+a desolate human world whose sun had deserted the heavens, whose fair
+fields, rivers, and groves were hardening into the frost of death, and
+all their germs of hope becoming but portions of the lifeless mass.
+"If I am sorrowful," I said, "God lives none the less. And His will is
+better than mine, yea, is my hidden and perfected will. In Him is my
+life. His will be done. What, then, is my trouble compared to hers? I
+will not sink into it and be selfish."
+
+In the morning my first business was to inquire after her. I found her
+in the shop, looking very ill, and obstinately reserved. Gerard sat in a
+corner, looking as far from happy as a child of his years could look. As
+I left the shop he crept out with me.
+
+"Gerard, come back," cried his mother.
+
+"I will not take him away," I said.
+
+The boy looked up in my face, as if he wanted to whisper to me, and I
+stooped to listen.
+
+"I dreamed last night," said the boy, "that a big angel with white wings
+came and took me out of my bed, and carried me high, high up--so high
+that I could not dream any more."
+
+"We shall be carried up so high one day, Gerard, my boy, that we shall
+not want to dream any more. For we shall be carried up to God himself.
+Now go back to your mother."
+
+He obeyed at once, and I went on through the village.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. THE DEVIL IN THE VICAR.
+
+
+I wanted just to pass the gate, and look up the road towards Oldcastle
+Hall. I thought to see nothing but the empty road between the leafless
+trees, lying there like a dead stream that would not bear me on to the
+"sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice" that lay beyond. But just as I
+reached the gate, Miss Oldcastle came out of the lodge, where I learned
+afterwards the woman that kept the gate was ill.
+
+When she saw me she stopped, and I entered hurriedly, and addressed her.
+But I could say nothing better than the merest commonplaces. For her old
+manner, which I had almost forgotten, a certain coldness shadowed with
+haughtiness, whose influence I had strongly felt when I began to make
+her acquaintance, had returned. I cannot make my reader understand how
+this could be blended with the sweetness in her face and the gentleness
+of her manners; but there the opposites were, and I could feel them
+both. There was likewise a certain drawing of herself away from me,
+which checked the smallest advance on my part; so that--I wonder at it
+now, but so it was--after a few words of very ordinary conversation, I
+bade her good morning and went away, feeling like "a man forbid"--as if
+I had done her some wrong, and she had chidden me for it. What a stone
+lay in my breast! I could hardly breathe for it. What could have caused
+her to change her manner towards me? I had made no advance; I could not
+have offended her. Yet there she glided up the road, and here stood I,
+outside the gate. That road was now a flowing river that bore from me
+the treasure of the earth, while my boat was spell-bound, and could not
+follow. I would run after her, fall at her feet, and intreat to know
+wherein I had offended her. But there I stood enchanted, and there
+she floated away between the trees; till at length she turned the slow
+sweep, and I, breathing deep as she vanished from my sight, turned
+likewise, and walked back the dreary way to the village. And now I knew
+that I had never been miserable in my life before. And I knew, too, that
+I had never loved her as I loved her now.
+
+But, as I had for the last ten years of my life been striving to be a
+right will, with a thousand failures and forgetfulnesses every one of
+those years, while yet the desire grew stronger as hope recovered from
+every failure, I would now try to do my work as if nothing had happened
+to incapacitate me for it. So I went on to fulfil the plan with which I
+had left home, including, as it did, a visit to Thomas Weir, whom I had
+not seen in his own shop since he had ordered me out of it. This, as far
+as I was concerned, was more accidental than intentional. I had, indeed,
+abstained from going to him for a while, in order to give him time TO
+COME ROUND; but then circumstances which I have recorded intervened to
+prevent me; so that as yet no advance had been made on my part any more
+than on his towards a reconciliation; which, however, could have been
+such only on one side, for I had not been in the least offended by the
+way he had behaved to me, and needed no reconciliation. To tell the
+truth, I was pleased to find that my words had had force enough with him
+to rouse his wrath. Anything rather than indifference! That the heart
+of the honest man would in the end right me, I could not doubt; in the
+meantime I would see whether a friendly call might not improve the state
+of affairs. Till he yielded to the voice within him, however, I could
+not expect that our relation to each other would be quite restored.
+As long as he resisted his conscience, and knew that I sided with his
+conscience, it was impossible he should regard me with peaceful eyes,
+however much he might desire to be friendly with me.
+
+I found him busy, as usual, for he was one of the most diligent men I
+have ever known. But his face was gloomy, and I thought or fancied that
+the old scorn had begun once more to usurp the expression of it. Young
+Tom was not in the shop.
+
+"It is a long time since I saw you, now, Thomas."
+
+"I can hardly wonder at that," he returned, as if he were trying to do
+me justice; but his eyes dropped, and he resumed his work, and said
+no more. I thought it better to make no reference to the past even by
+assuring him that it was not from resentment that I had been a stranger.
+
+"How is Tom?" I asked.
+
+"Well enough," he returned. Then, with a smile of peevishness not
+unmingled with contempt, he added: "He's getting too uppish for me. I
+don't think the Latin agrees with him."
+
+I could not help suspecting at once how the matter stood--namely, that
+the father, unhappy in his conduct to his daughter, and unable to make
+up his mind to do right with regard to her, had been behaving captiously
+and unjustly to his son, and so had rendered himself more miserable than
+ever.
+
+"Perhaps he finds it too much for him without me," I said, evasively;
+"but I called to-day partly to inform him that I am quite ready now to
+recommence our readings together; after which I hope you will find the
+Latin agree with him better."
+
+"I wish you would let him alone, sir--I mean, take no more trouble about
+him. You see I can't do as you want me; I wasn't made to go another
+man's way; and so it's very hard--more than I can bear--to be under so
+much obligation to you."
+
+"But you mistake me altogether, Thomas. It is for the lad's own sake
+that I want to go on reading with him. And you won't interfere between
+him and any use I can be of to him. I assure you, to have you go my way
+instead of your own is the last thing I could wish, though I confess I
+do wish very much that you would choose the right way for your own way."
+
+He made me no answer, but maintained a sullen silence.
+
+"Thomas," I said at length, "I had thought you were breaking every bond
+of Satan that withheld you from entering into the kingdom of heaven; but
+I fear he has strengthened his bands and holds you now as much a captive
+as ever. So it is not even your own way you are walking in, but his."
+
+"It's no use your trying to frighten me. I don't believe in the devil."
+
+"It is God I want you to believe in. And I am not going to dispute with
+you now about whether there is a devil or not. In a matter of life and
+death we have no time for settling every disputed point."
+
+"Life or death! What do you mean?"
+
+"I mean that whether you believe there is a devil or not, you KNOW there
+is an evil power in your mind dragging you down. I am not speaking in
+generals; I mean NOW, and you know as to what I mean it. And if you
+yield to it, that evil power, whatever may be your theory about it, will
+drag you down to death. It is a matter of life or death, I repeat, not
+of theory about the devil."
+
+"Well, I always did say, that if you once give a priest an inch he'll
+take an ell; and I am sorry I forgot it for once."
+
+Having said this, he shut up his mouth in a manner that indicated
+plainly enough he would not open it again for some time. This, more than
+his speech, irritated me, and with a mere "good morning," I walked out
+of the shop.
+
+No sooner was I in the open air than I knew that I too, I as well as
+poor Thomas Weir, was under a spell; knew that I had gone to him
+before I had recovered sufficiently from the mingled disappointment and
+mortification of my interview with Miss Oldcastle; that while I spoke to
+him I was not speaking with a whole heart; that I had been discharging a
+duty as if I had been discharging a musket; that, although I had spoken
+the truth, I had spoken it ungraciously and selfishly.
+
+I could not bear it. I turned instantly and went back into the shop.
+
+"Thomas, my friend," I said, holding out my hand, "I beg your pardon. I
+was wrong. I spoke to you as I ought not. I was troubled in my own mind,
+and that made me lose my temper and be rude to you, who are far more
+troubled than I am. Forgive me!"
+
+He did not take my hand at first, but stared at me as if, not
+comprehending me, he supposed that I was backing up what I had said last
+with more of the same sort. But by the time I had finished he saw what
+I meant; his countenance altered and looked as if the evil spirit were
+about to depart from him; he held out his hand, gave mine a great grasp,
+dropped his head, went on with his work, and said never a word.
+
+I went out of the shop once more, but in a greatly altered mood.
+
+On the way home, I tried to find out how it was that I had that morning
+failed so signally. I had little virtue in keeping my temper, because it
+was naturally very even; therefore I had the more shame in losing it.
+I had borne all my uneasiness about Miss Oldcastle without, as far as I
+knew, transgressing in this fashion till this very morning. Were great
+sorrows less hurtful to the temper than small disappointments? Yes,
+surely. But Shakespeare represents Brutus, after hearing of the sudden
+death of his wife, as losing his temper with Cassius to a degree that
+bewildered the latter, who said he did not know that Brutus could
+have been so angry. Is this consistent with the character of the
+stately-minded Brutus, or with the dignity of sorrow? It is. For the
+loss of his wife alone would have made him only less irritable; but
+the whole weight of an army, with its distracting cares and conflicting
+interests, pressed upon him; and the battle of an empire was to be
+fought at daybreak, so that he could not be alone with his grief.
+Between the silence of death in his mind, and the roar of life in his
+brain, he became irritable.
+
+Looking yet deeper into it, I found that till this morning I had
+experienced no personal mortification with respect to Miss Oldcastle. It
+was not the mere disappointment of having no more talk with her, for the
+sight of her was a blessing I had not in the least expected, that had
+worked upon me, but the fact that she had repelled or seemed to repel
+me. And thus I found that self was at the root of the wrong I had done
+to one over whose mental condition, especially while I was telling him
+the unwelcome truth, I ought to have been as tender as a mother over her
+wounded child. I could not say that it was wrong to feel disappointed or
+even mortified; but something was wrong when one whose especial business
+it was to serve his people in the name of Him who was full of grace and
+truth, made them suffer because of his own inward pain.
+
+No sooner had I settled this in my mind than my trouble returned with
+a sudden pang. Had I actually seen her that morning, and spoken to her,
+and left her with a pain in my heart? What if that face of hers was
+doomed ever to bring with it such a pain--to be ever to me no more than
+a lovely vision radiating grief? If so, I would endure in silence and as
+patiently as I could, trying to make up for the lack of brightness in
+my own fate by causing more brightness in the fate of others. I would at
+least keep on trying to do my work.
+
+That moment I felt a little hand poke itself into mine. I looked down,
+and there was Gerard Weir looking up in my face. I found myself in the
+midst of the children coming out of school, for it was Saturday, and a
+half-holiday. He smiled in my face, and I hope I smiled in his; and
+so, hand in hand, we went on to the vicarage, where I gave him up to
+my sister. But I cannot convey to my reader any notion of the quietness
+that entered my heart with the grasp of that childish hand. I think it
+was the faith of the boy in me that comforted me, but I could not help
+thinking of the words of our Lord about receiving a child in His name,
+and so receiving Him. By the time we reached the vicarage my heart
+was very quiet. As the little child held by my hand, so I seemed to
+be holding by God's hand. And a sense of heart-security, as well as
+soul-safety, awoke in me; and I said to myself,--Surely He will take
+care of my heart as well as of my mind and my conscience. For one
+blessed moment I seemed to be at the very centre of things, looking
+out quietly upon my own troubled emotions as upon something outside of
+me--apart from me, even as one from the firm rock may look abroad upon
+the vexed sea. And I thought I then knew something of what the apostle
+meant when he said, "Your life is hid with Christ in God." I knew that
+there was a deeper self than that which was thus troubled.
+
+I had not had my usual ramble this morning, and was otherwise ill
+prepared for the Sunday. So I went early into the church; but finding
+that the sexton's wife had not yet finished lighting the stove, I sat
+down by my own fire in the vestry.
+
+Suppose I am sitting there now while I say one word for our
+congregations in winter. I was very particular in having the church well
+warmed before Sunday. I think some parsons must neglect seeing after
+this matter on principle, because warmth may make a weary creature go to
+sleep here and there about the place: as if any healing doctrine could
+enter the soul while it is on the rack of the frost. The clergy should
+see--for it is their business--that their people have no occasion to
+think of their bodies at all while they are in church. They have enough
+ado to think of the truth. When our Lord was feeding even their bodies,
+He made them all sit down on the grass. It is worth noticing that
+there was much grass in the place--a rare thing I should think in
+those countries--and therefore, perhaps, it was chosen by Him for their
+comfort in feeding their souls and bodies both. If I may judge from
+experiences of my own, one of the reasons why some churches are of all
+places the least likely for anything good to be found in, is, that they
+are as wretchedly cold to the body as they are to the soul--too cold
+every way for anything to grow in them. Edelweiss, "Noble-white"--as
+they call a plant growing under the snow on some of the Alps--could not
+survive the winter in such churches. There is small welcome in a cold
+house. And the clergyman, who is the steward, should look to it. It
+is for him to give his Master's friends a welcome to his Master's
+house--for the welcome of a servant is precious, and now-a-days very
+rare.
+
+And now Mrs Stone must have finished. I go into the old church which
+looks as if it were quietly waiting for its people. No. She has not done
+yet. Never mind.--How full of meaning the vaulted roof looks! as if,
+having gathered a soul of its own out of the generations that have
+worshipped here for so long, it had feeling enough to grow hungry for a
+psalm before the end of the week.
+
+Some such half-foolish fancy was now passing through my tranquillized
+mind or rather heart--for the mind would have rejected it at once--when
+to my--what shall I call it?--not amazement, for the delight was too
+strong for amazement--the old organ woke up and began to think aloud.
+As if it had been brooding over it all the week in the wonderful
+convolutions of its wooden brain, it began to sigh out the Agnus Dei of
+Mozart's twelfth mass upon the air of the still church, which lay
+swept and garnished for the Sunday.--How could it be? I know now; and I
+guessed then; and my guess was right; and my reader must be content to
+guess too. I took no step to verify my conjecture, for I felt that I was
+upon my honour, but sat in one of the pews and listened, till the old
+organ sobbed itself into silence. Then I heard the steps of the sexton's
+wife vanish from the church, heard her lock the door, and knew that I
+was alone in the ancient pile, with the twilight growing thick about me,
+and felt like Sir Galahad, when, after the "rolling organ-harmony," he
+heard "wings flutter, voices hover clear." In a moment the mood changed;
+and I was sorry, not that the dear organ was dead for the night, but
+actually felt gently-mournful that the wonderful old thing never had
+and never could have a conscious life of its own. So strangely does
+the passion--which I had not invented, reader, whoever thou art that
+thinkest love and a church do not well harmonize--so strangely, I say,
+full to overflowing of its own vitality, does it radiate life, that it
+would even of its own superabundance quicken into blessed consciousness
+the inanimate objects around it, thinking what they would feel had they
+a consciousness correspondent to their form, were their faculties
+moved from within themselves instead of from the will and operation of
+humanity.
+
+I lingered on long in the dark church, as my reader knows I had done
+often before. Nor did I move from the seat I had first taken till I left
+the sacred building. And there I made my sermon for the next morning.
+And herewith I impart it to my reader. But he need not be afraid of
+another such as I have already given him, for I impart it only in its
+original germ, its concentrated essence of sermon--these four verses:
+
+    Had I the grace to win the grace
+      Of some old man complete in lore,
+    My face would worship at his face,
+      Like childhood seated on the floor.
+
+    Had I the grace to win the grace
+      Of childhood, loving shy, apart,
+    The child should find a nearer place,
+      And teach me resting on my heart.
+
+    Had I the grace to win the grace
+      Of maiden living all above,
+    My soul would trample down the base,
+      That she might have a man to love.
+
+    A grace I have no grace to win
+      Knocks now at my half-open door:
+    Ah, Lord of glory, come thou in,
+      Thy grace divine is all and more.
+
+This was what I made for myself. I told my people that God had created
+all our worships, reverences, tendernesses, loves. That they had come
+out of His heart, and He had made them in us because they were in Him
+first. That otherwise He would not have cared to make them. That all
+that we could imagine of the wise, the lovely, the beautiful, was in
+Him, only infinitely more of them than we could not merely imagine, but
+understand, even if He did all He could to explain them to us, to make
+us understand them. That in Him was all the wise teaching of the best
+man ever known in the world and more; all the grace and gentleness and
+truth of the best child and more; all the tenderness and devotion of the
+truest type of womankind and more; for there is a love that passeth the
+love of woman, not the love of Jonathan to David, though David said so:
+but the love of God to the men and women whom He has made. Therefore,
+we must be all God's; and all our aspirations, all our worships, all our
+honours, all our loves, must centre in Him, the Best.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. AN ANGEL UNAWARES.
+
+
+Feeling rather more than the usual reaction so well-known to clergymen
+after the concentrated duties of the Sunday, I resolved on Monday to
+have the long country walk I had been disappointed of on the Saturday
+previous. It was such a day as it seems impossible to describe except in
+negatives. It was not stormy, it was not rainy, it was not sunshiny, it
+was not snowy, it was not frosty, it was not foggy, it was not clear, it
+was nothing but cloudy and quiet and cold and generally ungenial,
+with just a puff of wind now and then to give an assertion to its
+ungeniality. I should not in the least have cared to tell what sort the
+day was, had it not been an exact representation of my own mind. It was
+not the day that made me such as itself. The weather could always easily
+influence the surface of my mind, my external mood, but it could
+never go much further. The smallest pleasure would break through the
+conditions that merely came of such a day. But this morning my whole
+mind and heart seemed like the day. The summer was thousands of miles
+off on the other side of the globe. Ethelwyn, up at the old house there
+across the river, seemed millions of miles away. The summer MIGHT come
+back; she never would come nearer: it was absurd to expect it. For in
+such moods stupidity constantly arrogates to itself the qualities and
+claims of insight. In fact, it passes itself off for common sense,
+making the most dreary ever appear the most reasonable. In such moods a
+man might almost be persuaded that it was ridiculous to expect any such
+poetic absurdity as the summer, with its diamond mornings and its opal
+evenings, ever to come again; nay, to think that it ever had had any
+existence except in the fancies of the human heart--one of its castles
+in the air. The whole of life seemed faint and foggy, with no red in it
+anywhere; and when I glanced at my present relations in Marshmallows, I
+could not help finding several circumstances to give some appearance of
+justice to this appearance of things. I seemed to myself to have done no
+good. I had driven Catherine Weir to the verge of suicide, while at the
+same time I could not restrain her from the contemplation of some dire
+revenge. I had lost the man upon whom I had most reckoned as a seal of
+my ministry, namely, Thomas Weir. True there was Old Rogers; but Old
+Rogers was just as good before I found him. I could not dream of
+having made him any better. And so I went on brooding over all the
+disappointing portions of my labour, all the time thinking about myself,
+instead of God and the work that lay for me to do in the days to come.
+
+"Nobody," I said, "but Old Rogers understands me. Nobody would care, as
+far as my teaching goes, if another man took my place from next Sunday
+forward. And for Miss Oldcastle, her playing the Agnus Dei on Saturday
+afternoon, even if she intended that I should hear it, could only
+indicate at most that she knew how she had behaved to me in the morning,
+and thought she had gone too far and been unkind, or perhaps was afraid
+lest she should be accountable for any failure I might make in my
+Sunday duties, and therefore felt bound to do something to restore my
+equanimity."
+
+Choosing, though without consciously intending to do so, the dreariest
+path to be found, I wandered up the side of the slow black river, with
+the sentinel pollards looking at themselves in its gloomy mirror, just
+as I was looking at myself in the mirror of my circumstances. They
+leaned in all directions, irregular as the headstones in an ancient
+churchyard. In the summer they looked like explosions of green leaves
+at the best; now they looked like the burnt-out cases of the summer's
+fireworks. How different, too, was the river from the time when a whole
+fleet of shining white lilies lay anchored among their own broad green
+leaves upon its clear waters, filled with sunlight in every pore, as
+they themselves would fill the pores of a million-caverned sponge! But I
+could not even recall the past summer as beautiful. I seemed to care for
+nothing. The first miserable afternoon at Marshmallows looked now as if
+it had been the whole of my coming relation to the place seen through a
+reversed telescope. And here I was IN it now.
+
+The walk along the side was tolerably dry, although the river was
+bank-full. But when I came to the bridge I wanted to cross--a wooden
+one--I found that the approach to it had been partly undermined and
+carried away, for here the river had overflowed its banks in one of the
+late storms; and all about the place was still very wet and swampy. I
+could therefore get no farther in my gloomy walk, and so turned back
+upon my steps. Scarcely had I done so, when I saw a man coming hastily
+towards me from far upon the straight line of the river walk. I could
+not mistake him at any distance. It was Old Rogers. I felt both ashamed
+and comforted when I recognized him.
+
+"Well, Old Rogers," I said, as soon as he came within hail, trying to
+speak cheerfully, "you cannot get much farther this way--without wading
+a bit, at least."
+
+"I don't want to go no farther now, sir. I came to find you."
+
+"Nothing amiss, I hope?"
+
+"Nothing as I knows on, sir. I only wanted to have a little chat with
+you. I told master I wanted to leave for an hour or so. He allus lets me
+do just as I like."
+
+"But how did you know where to find me?"
+
+"I saw you come this way. You passed me right on the bridge, and didn't
+see me, sir. So says I to myself, 'Old Rogers, summat's amiss wi' parson
+to-day. He never went by me like that afore. This won't do. You just go
+and see.' So I went home and told master, and here I be, sir. And I hope
+you're noways offended with the liberty of me."
+
+"Did I really pass you on the bridge?" I said, unable to understand it.
+
+"That you did, sir. I knowed parson must be a goodish bit in his own
+in'ards afore he would do that."
+
+"I needn't tell you I didn't see you, Old Rogers."
+
+"I could tell you that, sir. I hope there's nothing gone main wrong,
+sir. Miss is well, sir, I hope?"
+
+"Quite well, I thank you. No, my dear fellow, nothing's gone main wrong,
+as you say. Some of my running tackle got jammed a bit, that's all. I'm
+a little out of spirits, I believe."
+
+"Well, sir, don't you be afeard I'm going to be troublesome. Don't think
+I want to get aboard your ship, except you fling me a rope. There's
+a many things you mun ha' to think about that an ignorant man like me
+couldn't take up if you was to let 'em drop. And being a gentleman, I do
+believe, makes the matter worse betuxt us. And there's many a thing that
+no man can go talkin' about to any but only the Lord himself. Still you
+can't help us poor folks seeing when there's summat amiss, and we can't
+help havin' our own thoughts any more than the sailor's jackdaw that
+couldn't speak. And sometimes we may be nearer the mark than you would
+suppose, for God has made us all of one blood, you know."
+
+"What ARE you driving at, Old Rogers?" I said with a smile, which
+was none the less true that I suspected he had read some of the worst
+trouble of my heart. For why should I mind an honourable man like him
+knowing what oppressed me, though, as things went, I certainly should
+not, as he said, choose to tell it to any but one?
+
+"I don't want to say what I was driving at, if it was anything but
+this--that I want to put to the clumsy hand of a rough old tar, with a
+heart as soft as the pitch that makes his hand hard--to trim your sails
+a bit, sir, and help you to lie a point closer to the wind. You're not
+just close-hauled, sir."
+
+"Say on, Old Rogers. I understand you, and I will listen with all my
+heart, for you have a good right to speak."
+
+And Old Rogers spoke thus:--
+
+"Oncet upon a time, I made a voyage in a merchant barque. We were
+becalmed in the South Seas. And weary work it wur, a doin' of nothin'
+from day to day. But when the water began to come up thick from the
+bottom of the water-casks, it was wearier a deal. Then a thick fog came
+on, as white as snow a'most, and we couldn't see more than a few yards
+ahead or on any side of us. But the fog didn't keep the heat off;
+it only made it worse, and the water was fast going done. The short
+allowance grew shorter and shorter, and the men, some of them, were
+half-mad with thirst, and began to look bad at one another. I kept up my
+heart by looking ahead inside me. For days and days the fog hung about
+us as if the air had been made o' flocks o' wool. The captain took to
+his berth, and several of the crew to their hammocks, for it was just
+as hot on deck as anywhere else. The mate lay on a sparesail on the
+quarter-deck, groaning. I had a strong suspicion that the schooner was
+drifting, and hove the lead again and again, but could find no bottom.
+Some of the men got hold of the spirits, and THAT didn't quench their
+thirst. It drove them clean mad. I had to knock one of them down myself
+with a capstan bar, for he ran at the mate with his knife. At last I
+began to lose all hope. And still I was sure the schooner was slowly
+drifting. My head was like to burst, and my tongue was like a lump of
+holystone in my mouth. Well, one morning, I had just, as I thought, lain
+down on the deck to breathe my last, hoping I should die before I went
+quite mad with thirst, when all at once the fog lifted, like the foot
+of a sail. I sprung to my feet. There was the blue sky overhead; but the
+terrible burning sun was there. A moment more and a light air blew on my
+cheek, and, turning my face to it as if it had been the very breath
+of God, there was an island within half a mile, and I saw the shine
+of water on the face of a rock on the shore. I cried out, 'Land on the
+weather-quarter! Water in sight!' In a moment more a boat was lowered,
+and in a few minutes the boat's crew, of which I was one, were lying,
+clothes and all, in a little stream that came down from the hills
+above.--There, Mr Walton! that's what I wanted to say to you."
+
+This is as near the story of my old friend as my limited knowledge of
+sea affairs allows me to report it.
+
+"I understand you quite, Old Rogers, and I thank you heartily," I said.
+
+"No doubt," resumed he, "King Solomon was quite right, as he always was,
+I suppose, in what he SAID, for his wisdom mun ha' laid mostly in the
+tongue--right, I say, when he said, 'Boast not thyself of to-morrow; for
+thou knowest not what a day may bring forth;' but I can't help thinking
+there's another side to it. I think it would be as good advice to a man
+on the other tack, whose boasting lay far to windward, and he close on
+a lee-shore wi' breakers--it wouldn't be amiss to say to him, 'Don't
+strike your colours to the morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may
+bring forth.' There's just as many good days as bad ones; as much fair
+weather as foul in the days to come. And if a man keeps up heart, he's
+all the better for that, and none the worse when the evil day does come.
+But, God forgive me! I'm talking like a heathen. As if there was any
+chance about what the days would bring forth. No, my lad," said the old
+sailor, assuming the dignity of his superior years under the inspiration
+of the truth, "boast nor trust nor hope in the morrow. Boast and trust
+and hope in God, for thou shalt yet praise Him, who is the health of thy
+countenance and thy God."
+
+I could but hold out my hand. I had nothing to say. For he had spoken to
+me as an angel of God.
+
+The old man was silent for some moments: his emotion needed time to
+still itself again. Nor did he return to the subject. He held out his
+hand once more, saying--
+
+"Good day, sir. I must go back to my work."
+
+"I will go back with you," I returned.
+
+And so we walked back side by side to the village, but not a word did
+we speak the one to the other, till we shook hands and parted upon
+the bridge, where we had first met. Old Rogers went to his work, and I
+lingered upon the bridge. I leaned upon the low parapet, and looked up
+the stream as far as the mists creeping about the banks, and hovering
+in thinnest veils over the surface of the water, would permit. Then I
+turned and looked down the river crawling on to the sweep it made out
+of sight just where Mr Brownrigg's farm began to come down to its banks.
+Then I looked to the left, and there stood my old church, as quiet
+in the dreary day, though not so bright, as in the sunshine: even the
+graves themselves must look yet more "solemn sad" in a wintry day like
+this, than they look when the sunlight that infolds them proclaims
+that God is not the God of the dead but of the living. One of the great
+battles that we have to fight in this world--for twenty great
+battles have to be fought all at once and in one--is the battle with
+appearances. I turned me to the right, and there once more I saw, as on
+that first afternoon, the weathercock that watched the winds over the
+stables at Oldcastle Hall. It had caught just one glimpse of the sun
+through some rent in the vapours, and flung it across to me, ere it
+vanished again amid the general dinginess of the hour.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV. TWO PARISHIONERS.
+
+
+I HAVE said, near the beginning of my story, that my parish was a large
+one: how is it that I have mentioned but one of the great families in
+it, and have indeed confined my recollections entirely to the village
+and its immediate neighbourhood? Will my reader have patience while
+I explain this to him a little? First, as he may have observed, my
+personal attraction is towards the poor rather than the rich. I was
+made so. I can generally get nearer the poor than the rich. But I say
+GENERALLY, for I have known a few rich people quite as much to my mind
+as the best of the poor. Thereupon, of course, their education would
+give them the advantage with me in the possibilities of communion. But
+when the heart is right, and there is a good stock of common sense as
+well,--a gift predominant, as far as I am aware, in no one class over
+another, education will turn the scale very gently with me. And then
+when I reflect that some of these poor people would have made nobler
+ladies and gentlemen than all but two or three I know, if they had only
+had the opportunity, there is a reaction towards the poor, something
+like a feeling of favour because they have not had fair play--a feeling
+soon modified, though not altered, by the reflection that they are such
+because God who loves them better than we do, has so ordered their lot,
+and by the recollection that not only was our Lord himself poor, but He
+said the poor were blessed. And let me just say in passing that I not
+only believe it because He said it, but I believe it because I see that
+it is so. I think sometimes that the world must have been especially
+created for the poor, and that particular allowances will be made for
+the rich because they are born into such disadvantages, and with their
+wickednesses and their miseries, their love of spiritual dirt and
+meanness, subserve the highest growth and emancipation of the poor, that
+they may inherit both the earth and the kingdom of heaven.
+
+But I have been once more wandering from my subject.
+
+Thus it was that the people in the village lying close to my door
+attracted most of my attention at first; of which attention those
+more immediately associated with the village, as, for instance, the
+inhabitants of the Hall, came in for a share, although they did not
+belong to the same class.
+
+Again, the houses of most of the gentlefolk lay considerably apart from
+the church and from each other. Many of them went elsewhere to church,
+and I did not feel bound to visit those, for I had enough to occupy
+me without, and had little chance of getting a hold of them to do them
+good. Still there were one or two families which I would have visited
+oftener, I confess, had I been more interested in them, or had I had
+a horse. Therefore, I ought to have bought a horse sooner than I did.
+Before this winter was over, however, I did buy one, partly to please Dr
+Duncan, who urged me to it for the sake of my health, partly because I
+could then do my duty better, and partly, I confess, from having been
+very fond of an old mare of my father's, when I was a boy, living,
+after my mother's death, at a farm of his in B--shire. Happening to come
+across a gray mare very much like her, I bought her at once.
+
+I think it was the very day after the events recorded in my last chapter
+that I mounted her to pay a visit to two rich maiden ladies, whose
+carriage stopped at the Lych-gate most Sundays when the weather was
+favourable, but whom I had called upon only once since I came to the
+parish. I should not have thought this visit worth mentioning, except
+for the conversation I had with them, during which a hint or two were
+dropped which had an influence in colouring my thoughts for some time
+after.
+
+I was shown with much ceremony by a butler, as old apparently as his
+livery of yellow and green, into the presence of the two ladies, one of
+whom sat in state reading a volume of the Spectator. She was very tall,
+and as square as the straight long-backed chair upon which she sat. A
+fat asthmatic poodle lay at her feet upon the hearth-rug. The other, a
+little lively gray-haired creature, who looked like a most ancient girl
+whom no power of gathering years would ever make old, was standing upon
+a high chair, making love to a demoniacal-looking cockatoo in a gilded
+cage. As I entered the room, the latter all but jumped from her perch
+with a merry though wavering laugh, and advanced to meet me.
+
+"Jonathan, bring the cake and wine," she cried to the retreating
+servant.
+
+The former rose with a solemn stiff-backedness, which was more amusing
+than dignified, and extended her hand as I approached her, without
+moving from her place.
+
+"We were afraid, Mr Walton," said the little lady, "that you had
+forgotten we were parishioners of yours."
+
+"That I could hardly do," I answered, "seeing you are such regular
+attendants at church. But I confess I have given you ground for your
+rebuke, Miss Crowther. I bought a horse, however, the other day, and
+this is the first use I have put him to."
+
+"We're charmed to see you. It is very good of you not to forget such
+uninteresting girls as we are."
+
+"You forget, Jemima," interposed her sister, in a feminine bass, "that
+time is always on the wing. I should have thought we were both decidedly
+middle-aged, though you are the elder by I will not say how many years."
+
+"All but ten years, Hester. I remember rocking you in your cradle scores
+of times. But somehow, Mr Walton, I can't help feeling as if she were my
+elder sister. She is so learned, you see; and I don't read anything but
+the newspapers."
+
+"And your Bible, Jemima. Do yourself justice."
+
+"That's a matter of course, sister. But this is not the way to entertain
+Mr Walton."
+
+"The gentlemen used to entertain the ladies when I was young, Jemima. I
+do not know how it may have been when you were."
+
+"Much the same, I believe, sister. But if you look at Mr Walton, I think
+you will see that he is pretty much entertained as it is."
+
+"I agree with Miss Hester," I said. "It is the duty of gentlemen to
+entertain ladies. But it is so much the kinder of ladies when they
+surpass their duty, and condescend to entertain gentlemen."
+
+"What can surpass duty, Mr Walton? I confess I do not agree with your
+doctrines upon that point."
+
+"I do not quite understand you, Miss Hester," I returned.
+
+"Why, Mr Walton--I hope you will not think me rude, but it always
+seems to me--and it has given me much pain, when I consider that your
+congregation is chiefly composed of the lower classes, who may be
+greatly injured by such a style of preaching. I must say I think so, Mr
+Walton. Only perhaps you are one of those who think a lady's opinion on
+such matters is worth nothing."
+
+"On the contrary, I respect an opinion just as far as the lady or
+gentleman who holds it seems to me qualified to have formed it first.
+But you have not yet told me what you think so objectionable in my
+preaching."
+
+"You always speak as if faith in Christ was something greater than duty.
+Now I think duty the first thing."
+
+"I quite agree with you, Miss Crowther. For how can I, or any clergyman,
+urge a man to that which is not his duty? But tell me, is not faith in
+Christ a duty? Where you have mistaken me is, that you think I speak of
+faith as higher than duty, when indeed I speak of faith as higher than
+any OTHER duty. It is the highest duty of man. I do not say the duty he
+always sees clearest, or even sees at all. But the fact is, that when
+that which is a duty becomes the highest delight of a man, the joy of
+his very being, he no more thinks or needs to think about it as a duty.
+What would you think of the love of a son who, when an appeal was made
+to his affections, should say, 'Oh yes, I love my mother dearly: it is
+my duty, of course?'"
+
+"That sounds very plausible, Mr Walton; but still I cannot help feeling
+that you preach faith and not works. I do not say that you are not to
+preach faith, of course; but you know faith without works is dead."
+
+"Now, really, Hester," interposed Miss Jemima, "I cannot think how it
+is, but, for my part, I should have said that Mr Walton was constantly
+preaching works. He's always telling you to do something or other. I
+know I always come out of the church with something on my mind; and I've
+got to work it off somehow before I'm comfortable."
+
+And here Miss Jemima got up on the chair again, and began to flirt with
+the cockatoo once more, but only in silent signs.
+
+I cannot quite recall how this part of the conversation drew to a close.
+But I will tell a fact or two about the sisters which may possibly
+explain how it was that they took up such different notions of my
+preaching. The elder scarce left the house, but spent almost the
+whole of her time in reading small dingy books of eighteenth century
+literature. She believed in no other; thought Shakespeare sentimental
+where he was not low, and Bacon pompous; Addison thoroughly respectable
+and gentlemanly. Pope was the great English poet, incomparably before
+Milton. The "Essay on Man" contained the deepest wisdom; the "Rape of
+the Lock" the most graceful imagination to be found in the language. The
+"Vicar of Wakefield" was pretty, but foolish; while in philosophy, Paley
+was perfect, especially in his notion of happiness, which she had
+heard objected to, and therefore warmly defended. Somehow or other,
+respectability--in position, in morals, in religion, in conduct--was
+everything. The consequence was that her very nature was old-fashioned,
+and had nothing in it of that lasting youth which is the birthright--so
+often despised--of every immortal being. But I have already said more
+about her than her place in my story justifies.
+
+Miss Crowther, on the contrary, whose eccentricities did not lie on the
+side of respectability, had gone on shocking the stiff proprieties of
+her younger sister till she could be shocked no more, and gave in as to
+the hopelessness of fate. She had had a severe disappointment in youth,
+had not only survived it, but saved her heart alive out of it, losing
+only, as far as appeared to the eyes of her neighbours at least, any
+remnant of selfish care about herself; and she now spent the love which
+had before been concentrated upon one object, upon every living thing
+that came near her, even to her sister's sole favourite, the wheezing
+poodle. She was very odd, it must be confessed, with her gray hair, her
+clear gray eye with wrinkled eyelids, her light step, her laugh at once
+girlish and cracked; darting in and out of the cottages, scolding this
+matron with a lurking smile in every tone, hugging that baby, boxing
+the ears of the other little tyrant, passing this one's rent, and
+threatening that other with awful vengeances, but it was a very lovely
+oddity. Their property was not large, and she knew every living thing
+on the place down to the dogs and pigs. And Miss Jemima, as the people
+always called her, transferring the MISS CROWTHER of primogeniture to
+the younger, who kept, like King Henry IV.,--
+
+   "Her presence, like a robe pontifical,
+    Ne'er seen but wonder'd at,"
+
+was the actual queen of the neighbourhood; for, though she was the very
+soul of kindness, she was determined to have her own way, and had it.
+
+Although I did not know all this at the time, such were the two ladies
+who held these different opinions about my preaching; the one who did
+nothing but read Messrs Addison, Pope, Paley, and Co., considering that
+I neglected the doctrine of works as the seal of faith, and the one who
+was busy helping her neighbours from morning to night, finding little in
+my preaching, except incentive to benevolence.
+
+The next point where my recollection can take up the conversation, is
+where Miss Hester made the following further criticism on my pulpit
+labours.
+
+"You are too anxious to explain everything, Mr Walton."
+
+I pause in my recording, to do my critic the justice of remarking that
+what she said looks worse on paper than it sounded from her lips; for
+she was a gentlewoman, and the tone has much to do with the impression
+made by the intellectual contents of all speech.
+
+"Where can be the use of trying to make uneducated people see the
+grounds of everything?" she said. "It is enough that this or that is in
+the Bible."
+
+"Yes; but there is just the point. What is in the Bible? Is it this or
+that?"
+
+"You are their spiritual instructor: tell them what is in the Bible."
+
+"But you have just been objecting to my mode of representing what is in
+the Bible."
+
+"It will be so much the worse, if you add argument to convince them of
+what is incorrect."
+
+"I doubt that. Falsehood will expose itself the sooner that honest
+argument is used to support it."
+
+"You cannot expect them to judge of what you tell them."
+
+"The Bible urges upon us to search and understand."
+
+"I grant that for those whose business it is, like yourself."
+
+"Do you think, then, that the Church consists of a few privileged to
+understand, and a great many who cannot understand, and therefore need
+not be taught?"
+
+"I said you had to teach them."
+
+"But to teach is to make people understand."
+
+"I don't think so. If you come to that, how much can the wisest of us
+understand? You remember what Pope says,--
+
+   'Superior beings, when of late they saw
+    A mortal man unfold all Nature's law,
+    Admired such wisdom in an earthly shape,
+    And show'd a Newton as we show an ape'?"
+
+"I do not know the passage. Pope is not my Bible. I should call such
+superior beings very inferior beings indeed."
+
+"Do you call the angels inferior beings?"
+
+"Such angels, certainly."
+
+"He means the good angels, of course."
+
+"And I say the good angels could never behave like that, for contempt
+is one of the lowest spiritual conditions in which any being can place
+himself. Our Lord says, 'Take heed that ye despise not one of these
+little ones, for their angels do always behold the face of my Father,
+who is in heaven.'"
+
+"Now will you even say that you understand that passage?"
+
+"Practically, well enough; just as the poorest man of my congregation
+may understand it. I am not to despise one of the little ones. Pope
+represents the angels as despising a Newton even."
+
+"And you despise Pope."
+
+"I hope not. I say he was full of despising, and therefore, if for no
+other reason, a small man."
+
+"Surely you do not jest at his bodily infirmities?"
+
+"I had forgotten them quite."
+
+"In every other sense he was a great man."
+
+"I cannot allow it. He was intellectually a great man, but morally a
+small man."
+
+"Such refinements are not easily followed."
+
+"I will undertake to make the poorest woman in my congregation
+understand that."
+
+"Why don't you try your friend Mrs Oldcastle, then? It might do her
+a little good," said Miss Hester, now becoming, I thought, a little
+spiteful at hearing her favourite treated so unceremoniously. I found
+afterwards that there was some kindness in it, however.
+
+"I should have very little influence with Mrs Oldcastle if I were
+to make the attempt. But I am not called upon to address my flock
+individually upon every point of character."
+
+"I thought she was an intimate friend of yours."
+
+"Quite the contrary. We are scarcely friendly."
+
+"I am very glad to hear it," said Miss Jemima, who had been silent
+during the little controversy that her sister and I had been carrying
+on. "We have been quite misinformed. The fact is, we thought we might
+have seen more of you if it had not been for her. And as very few people
+of her own position in society care to visit her, we thought it a pity
+she should be your principal friend in the parish."
+
+"Why do they not visit her more?"
+
+"There are strange stories about her, which it is as well to leave
+alone. They are getting out of date too. But she is not a fit woman to
+be regarded as the clergyman's friend. There!" said Miss Jemima, as if
+she had wanted to relieve her bosom of a burden, and had done it.
+
+"I think, however, her religious opinions would correspond with your
+own, Mr Walton," said Miss Hester.
+
+"Possibly," I answered, with indifference; "I don't care much about
+opinion."
+
+"Her daughter would be a nice girl, I fancy, if she weren't kept down
+by her mother. She looks scared, poor thing! And they say she's not
+quite--the thing, you know," said Miss Jemima.
+
+"What DO you mean, Miss Crowther?"
+
+She gently tapped her forehead with a forefinger.
+
+I laughed. I thought it was not worth my while to enter as the champion
+of Miss Oldcastle's sanity.
+
+"They are, and have been, a strange family as far back as I can
+remember; and my mother used to say the same. I am glad she comes to our
+church now. You mustn't let her set her cap at you, though, Mr Walton.
+It wouldn't do at all. She's pretty enough, too!"
+
+"Yes," I returned, "she is rather pretty. But I don't think she looks as
+if she had a cap to set at anybody."
+
+I rose to go, for I did not relish any further pursuit of the
+conversation in the same direction.
+
+I rode home slowly, brooding on the lovely marvel, that out of such a
+rough ungracious stem as the Oldcastle family, should have sprung such
+a delicate, pale, winter-braved flower, as Ethelwyn. And I prayed that I
+might be honoured to rescue her from the ungenial soil and atmosphere to
+which the machinations of her mother threatened to confine her for the
+rest of a suffering life.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI. SATAN CAST OUT.
+
+
+I was within a mile of the village, returning from my visit to the
+Misses Crowther, when my horse, which was walking slowly along the soft
+side of the road, lifted his head, and pricked up his ears at the sound,
+which he heard first, of approaching hoofs. The riders soon came in
+sight--Miss Oldcastle, Judy, and Captain Everard. Miss Oldcastle I had
+never seen on horseback before. Judy was on a little white pony she used
+to gallop about the fields near the Hall. The Captain was laughing and
+chatting gaily as they drew near, now to the one, now to the other.
+Being on my own side of the road I held straight on, not wishing to stop
+or to reveal the signs of a distress which had almost overwhelmed me. I
+felt as cold as death, or rather as if my whole being had been deprived
+of vitality by a sudden exhaustion around me of the ethereal element of
+life. I believe I did not alter my bearing, but remained with my head
+bent, for I had been thinking hard just before, till we were on the
+point of meeting, when I lifted my hat to Miss Oldcastle without drawing
+bridle, and went on. The Captain returned my salutation, and likewise
+rode on. I could just see, as they passed me, that Miss Oldcastle's pale
+face was flushed even to scarlet, but she only bowed and kept alongside
+of her companion. I thought I had escaped conversation, and had gone
+about twenty yards farther, when I heard the clatter of Judy's pony
+behind me, and up she came at full gallop.
+
+"Why didn't you stop to speak to us, Mr Walton?" she said. "I pulled up,
+but you never looked at me. We shall be cross all the rest of the day,
+because you cut us so. What have we done?"
+
+"Nothing, Judy, that I know of," I answered, trying to speak cheerfully.
+"But I do not know your companion, and I was not in the humour for an
+introduction."
+
+She looked hard at me with her keen gray eyes; and I felt as if the
+child was seeing through me.
+
+"I don't know what to make of it, Mr Walton. You're very different
+somehow from what you used to be. There's something wrong somewhere. But
+I suppose you would all tell me it's none of my business. So I won't ask
+questions. Only I wish I could do anything for you."
+
+I felt the child's kindness, but could only say--
+
+"Thank you, Judy. I am sure I should ask you if there were anything you
+could do for me. But you'll be left behind."
+
+"No fear of that. My Dobbin can go much faster than their big horses.
+But I see you don't want me, so good-bye."
+
+She turned her pony's head as she spoke, jumped the ditch at the side of
+the road, and flew after them along the grass like a swallow. I likewise
+roused my horse and went off at a hard trot, with the vain impulse so to
+shake off the tormenting thoughts that crowded on me like gadflies. But
+this day was to be one of more trial still.
+
+As I turned a corner, almost into the street of the village, Tom Weir
+was at my side. He had evidently been watching for me. His face was so
+pale, that I saw in a moment something had happened.
+
+"What is the matter, Tom?" I asked, in some alarm.
+
+He did not reply for a moment, but kept unconsciously stroking my
+horse's neck, and staring at me "with wide blue eyes."
+
+"Come, Tom," I repeated, "tell me what is the matter."
+
+I could see his bare throat knot and relax, like the motion of a
+serpent, before he could utter the words.
+
+"Kate has killed her little boy, sir."
+
+He followed them with a stifled cry--almost a scream, and hid his face
+in his hands.
+
+"God forbid!" I exclaimed, and struck my heels in my horse's sides,
+nearly overturning poor Tom in my haste.
+
+"She's mad, sir; she's mad," he cried, as I rode off.
+
+"Come after me," I said, "and take the mare home. I shan't be able to
+leave your sister."
+
+Had I had a share, by my harsh words, in driving the woman beyond the
+bounds of human reason and endurance? The thought was dreadful. But I
+must not let my mind rest on it now, lest I should be unfitted for what
+might have to be done. Before I reached the door, I saw a little crowd
+of the villagers, mostly women and children, gathered about it. I got
+off my horse, and gave him to a woman to hold till Tom should come up.
+With a little difficulty, I prevailed on the rest to go home at once,
+and not add to the confusions and terrors of the unhappy affair by
+the excitement of their presence. As soon as they had yielded to my
+arguments, I entered the shop, which to my annoyance I found full of the
+neighbours. These likewise I got rid of as soon as possible, and locking
+the door behind them, went up to the room above.
+
+To my surprise, I found no one there. On the hearth and in the fender
+lay two little pools of blood. All in the house was utterly still. It
+was very dreadful. I went to the only other door. It was not bolted as I
+had expected to find it. I opened it, peeped in, and entered. On the
+bed lay the mother, white as death, but with her black eyes wide open,
+staring at the ceiling: and on her arm lay little Gerard, as white,
+except where the blood had flowed from the bandage that could not
+confine it, down his sweet deathlike face. His eyes were fast closed,
+and he had no sign of life about him. I shut the door behind me, and
+approached the bed. When Catherine caught sight of me, she showed no
+surprise or emotion of any kind. Her lips, with automaton-like movement,
+uttered the words--
+
+"I have done it at last. I am ready. Take me away. I shall be hanged. I
+don't care. I confess it. Only don't let the people stare at me."
+
+Her lips went on moving, but I could hear no more till suddenly she
+broke out--
+
+"Oh! my baby! my baby!" and gave a cry of such agony as I hope never to
+hear again while I live.
+
+At this moment I heard a loud knocking at the shop-door, which was the
+only entrance to the house, and remembering that I had locked it, I went
+down to see who was there. I found Thomas Weir, the father, accompanied
+by Dr Duncan, whom, as it happened, he had had some difficulty in
+finding. Thomas had sped to his daughter the moment he heard the rumour
+of what had happened, and his fierceness in clearing the shop had at
+least prevented the neighbours, even in his absence, from intruding
+further.
+
+We went up together to Catherine's room. Thomas said nothing to me about
+what had happened, and I found it difficult even to conjecture from his
+countenance what thoughts were passing through his mind.
+
+Catherine looked from one to another of us, as if she did not know the
+one from the other. She made no motion to rise from her bed, nor did she
+utter a word, although her lips would now and then move as if moulding a
+sentence. When Dr Duncan, after looking at the child, proceeded to take
+him from her, she gave him one imploring look, and yielded with a moan;
+then began to stare hopelessly at the ceiling again. The doctor carried
+the child into the next room, and the grandfather followed.
+
+"You see what you have driven me to!" cried Catherine, the moment I was
+left alone with her. "I hope you are satisfied."
+
+The words went to my very soul. But when I looked at her, her eyes were
+wandering about over the ceiling, and I had and still have difficulty in
+believing that she spoke the words, and that they were not an illusion
+of my sense, occasioned by the commotion of my own feelings. I
+thought it better, however, to leave her, and join the others in the
+sitting-room. The first thing I saw there was Thomas on his knees,
+with a basin of water, washing away the blood of his grandson from his
+daughter's floor. The very sight of the child had hitherto been nauseous
+to him, and his daughter had been beyond the reach of his forgiveness.
+Here was the end of it--the blood of the one shed by the hand of the
+other, and the father of both, who had disdained both, on his knees,
+wiping it up. Dr Duncan was giving the child brandy; for he had found
+that he had been sick, and that the loss of blood was the chief cause
+of his condition. The blood flowed from a wound on the head, extending
+backwards from the temple, which had evidently been occasioned by a fall
+upon the fender, where the blood lay both inside and out; and the
+doctor took the sickness as a sign that the brain had not been seriously
+injured by the blow. In a few minutes he said--
+
+"I think he'll come round."
+
+"Will it be safe to tell his mother so?" I asked.
+
+"Yes: I think you may."
+
+I hastened to her room.
+
+"Your little darling is not dead, Catherine. He is coming to."
+
+She THREW herself off the bed at my feet, caught them round with her
+arms, and cried--
+
+"I will forgive him. I will do anything you like. I forgive George
+Everard. I will go and ask my father to forgive me."
+
+I lifted her in my arms--how light she was!--and laid her again on the
+bed, where she burst into tears, and lay sobbing and weeping. I went to
+the other room. Little Gerard opened his eyes and closed them again, as
+I entered. The doctor had laid him in his own crib. He said his pulse
+was improving. I beckoned to Thomas. He followed me.
+
+"She wants to ask you to forgive her," I said. "Do not, in God's name,
+wait till she asks you, but go and tell her that you forgive her."
+
+"I dare not say I forgive her," he answered. "I have more need to ask
+her to forgive me."
+
+I took him by the hand, and led him into her room. She feebly lifted
+her arms towards him. Not a word was said on either side. I left them in
+each other's embrace. The hard rocks had been struck with the rod, and
+the waters of life had flowed forth from each, and had met between.
+
+I have more than once known this in the course of my experience--the
+ice and snow of a long estrangement suddenly give way, and the boiling
+geyser-floods of old affection rush from the hot deeps of the heart. I
+think myself that the very lastingness and strength of animosity have
+their origin sometimes in the reality of affection: the love lasts all
+the while, freshly indignant at every new load heaped upon it; till,
+at last, a word, a look, a sorrow, a gladness, sets it free; and,
+forgetting all its claims, it rushes irresistibly towards its ends. Thus
+was it with Thomas and Catherine Weir.
+
+When I rejoined Dr Duncan, I found little Gerard asleep, and breathing
+quietly.
+
+"What do you know of this sad business, Mr Walton?" said the doctor.
+
+"I should like to ask the same question of you," I returned. "Young Tom
+told me that his sister had murdered the child. That is all I know."
+
+"His father told me the same; and that is all I know. Do you believe
+it?"
+
+"At least we have no evidence about it. It is tolerably certain neither
+of those two could have been present. They must have received it by
+report. We must wait till she is able to explain the thing herself."
+
+"Meantime," said Dr Duncan, "all I believe is, that she struck the
+child, and that he fell upon the fender."
+
+I may as well inform my reader that, as far as Catherine could give an
+account of the transaction, this conjecture was corroborated. But the
+smallest reminder of it evidently filled her with such a horror of
+self-loathing, that I took care to avoid the subject entirely, after
+the attempt at explanation which she made at my request. She could not
+remember with any clearness what had happened. All she remembered was
+that she had been more miserable than ever in her life before; that the
+child had come to her, as he seldom did, with some childish request or
+other; that she felt herself seized with intense hatred of him; and the
+next thing she knew was that his blood was running in a long red finger
+towards her. Then it seemed as if that blood had been drawn from her own
+over-charged heart and brain; she knew what she had done, though she did
+not know how she had done it; and the tide of her ebbed affection flowed
+like the returning waters of the Solway. But beyond her restored love,
+she remembered nothing more that happened till she lay weeping with the
+hope that the child would yet live. Probably more particulars returned
+afterwards, but I took care to ask no more questions. In the increase of
+illness that followed, I more than once saw her shudder while she slept,
+and thought she was dreaming what her waking memory had forgotten; and
+once she started awake, crying, "I have murdered him again."
+
+To return to that first evening:--When Thomas came from his daughter's
+room, he looked like a man from whom the bitterness of evil had passed
+away. To human eyes, at least, it seemed as if self had been utterly
+slain in him. His face had that child-like expression in its paleness,
+and the tearfulness without tears haunting his eyes, which reminds one
+of the feeling of an evening in summer between which and the sultry
+day preceding it has fallen the gauzy veil of a cooling shower, with a
+rainbow in the east.
+
+"She is asleep," he said.
+
+"How is it your daughter Mary is not here?" I asked.
+
+"She was taken with a fit the moment she heard the bad news, sir. I left
+her with nobody but father. I think I must go and look after her now.
+It's not the first she's had neither, though I never told any one
+before. You won't mention it, sir. It makes people look shy at you, you
+know, sir."
+
+"Indeed, I won't mention it.--Then she mustn't sit up, and two nurses
+will be wanted here. You and I must take it to-night, Thomas. You'll
+attend to your daughter, if she wants anything, and I know this little
+darling won't be frightened if he comes to himself, and sees me beside
+him."
+
+"God bless you, sir," said Thomas, fervently.
+
+And from that hour to this there has never been a coolness between us.
+
+"A very good arrangement," said Dr Duncan; "only I feel as if I ought to
+have a share in it."
+
+"No, no," I said. "We do not know who may want you. Besides, we are both
+younger than you."
+
+"I will come over early in the morning then, and see how you are going
+on."
+
+As soon as Thomas returned with good news of Mary's recovery, I left
+him, and went home to tell my sister, and arrange for the night. We
+carried back with us what things we could think of to make the two
+patients as comfortable as possible; for, as regarded Catherine, now
+that she would let her fellows help her, I was even anxious that she
+should feel something of that love about her which she had so long
+driven from her door. I felt towards her somewhat as towards a new-born
+child, for whom this life of mingled weft must be made as soft as its
+material will admit of; or rather, as if she had been my own sister, as
+indeed she was, returned from wandering in weary and miry ways, to taste
+once more the tenderness of home. I wanted her to read the love of God
+in the love that even I could show her. And, besides, I must confess
+that, although the result had been, in God's great grace, so good, my
+heart still smote me for the severity with which I had spoken the truth
+to her; and it was a relief to myself to endeavour to make some amends
+for having so spoken to her. But I had no intention of going near her
+that night, for I thought the less she saw of me the better, till she
+should be a little stronger, and have had time, with the help of
+her renewed feelings, to get over the painful associations so long
+accompanying the thought of me. So I took my place beside Gerard, and
+watched through the night. The little fellow repeatedly cried out in
+that terror which is so often the consequence of the loss of blood;
+but when I laid my hand on him, he smiled without waking, and lay
+quite still again for a while. Once or twice he woke up, and looked so
+bewildered that I feared delirium; but a little jelly composed him, and
+he fell fast asleep again. He did not seem even to have headache from
+the blow.
+
+But when I was left alone with the child, seated in a chair by the fire,
+my only light, how my thoughts rushed upon the facts bearing on my own
+history which this day had brought before me! Horror it was to think of
+Miss Oldcastle even as only riding with the seducer of Catherine Weir.
+There was torture in the thought of his touching her hand; and to think
+that before the summer came once more, he might be her husband! I will
+not dwell on the sufferings of that night more than is needful; for even
+now, in my old age, I cannot recall without renewing them. But I must
+indicate one train of thought which kept passing through my mind
+with constant recurrence:--Was it fair to let her marry such a man in
+ignorance? Would she marry him if she knew what I knew of him? Could
+I speak against my rival?--blacken him even with the truth--the only
+defilement that can really cling? Could I for my own dignity do so? And
+was she therefore to be sacrificed in ignorance? Might not some one else
+do it instead of me? But if I set it agoing, was it not precisely the
+same thing as if I did it myself, only more cowardly? There was but one
+way of doing it, and that was--with the full and solemn consciousness
+that it was and must be a barrier between us for ever. If I could give
+her up fully and altogether, then I might tell her the truth which was
+to preserve her from marrying such a man as my rival. And I must do so,
+sooner than that she, my very dream of purity and gentle truth, should
+wed defilement. But how bitter to cast away my CHANCE! as I said, in the
+gathering despair of that black night. And although every time I said
+it--for the same words would come over and over as in a delirious
+dream--I repeated yet again to myself that wonderful line of Spenser,--
+
+     "It chanced--eternal God that chance did guide,"
+
+yet the words never grew into spirit in me; they remained "words, words,
+words," and meant nothing to my feeling--hardly even to my judgment
+meant anything at all. Then came another bitter thought, the bitterness
+of which was wicked: it flashed upon me that my own earnestness with
+Catherine Weir, in urging her to the duty of forgiveness, would bear a
+main part in wrapping up in secrecy that evil thing which ought not to
+be hid. For had she not vowed--with the same facts before her which now
+threatened to crush my heart into a lump of clay--to denounce the man at
+the very altar? Had not the revenge which I had ignorantly combated been
+my best ally? And for one brief, black, wicked moment I repented that I
+had acted as I had acted. The next I was on my knees by the side of the
+sleeping child, and had repented back again in shame and sorrow. Then
+came the consolation that if I suffered hereby, I suffered from doing my
+duty. And that was well.
+
+Scarcely had I seated myself again by the fire when the door of the room
+opened softly, and Thomas appeared.
+
+"Kate is very strange, sir," he said, "and wants to see you."
+
+I rose at once.
+
+"Perhaps, then, you had better stay with Gerard."
+
+"I will, sir; for I think she wants to speak to you alone."
+
+I entered her chamber. A candle stood on a chest of drawers, and its
+light fell on her face, once more flushed in those two spots with the
+glow of the unseen fire of disease. Her eyes, too, glittered again, but
+the fierceness was gone, and only the suffering remained. I drew a chair
+beside her, and took her hand. She yielded it willingly, even returned
+the pressure of kindness which I offered to the thin trembling fingers.
+
+"You are too good, sir," she said. "I want to tell you all. He promised
+to marry me, I believed him. But I did very wrong. And I have been a bad
+mother, for I could not keep from seeing his face in Gerard's. Gerard
+was the name he told me to call him when I had to write to him, and so I
+named the little darling Gerard. How is he, sir?"
+
+"Doing nicely," I replied. "I do not think you need be at all uneasy
+about him now."
+
+"Thank God. I forgive his father now with all my heart. I feel it easier
+since I saw how wicked I could be myself. And I feel it easier, too,
+that I have not long to live. I forgive him with all my heart, and I
+will take no revenge. I will not tell one who he is. I have never told
+any one yet. But I will tell you. His name is George Everard--Captain
+Everard. I came to know him when I was apprenticed at Addicehead. I
+would not tell you, sir, if I did not know that you will not tell
+any one. I know you so well that I will not ask you not. I saw him
+yesterday, and it drove me wild. But it is all over now. My heart feels
+so cool now. Do you think God will forgive me?"
+
+Without one word of my own, I took out my pocket Testament and read
+these words:--
+
+"For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also
+forgive you."
+
+Then I read to her, from the seventh chapter of St Luke's Gospel, the
+story of the woman who was a sinner and came to Jesus in Simon's house,
+that she might see how the Lord himself thought and felt about such.
+When I had finished, I found that she was gently weeping, and so I left
+her, and resumed my place beside the boy. I told Thomas that he had
+better not go near her just yet. So we sat in silence together for a
+while, during which I felt so weary and benumbed, that I neither cared
+to resume my former train of thought, nor to enter upon the new one
+suggested by the confession of Catherine. I believe I must have fallen
+asleep in my chair, for I suddenly returned to consciousness at a cry
+from Gerard. I started up, and there was the child fast asleep, but
+standing on his feet in his crib, pushing with his hands from before
+him, as if resisting some one, and crying--
+
+"Don't. Don't. Go away, man. Mammy! Mr Walton!"
+
+I took him in my arms, and kissed him, and laid him down again; and he
+lay as still as if he had never moved. At the same moment, Thomas came
+again into the room.
+
+"I am sorry to be so troublesome, sir," he said; "but my poor daughter
+says there is one thing more she wanted to say to you."
+
+I returned at once. As soon as I entered the room, she said eagerly:--
+
+"I forgive him--I forgive him with all my heart; but don't let him take
+Gerard."
+
+I assured her I would do my best to prevent any such attempt on his
+part, and making her promise to try to go to sleep, left her once more.
+Nor was either of the patients disturbed again during the night. Both
+slept, as it appeared, refreshingly.
+
+In the morning, that is, before eight o'clock, the old doctor made his
+welcome appearance, and pronounced both quite as well as he had expected
+to find them. In another hour, he had sent young Tom to take my place,
+and my sister to take his father's. I was determined that none of the
+gossips of the village should go near the invalid if I could help it;
+for, though such might be kind-hearted and estimable women, their place
+was not by such a couch as that of Catherine Weir. I enjoined my sister
+to be very gentle in her approaches to her, to be careful even not
+to seem anxious to serve her, and so to allow her to get gradually
+accustomed to her presence, not showing herself for the first day more
+than she could help, and yet taking good care she should have everything
+she wanted. Martha seemed to understand me perfectly; and I left her in
+charge with the more confidence that I knew Dr Duncan would call several
+times in the course of the day. As for Tom, I had equal assurance
+that he would attend to orders; and as Gerard was very fond of him, I
+dismissed all anxiety about both, and allowed my mind to return with
+fresh avidity to the contemplation of its own cares, and fears, and
+perplexities.
+
+It was of no use trying to go to sleep, so I set out for a walk.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII. THE MAN AND THE CHILD.
+
+
+It was a fine frosty morning, the invigorating influences of which,
+acting along with the excitement following immediately upon a sleepless
+night, overcame in a great measure the depression occasioned by the
+contemplation of my circumstances. Disinclined notwithstanding for any
+more pleasant prospect, I sought the rugged common where I had so lately
+met Catherine Weir in the storm and darkness, and where I had stood
+without knowing it upon the very verge of the precipice down which my
+fate was now threatening to hurl me. I reached the same chasm in which
+I had sought a breathing space on that night, and turning into it, sat
+down upon a block of sand which the frost had detached from the wall
+above. And now the tumult began again in my mind, revolving around the
+vortex of a new centre of difficulty.
+
+For, first of all, I found my mind relieved by the fact that,
+having urged Catherine to a line of conduct which had resulted in
+confession,--a confession which, leaving all other considerations of my
+office out of view, had the greater claim upon my secrecy that it was
+made in confidence in my uncovenanted honour,--I was not, could not be
+at liberty to disclose the secret she confided to me, which, disclosed
+by herself, would have been the revenge from which I had warned her, and
+at the same time my deliverance. I was relieved I say at first, by this
+view of the matter, because I might thus keep my own chance of some
+favourable turn; whereas, if I once told Miss Oldcastle, I must give her
+up for ever, as I had plainly seen in the watch of the preceding night.
+But my love did not long remain skulking thus behind the hedge of
+honour. Suddenly I woke and saw that I was unworthy of the honour of
+loving her, for that I was glad to be compelled to risk her well-being
+for the chance of my own happiness; a risk which involved infinitely
+more wretchedness to her than the loss of my dearest hopes to me; for
+it is one thing for a man not to marry the woman he loves, and quite
+another for a woman to marry a man she cannot ever respect. Had I
+not been withheld partly by my obligation to Catherine, partly by the
+feeling that I ought to wait and see what God would do, I should have
+risen that moment and gone straight to Oldcastle Hall, that I might
+plunge at once into the ocean of my loss, and encounter, with the full
+sense of honourable degradation, every misconstruction that might justly
+be devised of my conduct. For that I had given her up first could
+never be known even to her in this world. I could only save her by
+encountering and enduring and cherishing her scorn. At least so it
+seemed to me at the time; and, although I am certain the other higher
+motives had much to do in holding me back, I am equally certain that
+this awful vision of the irrevocable fate to follow upon the deed, had
+great influence, as well, in inclining me to suspend action.
+
+I was still sitting in the hollow, when I heard the sound of horses'
+hoofs in the distance, and felt a foreboding of what would appear. I
+was only a few yards from the road upon which the sand-cleft opened,
+and could see a space of it sufficient to show the persons even of rapid
+riders. The sounds drew nearer. I could distinguish the step of a pony
+and the steps of two horses besides. Up they came and swept past--Miss
+Oldcastle upon Judy's pony, and Mr Stoddart upon her horse; with the
+captain upon his own. How grateful I felt to Mr Stoddart! And the hope
+arose in me that he had accompanied them at Miss Oldcastle's request.
+
+I had had no fear of being seen, sitting as I was on the side from which
+they came. One of the three, however, caught a glimpse of me, and even
+in the moment ere she vanished I fancied I saw the lily-white grow
+rosy-red. But it must have been fancy, for she could hardly have been
+quite pale upon horseback on such a keen morning.
+
+I could not sit any longer. As soon as I ceased to hear the sound of
+their progress, I rose and walked home--much quieter in heart and mind
+than when I set out.
+
+As I entered by the nearer gate of the vicarage, I saw Old Rogers enter
+by the farther. He did not see me, but we met at the door. I greeted
+him.
+
+"I'm in luck," he said, "to meet yer reverence just coming home. How's
+poor Miss Weir to-day, sir?"
+
+"She was rather better, when I left her this morning, than she had been
+through the night. I have not heard since. I left my sister with her. I
+greatly doubt if she will ever get up again. That's between ourselves,
+you know. Come in."
+
+"Thank you, sir. I wanted to have a little talk with you.--You don't
+believe what they say--that she tried to kill the poor little fellow?"
+he asked, as soon as the study door was closed behind us.
+
+"If she did, she was out of her mind for the moment. But I don't believe
+it."
+
+And thereupon I told him what both his master and I thought about
+it. But I did not tell him what she had said confirmatory of our
+conclusions.
+
+"That's just what I came to myself, sir, turning the thing over in my
+old head. But there's dreadful things done in the world, sir. There's my
+daughter been a-telling of me--"
+
+I was instantly breathless attention. What he chose to tell me I felt
+at liberty to hear, though I would not have listened to Jane herself.--I
+must here mention that she and Richard were not yet married, old Mr
+Brownrigg not having yet consented to any day his son wished to fix;
+and that she was, therefore, still in her place of attendance upon Miss
+Oldcastle.
+
+"--There's been my daughter a-telling of me," said Rogers, "that the old
+lady up at the Hall there is tormenting the life out of that daughter of
+hers--she don't look much like hers, do she, sir?--wanting to make her
+marry a man of her choosing. I saw him go past o' horseback with her
+yesterday, and I didn't more than half like the looks on him. He's too
+like a fair-spoken captain I sailed with once, what was the hardest man
+I ever sailed with. His own way was everything, even after he saw it
+wouldn't do. Now, don't you think, sir, somebody or other ought to
+interfere? It's as bad as murder that, and anybody has a right to do
+summat to perwent it."
+
+"I don't know what can be done, Rogers. I CAN'T interfere."
+
+The old man was silent. Evidently he thought I might interfere if I
+pleased. I could see what he was thinking. Possibly his daughter had
+told him something more than he chose to communicate to me. I could not
+help suspecting the mode in which he judged I might interfere. But
+I could see no likelihood before me but that of confusion and
+precipitation. In a word, I had not a plain path to follow.
+
+"Old Rogers," I said, "I can almost guess what you mean. But I am
+in more difficulty with regard to what you suggest than I can easily
+explain to you. I need not tell you, however, that I will turn the whole
+matter over in my mind."
+
+"The prey ought to be taken from the lion somehow, if it please God,"
+returned the old man solemnly. "The poor young lady keeps up as well
+as she can before her mother; but Jane do say there's a power o' crying
+done in her own room."
+
+Partly to hide my emotion, partly with the sudden resolve to do
+something, if anything could be done, I said:--
+
+"I will call on Mr Stoddart this evening. I may hear something from him
+to suggest a mode of action."
+
+"I don't think you'll get anything worth while from Mr Stoddart. He
+takes things a deal too easy like. He'll be this man's man and that
+man's man both at oncet. I beg your pardon, sir. But HE won't help us."
+
+"That's all I can think of at present, though," I said; whereupon the
+man-of-war's man, with true breeding, rose at once, and took a kindly
+leave.
+
+I was in the storm again. She suffering, resisting, and I standing
+aloof! But what could I do? She had repelled me--she would repel me.
+Were I to dare to speak, and so be refused, the separation would be
+final. She had said that the day might come when she would ask help from
+me: she had made no movement towards the request. I would gladly die
+to serve her--yea, more gladly far than live, if that service was
+to separate us. But what to do I could not see. Still, just to do
+something, even if a useless something, I would go and see Mr Stoddart
+that evening. I was sure to find him alone, for he never dined with the
+family, and I might possibly catch a glimpse of Miss Oldcastle.
+
+I found little Gerard so much better, though very weak, and his mother
+so quiet, notwithstanding great feverishness, that I might safely leave
+them to the care of Mary, who had quite recovered from her attack, and
+her brother Tom. So there was something off my mind for the present.
+
+The heavens were glorious with stars,--Arcturus and his host, the
+Pleiades, Orion, and all those worlds that shine out when ours is dark;
+but I did not care for them. Let them shine: they could not shine into
+me. I tried with feeble effort to lift my eyes to Him who is above the
+stars, and yet holds the sea, yea, the sea of human thought and trouble,
+in the hollow of His hand. How much sustaining, although no conscious
+comforting, I got from that region
+
+   "Where all men's prayers to Thee raised Return possessed of what
+   they pray Thee."
+
+I cannot tell. It was not a time favourable to the analysis of
+feeling--still less of religious feeling. But somehow things did seem a
+little more endurable before I reached the house.
+
+I was passing across the hall, following the "white wolf" to Mr
+Stoddart's room, when the drawing-room door opened, and Miss Oldcastle
+came half out, but seeing me drew back instantly. A moment after,
+however, I heard the sound of her dress following us. Light as was her
+step, every footfall seemed to be upon my heart. I did not dare to look
+round, for dread of seeing her turn away from me. I felt like one under
+a spell, or in an endless dream; but gladly would I have walked on
+for ever in hope, with that silken vortex of sound following me. Soon,
+however, it ceased. She had turned aside in some other direction, and I
+passed on to Mr Stoddart's room.
+
+He received me kindly, as he always did; but his smile flickered
+uneasily. He seemed in some trouble, and yet pleased to see me.
+
+"I am glad you have taken to horseback," I said. "It gives me hope that
+you will be my companion sometimes when I make a round of my parish. I
+should like you to see some of our people. You would find more in them
+to interest you than perhaps you would expect."
+
+I thus tried to seem at ease, as I was far from feeling.
+
+"I am not so fond of riding as I used to be," returned Mr Stoddart.
+
+"Did you like the Arab horses in India?"
+
+"Yes, after I got used to their careless ways. That horse you must have
+seen me on the other day, is very nearly a pure Arab. He belongs to
+Captain Everard, and carries Miss Oldcastle beautifully. I was quite
+sorry to take him from her, but it was her own doing. She would have me
+go with her. I think I have lost much firmness since I was ill."
+
+"If the loss of firmness means the increase of kindness, I do not think
+you will have to lament it," I answered. "Does Captain Everard make a
+long stay?"
+
+"He stays from day to day. I wish he would go. I don't know what to do.
+Mrs Oldcastle and he form one party in the house; Miss Oldcastle and
+Judy another; and each is trying to gain me over. I don't want to belong
+to either. If they would only let me alone!"
+
+"What do they want of you, Mr Stoddart?"
+
+"Mrs Oldcastle wants me to use my influence with Ethelwyn, to persuade
+her to behave differently to Captain Everard. The old lady has set her
+heart on their marriage, and Ethelwyn, though she dares not break with
+him, she is so much afraid of her mother, yet keeps him somehow at arm's
+length. Then Judy is always begging me to stand up for her aunt. But
+what's the use of my standing up for her if she won't stand up for
+herself; she never says a word to me about it herself. It's all Judy's
+doing. How am I to know what she wants?"
+
+"I thought you said just now she asked you to ride with her?"
+
+"So she did, but nothing more. She did not even press it, only the tears
+came in her eyes when I refused, and I could not bear that; so I went
+against my will. I don't want to make enemies. I am sure I don't see why
+she should stand out. He's a very good match in point of property and
+family too."
+
+"Perhaps she does not like him?" I forced myself to say.
+
+"Oh! I suppose not, or she would not be so troublesome. But she could
+arrange all that if she were inclined to be agreeable to her friends.
+After all I have done for her! Well, one must not look to be repaid
+for anything one does for others. I used to be very fond of her: I am
+getting quite tired of her miserable looks."
+
+And what had this man done for her, then? He had, for his own amusement,
+taught her Hindostanee; he had given her some insight into the
+principles of mechanics, and he had roused in her some taste for the
+writings of the Mystics. But for all that regarded the dignity of her
+humanity and her womanhood, if she had had no teaching but what he gave
+her, her mind would have been merely "an unweeded garden that grows to
+seed." And now he complained that in return for his pains she would not
+submit to the degradation of marrying a man she did not love, in order
+to leave him in the enjoyment of his own lazy and cowardly peace. Really
+he was a worse man than I had thought him. Clearly he would not help to
+keep her in the right path, not even interfere to prevent her from being
+pushed into the wrong one. But perhaps he was only expressing his own
+discomfort, not giving his real judgment, and I might be censuring him
+too hardly.
+
+"What will be the result, do you suppose?" I asked.
+
+"I can't tell. Sooner or later she will have to give in to her mother.
+Everybody does. She might as well yield with a good grace."
+
+"She must do what she thinks right," I said. "And you, Mr Stoddart,
+ought to help her to do what is right. You surely would not urge her to
+marry a man she did not love."
+
+"Well, no; not exactly urge her. And yet society does not object to it.
+It is an acknowledged arrangement, common enough."
+
+"Society is scarcely an interpreter of the divine will. Society will
+honour vile things enough, so long as the doer has money sufficient
+to clothe them in a grace not their own. There is a God's-way of doing
+everything in the world, up to marrying, or down to paying a bill."
+
+"Yes, yes, I know what you would say; and I suppose you are right.
+I will not urge any opinion of mine. Besides, we shall have a little
+respite soon, for he must join his regiment in a day or two."
+
+It was some relief to hear this. But I could not with equanimity
+prosecute a conversation having Miss Oldcastle for the subject of it,
+and presently took my leave.
+
+As I walked through one of the long passages, but dimly lighted, leading
+from Mr Stoddart's apartment to the great staircase, I started at a
+light touch on my arm. It was from Judy's hand.
+
+"Dear Mr Walton----" she said, and stopped.
+
+For at the same moment appeared at the farther end of the passage
+towards which I had been advancing, a figure of which little more than
+a white face was visible; and the voice of Sarah, through whose softness
+always ran a harsh thread that made it unmistakable, said,
+
+"Miss Judy, your grandmamma wants you."
+
+Judy took her hand from my arm, and with an almost martial stride
+the little creature walked up to the speaker, and stood before her
+defiantly. I could see them quite well in the fuller light at the end
+of the passage, where there stood a lamp. I followed slowly that I
+might not interrupt the child's behaviour, which moved me strangely
+in contrast with the pusillanimity I had so lately witnessed in Mr
+Stoddart.
+
+"Sarah," she said, "you know you are telling a lie Grannie does NOT want
+me. You have NOT been in the dining-room since I left it one moment ago.
+Do you think, you BAD woman, _I_ am going to be afraid of you? I know
+you better than you think. Go away directly, or I will make you."
+
+She stamped her little foot, and the "white wolf" turned and walked away
+without a word.
+
+If the mothers among my readers are shocked at the want of decorum in my
+friend Judy, I would just say, that valuable as propriety of demeanour
+is, truth of conduct is infinitely more precious. Glad should I be to
+think that the even tenor of my children's good manners could never be
+interrupted, except by such righteous indignation as carried Judy beyond
+the strict bounds of good breeding. Nor could I find it in my heart to
+rebuke her wherein she had been wrong. In the face of her courage and
+uprightness, the fault was so insignificant that it would have been
+giving it an altogether undue importance to allude to it at all, and
+might weaken her confidence in my sympathy with her rectitude. When
+I joined her she put her hand in mine, and so walked with me down the
+stair and out at the front door.
+
+"You will take cold, Judy, going out like that," I said.
+
+"I am in too great a passion to take cold," she answered. "But I have no
+time to talk about that creeping creature.--Auntie DOESN'T like Captain
+Everard; and grannie keeps insisting on it that she shall have him
+whether she likes him or not. Now do tell me what you think."
+
+"I do not quite understand you, my child."
+
+"I know auntie would like to know what you think. But I know she will
+never ask you herself. So _I_ am asking you whether a lady ought to
+marry a gentleman she does not like, to please her mother."
+
+"Certainly not, Judy. It is often wicked, and at best a mistake."
+
+"Thank you, Mr Walton. I will tell her. She will be glad to hear that
+you say so, I know."
+
+"Mind you tell her you asked me, Judy. I should not like her to think I
+had been interfering, you know."
+
+"Yes, yes; I know quite well. I will take care. Thank you. He's going
+to-morrow. Good night."
+
+She bounded into the house again, and I walked away down the avenue. I
+saw and felt the stars now, for hope had come again in my heart, and
+I thanked the God of hope. "Our minds are small because they are
+faithless," I said to myself. "If we had faith in God, as our Lord tells
+us, our hearts would share in His greatness and peace. For we should not
+then be shut up in ourselves, but would walk abroad in Him." And with a
+light step and a light heart I went home.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII. OLD MRS TOMKINS.
+
+
+Very severe weather came, and much sickness followed, chiefly amongst
+the poorer people, who can so ill keep out the cold. Yet some of
+my well-to-do parishioners were laid up likewise--amongst others Mr
+Boulderstone, who had an attack of pleurisy. I had grown quite attached
+to Mr Boulderstone by this time, not because he was what is called
+interesting, for he was not; not because he was clever, for he was
+not; not because he was well-read, for he was not; not because he was
+possessed of influence in the parish, though he had that influence;
+but simply because he was true; he was what he appeared, felt what he
+professed, did what he said; appearing kind, and feeling and acting
+kindly. Such a man is rare and precious, were he as stupid as the Welsh
+giant in "Jack the Giant-Killer." I could never see Mr Boulderstone a
+mile off, but my heart felt the warmer for the sight.
+
+Even in his great pain he seemed to forget himself as he received me,
+and to gain comfort from my mere presence. I could not help regarding
+him as a child of heaven, to be treated with the more reverence that he
+had the less aid to his goodness from his slow understanding. It seemed
+to me that the angels might gather with reverence around such a man, to
+watch the gradual and tardy awakening of the intellect in one in whom
+the heart and the conscience had been awake from the first. The latter
+safe, they at least would see well that there was no fear for the
+former. Intelligence is a consequence of love; nor is there any true
+intelligence without it.
+
+But I could not help feeling keenly the contrast when I went from his
+warm, comfortable, well-defended chamber, in which every appliance that
+could alleviate suffering or aid recovery was at hand, like a castle
+well appointed with arms and engines against the inroads of winter and
+his yet colder ally Death,--when, I say, I went from his chamber to the
+cottage of the Tomkinses, and found it, as it were, lying open and bare
+to the enemy. What holes and cracks there were about the door, through
+which the fierce wind rushed at once into the room to attack the
+aged feet and hands and throats! There were no defences of threefold
+draperies, and no soft carpet on the brick floor,--only a small rug
+which my sister had carried them laid down before a weak-eyed little
+fire, that seemed to despair of making anything of it against the huge
+cold that beleaguered and invaded the place. True, we had had the little
+cottage patched up. The two Thomas Weirs had been at work upon it for a
+whole day and a half in the first of the cold weather this winter; but
+it was like putting the new cloth on the old garment, for fresh places
+had broken out, and although Mrs Tomkins had fought the cold well with
+what rags she could spare, and an old knife, yet such razor-edged winds
+are hard to keep out, and here she was now, lying in bed, and breathing
+hard, like the sore-pressed garrison which had retreated to its last
+defence, the keep of the castle. Poor old Tomkins sat shivering over the
+little fire.
+
+"Come, come, Tomkins! this won't do," I said, as I caught up a broken
+shovel that would have let a lump as big as one's fist through a hole in
+the middle of it. "Why don't you burn your coals in weather like this?
+Where do you keep them?"
+
+It made my heart ache to see the little heap in a box hardly bigger than
+the chest of tea my sister brought from London with her. I threw half of
+it on the fire at once.
+
+"Deary me, Mr Walton! you ARE wasteful, sir. The Lord never sent His
+good coals to be used that way."
+
+"He did though, Tomkins," I answered. "And He'll send you a little more
+this evening, after I get home. Keep yourself warm, man. This world's
+cold in winter, you know."
+
+"Indeed, sir, I know that. And I'm like to know it worse afore long.
+She's going," he said, pointing over his shoulder with his thumb towards
+the bed where his wife lay.
+
+I went to her. I had seen her several times within the last few weeks,
+but had observed nothing to make me consider her seriously ill. I now
+saw at a glance that Tomkins was right. She had not long to live.
+
+"I am sorry to see you suffering so much, Mrs Tomkins," I said.
+
+"I don't suffer so wery much, sir; though to be sure it be hard to get
+the breath into my body, sir. And I do feel cold-like, sir."
+
+"I'm going home directly, and I'll send you down another blanket. It's
+much colder to-day than it was yesterday."
+
+"It's not weather-cold, sir, wi' me. It's grave-cold, sir. Blankets
+won't do me no good, sir. I can't get it out of my head how perishing
+cold I shall be when I'm under the mould, sir; though I oughtn't to mind
+it when it's the will o' God. It's only till the resurrection, sir."
+
+"But it's not the will of God, Mrs Tomkins."
+
+"Ain't it, sir? Sure I thought it was."
+
+"You believe in Jesus Christ, don't you, Mrs Tomkins?"
+
+"That I do, sir, with all my heart and soul."
+
+"Well, He says that whosoever liveth and believeth in Him shall never
+die."
+
+"But, you know, sir, everybody dies. I MUST die, and be laid in the
+churchyard, sir. And that's what I don't like."
+
+"But I say that is all a mistake. YOU won't die. Your body will die, and
+be laid away out of sight; but you will be awake, alive, more alive than
+you are now, a great deal."
+
+And here let me interrupt the conversation to remark upon the great
+mistake of teaching children that they have souls. The consequence is,
+that they think of their souls as of something which is not themselves.
+For what a man HAS cannot be himself. Hence, when they are told that
+their souls go to heaven, they think of their SELVES as lying in the
+grave. They ought to be taught that they have bodies; and that their
+bodies die; while they themselves live on. Then they will not think, as
+old Mrs Tomkins did, that THEY will be laid in the grave. It is making
+altogether too much of the body, and is indicative of an evil tendency
+to materialism, that we talk as if we POSSESSED souls, instead of BEING
+souls. We should teach our children to think no more of their bodies
+when dead than they do of their hair when it is cut off, or of their old
+clothes when they have done with them.
+
+"Do you really think so, sir?"
+
+"Indeed I do. I don't know anything about where you will be. But you
+will be with God--in your Father's house, you know. And that is enough,
+is it not?"
+
+"Yes, surely, sir. But I wish you was to be there by the bedside of me
+when I was a-dyin'. I can't help bein' summat skeered at it. It don't
+come nat'ral to me, like. I ha' got used to this old bed here, cold as
+it has been--many's the night--wi' my good man there by the side of me."
+
+"Send for me, Mrs Tomkins, any moment, day or night, and I'll be with
+you directly."
+
+"I think, sir, if I had a hold ov you i' the one hand, and my man there,
+the Lord bless him, i' the other, I could go comfortable."
+
+"I'll come the minute you send for me--just to keep you in mind that a
+better friend than I am is holding you all the time, though you mayn't
+feel His hands. If it is some comfort to have hold of a human friend,
+think that a friend who is more than man, a divine friend, has a hold of
+you, who knows all your fears and pains, and sees how natural they are,
+and can just with a word, or a touch, or a look into your soul, keep
+them from going one hair's-breadth too far. He loves us up to all out
+need, just because we need it, and He is all love to give."
+
+"But I can't help thinking, sir, that I wouldn't be troublesome. He
+has such a deal to look after! And I don't see how He can think of
+everybody, at every minute, like. I don't mean that He will let anything
+go wrong. But He might forget an old body like me for a minute, like."
+
+"You would need to be as wise as He is before you could see how He does
+it. But you must believe more than you can understand. It is only common
+sense to do so. Think how nonsensical it would be to suppose that
+one who could make everything, and keep the whole going as He does,
+shouldn't be able to help forgetting. It would be unreasonable to
+think that He must forget because you couldn't understand how He could
+remember. I think it is as hard for Him to forget anything as it is for
+us to remember everything; for forgetting comes of weakness, and from
+our not being finished yet, and He is all strength and all perfection."
+
+"Then you think, sir, He never forgets anything?"
+
+I knew by the trouble that gathered on the old woman's brow what kind of
+thought was passing through her mind. But I let her go on, thinking
+so to help her the better. She paused for one moment only, and then
+resumed--much interrupted by the shortness of her breathing.
+
+"When I was brought to bed first," she said, "it was o' twins, sir. And
+oh! sir, it was VERY hard. As I said to my man after I got my head up
+a bit, 'Tomkins,' says I, 'you don't know what it is to have TWO on
+'em cryin' and cryin', and you next to nothin' to give 'em; till their
+cryin' sticks to your brain, and ye hear 'em when they're fast asleep,
+one on each side o' you.' Well, sir, I'm ashamed to confess it even to
+you; and what the Lord can think of me, I don't know."
+
+"I would rather confess to Him than to the best friend I ever had," I
+said; "I am so sure that He will make every excuse for me that ought to
+be made. And a friend can't always do that. He can't know all about
+it. And you can't tell him all, because you don't know all yourself. He
+does."
+
+"But I would like to tell YOU, sir. Would you believe it, sir, I wished
+'em dead? Just to get the wailin' of them out o' my head, I wished 'em
+dead. In the courtyard o' the squire's house, where my Tomkins worked on
+the home-farm, there was an old draw-well. It wasn't used, and there was
+a lid to it, with a hole in it, through which you could put a good big
+stone. And Tomkins once took me to it, and, without tellin' me what it
+was, he put a stone in, and told me to hearken. And I hearkened, but I
+heard nothing,--as I told him so. 'But,' says he, 'hearken, lass.' And
+in a little while there come a blast o' noise like from somewheres.
+'What's that, Tomkins?' I said. 'That's the ston',' says he, 'a strikin'
+on the water down that there well.' And I turned sick at the thought of
+it. And it's down there that I wished the darlin's that God had sent me;
+for there they'd be quiet."
+
+"Mothers are often a little out of their minds at such times, Mrs
+Tomkins. And so were you."
+
+"I don't know, sir. But I must tell you another thing. The Sunday afore
+that, the parson had been preachin' about 'Suffer little children,' you
+know, sir, 'to come unto me.' I suppose that was what put it in my
+head; but I fell asleep wi' nothin' else in my head but the cries o' the
+infants and the sound o' the ston' in the draw-well. And I dreamed
+that I had one o' them under each arm, cryin' dreadful, and was walkin'
+across the court the way to the draw-well; when all at once a man come
+up to me and held out his two hands, and said, 'Gie me my childer.' And
+I was in a terrible fear. And I gave him first one and then the t'other,
+and he took them, and one laid its head on one shoulder of him, and
+t'other upon t'other, and they stopped their cryin', and fell fast
+asleep; and away he walked wi' them into the dark, and I saw him no
+more. And then I awoke cryin', I didn't know why. And I took my twins to
+me, and my breasts was full, if ye 'll excuse me, sir. And my heart was
+as full o' love to them. And they hardly cried worth mentionin' again.
+But afore they was two year old, they both died o' the brown chytis,
+sir. And I think that He took them."
+
+"He did take them, Mrs Tomkins; and you'll see them again soon."
+
+"But, if He never forgets anything----"
+
+"I didn't say that. I think He can do what He pleases. And if He pleases
+to forget anything, then He can forget it. And I think that is what He
+does with our sins--that is, after He has got them away from us, once
+we are clean from them altogether. It would be a dreadful thing if He
+forgot them before that, and left them sticking fast to us and defiling
+us. How then should we ever be made clean?--What else does the prophet
+Isaiah mean when he says, 'Thou hast cast my sins behind Thy back?' Is
+not that where He does not choose to see them any more? They are not
+pleasant to Him to think of any more than to us. It is as if He said--'I
+will not think of that any more, for my sister will never do it again,'
+and so He throws it behind His back."
+
+"They ARE good words, sir. I could not bear Him to think of me and my
+sins both at once."
+
+I could not help thinking of the words of Macbeth, "To know my deed,
+'twere best not know myself."
+
+The old woman lay quiet after this, relieved in mind, though not in
+body, by the communication she had made with so much difficulty, and I
+hastened home to send some coals and other things, and then call upon Dr
+Duncan, lest he should not know that his patient was so much worse as I
+had found her.
+
+From Dr Duncan's I went to see old Samuel Weir, who likewise was ailing.
+The bitter weather was telling chiefly upon the aged. I found him in
+bed, under the old embroidery. No one was in the room with him. He
+greeted me with a withered smile, sweet and true, although no flash of
+white teeth broke forth to light up the welcome of the aged head.
+
+"Are you not lonely, Mr Weir?"
+
+"No, sir. I don't know as ever I was less lonely. I've got my stick, you
+see, sir," he said, pointing to a thorn stick which lay beside him.
+
+"I do not quite understand you," I returned, knowing that the old man's
+gently humorous sayings always meant something.
+
+"You see, sir, when I want anything, I've only got to knock on the
+floor, and up comes my son out of the shop. And then again, when I knock
+at the door of the house up there, my Father opens it and looks out. So
+I have both my son on earth and my Father in heaven, and what can an old
+man want more?"
+
+"What, indeed, could any one want more?"
+
+"It's very strange," the old man resumed after a pause, "but as I lie
+here, after I've had my tea, and it is almost dark, I begin to feel as
+if I was a child again.--They say old age is a second childhood; but
+before I grew so old, I used to think that meant only that a man was
+helpless and silly again, as he used to be when he was a child: I never
+thought it meant that a man felt like a child again, as light-hearted
+and untroubled as I do now."
+
+"Well, I suspect that is not what people do mean when they say so. But
+I am very glad--you don't know how pleased it makes me to hear that you
+feel so. I will hope to fare in the same way when my time comes."
+
+"Indeed, I hope you will, sir; for I am main and happy. Just before you
+came in now, I had really forgotten that I was a toothless old man,
+and thought I was lying here waiting for my mother to come in and say
+good-night to me before I went to sleep. Wasn't that curious, when I
+never saw my mother, as I told you before, sir?"
+
+"It was very curious."
+
+"But I have no end of fancies. Only when I begin to think about it,
+I can always tell when they are fancies, and they never put me out.
+There's one I see often--a man down on his knees at that cupboard nigh
+the floor there, searching and searching for somewhat. And I wish he
+would just turn round his face once for a moment that I might see him. I
+have a notion always it's my own father."
+
+"How do you account for that fancy, now, Mr Weir?"
+
+"I've often thought about it, sir, but I never could account for it.
+I'm none willing to think it's a ghost; for what's the good of it? I've
+turned out that cupboard over and over, and there's nothing there I
+don't know."
+
+"You're not afraid of it, are you?"
+
+"No, sir. Why should I be? I never did it no harm. And God can surely
+take care of me from all sorts."
+
+My readers must not think anything is going to come out of this strange
+illusion of the old man's brain. I questioned him a little more about
+it, and came simply to the conclusion, that when he was a child he
+had found the door open and had wandered into the house, at the time
+uninhabited, had peeped in at the door of the same room where he now
+lay, and had actually seen a man in the position he described, half in
+the cupboard, searching for something. His mind had kept the impression
+after the conscious memory had lost its hold of the circumstance, and
+now revived it under certain physical conditions. It was a glimpse out
+of one of the many stories which haunted the old mansion. But there he
+lay like a child, as he said, fearless even of such usurpations upon his
+senses.
+
+I think instances of quiet unSELFconscious faith are more common than
+is generally supposed. Few have along with it the genial communicative
+impulse of old Samuel Weir, which gives the opportunity of seeing into
+their hidden world. He seemed to have been, and to have remained, a
+child, in the best sense of the word. He had never had much trouble with
+himself, for he was of a kindly, gentle, trusting nature; and his will
+had never been called upon to exercise any strong effort to enable him
+to walk in the straight path. Nor had his intellect, on the other hand,
+while capable enough, ever been so active as to suggest difficulties to
+his faith, leaving him, even theoretically, far nearer the truth
+than those who start objections for their own sakes, liking to feel
+themselves in a position of supposed antagonism to the generally
+acknowledged sources of illumination. For faith is in itself a light
+that lightens even the intellect, and hence the shield of the complete
+soldier of God, the shield of faith, is represented by Spenser as
+"framed all of diamond, perfect, pure, and clean," (the power of the
+diamond to absorb and again radiate light being no poetic fiction, but a
+well-known scientific fact,) whose light falling upon any enchantment or
+false appearance, destroys it utterly: for
+
+   "all that was not such as seemed in sight.
+    Before that shield did fade, and suddaine fall."
+
+Old Rogers had passed through a very much larger experience. Many more
+difficulties had come to him, and he had met them in his own fashion and
+overcome them. For while there is such a thing as truth, the mind that
+can honestly beget a difficulty must at the same time be capable of
+receiving that light of the truth which annihilates the difficulty,
+or at least of receiving enough to enable it to foresee vaguely some
+solution, for a full perception of which the intellect may not be as yet
+competent. By every such victory Old Rogers had enlarged his being, ever
+becoming more childlike and faithful; so that, while the childlikeness
+of Weir was the childlikeness of a child, that of Old Rogers was
+the childlikeness of a man, in which submission to God is not only a
+gladness, but a conscious will and choice. But as the safety of neither
+depended on his own feelings, but on the love of God who was working in
+him, we may well leave all such differences of nature and education
+to the care of Him who first made the men different, and then brought
+different conditions out of them. The one thing is, whether we are
+letting God have His own way with us, following where He leads, learning
+the lessons He gives us.
+
+I wished that Mr Stoddart had been with me during these two visits.
+Perhaps he might have seen that the education of life was a marvellous
+thing, and, even in the poorest intellectual results, far more full of
+poetry and wonder than the outcome of that constant watering with the
+watering-pot of self-education which, dissociated from the duties of
+life and the influences of his fellows, had made of him what he was. But
+I doubt if he would have seen it.
+
+A week had elapsed from the night I had sat up with Gerard Weir, and his
+mother had not risen from her bed, nor did it seem likely she would
+ever rise again. On a Friday I went to see her, just as the darkness was
+beginning to gather. The fire of life was burning itself out fast. It
+glowed on her cheeks, it burned in her hands, it blazed in her eyes.
+But the fever had left her mind. That was cool, oh, so cool, now! Those
+fierce tropical storms of passion had passed away, and nothing of life
+was lost. Revenge had passed away, but revenge is of death, and deadly.
+Forgiveness had taken its place, and forgiveness is the giving, and
+so the receiving of life. Gerard, his dear little head starred with
+sticking-plaster, sat on her bed, looking as quietly happy as child
+could look, over a wooden horse with cylindrical body and jointless
+legs, covered with an eruption of red and black spots.--Is it the
+ignorance or the imagination of children that makes them so easily
+pleased with the merest hint at representation? I suspect the one helps
+the other towards that most desirable result, satisfaction.--But he
+dropped it when he saw me, in a way so abandoning that--comparing small
+things with great--it called to my mind those lines of Milton:--
+
+   "From his slack hand the garland wreathed for Eve,
+    Down dropt, and all the faded roses shed."
+
+The quiet child FLUNG himself upon my neck, and the mother's face
+gleamed with pleasure.
+
+"Dear boy!" I said, "I am very glad to see you so much better."
+
+For this was the first time he had shown such a revival of energy. He
+had been quite sweet when he saw me, but, until this evening, listless.
+
+"Yes," he said, "I am quite well now." And he put his hand up to his
+head.
+
+"Does it ache?"
+
+"Not much now. The doctor says I had a bad fall."
+
+"So you had, my child. But you will soon be well again."
+
+The mother's face was turned aside, yet I could see one tear forcing its
+way from under her closed eyelid.
+
+"Oh, I don't mind it," he answered. "Mammy is so kind to me! She lets me
+sit on her bed as long as I like."
+
+"That IS nice. But just run to auntie in the next room. I think your
+mammy would like to talk to me for a little while."
+
+The child hurried off the bed, and ran with overflowing obedience.
+
+"I can even think of HIM now," said the mother, "without going into a
+passion. I hope God will forgive him. _I_ do. I think He will forgive
+me."
+
+"Did you ever hear," I asked, "of Jesus refusing anybody that wanted
+kindness from Him? He wouldn't always do exactly what they asked Him,
+because that would sometimes be of no use, and sometimes would even
+be wrong; but He never pushed them away from Him, never repulsed
+their approach to Him. For the sake of His disciples, He made the
+Syrophenician woman suffer a little while, but only to give her
+such praise afterwards and such a granting of her prayer as is just
+wonderful."
+
+She said nothing for a little while; then murmured,
+
+"Shall I have to be ashamed to all eternity? I do not want not to be
+ashamed; but shall I never be able to be like other people--in heaven I
+mean?"
+
+"If He is satisfied with you, you need not think anything more about
+yourself. If He lets you once kiss His feet, you won't care to think
+about other people's opinion of you even in heaven. But things will go
+very differently there from here. For everybody there will be more or
+less ashamed of himself, and will think worse of himself than he does
+of any one else. If trouble about your past life were to show itself on
+your face there, they would all run to comfort you, trying to make the
+best of it, and telling you that you must think about yourself as He
+thinks about you; for what He thinks is the rule, because it is the
+infallible right way. But perhaps rather, they would tell you to leave
+that to Him who has taken away our sins, and not trouble yourself any
+more about it. But to tell the truth, I don't think such thoughts will
+come to you at all when once you have seen the face of Jesus Christ. You
+will be so filled with His glory and goodness and grace, that you will
+just live in Him and not in yourself at all."
+
+"Will He let us tell Him anything we please?"
+
+"He lets you do that now: surely He will not be less our God, our friend
+there."
+
+"Oh, I don't mind how soon He takes me now! Only there's that poor child
+that I've behaved so badly to! I wish I could take him with me. I have
+no time to make it up to him here."
+
+"You must wait till he comes. He won't think hardly of you. There's no
+fear of that."
+
+"What will become of him, though? I can't bear the idea of burdening my
+father with him."
+
+"Your father will be glad to have him, I know. He will feel it a
+privilege to do something for your sake. But the boy will do him good.
+If he does not want him, I will take him myself."
+
+"Oh! thank you, thank you, sir."
+
+A burst of tears followed.
+
+"He has often done me good," I said.
+
+"Who, sir? My father?"
+
+"No. Your son."
+
+"I don't quite understand what you mean, sir."
+
+"I mean just what I say. The words and behaviour of your lovely boy have
+both roused and comforted my heart again and again."
+
+She burst again into tears.
+
+"That is good to hear. To think of your saying that! The poor little
+innocent! Then it isn't all punishment?"
+
+"If it were ALL punishment, we should perish utterly. He is your
+punishment; but look in what a lovely loving form your punishment has
+come, and say whether God has been good to you or not."
+
+"If I had only received my punishment humbly, things would have been
+very different now. But I do take it--at least I want to take it--just
+as He would have me take it. I will bear anything He likes. I suppose I
+must die?"
+
+"I think He means you to die now. You are ready for it now, I think.
+You have wanted to die for a long time; but you were not ready for it
+before."
+
+"And now I want to live for my boy. But His will be done."
+
+"Amen. There is no such prayer in the universe as that. It means
+everything best and most beautiful. Thy will, O God, evermore be done."
+
+She lay silent. A tap came to the chamber-door. It was Mary, who nursed
+her sister and attended to the shop.
+
+"If you please, sir, here's a little girl come to say that Mrs Tomkins
+is dying, and wants to see you."
+
+"Then I must say good-night to you, Catherine. I will see you to-morrow
+morning. Think about old Mrs Tomkins; she's a good old soul; and when
+you find your heart drawn to her in the trouble of death, then lift it
+up to God for her, that He will please to comfort and support her, and
+make her happier than health--stronger than strength, taking off the old
+worn garment of her body, and putting upon her the garment of salvation,
+which will be a grand new body, like that the Saviour had when He rose
+again."
+
+"I will try. I will think about her."
+
+For I thought this would be a help to prepare her for her own death. In
+thinking lovingly about others, we think healthily about ourselves. And
+the things she thought of for the comfort of Mrs Tomkins, would return
+to comfort herself in the prospect of her own end, when perhaps she
+might not be able to think them out for herself.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX. CALM AND STORM.
+
+
+But of the two, Catherine had herself to go first. Again and again was I
+sent for to say farewell to Mrs Tomkins, and again and again I returned
+home leaying her asleep, and for the time better. But on a Saturday
+evening, as I sat by my vestry-fire, pondering on many things, and
+trying to make myself feel that they were as God saw them and not as
+they appeared to me, young Tom came to me with the news that his sister
+seemed much worse, and his father would be much obliged if I would go
+and see her. I sent Tom on before, because I wished to follow alone.
+
+It was a brilliant starry night; no moon, no clouds, no wind, nothing
+but stars. They seemed to lean down towards the earth, as I have seen
+them since in more southern regions. It was, indeed, a glorious night.
+That is, I knew it was; I did not feel that it was. For the death which
+I went to be near, came, with a strange sense of separation, between
+me and the nature around me. I felt as if nature knew nothing, felt
+nothing, meant nothing, did not belong to humanity at all; for here was
+death, and there shone the stars. I was wrong, as I knew afterwards.
+
+I had had very little knowledge of the external shows of death. Strange
+as it may appear, I had never yet seen a fellow-creature pass beyond the
+call of his fellow-mortals. I had not even seen my father die. And the
+thought was oppressive to me. "To think," I said to myself, as I walked
+over the bridge to the village-street--"to think that the one moment the
+person is here, and the next--who shall say WHERE? for we know nothing
+of the region beyond the grave! Not even our risen Lord thought fit to
+bring back from Hades any news for the human family standing straining
+their eyes after their brothers and sisters that have vanished in the
+dark. Surely it is well, all well, although we know nothing, save that
+our Lord has been there, knows all about it, and does not choose to tell
+us. Welcome ignorarance then! the ignorance in which he chooses to leave
+us. I would rather not know, if He gave me my choice, but preferred
+that I should not know." And so the oppression passed from me, and I was
+free.
+
+But little as I knew of the signs of the approach of death, I was
+certain, the moment I saw Catherine, that the veil that hid the "silent
+land" had begun to lift slowly between her and it. And for a moment I
+almost envied her that she was so soon to see and know that after which
+our blindness and ignorance were wondering and hungering. She could
+hardly speak. She looked more patient than calm. There was no light in
+the room but that of the fire, which flickered flashing and fading, now
+lighting up the troubled eye, and now letting a shadow of the coming
+repose fall gently over it. Thomas sat by the fire with the child on his
+knee, both looking fixedly into the glow. Gerard's natural mood was so
+quiet and earnest, that the solemnity about him did not oppress him. He
+looked as if he were present at some religious observance of which he
+felt more than he understood, and his childish peace was in no wise
+inharmonious with the awful silence of the coming change. He was no more
+disquieted at the presence of death than the stars were.
+
+And this was the end of the lovely girl--to leave the fair world still
+young, because a selfish man had seen that she was fair! No time can
+change the relation of cause and effect. The poison that operates ever
+so slowly is yet poison, and yet slays. And that man was now murdering
+her, with weapon long-reaching from out of the past. But no, thank God!
+this was not the end of her. Though there is woe for that man by whom
+the offence cometh, yet there is provision for the offence. There is One
+who bringeth light out of darkness, joy out of sorrow, humility out of
+wrong. Back to the Father's house we go with the sorrows and sins which,
+instead of inheriting the earth, we gathered and heaped upon our weary
+shoulders, and a different Elder Brother from that angry one who would
+not receive the poor swine-humbled prodigal, takes the burden from our
+shoulders, and leads us into the presence of the Good.
+
+She put out her hand feebly, let it lie in mine, looked as if she wanted
+me to sit down by her bedside, and when I did so, closed her eyes.
+She said nothing. Her father was too much troubled to meet me without
+showing the signs of his distress, and his was a nature that ever sought
+concealment for its emotion; therefore he sat still. But Gerard crept
+down from his knee, came to me, clambered up on mine, and laid his
+little hand upon his mother's, which I was holding. She opened her eyes,
+looked at the child, shut them again, and tears came out from between
+the closed lids.
+
+"Has Gerard ever been baptized?" I asked her.
+
+Her lips indicated a NO.
+
+"Then I will be his godfather. And that will be a pledge to you that I
+will never lose sight of him."
+
+She pressed my hand, and the tears came faster.
+
+Believing with all my heart that the dying should remember their dying
+Lord, and that the "Do this in remembrance of me" can never be better
+obeyed than when the partaker is about to pass, supported by the God of
+his faith, through the same darkness which lay before our Lord when He
+uttered the words and appointed the symbol, we kneeled, Thomas and I,
+and young Tom, who had by this time joined us with his sister Mary,
+around the bed, and partook with the dying woman of the signs of that
+death, wherein our Lord gave Himself entirely to us, to live by
+His death, and to the Father of us all in holiest sacrifice as the
+high-priest of us His people, leading us to the altar of a like
+self-abnegation. Upon what that bread and that wine mean, the sacrifice
+of our Lord, the whole world of humanity hangs. It is the redemption of
+men.
+
+After she had received the holy sacrament, she lay still as before. I
+heard her murmur once, "Lord, I do not deserve it. But I do love
+Thee." And about two hours after, she quietly breathed her last. We all
+kneeled, and I thanked the Father of us aloud that He had taken her to
+Himself. Gerard had been fast asleep on his aunt's lap, and she had
+put him to bed a little before. Surely he slept a deeper sleep than his
+mother's; for had she not awaked even as she fell asleep?
+
+When I came out once more, I knew better what the stars meant. They
+looked to me now as if they knew all about death, and therefore could
+not be sad to the eyes of men; as if that unsympathetic look they wore
+came from this, that they were made like the happy truth, and not like
+our fears.
+
+But soon the solemn feeling of repose, the sense that the world and
+all its cares would thus pass into nothing, vanished in its turn. For
+a moment I had been, as it were, walking on the shore of the Eternal,
+where the tide of time had left me in its retreat. Far away across the
+level sands I heard it moaning, but I stood on the firm ground of truth,
+and heeded it not. In a few moments more it was raving around me; it
+had carried me away from my rest, and I was filled with the noise of its
+cares.
+
+For when I returned home, my sister told me that Old Rogers had called,
+and seemed concerned not to find me at home. He would have gone to find
+me, my sister said, had I been anywhere but by a deathbed. He would not
+leave any message, however, saying he would call in the morning.
+
+I thought it better to go to his house. The stars were still shining as
+brightly as before, but a strong foreboding of trouble filled my mind,
+and once more the stars were far away, and lifted me no nearer to "Him
+who made the seven stars and Orion." When I examined myself, I could
+give no reason for my sudden fearfulness, save this: that as I went to
+Catherine's house, I had passed Jane Rogers on her way to her father's,
+and having just greeted her, had gone on; but, as it now came back upon
+me, she had looked at me strangely--that is, with some significance in
+her face which conveyed nothing to me; and now her father had been to
+seek me: it must have something to do with Miss Oldcastle.
+
+But when I came to the cottage, it was dark and still, and I could not
+bring myself to rouse the weary man from his bed. Indeed it was past
+eleven, as I found to my surprise on looking at my watch. So I turned
+and lingered by the old mill, and fell a pondering on the profusion
+of strength that rushed past the wheel away to the great sea, doing
+nothing. "Nature," I thought, "does not demand that power should always
+be force. Power itself must repose. He that believeth shall--not make
+haste, says the Bible. But it needs strength to be still. Is my faith
+not strong enough to be still?" I looked up to the heavens once more,
+and the quietness of the stars seemed to reproach me. "We are safe up
+here," they seemed to say: "we shine, fearless and confident, for the
+God who gave the primrose its rough leaves to hide it from the blast of
+uneven spring, hangs us in the awful hollows of space. We cannot fall
+out of His safety. Lift up your eyes on high, and behold! Who hath
+created these things--that bringeth out their host by number! He calleth
+them all by names. By the greatness of His might, for that He is strong
+in power, not one faileth. Why sayest thou, O Jacob! and speakest, O
+Israel! my way is hid from the Lord, and my judgment is passed over from
+my God?"
+
+The night was very still; there was, I thought, no one awake within
+miles of me. The stars seemed to shine into me the divine reproach of
+those glorious words. "O my God!" I cried, and fell on my knees by the
+mill-door.
+
+What I tried to say more I will not say here. I MAY say that I cried to
+God. What I said to Him ought not, cannot be repeated to another.
+
+When I opened my eyes I saw the door of the mill was open too, and there
+in the door, his white head glimmering, stood Old Rogers, with a look
+on his face as if he had just come down from the mount. I started to my
+feet, with that strange feeling of something like shame that seizes one
+at the very thought of other eyes than those of the Father. The old
+man came forward, and bowed his head with an unconscious expression of
+humble dignity, but would have passed me without speech, leaving the
+mill-door open behind him. I could not bear to part with him thus.
+
+"Won't you speak to me, Rogers?" I said.
+
+He turned at once with evident pleasure.
+
+"I beg your pardon, sir. I was ashamed of having intruded on you, and
+I thought you would rather be left alone. I thought--I thought---"
+hesitated the old man, "that you might like to go into the mill, for the
+night's cold out o' doors."
+
+"Thank you, Rogers. I won't now. I thought you had been in bed. How do
+you come to be out so late?"
+
+"You see, sir, when I'm in any trouble, it's no use to go to bed. I
+can't sleep. I only keep the old 'oman wakin'. And the key o' the mill
+allus hangin' at the back o' my door, and knowin' it to be a good place
+to--to--shut the door in, I came out as soon as she was asleep; but I
+little thought to see you, sir."
+
+"I came to find you, not thinking how the time went. Catherine Weir is
+gone home."
+
+"I am right glad to hear it, poor woman. And perhaps something will come
+out now that will help us."
+
+"I do not quite understand you," I said, with hesitation.
+
+But Rogers made no reply.
+
+"I am sorry to hear you are in trouble to-night. Can I help you?" I
+resumed.
+
+"If you can help yourself, sir, you can help me. But I have no right to
+say so. Only, if a pair of old eyes be not blind, a man may pray to
+God about anything he sees. I was prayin' hard about you in there, sir,
+while you was on your knees o' the other side o' the door."
+
+I could partly guess what the old man meant, and I could not ask him for
+further explanation.
+
+"What did you want to see me about?" I inquired.
+
+He hesitated for a moment.
+
+"I daresay it was very foolish of me, sir. But I just wanted to tell you
+that--our Jane was down here from the Hall this arternoon----"
+
+"I passed her on the bridge. Is she quite well?"
+
+"Yes, yes, sir. You know that's not the point."
+
+The old man's tone seemed to reprove me for vain words, and I held my
+peace.
+
+"The captain's there again."
+
+An icy spear seemed to pass through my heart. I could make no reply. The
+same moment a cold wind blew on me from the open door of the mill.
+
+Although Lear was of course right when he said,
+
+        "The tempest in my mind
+    Doth from my senses take all feeling else
+    Save what beats there,"
+
+yet it is also true, that sometimes, in the midst of its greatest pain,
+the mind takes marvellous notice of the smallest things that happen
+around it. This involves a law of which illustrations could be
+plentifully adduced from Shakespeare himself, namely, that the
+intellectual part of the mind can go on working with strange
+independence of the emotional.
+
+From the door of the mill, as from a sepulchral tavern, blew a cold
+wind like the very breath of death upon me, just when that pang shot, in
+absolute pain, through my heart. For a wind had arisen from behind the
+mill, and we were in its shelter save where a window behind and the door
+beside me allowed free passage to the first of the coming storm.
+
+I believed I turned away from the old man without a word. He made no
+attempt to detain me. Whether he went back into his closet, the old
+mill, sacred in the eyes of the Father who honours His children, even as
+the church wherein many prayers went up to Him, or turned homewards to
+his cottage and his sleeping wife, I cannot tell. The first I remember
+after that cold wind is, that I was fighting with that wind, gathered
+even to a storm, upon the common where I had dealt so severely with
+her who had this very night gone into that region into which, as into a
+waveless sea, all the rivers of life rush and are silent. Is it the sea
+of death? No. The sea of life--a life too keen, too refined, for our
+senses to know it, and therefore we call it death--because we cannot lay
+hold upon it.
+
+I will not dwell upon my thoughts as I wandered about over that waste.
+The wind had risen to a storm charged with fierce showers of stinging
+hail, which gave a look of gray wrath to the invisible wind as it swept
+slanting by, and then danced and scudded along the levels. The next
+point in that night of pain is when I found myself standing at the iron
+gate of Oldcastle Hall. I had left the common, passed my own house
+and the church, crossed the river, walked through the village, and was
+restored to self-consciousness--that is, I knew that I was there--only
+when first I stood in the shelter of one of those great pillars and the
+monster on its top. Finding the gate open, for they were not precise
+about having it fastened, I pushed it and entered. The wind was roaring
+in the trees as I think I have never heard it roar since; for the hail
+clashed upon the bare branches and twigs, and mingled an unearthly hiss
+with the roar. In the midst of it the house stood like a tomb, dark,
+silent, without one dim light to show that sleep and not death ruled
+within. I could have fancied that there were no windows in it, that it
+stood, like an eyeless skull, in that gaunt forest of skeleton trees,
+empty and desolate, beaten by the ungenial hail, the dead rain of the
+country of death. I passed round to the other side, stepping gently lest
+some ear might be awake--as if any ear, even that of Judy's white
+wolf, could have heard the loudest step in such a storm. I heard the
+hailstones crush between my feet and the soft grass of the lawn, but
+I dared not stop to look up at the back of the house. I went on to the
+staircase in the rock, and by its rude steps, dangerous in the flapping
+of such storm-wings as swept about it that night, descended to the
+little grove below, around the deep-walled pool. Here the wind did not
+reach me. It roared overhead, but, save an occasional sigh, as if of
+sympathy with their suffering brethren abroad in the woild, the hermits
+of this cell stood upright and still around the sleeping water. But my
+heart was a well in which a storm boiled and raged; and all that "pother
+o'er my head" was peace itself compared to what I felt. I sat down on
+the seat at the foot of a tree, where I had first seen Miss Oldcastle
+reading. And then I looked up to the house. Yes, there was a light
+there! It must be in her window. She then could not rest any more than
+I. Sleep was driven from her eyes because she must wed the man she would
+not; while sleep was driven from mine because I could not marry the
+woman I would. Was that it? No. My heart acquitted me, in part at
+least, of thinking only of my own sorrow in the presence of her greater
+distress. Gladly would I have given her up for ever, without a hope, to
+redeem her from such a bondage. "But it would be to marry another some
+day," suggested the tormentor within. And then the storm, which had a
+little abated, broke out afresh in my soul. But before I rose from her
+seat I was ready even for that--at least I thought so--if only I might
+deliver her from the all but destruction that seemed to be impending
+over her. The same moment in which my mind seemed to have arrived at
+the possibility of such a resolution, I rose almost involuntarily, and
+glancing once more at the dull light in her window--for I did not doubt
+that it was her window, though it was much too dark to discern, the
+shape of the house--almost felt my way to the stair, and climbed again
+into the storm.
+
+But I was quieter now, and able to go home. It must have been nearly
+morning, though at this season of the year the morning is undefined,
+when I reached my own house. My sister had gone to bed, for I could
+always let myself in; nor, indeed, did any one in Marshmailows think the
+locking of the door at night an imperative duty.
+
+When I fell asleep, I was again in the old quarry, staring into the deep
+well. I thought Mrs Oldcastle was murdering her daughter in the house
+above, while I was spell-bound to the spot, where, if I stood long
+enough, I should see her body float into the well from the subterranean
+passage, the opening of which was just below where I stood. I was thus
+confusing and reconstructing the two dreadful stories of the place--that
+told me by old Weir, about the circumstances of his birth; and that told
+me by Dr Duncan, about Mrs Oldcastle's treatment of her elder daughter.
+But as a white hand and arm appeared in the water below me, sorrow and
+pity more than horror broke the bonds of sleep, and I awoke to less
+trouble than that of my dreams, only because that which I feared had not
+yet come.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX. A SERMON TO MYSELF.
+
+
+It was the Sabbath morn. But such a Sabbath! The day seemed all wan
+with weeping, and gray with care. The wind dashed itself against the
+casement, laden with soft heavy sleet. The ground, the bushes, the very
+outhouses seemed sodden with the rain. The trees, which looked stricken
+as if they could die of grief, were yet tormented with fear, for the
+bare branches went streaming out in the torrent of the wind, as cowering
+before the invisible foe. The first thing I knew when I awoke was the
+raving of that wind. I could lie in bed not a moment longer. I could not
+rest. But how was I to do the work of my office? When a man's duty looks
+like an enemy, dragging him into the dark mountains, he has no less to
+go with it than when, like a friend with loving face, it offers to lead
+him along green pastures by the river-side. I had little power over
+my feelings; I could not prevent my mind from mirroring itself in the
+nature around me; but I could address myself to the work I had to do.
+"My God!" was all the prayer I could pray ere I descended to join my
+sister at the breakfast-table. But He knew what lay behind the one word.
+
+Martha could not help seeing that something was the matter. I saw by her
+looks that she could read so much in mine. But her eyes alone questioned
+me, and that only by glancing at me anxiously from, time to time. I was
+grateful to her for saying nothing. It is a fine thing in friendship to
+know when to be silent.
+
+The prayers were before me, in the hands of all my friends, and in the
+hearts of some of them; and if I could not enter into them as I would, I
+could yet read them humbly before God as His servant to help the
+people to worship as one flock. But how was I to preach? I had been in
+difficulty before now, but never in so much. How was I to teach others,
+whose mind was one confusion? The subject on which I was pondering when
+young Weir came to tell me his sister was dying, had retreated as if
+into the far past; it seemed as if years had come between that time and
+this, though but one black night had rolled by. To attempt to speak upon
+that would have been vain, for I had nothing to say on the matter now.
+And if I could have recalled my former thoughts, I should have felt a
+hypocrite as I delivered them, so utterly dissociated would they have
+been from anything that I was thinking or feeling now. Here would have
+been my visible form and audible voice, uttering that as present to me
+now, as felt by me now, which I did think and feel yesterday, but which,
+although I believed it, was not present to my feeling or heart, and must
+wait the revolution of months, or it might be of years, before I should
+feel it again, before I should be able to exhort my people about it with
+the fervour of a present faith. But, indeed, I could not even recall
+what I had thought and felt. Should I then tell them that I could not
+speak to them that morning?--There would be nothing wrong in that. But I
+felt ashamed of yielding to personal trouble when the truths of God were
+all about me, although I could not feel them. Might not some hungry soul
+go away without being satisfied, because I was faint and down-hearted? I
+confess I had a desire likewise to avoid giving rise to speculation and
+talk about myself, a desire which, although not wrong, could neither
+have strengthened me to speak the truth, nor have justified me in making
+the attempt.--What was to be done?
+
+All at once the remembrance crossed my mind of a sermon I had preached
+before upon the words of St Paul: "Thou therefore which teachest
+another, teachest thou not thyself?" a subject suggested by the fact
+that on the preceding Sunday I had especially felt, in preaching to my
+people, that I was exhorting myself whose necessity was greater than
+theirs--at least I felt it to be greater than I could know theirs to be.
+And now the converse of the thought came to me, and I said to myself,
+"Might I not try the other way now, and preach to myself? In teaching
+myself, might I not teach others? Would it not hold? I am very troubled
+and faithless now. If I knew that God was going to lay the full weight
+of this grief upon me, yet if I loved Him with all my heart, should I
+not at least be more quiet? There would not be a storm within me then,
+as if the Father had descended from the throne of the heavens, and
+'chaos were come again.' Let me expostulate with myself in my heart, and
+the words of my expostulation will not be the less true with my people."
+
+All this passed through my mind as I sat in my study after breakfast,
+with the great old cedar roaring before my window. It was within an hour
+of church-time. I took my Bible, read and thought, got even some comfort
+already, and found myself in my vestry not quite unwilling to read the
+prayers and speak to my people.
+
+There were very few present. The day was one of the worst--violently
+stormy, which harmonized somewhat with my feelings; and, to my further
+relief, the Hall pew was empty. Instead of finding myself a mere
+minister to the prayers of others, I found, as I read, that my heart
+went out in crying to God for the divine presence of His Spirit. And if
+I thought more of myself in my prayers than was well, yet as soon as
+I was converted, would I not strengthen my brethren? And the sermon I
+preached to myself and through myself to my people, was that which
+the stars had preached to me, and thereby driven me to my knees by
+the mill-door. I took for my text, "The glory of the Lord shall be
+revealed;" and then I proceeded to show them how the glory of the Lord
+was to be revealed. I preached to myself that throughout this fortieth
+chapter of the prophecies of Isaiah, the power of God is put side by
+side with the weakness of men, not that He, the perfect, may glory over
+His feeble children; not that He may say to them--"Look how mighty I am,
+and go down upon your knees and worship"--for power alone was never yet
+worthy of prayer; but that he may say thus: "Look, my children, you will
+never be strong but with MY strength. I have no other to give you. And
+that you can get only by trusting in me. I cannot give it you any other
+way. There is no other way. But can you not trust in me? Look how strong
+I am. You wither like the grass. Do not fear. Let the grass wither. Lay
+hold of my word, that which I say to you out of my truth, and that will
+be life in you that the blowing of the wind that withers cannot reach. I
+am coming with my strong hand and my judging arm to do my work. And what
+is the work of my strong hand and ruling arm? To feed my flock like a
+shepherd, to gather the lambs with my arm, and carry them in my bosom,
+and gently lead those that are with young. I have measured the waters in
+the hollow of my hand, and held the mountains in my scales, to give each
+his due weight, and all the nations, so strong and fearful in your eyes,
+are as nothing beside my strength and what I can do. Do not think of
+me as of an image that your hands can make, a thing you can choose to
+serve, and for which you can do things to win its favour. I am before
+and above the earth, and over your life, and your oppressors I will
+wither with my breath. I come to you with help I need no worship from
+you. But I say love me, for love is life, and I love you. Look at the
+stars I have made. I know every one of them. Not one goes wrong, because
+I keep him right. Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel--my
+way is HID from the Lord, and my judgment is passed over from my God!
+I give POWER to the FAINT, and to them that have no might, plenty of
+strength."
+
+"Thus," I went on to say, "God brings His strength to destroy our
+weakness by making us strong. This is a God indeed! Shall we not trust
+Him?"
+
+I gave my people this paraphrase of the chapter, to help them to see
+the meanings which their familiarity with the words, and their
+non-familiarity with the modes of Eastern thought, and the forms of
+Eastern expression, would unite to prevent them from catching more than
+broken glimmerings of. And then I tried to show them that it was in
+the commonest troubles of life, as well as in the spiritual fears and
+perplexities that came upon them, that they were to trust in God; for
+God made the outside as well as the inside, and they altogether belonged
+to Him; and that when outside things, such as pain or loss of work, or
+difficulty in getting money, were referred to God and His will, they too
+straightway became spiritual affairs, for nothing in the world could any
+longer appear common or unclean to the man who saw God in everything.
+But I told them they must not be too anxious to be delivered from that
+which troubled them: but they ought to be anxious to have the presence
+of God with them to support them, and make them able in patience
+to possess their souls; and so the trouble would work its end--the
+purification of their minds, that the light and gladness of God and all
+His earth, which the pure in heart and the meek alone could inherit,
+might shine in upon them. And then I repeated to them this portion of a
+prayer out of one of Sir Philip Sidney's books:--
+
+"O Lord, I yield unto Thy will, and joyfully embrace what sorrow Thou
+wilt have me suffer. Only thus much let me crave of Thee, (let my
+craving, O Lord, be accepted of Thee, since even that proceeds from
+Thee,) let me crave, even by the noblest title, which in my greatest
+affliction I may give myself, that I am Thy creature, and by Thy
+goodness (which is Thyself) that Thou wilt suffer some beam of Thy
+majesty so to shine into my mind, that it may still depend confidently
+on Thee."
+
+All the time I was speaking, the rain, mingled with sleet, was dashing
+against the windows, and the wind was howling over the graves all about.
+But the dead were not troubled by the storm; and over my head, from
+beam to beam of the roof, now resting on one, now flitting to another, a
+sparrow kept flying, which had taken refuge in the church till the storm
+should cease and the sun shine out in the great temple. "This," I said
+aloud, "is what the church is for: as the sparrow finds there a house
+from the storm, so the human heart escapes thither to hear the still
+small voice of God when its faith is too weak to find Him in the storm,
+and in the sorrow, and in the pain." And while I spoke, a dim watery
+gleam fell on the chancel-floor, and the comfort of the sun awoke in
+my heart. Nor let any one call me superstitious for taking that pale
+sun-ray of hope as sent to me; for I received it as comfort for the
+race, and for me as one of the family, even as the bow that was set in
+the cloud, a promise to the eyes of light for them that sit in darkness.
+As I write, my eye falls upon the Bible on the table by my side, and
+I read the words, "For the Lord God is a sun and shield, the Lord will
+give grace and glory." And I lift my eyes from my paper and look abroad
+from my window, and the sun is shining in its strength. The leaves are
+dancing in the light wind that gives them each its share of the sun, and
+my trouble has passed away for ever, like the storm of that night and
+the unrest of that strange Sabbath.
+
+Such comforts would come to us oftener from Nature, if we really
+believed that our God was the God of Nature; that when He made, or
+rather when He makes, He means; that not His hands only, but His heart
+too, is in the making of those things; that, therefore, the influences
+of Nature upon human minds and hearts are because He intended them. And
+if we believe that our God is everywhere, why should we not think Him
+present even in the coincidences that sometimes seem so strange? For,
+if He be in the things that coincide, He must be in the coincidence of
+those things.
+
+Miss Oldcastle told me once that she could not take her eyes off a
+butterfly which was flitting about in the church all the time I was
+speaking of the resurrection of the dead. I told the people that in
+Greek there was one word for the soul and for a butterfly--Psyche; that
+I thought as the light on the rain made the natural symbol of mercy--the
+rainbow, so the butterfly was the type in nature, and made to the end,
+amongst other ends, of being such a type--of the resurrection of the
+human body; that its name certainly expressed the hope of the Greeks in
+immortality, while to us it speaks likewise of a glorified body,
+whereby we shall know and love each other with our eyes as well as our
+hearts.--My sister saw the butterfly too, but only remembered that she
+had seen it when it was mentioned in her hearing: on her the sight made
+no impression; she saw no coincidence.
+
+I descended from the pulpit comforted by the sermon I had preached to
+myself. But I was glad to feel justified in telling my people that,
+in consequence of the continued storm, for there had been no more of
+sunshine than just that watery gleam, there would be no service in the
+afternoon, and that I would instead visit some of my sick poor, whom the
+weather might have discomposed in their worn dwellings.
+
+The people were very slow in dispersing. There was so much putting on of
+clogs, gathering up of skirts over the head, and expanding of umbrellas,
+soon to be taken down again as worse than useless in the violence of
+the wind, that the porches were crowded, and the few left in the church
+detained till the others made way. I lingered with these. They were all
+poor people.
+
+"I am sorry you will have such a wet walk home," I said to Mrs Baird,
+the wife of old Reginald Baird, the shoemaker, a little wizened
+creature, with more wrinkles than hairs, who the older and more withered
+she grew, seemed like the kernels of some nuts only to grow the sweeter.
+
+"It's very good of you to let us off this afternoon, sir. Not as I minds
+the wet: it finds out the holes in people's shoes, and gets my husband
+into more work."
+
+This was in fact the response of the shoemaker's wife to my sermon. If
+we look for responses after our fashion instead of after people's own
+fashion, we ought to be disappointed. Any recognition of truth,
+whatever form it may take, whether that of poetic delight, intellectual
+corroboration, practical commonplace; or even vulgar aphorism, must be
+welcomed by the husbandmen of the God of growth. A response which jars
+against the peculiar pitch of our mental instrument, must not therefore
+be turned away from with dislike. Our mood of the moment is not that
+by which the universe is tuned into its harmonies. We must drop our
+instrument and listen to the other, and if we find that the player
+upon it is breathing after a higher expression, is, after his fashion,
+striving to embody something he sees of the same truth the utterance of
+which called forth this his answer, let us thank God and take courage.
+God at least is pleased: and if our refinement and education take away
+from our pleasure, it is because of something low, false, and selfish,
+not divine in a word, that is mingled with that refinement and that
+education. If the shoemaker's wife's response to the prophet's grand
+poem about the care of God over His creatures, took the form of
+acknowledgment for the rain that found out the holes in the people's
+shoes, it was the more genuine and true, for in itself it afforded proof
+that it was not a mere reflex of the words of the prophet, but sprung
+from the experience and recognition of the shoemaker's wife. Nor was
+there anything necessarily selfish in it, for if there are holes in
+people's shoes, the sooner they are found out the better.
+
+While I was talking to Mrs Baird, Mr Stoddart, whose love for the old
+organ had been stronger than his dislike to the storm, had come down
+into the church, and now approached me.
+
+"I never saw you in the church before, Mr Stoddart," I said, "though I
+have heard you often enough. You use your own private door always."
+
+"I thought to go that way now, but there came such a fierce burst
+of wind and rain in my face, that my courage failed me, and I turned
+back--like the sparrow--for refuge in the church."
+
+"A thought strikes me," I said. "Come home with me, and have some lunch,
+and then we will go together to see some of my poor people. I have often
+wished to ask you."
+
+His face fell.
+
+"It is such a day!" he answered, remonstratingly, but not positively
+refusing. It was not his way ever to refuse anything positively.
+
+"So it was when you set out this morning," I returned; "but you would
+not deprive us of the aid of your music for the sake of a charge of
+wind, and a rattle of rain-drops."
+
+"But I shan't be of any use. You are going, and that is enough."
+
+"I beg your pardon. Your very presence will be of use. Nothing yet given
+him or done for him by his fellow, ever did any man so much good as the
+recognition of the brotherhood by the common signs of friendship and
+sympathy. The best good of given money depends on the degree to which
+it is the sign of that friendship and sympathy. Our Lord did not make
+little of visiting: 'I was sick, and ye visited me.' 'Inasmuch as ye did
+it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.' Of course,
+if the visitor goes professionally and not humanly,--as a mere
+religious policeman, that is--whether he only distributes tracts with
+condescending words, or gives money liberally because he thinks he
+ought, the more he does not go the better, for he only does harm to them
+and himself too."
+
+"But I cannot pretend to feel any of the interest you consider
+essential: why then should I go?"
+
+"To please me, your friend. That is a good human reason. You need not
+say a word--you must not pretend anything. Go as my companion, not as
+their visitor. Will you come?"
+
+"I suppose I must."
+
+"You must, then. Thank you. You will help me. I have seldom a
+companion."
+
+So when the storm-fit had abated for the moment, we hurried to the
+vicarage, had a good though hasty lunch, (to which I was pleased to see
+Mr Stoddart do justice; for it is with man as with beast, if you want
+work out of him, he must eat well--and it is the one justification
+of eating well, that a man works well upon it,) and set out for the
+village. The rain was worse than ever. There was no sleet, and the
+wind was not cold, but the windows of heaven were opened, and if the
+fountains of the great deep were not broken up, it looked like it, at
+least, when we reached the bridge and saw how the river had spread out
+over all the low lands on its borders. We could not talk much as we went
+along.
+
+"Don't you find some pleasure in fighting the wind?" I said.
+
+"I have no doubt I should," answered Mr Stoddart, "if I thought I were
+going to do any good; but as it is, to tell the truth, I would rather be
+by my own fire with my folio Dante on the reading desk."
+
+"Well, I would rather help the poorest woman in creation, than
+contemplate the sufferings of the greatest and wickedest," I said.
+
+"There are two things you forget," returned Mr Stoddart. "First, that
+the poem of Dante is not nearly occupied with the sufferings of
+the wicked; and next, that what I have complained of in this
+expedition--which as far as I am concerned, I would call a wild goose
+chase, were it not that it is your doing and not mine--is that I am not
+going to help anybody."
+
+"You would have the best of the argument entirely," I replied, "if your
+expectation was sure to turn out correct."
+
+As I spoke, we had come within a few yards of the Tomkins's cottage,
+which lay low down from the village towards the river, and I saw that
+the water was at the threshold. I turned to Mr Stoddart, who, to do him
+justice, had not yet grumbled in the least.
+
+"Perhaps you had better go home, after all," I said; "for you must wade
+into Tomkins's if you go at all. Poor old man! what can he be doing,
+with his wife dying, and the river in his house!"
+
+"You have constituted yourself my superior officer, Mr Walton. I never
+turned my back on my leader yet. Though I confess I wish I could see the
+enemy a little clearer."
+
+"There is the enemy," I said, pointing to the water, and walking into
+it.
+
+Mr Stoddart followed me without a moment's hesitation.
+
+When I opened the door, the first thing I saw was a small stream of
+water running straight from the door to the fire on the hearth, which it
+had already drowned. The old man was sitting by his wife's bedside. Life
+seemed rapidly going from the old woman. She lay breathing very hard.
+
+"Oh, sir," said the old man, as he rose, almost crying, "you're come at
+last!"
+
+"Did you send for me?" I asked.
+
+"No, sir. I had nobody to send. Leastways, I asked the Lord if He
+wouldn't fetch you. I been prayin' hard for you for the last hour. I
+couldn't leave her to come for you. And I do believe the wind 'ud ha'
+blown me off my two old legs."
+
+"Well, I am come, you see. I would have come sooner, but I had no idea
+you would be flooded."
+
+"It's not that I mind, sir, though it IS cold sin' the fire went. But
+she IS goin' now, sir. She ha'n't spoken a word this two hours and more,
+and her breathin's worse and worse. She don't know me now, sir."
+
+A moan of protestation came from the dying woman.
+
+"She does know you, and loves you too, Tomkins," I said. "And you'll
+both know each other better by and by."
+
+The old woman made a feeble motion with her hand. I took it in mine. It
+was cold and deathlike. The rain was falling in large slow drops from
+the roof upon the bedclothes. But she would be beyond the reach of all
+the region storms before long, and it did not matter much.
+
+"Look if you can find a basin or plate, Mr Stoddart, and put it to catch
+the drop here," I said.
+
+For I wanted to give him the first chance of being useful.
+
+"There's one in the press there," said the old man, rising feebly.
+
+"Keep your seat," said Mr Stoddart. "I'll get it."
+
+And he got a basin from the cupboard, and put it on the bed to catch the
+drop.
+
+The old woman held my hand in hers; but by its motion I knew that
+she wanted something; and guessing what it was from what she had said
+before, I made her husband sit on the bed on the other side of her and
+take hold of her other hand, while I took his place on the chair by
+the bedside. This seemed to content her. So I went and whispered to Mr
+Stoddart, who had stood looking on disconsolately:--
+
+"You heard me say I would visit some of my sick people this afternoon.
+Some will be expecting me with certainty. You must go instead of me, and
+tell them that I cannot come, because old Mrs Tomkins is dying; but I
+will see them soon."
+
+He seemed rather relieved at the commission. I gave him the necessary
+directions to find the cottages, and he left me.
+
+I may mention here that this was the beginning of a relation between Mr
+Stoddart and the poor of the parish--a very slight one indeed, at first,
+for it consisted only in his knowing two or three of them, so as to
+ask after their health when he met them, and give them an occasional
+half-crown. But it led to better things before many years had passed. It
+seems scarcely more than yesterday--though it is twenty years ago--that
+I came upon him in the avenue, standing in dismay over the fragments of
+a jug of soup which he had dropped, to the detriment of his trousers as
+well as the loss of his soup. "What am I to do?" he said. "Poor Jones
+expects his soup to-day."--"Why, go back and get some more."--"But what
+will cook say?" The poor man was more afraid of the cook than he would
+have been of a squadron of cavalry. "Never mind the cook. Tell her you
+must have some more as soon as it can be got ready." He stood uncertain
+for a moment. Then his face brightened. "I will tell her I want my
+luncheon. I always have soup. And I'll get out through the greenhouse,
+and carry it to Jones."--"Very well," I said; "that will do capitally."
+And I went on, without caring to disturb my satisfaction by determining
+whether the devotion of his own soup arose more from love to Jones, or
+fear of the cook. He was a great help to me in the latter part of his
+life, especially after I lost good Dr Duncan, and my beloved friend Old
+Rogers. He was just one of those men who make excellent front-rank men,
+but are quite unfit for officers. He could do what he was told without
+flinching, but he always required to be told.
+
+I resumed my seat by the bedside, where the old woman was again moaning.
+As soon as I took her hand she ceased, and so I sat till it began to
+grow dark.
+
+"Are you there, sir?" she would murmur.
+
+"Yes, I am here. I have a hold of your hand."
+
+"I can't feel you, sir."
+
+"But you can hear me. And you can hear God's voice in your heart. I am
+here, though you can't feel me. And God is here, though you can't see
+Him."
+
+She would be silent for a while, and then murmur again--
+
+"Are you there, Tomkins?"
+
+"Yes, my woman, I'm here," answered the old man to one of these
+questions; "but I wish I was there instead, wheresomever it be as you're
+goin', old girl."
+
+And all that I could hear of her answer was, "Bym by; bym by."
+
+Why should I linger over the death-bed of an illiterate woman, old and
+plain, dying away by inches? Is it only that she died with a hold of my
+hand, and that therefore I am interested in the story? I trust not. I
+was interested in HER. Why? Would my readers be more interested if I
+told them of the death of a young lovely creature, who said touching
+things, and died amidst a circle of friends, who felt that the very
+light of life was being taken away from them? It was enough for me that
+here was a woman with a heart like my own; who needed the same salvation
+I needed; to whom the love of God was the one blessed thing; who was
+passing through the same dark passage into the light that the Lord had
+passed through before her, that I had to pass through after her. She had
+no theories--at least, she gave utterance to none; she had few thoughts
+of her own--and gave still fewer of them expression; you might guess at
+a true notion in her mind, but an abstract idea she could scarcely lay
+hold of; her speech was very common; her manner rather brusque than
+gentle; but she could love; she could forget herself; she could be sorry
+for what she did or thought wrong; she could hope; she could wish to
+be better; she could admire good people; she could trust in God her
+Saviour. And now the loving God-made human heart in her was going into a
+new school that it might begin a fresh beautiful growth. She was old,
+I have said, and plain; but now her old age and plainness were about to
+vanish, and all that had made her youth attractive to young Tomkins
+was about to return to her, only rendered tenfold more beautiful by the
+growth of fifty years of learning according to her ability. God has
+such patience in working us into vessels of honour! in teaching us to
+be children! And shall we find the human heart in which the germs of all
+that is noblest and loveliest and likest to God have begun to grow and
+manifest themselves uninteresting, because its circumstances have been
+narrow, bare, and poverty-stricken, though neither sordid nor unclean;
+because the woman is old and wrinkled and brown, as if these were
+more than the transient accidents of humanity; because she has neither
+learned grammar nor philosophy; because her habits have neither been
+delicate nor self-indulgent? To help the mind of such a woman to unfold
+to the recognition of the endless delights of truth; to watch the
+dawn of the rising intelligence upon the too still face, and the
+transfiguration of the whole form, as the gentle rusticity vanishes in
+yet gentler grace, is a labour and a delight worth the time and mind of
+an archangel. Our best living poet says--but no; I will not quote. It is
+a distinct wrong that befalls the best books to have many of their best
+words quoted till in their own place and connexion they cease to
+have force and influence. The meaning of the passage is that the
+communication of truth is one of the greatest delights the human heart
+can experience. Surely this is true. Does not the teaching of men form a
+great part of the divine gladness?
+
+Therefore even the dull approaches of death are full of deep
+significance and warm interest to one who loves his fellows, who desires
+not to be distinguished by any better fate than theirs; and shrinks from
+the pride of supposing that his own death, or that of the noblest of
+the good, is more precious in the sight of God than that of "one of the
+least of these little ones."
+
+At length, after a long silence, the peculiar sounds of obstructed
+breathing indicated the end at hand. The jaw fell, and the eyes were
+fixed. The old man closed the mouth and the eyes of his old companion,
+weeping like a child, and I prayed aloud, giving thanks to God for
+taking her to Himself. It went to my heart to leave the old man alone
+with the dead; but it was better to let him be alone for a while, ere
+the women should come to do the last offices for the abandoned form.
+
+I went to Old Rogers, told him the state in which I had left poor
+Tomkins, and asked him what was to be done.
+
+"I'll go and bring him home, sir, directly. He can't be left there."
+
+"But how can you bring him in such a night?"
+
+"Let me see, sir. I must think. Would your mare go in a cart, do you
+think?"
+
+"Quite quietly. She brought a load of gravel from the common a few days
+ago. But where's your cart? I haven't got one."
+
+"There's one at Weir's to be repaired, sir. It wouldn't be stealing to
+borrow it."
+
+How he managed with Tomkins I do not know. I thought it better to leave
+all the rest to him. He only said afterwards, that he could hardly get
+the old man away from the body. But when I went in next day, I found
+Tomkins sitting, disconsolate, but as comfortable as he could be, in
+the easy chair by the side of the fire. Mrs Rogers was bustling about
+cheerily. The storm had died in the night. The sun was shining. It was
+the first of the spring weather. The whole country was gleaming with
+water. But soon it would sink away, and the grass be the thicker for its
+rising.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI. A COUNCIL OF FRIENDS.
+
+
+My reader will easily believe that I returned home that Sunday evening
+somewhat jaded, nor will he be surprised if I say that next morning I
+felt disinclined to leave my bed. I was able, however, to rise and go,
+as I have said, to Old Rogers's cottage.
+
+But when I came home, I could no longer conceal from myself that I was
+in danger of a return of my last attack. I had been sitting for hours
+in wet clothes, with my boots full of water, and now I had to suffer for
+it. But as I was not to blame in the matter, and had no choice offered
+me whether I should be wet or dry while I sat by the dying woman, I felt
+no depression at the prospect of the coming illness. Indeed, I was too
+much depressed from other causes, from mental strife and hopelessness,
+to care much whether I was well or ill. I could have welcomed death in
+the mood in which I sometimes felt myself during the next few days, when
+I was unable to leave my bed, and knew that Captain Everard was at
+the Hall, and knew nothing besides. For no voice reached me from that
+quarter any more than if Oldcastle Hall had been a region beyond the
+grave. Miss Oldcastle seemed to have vanished from my ken as much as
+Catherine Weir and Mrs Tomkins--yes, more--for there was only death
+between these and me; whereas, there was something far worse--I could
+not always tell what--that rose ever between Miss Oldcastle and myself,
+and paralysed any effort I might fancy myself on the point of making for
+her rescue.
+
+One pleasant thing happened. On the Thursday, I think it was, I felt
+better. My sister came into my room and said that Miss Crowther had
+called, and wanted to see me.
+
+"Which Miss Crowther is it?" I asked.
+
+"The little lady that looks like a bird, and chirps when she talks."
+
+Of course I was no longer in any doubt as to which of them it was.
+
+"You told her I had a bad cold, did you not?"
+
+"Oh, yes. But she says if it is only a cold, it will do you no harm to
+see her."
+
+"But you told her I was in bed, didn't you?"
+
+"Of course. But it makes no difference. She says she's used to seeing
+sick folk in bed; and if you don't mind seeing her, she doesn't mind
+seeing you."
+
+"Well, I suppose I must see her," I said.
+
+So my sister made me a little tidier, and introduced Miss Crowther.
+
+"O dear Mr Walton, I am SO sorry! But you're not very ill, are you?"
+
+"I hope not, Miss Jemima. Indeed, I begin to think this morning that I
+am going to get off easier than I expected."
+
+"I am glad of that. Now listen to me. I won't keep you, and it is a
+matter of some importance. I hear that one of your people is dead, a
+young woman of the name of Weir, who has left a little boy behind her.
+Now, I have been wanting for a long time to adopt a child----"
+
+"But," I interrupted her, "What would Miss Hester say?"
+
+"My sister is not so very dreadful as perhaps you think her, Mr Walton;
+and besides, when I do want my own way very particularly, which is not
+often, for there are not so many things that it's worth while insisting
+upon--but when I DO want my own way, I always have it. I then stand
+upon my right of--what do you call it?--primo--primogeniture--that's it!
+Well, I think I know something of this child's father. I am sorry to
+say I don't know much good of him, and that's the worse for the boy.
+Still----"
+
+"The boy is an uncommonly sweet and lovable child, whoever was his
+father," I interposed.
+
+"I am very glad to hear it. I am the more determined to adopt him. What
+friends has he?"
+
+"He has a grandfather, and an uncle and aunt, and will have a
+godfather--that's me--in a few days, I hope."
+
+"I am very glad to hear it. There will be no opposition on the part of
+the relatives, I presume?"
+
+"I am not so sure of that. I fear I shall object for one, Miss Jemima."
+
+"You? I didn't expect that of you, Mr Walton, I must say."
+
+And there was a tremor in the old lady's voice more of disappointment
+and hurt than of anger.
+
+"I will think it over, though, and talk about it to his grandfather, and
+we shall find out what's best, I do hope. You must not think I should
+not like you to have him."
+
+"Thank you, Mr Walton. Then I won't stay longer now. But I warn you I
+will call again very soon, if you don't come to see me. Good morning."
+
+And the dear old lady shook hands with me and left me rather hurriedly,
+turning at the door, however, to add--
+
+"Mind, I've set my heart upon having the boy, Mr Walton. I've seen him
+often."
+
+What could have made Miss Crowther take such a fancy to the boy? I
+could not help associating it with what I had heard of her youthful
+disappointment, but never having had my conjectures confirmed, I will
+say no more about them. Of course I talked the matter over with Thomas
+Weir; but, as I had suspected, I found that he was now as unwilling to
+part with the boy as he had formerly disliked the sight of him. Nor did
+I press the matter at all, having a belief that the circumstances of
+one's natal position are not to be rudely handled or thoughtlessly
+altered, besides that I thought Thomas and his daughter ought to have
+all the comfort and good that were to be got from the presence of the
+boy whose advent had occasioned them so much trouble and sorrow, yea,
+and sin too. But I did not give a positive and final refusal to Miss
+Crowther. I only said "for the present;" for I did not feel at liberty
+to go further. I thought that such changes might take place as would
+render the trial of such a new relationship desirable; as, indeed, it
+turned out in the end, though I cannot tell the story now, but must keep
+it for a possible future.
+
+I have, I think, entirely as yet, followed, in these memoirs, the plan
+of relating either those things only at which I was present, or, if
+other things, only in the same mode in which I heard them. I will
+now depart from this plan--for once. Years passed before some of the
+following facts were reported to me, but it is only here that they could
+be interesting to my readers.
+
+At the very time Miss Crowther was with me, as nearly as I can guess,
+Old Rogers turned into Thomas Weir's workshop. The usual, on the present
+occasion somewhat melancholy, greetings having passed between them, Old
+Rogers said--
+
+"Don't you think, Mr Weir, there's summat the matter wi' parson?"
+
+"Overworked," returned Weir. "He's lost two, ye see, and had to see them
+both safe over, as I may say, within the same day. He's got a bad cold,
+I'm sorry to hear, besides. Have ye heard of him to-day?"
+
+"Yes, yes; he's badly, and in bed. But that's not what I mean. There's
+summat on his mind," said Old Rogers.
+
+"Well, I don't think it's for you or me to meddle with parson's mind,"
+returned Weir.
+
+"I'm not so sure o' that," persisted Rogers. "But if I had thought, Mr
+Weir, as how you would be ready to take me up short for mentionin'
+of the thing, I wouldn't ha' opened my mouth to you about
+parson--leastways, in that way, I mean."
+
+"But what way DO you mean, Old Rogers?"
+
+"Why, about his in'ards, you know."
+
+"I'm no nearer your meanin' yet."
+
+"Well, Mr Weir, you and me's two old fellows, now--leastways I'm a deal
+older than you. But that doesn't signify to what I want to say."
+
+And here Old Rogers stuck fast--according to Weir's story.
+
+"It don't seem easy to say no how, Old Rogers," said Weir.
+
+"Well, it ain't. So I must just let it go by the run, and hope the
+parson, who'll never know, would forgive me if he did."
+
+"Well, then, what is it?"
+
+"It's my opinion that that parson o' ours--you see, we knows about it,
+Mr Weir, though we're not gentlefolks--leastways, I'm none."
+
+"Now, what DO you mean, Old Rogers?"
+
+"Well, I means this--as how parson's in love. There, that's paid out."
+
+"Suppose he was, I don't see yet what business that is of yours or mine
+either."
+
+"Well, I do. I'd go to Davie Jones for that man."
+
+A heathenish expression, perhaps; but Weir assured me, with much
+amusement in his tone, that those were the very words Old Rogers used.
+Leaving the expression aside, will the reader think for a moment on the
+old man's reasoning? My condition WAS his business; for he was ready to
+die for me! Ah! love does indeed make us all each other's keeper, just
+as we were intended to be.
+
+"But what CAN we do?" returned Weir.
+
+Perhaps he was the less inclined to listen to the old man, that he was
+busy with a coffin for his daughter, who was lying dead down the street.
+And so my poor affairs were talked of over the coffin-planks. Well,
+well, it was no bad omen.
+
+"I tell you what, Mr Weir, this here's a serious business. And it seems
+to me it's not shipshape o' you to go on with that plane o' yours, when
+we're talkin' about parson."
+
+"Well, Old Rogers, I meant no offence. Here goes. NOW, what have you to
+say? Though if it's offence to parson you're speakin' of, I know, if I
+were parson, who I'd think was takin' the greatest liberty, me wi' my
+plane, or you wi' your fancies."
+
+"Belay there, and hearken."
+
+So Old Rogers went into as many particulars as he thought fit, to
+prove that his suspicion as to the state of my mind was correct; which
+particulars I do not care to lay in a collected form before my reader,
+he being in no need of such a summing up to give his verdict, seeing the
+parson has already pleaded guilty. When he had finished,
+
+"Supposing all you say, Old Rogers," remarked Thomas, "I don't yet
+see what WE'VE got to do with it. Parson ought to know best what he's
+about."
+
+"But my daughter tells me," said Rogers, "that Miss Oldcastle has no
+mind to marry Captain Everard. And she thinks if parson would only speak
+out he might have a chance."
+
+Weir made no reply, and was silent so long, with his head bent, that
+Rogers grew impatient.
+
+"Well, man, ha' you nothing to say now--not for your best friend--on
+earth, I mean--and that's parson? It may seem a small matter to you, but
+it's no small matter to parson."
+
+"Small to me!" said Weir, and taking up his tool, a constant recourse
+with him when agitated, he began to plane furiously.
+
+Old Rogers now saw that there was more in it than he had thought, and
+held his peace and waited. After a minute or two of fierce activity,
+Thomas lifted up a face more white than the deal board he was planing,
+and said,
+
+"You should have come to the point a little sooner, Old Rogers."
+
+He then laid down his plane, and went out of the workshop, leaving
+Rogers standing there in bewilderment. But he was not gone many minutes.
+He returned with a letter in his hand.
+
+"There," he said, giving it to Rogers.
+
+"I can't read hand o' write," returned Rogers. "I ha' enough ado with
+straight-foret print But I'll take it to parson."
+
+"On no account," returned Thomas, emphatically "That's not what I gave
+it you for. Neither you nor parson has any right to read that letter;
+and I don't want either of you to read it. Can Jane read writing?"
+
+"I don't know as she can, for, you see, what makes lasses take to
+writin' is when their young man's over the seas, leastways not in the
+mill over the brook."
+
+"I'll be back in a minute," said Thomas, and taking the letter from
+Rogers's hand, he left the shop again.
+
+He returned once more with the letter sealed up in an envelope,
+addressed to Miss Oldcastle.
+
+"Now, you tell your Jane to give that to Miss Oldcastle from me--mind,
+from ME; and she must give it into her own hands, and let no one else
+see it. And I must have it again. Mind you tell her all that, Old
+Rogers."
+
+"I will. It's for Miss Oldcastle, and no one else to know on't. And
+you're to have it again all safe when done with."
+
+"Yes. Can you trust Jane not to go talking about it?"
+
+"I think I can. I ought to, anyhow. But she can't know anythink in the
+letter now, Mr Weir."
+
+"I know that; but Marshmallows is a talkin' place. And poor Kate ain't
+right out o' hearin' yet.--You'll come and see her buried to-morrow,
+won't ye, Old Rogers?"
+
+"I will, Thomas. You've had a troubled life, but thank God the sun came
+out a bit before she died."
+
+"That's true, Rogers. It's all right, I do think, though I grumbled long
+and sore. But Jane mustn't speak of that letter."
+
+"No. That she shan't."
+
+"I'll tell you some day what's in it. But I can't bear to talk about it
+yet."
+
+And so they parted.
+
+I was too unwell still either to be able to bury my dead out of my sight
+or to comfort my living the next Sunday. I got help from Addicehead,
+however, and the dead bodies were laid aside in the ancient wardrobe of
+the tomb. They were both buried by my vestry-door, Catherine where I had
+found young Tom lying, namely, in the grave of her mother, and old Mrs
+Tomkins on the other side of the path.
+
+On Sunday, Rogers gave his daughter the letter, and she carried it to
+the Hall. It was not till she had to wait on her mistress before leaving
+her for the night that she found an opportunity of giving it into her
+own hands.
+
+Then when her bell rang, Jane went up to her room, and found her so pale
+and haggard that she was frightened. She had thrown herself back on the
+couch, with her hands lying by her sides, as if she cared for nothing in
+this world or out of it. But when Jane entered, she started and sat up,
+and tried to look like herself. Her face, however, was so pitiful, that
+honest-hearted Jane could not help crying, upon which the responsive
+sisterhood overcame the proud lady, and she cried too. Jane had all but
+forgotten the letter, of the import of which she had no idea, for her
+father had taken care to rouse no suspicions in her mind. But when she
+saw her cry, the longing to give her something, which comes to us all
+when we witness trouble--for giving seems to mean everything-brought to
+her mind the letter she had undertaken to deliver to her. Now she had
+no notion, as I have said, that the letter had anything to do with her
+present perplexity, but she hoped it might divert her thoughts for a
+moment, which is all that love at a distance can look for sometimes.
+
+"Here is a letter," said Jane, "that Mr Weir the carpenter gave to my
+father to give to me to bring to you, miss."
+
+"What is it about, Jane?" she asked listlessly.
+
+Then a sudden flash broke from her eyes, and she held out her hand
+eagerly to take it. She opened it and read it with changing colour, but
+when she had finished it, her cheeks were crimson, and her eyes glowing
+like fire.
+
+"The wretch," she said, and threw the letter from her into the middle of
+the floor.
+
+Jane, who remembered the injunctions of her father as to the safety
+and return of the letter, stooped to pick it up: but had hardly raised
+herself when the door opened, and in came Mrs Oldcastle. The moment she
+saw her mother, Ethelwyn rose, and advancing to meet her, said,
+
+"Mother, I will NOT marry that man. You may do what you please with me,
+but I WILL NOT."
+
+"Heigho!" exclaimed Mrs Oldcastle with spread nostrils, and turning
+suddenly upon Jane, snatched the letter out of her hand.
+
+She opened and read it, her face getting more still and stony as she
+read. Miss Oldcastle stood and looked at her mother with cheeks now pale
+but with still flashing eyes. The moment her mother had finished the
+letter, she walked swiftly to the fire, tearing the letter as she went,
+and thrust it between the bars, pushing it in fiercely with the poker,
+and muttering--
+
+"A vile forgery of those low Chartist wretches! As if he would ever
+have looked at one of THEIR women! A low conspiracy to get money from a
+gentleman in his honourable position!"
+
+And for the first time since she went to the Hall, Jane said, there was
+colour in that dead white face.
+
+She turned once more, fiercer than ever, upon Jane, and in a tone of
+rage under powerful repression, began:--
+
+"You leave the house--THIS INSTANT."
+
+The last two words, notwithstanding her self-command, rose to a scream.
+And she came from the fire towards Jane, who stood trembling near the
+door, with such an expression on her countenance that absolute fear
+drove her from the room before she knew what she was about. The locking
+of the door behind her let her know that she had abandoned her young
+mistress to the madness of her mother's evil temper and disposition. But
+it was too late. She lingered by the door and listened, but beyond
+an occasional hoarse tone of suppressed energy, she heard nothing.
+At length the lock--as suddenly turned, and she was surprised by Mrs
+Oldcastle, if not in a listening attitude, at least where she had no
+right to be after the dismissal she had received.
+
+Opposite Miss Oldcastle's bedroom was another, seldom used, the door of
+which was now standing open. Instead of speaking to Jane, Mrs Oldcastle
+gave her a violent push, which drove her into this room. Thereupon she
+shut the door and locked it. Jane spent the whole of the night in that
+room, in no small degree of trepidation as to what might happen next.
+But she heard no noise all the rest of the night, part of which,
+however, was spent in sound sleep, for Jane's conscience was in no ways
+disturbed as to any part she had played in the current events.
+
+It was not till the morning that she examined the door, to see if she
+could not manage to get out and escape from the house, for she shared
+with the rest of the family an indescribable fear of Mrs Oldcastle and
+her confidante, the White Wolf. But she found it was of no use: the
+lock was at least as strong as the door. Being a sensible girl and
+self-possessed, as her parents' child ought to be, she made no noise,
+but waited patiently for what might come. At length, hearing a step in
+the passage, she tapped gently at the door and called, "Who's there?"
+The cook's voice answered.
+
+"Let me out," said Jane. "The door's locked." The cook tried, but
+found there was no key. Jane told her how she came there, and the cook
+promised to get her out as soon as she could. Meantime all she could do
+for her was to hand her a loaf of bread on a stick from the next window.
+It had been long dark before some one unlocked the door, and left her
+at liberty to go where she pleased, of which she did not fail to make
+immediate use.
+
+Unable to find her young mistress, she packed her box, and, leaving
+it behind her, escaped to her father. As soon as she had told him the
+story, he came straight to me.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII. THE NEXT THING.
+
+
+As I sat in my study, in the twilight of that same day, the door was
+hurriedly opened, and Judy entered. She looked about the room with a
+quick glance to see that we were alone, then caught my hand in both of
+hers, and burst out crying.
+
+"Why, Judy!" I said, "what IS the matter?" But the sobs would not allow
+her to answer. I was too frightened to put any more questions, and so
+stood silent--my chest feeling like an empty tomb that waited for death
+to fill it. At length with a strong effort she checked the succession of
+her sobs, and spoke.
+
+"They are killing auntie. She looks like a ghost already," said the
+child, again bursting into tears.
+
+"Tell me, Judy, what CAN I do for her?"
+
+"You must find out, Mr Walton. If you loved her as much as I do, you
+would find out what to do."
+
+"But she will not let me do anything for her."
+
+"Yes, she will. She says you promised to help her some day."
+
+"Did she send you, then?"
+
+"No. She did not send me."
+
+"Then how--what--what can I do!"
+
+"Oh, you exact people! You must have everything square and in print
+before you move. If it had been me now, wouldn't I have been off like a
+shot! Do get your hat, Mr Walton."
+
+"Come, then, Judy. I will go at once.--Shall I see her?"
+
+And every vein throbbed at the thought of rescuing her from her
+persecutors, though I had not yet the smallest idea how it was to be
+effected.
+
+"We will talk about that as we go," said Judy, authoritatively.
+
+In a moment more we were in the open air. It was a still night, with an
+odour of damp earth, and a hint of green buds in it. A pale half-moon
+hung in the sky, now and then hidden by the clouds that swept across it,
+for there was wind in the heavens, though upon earth all was still. I
+offered Judy my arm, but she took my hand, and we walked on without a
+word till we had got through the village and out upon the road.
+
+"Now, Judy," I said at last, "tell me what they are doing to your aunt?"
+
+"I don't know what they are doing. But I am sure she will die."
+
+"Is she ill?"
+
+"She is as white as a sheet, and will not leave her room. Grannie must
+have frightened her dreadfully. Everybody is frightened at her but me,
+and I begin to be frightened too. And what will become of auntie then?"
+
+"But what can her mother do to her?"
+
+"I don't know. I think it is her determination to have her own way that
+makes auntie afraid she will get it somehow; and she says now she will
+rather die than marry Captain Everard. Then there is no one allowed to
+wait on her but Sarah, and I know the very sight of her is enough to
+turn auntie sick almost. What has become of Jane I don't know. I haven't
+seen her all day, and the servants are whispering together more than
+usual. Auntie can't eat what Sarah brings her, I am sure; else I should
+almost fancy she was starving herself to death to keep clear of that
+Captain Everard."
+
+"Is he still at the Hall?"
+
+"Yes. But I don't think it is altogether his fault. Grannie won't let
+him go. I don't believe he knows how determined auntie is not to marry
+him. Only, to be sure, though grannie never lets her have more than five
+shillings in her pocket at a time, she will be worth something when she
+is married."
+
+"Nothing can make her worth more than she is, Judy," I said, perhaps
+with some discontent in my tone.
+
+"That's as you and I think, Mr Walton; not as grannie and the captain
+think at all. I daresay he would not care much more than grannie whether
+she was willing or not, so long as she married him."
+
+"But, Judy, we must have some plan laid before we reach the Hall; else
+my coming will be of no use."
+
+"Of course. I know how much I can do, and you must arrange the rest
+with her. I will take you to the little room up-stairs--we call it the
+octagon. That you know is just under auntie's room. They will be at
+dinner--the captain and grannie. I will leave you there, and tell auntie
+that you want to see her."
+
+"But, Judy,---"
+
+"Don't you want to see her, Mr Walton?"
+
+"Yes, I do; more than you can think."
+
+"Then I will tell her so."
+
+"But will she come to me?"
+
+"I don't know. We have to find that out."
+
+"Very well. I leave myself in your hands."
+
+I was now perfectly collected. All my dubitation and distress were gone,
+for I had something to do, although what I could not yet tell. That she
+did not love Captain Everard was plain, and that she had as yet resisted
+her mother was also plain, though it was not equally certain that she
+would, if left at her mercy, go on to resist her. This was what I hoped
+to strengthen her to do. I saw nothing more within my reach as yet. But
+from what I knew of Miss Oldcastle, I saw plainly enough that no
+greater good could be done for her than this enabling to resistance.
+Self-assertion was so foreign to her nature, that it needed a sense of
+duty to rouse her even to self-defence. As I have said before, she was
+clad in the mail of endurance, but was utterly without weapons. And
+there was a danger of her conduct and then of her mind giving way at
+last, from the gradual inroads of weakness upon the thews which she left
+unexercised. In respect of this, I prayed heartily that I might help
+her.
+
+Judy and I scarcely spoke to each other from the moment we entered the
+gate till I found myself at a side door which I had never observed till
+now. It was fastened, and Judy told me to wait till she went in
+and opened it. The moon was now quite obscured, and I was under no
+apprehension of discovery. While I stood there I could not help thinking
+of Dr Duncan's story, and reflecting that the daughter was now returning
+the kindness shown to the mother.
+
+I had not to wait long before the door opened behind me noiselessly,
+and I stepped into the dark house. Judy took me by the hand, and led me
+along a passage, and then up a stair into the little drawing-room. There
+was no light. She led me to a seat at the farther end, and opening a
+door close beside me, left me in the dark.
+
+There I sat so long that I fell into a fit of musing, broken ever by
+startled expectation. Castle after castle I built up; castle after
+castle fell to pieces in my hands. Still she did not come. At length I
+got so restless and excited that only the darkness kept me from
+starting up and pacing the room. Still she did not come, and partly from
+weakness, partly from hope deferred, I found myself beginning to tremble
+all over. Nor could I control myself. As the trembling increased, I
+grew alarmed lest I should become unable to carry out all that might be
+necessary.
+
+Suddenly from out of the dark a hand settled on my arm. I looked up and
+could just see the whiteness of a face. Before I could speak, a voice
+said brokenly, in a half-whisper:--
+
+"WILL you save me, Mr Walton? But you're trembling; you are ill; you
+ought not to have come to me. I will get you something."
+
+And she moved to go, but I held her. All my trembling was gone in a
+moment. Her words, so careful of me even in her deep misery, went to
+my heart and gave me strength. The suppressed feelings of many months
+rushed to my lips. What I said I do not know, but I know that I told her
+I loved her. And I know that she did not draw her hand from mine when I
+said so.
+
+But ere I ceased came a revulsion of feeling.
+
+"Forgive me," I said, "I am selfishness itself to speak to you thus now,
+to take advantage of your misery to make you listen to mine. But, at
+least, it will make you sure that if all I am, all I have will save
+you--"
+
+"But I am saved already," she interposed, "if you love me--for I love
+you."
+
+And for some moments there were no words to speak. I stood holding her
+hand, conscious only of God and her. At last I said:
+
+"There is no time now but for action. Nor do I see anything but to go
+with me at once. Will you come home to my sister? Or I will take you
+wherever you please."
+
+"I will go with you anywhere you think best. Only take me away."
+
+"Put on your bonnet, then, and a warm cloak, and we will settle all
+about it as we go."
+
+She had scarcely left the room when Mrs Oldcastle came to the door.
+
+"No lights here!" she said. "Sarah, bring candles, and tell Captain
+Everard, when he will join us, to come to the octagon room. Where can
+that little Judy be? The child gets more and more troublesome, I do
+think. I must take her in hand."
+
+I had been in great perplexity how to let her know that I was there;
+for to announce yourself to a lady by a voice out of the darkness of her
+boudoir, or to wait for candles to discover you where she thought she
+was quite alone--neither is a pleasant way of presenting yourself to her
+consciousness. But I was helped out of the beginning into the middle of
+my difficulties, once more by that blessed little Judy. I did not know
+she was in the room till I heard her voice. Nor do I yet know how much
+she had heard of the conversation between her aunt and myself; for
+although I sometimes see her look roguish even now that she is a
+middle-aged woman with many children, when anything is said which might
+be supposed to have a possible reference to that night, I have never
+cared to ask her.
+
+"Here I am, grannie," said her voice. "But I won't be taken in hand by
+you or any one else. I tell you that. So mind. And Mr Walton is here,
+too, and Aunt Ethelwyn is going out with him for a long walk."
+
+"What do you mean, you silly child?"
+
+"I mean what I say," and "Miss Judy speaks the truth," fell together
+from her lips and mine.
+
+"Mr Walton," began Mrs Oldcastle, indignantly, "it is scarcely like a
+gentleman to come where you are not wanted---"
+
+Here Judy interrupted her.
+
+"I beg your pardon, grannie, Mr Walton WAS wanted--very much wanted. I
+went and fetched him."
+
+But Mrs Oldcastle went on unheeding.
+
+"---and to be sitting in my room in the dark too!"
+
+"That couldn't be helped, grannie. Here comes Sarah with candles."
+
+"Sarah," said Mrs Oldcastle, "ask Captain Everard to be kind enough to
+step this way."
+
+"Yes, ma'am," answered Sarah, with an untranslatable look at me as she
+set down the candles.
+
+We could now see each other. Knowing words to be but idle breath, I
+would not complicate matters by speech, but stood silent, regarding Mrs
+Oldcastle. She on her part did not flinch, but returned my look with
+one both haughty and contemptuous. In a few moments, Captain Everard
+entered, bowed slightly, and looked to Mrs Oldcastle as if for an
+explanation. Whereupon she spoke, but to me.
+
+"Mr Walton," she said, "will you explain to Captain Everard to what we
+owe the UNEXPECTED pleasure of a visit from you?"
+
+"Captain Everard has no claim to any explanation from me. To you, Mrs
+Oldcastle, I would have answered, had you asked me, that I was waiting
+for Miss Oldcastle."
+
+"Pray inform Miss Oldcastle, Judy, that Mr Walton insists upon seeing
+her at once."
+
+"That is quite unnecessary. Miss Oldcastle will be here presently," I
+said.
+
+Mrs Oldcastle turned slightly livid with wrath. She was always white,
+as I have said: the change I can describe only by the word I have used,
+indicating a bluish darkening of the whiteness. She walked towards the
+door beside me. I stepped between her and it.
+
+"Pardon me, Mrs Oldcastle. That is the way to Miss Oldcastle's room. I
+am here to protect her."
+
+Without saying a word she turned and looked at Captain Everard. He
+advanced with a long stride of determination. But ere he reached me,
+the door behind me opened, and Miss Oldcastle appeared in her bonnet
+and shawl, catrying a small bag in her hand. Seeing how things were, the
+moment she entered, she put her hand on my arm, and stood fronting the
+enemy with me. Judy was on my right, her eyes flashing, and her cheek as
+red as a peony, evidently prepared to do battle a toute outrance for her
+friends.
+
+"Miss Oldcastle, go to your room instantly, I COMMAND you," said her
+mother; and she approached as if to remove her hand from my arm. I put
+my other arm between her and her daughter.
+
+"No, Mrs Oldcastle," I said. "You have lost all a mother's rights by
+ceasing to behave like a mother, Miss Oldcastle will never more
+do anything in obedience to your commands, whatever she may do in
+compliance with your wishes."
+
+"Allow me to remark," said Captain Everard, with attempted nonchalance,
+"that that is strange doctrine for your cloth."
+
+"So much the worse for my cloth, then," I answered, "and the better for
+yours if it leads you to act more honourably."
+
+Still keeping himself entrenched in the affectation of a supercilious
+indifference, he smiled haughtily, and gave a look of dramatic appeal to
+Mrs Oldcastle.
+
+"At least," said that lady, "do not disgrace yourself, Ethelwyn, by
+leaving the house in this unaccountable manner at night and on foot. If
+you WILL leave the protection of your mother's roof, wait at least till
+tomorrow."
+
+"I would rather spend the night in the open air than pass another under
+your roof, mother. You have been a strange mother to me--and Dorothy
+too!"
+
+"At least do not put your character in question by going in this
+unmaidenly fashion. People will talk to your prejudice--and Mr Walton's
+too."
+
+Ethelwyn smiled.--She was now as collected as I was, seeming to have
+cast off all her weakness. My heart was uplifted more than I can
+say.--She knew her mother too well to be caught by the change in her
+tone.
+
+I had not hitherto interrupted her once when she took the answer upon
+herself, for she was not one to be checked when she chose to speak. But
+now she answered nothing, only looked at me, and I understood her, of
+course.
+
+"They will hardly have time to do so, I trust, before it will be out of
+their power. It rests with Miss Oldcastle herself to say when that shall
+be."
+
+As if she had never suspected that such was the result of her scheming,
+Mrs Oldcastle's demeanour changed utterly. The form of her visage was
+altered. She made a spring at her daughter, and seized her by the arm.
+
+"Then I forbid it," she screamed; "and I WILL be obeyed. I stand on my
+rights. Go to your room, you minx."
+
+"There is no law human or divine to prevent her from marrying whom she
+will. How old are you, Ethelwyn?"
+
+I thought it better to seem even cooler than I was.
+
+"Twenty-seven," answered Miss Oldcastle.
+
+"Is it possible you can be so foolish, Mrs Oldcastle, as to think you
+have the slightest hold on your daughter's freedom? Let her arm go."
+
+But she kept her grasp.
+
+"You hurt me, mother," said Miss Oldcastle.
+
+"Hurt you? you smooth-faced hypocrite! I will hurt you then!"
+
+But I took Mrs Oldcastle's arm in my hand, and she let go her hold.
+
+"How dare you touch a woman?" she said.
+
+"Because she has so far ceased to be a woman as to torture her own
+daughter."
+
+Here Captain Everard stepped forward, saying,--
+
+"The riot-act ought to be read, I think. It is time for the military to
+interfere."
+
+"Well put, Captain Everard," I said. "Our side will disperse if you will
+only leave room for us to go."
+
+"Possibly _I_ may have something to say in the matter."
+
+"Say on."
+
+"This lady has jilted me."
+
+"Have you, Ethelwyn?"
+
+"I have not."
+
+"Then, Captain Everard, you lie."
+
+"You dare to tell me so?"
+
+And he strode a pace nearer.
+
+"It needs no daring. I know you too well; and so does another who
+trusted you and found you false as hell."
+
+"You presume on your cloth, but--" he said, lifting his hand.
+
+"You may strike me, presuming on my cloth," I answered; "and I will not
+return your blow. Insult me as you will, and I will bear it. Call me
+coward, and I will say nothing. But lay one hand on me to prevent me
+from doing my duty, and I knock you down--or find you more of a man than
+I take you for."
+
+It was either conscience or something not so good that made a coward of
+him. He turned on his heel.
+
+"I really am not sufficiently interested in the affair to oppose you.
+You may take the girl for me. Both your cloth and the presence of ladies
+protect your insolence. I do not like brawling where one cannot fight.
+You shall hear from me before long, Mr Walton."
+
+"No, Captain Everard, I shall not hear from you. You know you dare not
+write to me. I know that of you which, even on the code of the duellist,
+would justify any gentleman in refusing to meet you. Stand out of my
+way!"
+
+I advanced with Miss Oldcastle on my arm. He drew back; and we left the
+room.
+
+As we reached the door, Judy bounded after us, threw her arms round her
+aunt's neck, then round mine, kissing us both, and returned to her place
+on the sofa. Mrs Oldcastle gave a scream, and sunk fainting on a
+chair. It was a last effort to detain her daughter and gain time. Miss
+Oldcastle would have returned, but I would not permit her.
+
+"No," I said; "she will be better without you. Judy, ring the bell for
+Sarah."
+
+"How dare you give orders in my house?" exclaimed Mrs Oldcastle, sitting
+bolt upright in the chair, and shaking her fist at us. Then assuming the
+heroic, she added, "From this moment she is no daughter of mine. Nor
+can you touch one farthing of her money, sir. You have married a beggar
+after all, and that you'll both know before long."
+
+"Thy money perish with thee!" I said, and repented the moment I had said
+it. It sounded like an imprecation, and I know I had no correspondent
+feeling; for, after all, she was the mother of my Ethelwyn. But the
+allusion to money made me so indignant, that the words burst from me ere
+I could consider their import.
+
+The cool wind greeted us like the breath of God, as we left the house
+and closed the door behind us. The moon was shining from the edge of a
+vaporous mountain, which gradually drew away from her, leaving her alone
+in the midst of a lake of blue. But we had not gone many paces from the
+house when Miss Oldcastle began to tremble violently, and could scarcely
+get along with all the help I could give her. Nor, for the space of six
+weeks did one word pass between us about the painful occurrences of that
+evening. For all that time she was quite unable to bear it.
+
+When we managed at last to reach the vicarage, I gave her in charge to
+my sister, with instructions to help her to bed at once, while I went
+for Dr Duncan.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII. OLD ROGERS'S THANKSGIVING.
+
+
+I found the old man seated at his dinner, which he left immediately when
+he heard that Miss Oldcastle needed his help. In a few words I told
+him, as we went, the story of what had befallen at the Hall, to which
+he listened with the interest of a boy reading a romance, asking twenty
+questions about the particulars which I hurried over. Then he shook me
+warmly by the hand, saying--
+
+"You have fairly won her, Walton, and I am as glad of it as I could
+be of anything I can think of. She is well worth all you must have
+suffered. This will at length remove the curse from that wretched
+family. You have saved her from perhaps even a worse fate than her
+sister's."
+
+"I fear she will be ill, though," I said, "after all that she has gone
+through."
+
+But I did not even suspect how ill she would be.
+
+As soon as I heard Dr Duncan's opinion of her, which was not very
+definite, a great fear seized upon me that I was destined to lose her
+after all. This fear, however, terrible as it was, did not torture me
+like the fear that had preceded it. I could oftener feel able to say,
+"Thy will be done" than I could before.
+
+Dr Duncan was hardly out of the house when Old Rogers arrived, and was
+shown into the study. He looked excited. I allowed him to tell out his
+story, which was his daughter's of course, without interruption. He
+ended by saying:--
+
+"Now, sir, you really must do summat. This won't do in a Christian
+country. We ain't aboard ship here with a nor'-easter a-walkin' the
+quarter-deck."
+
+"There's no occasion, my dear old fellow, to do anything."
+
+He was taken aback.
+
+"Well, I don't understand you, Mr Walton. You're the last man I'd have
+expected to hear argufy for faith without works. It's right to trust
+in God; but if you don't stand to your halliards, your craft 'll miss
+stays, and your faith 'll be blown out of the bolt-ropes in the turn of
+a marlinspike."
+
+I suspect there was some confusion in the figure, but the old man's
+meaning was plain enough. Nor would I keep him in a moment more of
+suspense.
+
+"Miss Oldcastle is in the house, Old Rogers," I said.
+
+"What house, sir?" returned the old man, his gray eyes opening wider as
+he spoke.
+
+"This house, to be sure."
+
+I shall never forget the look the old man cast upwards, or the reality
+given to it by the ordinarily odd sailor-fashion of pulling his
+forelock, as he returned inward thanks to the Father of all for His
+kindness to his friend. And never in my now wide circle of readers shall
+I find one, the most educated and responsive, who will listen to my
+story with a more gracious interest than that old man showed as I
+recounted to him the adventures of the evening. There were few to whom I
+could have told them: to Old Rogers I felt that it was right and natural
+and dignified to tell the story even of my love's victory.
+
+How then am I able to tell it to the world as now? I can easily explain
+the seeming inconsistency. It is not merely that I am speaking, as I
+have said before, from behind a screen, or as clothed in the coat of
+darkness of an anonymous writer; but I find that, as I come nearer and
+nearer to the invisible world, all my brothers and sisters grow dearer
+and dearer to me; I feel towards them more and more as the children of
+my Father in heaven; and although some of them are good children and
+some naughty children, some very lovable and some hard to love, yet I
+never feel that they are below me, or unfit to listen to the story even
+of my love, if they only care to listen; and if they do not care, there
+is no harm done, except they read it. Even should they, and then
+scoff at what seemed and seems to me the precious story, I have these
+defences: first, that it was not for them that I cast forth my precious
+pearls, for precious to me is the significance of every fact in my
+history--not that it is mine, for I have only been as clay in the hands
+of the potter, but that it is God's, who made my history as it seemed
+and was good to Him; and second, that even should they trample them
+under their feet, they cannot well get at me to rend me. And more, the
+nearer I come to the region beyond, the more I feel that in that land a
+man needs not shrink from uttering his deepest thoughts, inasmuch as he
+that understands them not will not therefore revile him.--"But you are
+not there yet. You are in the land in which the brother speaketh evil of
+that which he understandeth not."--True, friend; too true. But I only do
+as Dr Donne did in writing that poem in his sickness, when he thought he
+was near to the world of which we speak: I rehearse now, that I may find
+it easier then.
+
+   "Since I am coming to that holy room,
+      Where, with the choir of saints for evermore,
+    I shall be made thy music, as I come,
+      I tune the instrument here at the door;
+      And what I must do then, think here before."
+
+When Rogers had thanked God, he rose, took my hand, and said:--
+
+"Mr Walton, you WILL preach now. I thank God for the good we shall all
+get from the trouble you have gone through."
+
+"I ought to be the better for it," I answered.
+
+"You WILL be the better for it," he returned. "I believe I've allus been
+the better for any trouble as ever I had to go through with. I couldn't
+quite say the same for every bit of good luck I had; leastways, I
+considei trouble the best luck a man can have. And I wish you a good
+night, sir. Thank God! again."
+
+"But, Rogers, you don't mean it would be good for us to have bad luck
+always, do you? You shouldn't be pleased at what's come to me now, in
+that case."
+
+"No, sir, sartinly not."
+
+"How can you say, then, that bad luck is the best luck?"
+
+"I mean the bad luck that comes to us--not the bad luck that doesn't
+come. But you're right, sir. Good luck or bad luck's both best when HE
+sends 'em, as He allus does. In fac', sir, there is no bad luck but what
+comes out o' the man hisself. The rest's all good."
+
+But whether it was the consequence of a reaction from the mental strain
+I had suffered, or the depressing effect of Miss Oldcastle's illness
+coming so close upon the joy of winning her; or that I was more careless
+and less anxious to do my duty than I ought to have been--I greatly fear
+that Old Rogers must have been painfully disappointed in the sermons
+which I did preach for several of the following Sundays. He never even
+hinted at such a fact, but I felt it much myself. A man has often to be
+humbled through failure, especially after success. I do not clearly
+know how my failures worked upon me; but I think a man may sometimes get
+spiritual good without being conscious of the point of its arrival,
+or being able to trace the process by which it was wrought in him. I
+believe that my failures did work some humility in me, and a certain
+carelessness of outward success even in spiritual matters, so far as
+the success affected me, provided only the will of God was done in the
+dishonour of my weakness. And I think, but I am not sure, that soon
+after I approached this condition of mind, I began to preach better. But
+still I found for some time that however much the subject of my sermon
+interested me in my study or in the church or vestry on the Saturday
+evening; nay, even although my heart was full of fervour during the
+prayers and lessons; no sooner had I begun to speak than the glow died
+out of the sky of my thoughts; a dull clearness of the intellectual
+faculties took its place; and I was painfully aware that what I could
+speak without being moved myself was not the most likely utterance
+to move the feelings of those who only listened. Still a man may
+occasionally be used by the Spirit of God as the inglorious "trumpet
+of a prophecy" instead of being inspired with the life of the Word, and
+hence speaking out of a full heart in testimony of that which he hath
+known and seen.
+
+I hardly remember when or how I came upon the plan, but now, as often
+as I find myself in such a condition, I turn away from any attempt to
+produce a sermon; and, taking up one of the sayings of our Lord which He
+himself has said "are spirit and are life," I labour simply to make
+the people see in it what I see in it; and when I find that thus my own
+heart is warmed, I am justified in the hope that the hearts of some at
+least of my hearers are thereby warmed likewise.
+
+But no doubt the fact that the life of Miss Oldcastle seemed to tremble
+in the balance, had something to do with those results of which I may
+have already said too much. My design had been to go at once to London
+and make preparation for as early a wedding as she would consent to;
+but the very day after I brought her home, life and not marriage was the
+question. Dr Duncan looked very grave, and although he gave me all the
+encouragement he could, all his encouragement did not amount to much.
+There was such a lack of vitality about her! The treatment to which she
+had been for so long a time subjected had depressed her till life was
+nearly quenched from lack of hope. Nor did the sudden change seem able
+to restore the healthy action of what the old physicians called the
+animal spirits. Possibly the strong reaction paralysed their channels,
+and thus prevented her gladness from reaching her physical nature so
+as to operate on its health. Her whole complaint appeared in excessive
+weakness. Finding that she fainted after every little excitement, I left
+her for four weeks entirely to my sister and Dr Duncan, during which
+time she never saw me; and it was long before I could venture to stay
+in her room more than a minute or two. But as the summer approached she
+began to show signs of reviving life, and by the end of May was able to
+be wheeled into the garden in a chair.
+
+During her aunt's illness, Judy came often to the vicarage. But Miss
+Oldcastle was unable to see her any more than myself without the painful
+consequence which I have mentioned. So the dear child always came to me
+in the study, and through her endless vivacity infected me with some of
+her hope. For she had no fears whatever about her aunt's recovery.
+
+I had had some painful apprehensions as to the treatment Judy herself
+might meet with from her grandmother, and had been doubtful whether I
+ought not to hive carried her off as well as her aunt; but the first
+time she came, which was the next day, she set my mind at rest on that
+subject.
+
+"But does your grannie know where you are come?" I had asked her.
+
+"So well, Mr Walton," sne replied, "that there was no occasion to tell
+her. Why shouldn't I rebel as well as Aunt Wynnie, I wonder?" she added,
+looking archness itself.
+
+"How does she bear it?"
+
+"Bear what, Mr Walton?"
+
+"The loss of your aunt."
+
+"You don't think grannie cares about that, do you! She's vexed enough at
+the loss of Captain Everard,--Do you know, I think he had too much wine
+yesterday, or he wouldn't have made quite such a fool of himself."
+
+"I fear he hadn't had quite enough to give him courage, Judy. I daresay
+he was brave enough once, but a bad conscience soon destroys a man's
+courage."
+
+"Why do you call it a bad conscience, Mr Walton? I should have thought
+that a bad conscience was one that would let a girl go on anyhow and say
+nothing about it to make her uncomfortable."
+
+"You are quite right, Judy; that is the worst kind of conscience,
+certainly. But tell me, how does Mrs Oldcastle bear it?"
+
+"You asked me that already."
+
+Somehow Judy's words always seem more pert upon paper than they did upon
+her lips. Her naivete, the twinkling light in her eyes, and the smile
+flitting about her mouth, always modified greatly the expression of her
+words.
+
+"--Grannie never says a word about you or auntie either."
+
+"But you said she was vexed: how do you know that?"
+
+"Because ever since the captain went away this morning, she won't speak
+a word to Sarah even."
+
+"Are you not afraid of her locking you up some day or other?"
+
+"Not a bit of it. Grannie won't touch me. And you shouldn't tempt me to
+run away from her like auntie. I won't. Grannie is a naughty old lady,
+and I don't believe anybody loves her but me--not Sarah, I'm certain.
+Therefore I can't leave her, and I won't leave her, Mr Walton, whatever
+you may say about her."
+
+"Indeed, I don't want you to leave her, Judy."
+
+And Judy did not leave her as long as she lived. And the old lady's love
+to that child was at least one redeeming point in her fierce character.
+No one can tell how mucn good it may have done her before she
+died--though but a few years passed before her soul was required of her.
+Before that time came, however, a quarrel took place between her and
+Sarah, which quarrel I incline to regard as a hopeful sign. And to this
+day Judy has never heard how her old grannie treated her mother. When
+she learns it now from these pages I think she will be glad that she did
+not know it before her death.
+
+The old lady would see neither doctor nor parson; nor would she hear of
+sending for her daughter. The only sign of softening that she gave was
+that once she folded her granddaughter in her arms and wept long and
+bitterly. Perhaps the thought of her dying child came back upon her,
+along with the reflection that the only friend she had was the child of
+that marriage which she had persecuted to dissolution.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV. TOM'S STORY.
+
+
+My reader will perceive that this part of my story is drawing to a
+close. It embraces but a brief period of my life, and I have plenty more
+behind not altogether unworthy of record. But the portions of any man's
+life most generally interesting are those in which, while the outward
+history is most stirring, it derives its chief significance from
+accompanying conflict within. It is not the rapid change of events,
+or the unusual concourse of circumstances that alone can interest the
+thoughtful mind; while, on the other hand, internal change and tumult
+can be ill set forth to the reader, save they be accompanied and in
+part, at least, occasioned by outward events capable of embodying and
+elucidating the things that are of themselves unseen. For man's life
+ought to be a whole; and not to mention the spiritual necessities of our
+nature--to leave the fact alone that a man is a mere thing of shreds
+and patches until his heart is united, as the Psalmist says, to fear the
+name of God--to leave these considerations aside, I say, no man's life
+is fit for representation as a work of art save in proportion as there
+has been a significant relation between his outer and inner life, a
+visible outcome of some sort of harmony between them. Therefore I chose
+the portion in which I had suffered most, and in which the outward
+occurrences of my own life had been most interesting, for the fullest
+representation; while I reserve for a more occasional and fragmentary
+record many things in the way of experience, thought, observation, and
+facts in the history both of myself and individuals of my flock, which
+admit of, and indeed require, a more individual treatment than would be
+altogether suitable to a continuous story. But before I close this part
+of my communications with those whom I count my friends, for till they
+assure me of the contrary I mean to flatter myself with considering my
+readers generally as such, I must gather up the ends of my thread, and
+dispose them in such a manner that they shall neither hang too loose,
+nor yet refuse length enough for what my friend Rogers would call
+splicing.
+
+It was yet summer when Miss Oldcastle and I were married. It was to me
+a day awful in its gladness. She was now quite well, and no shadow hung
+upon her half-moon forehead. We went for a fortnight into Wales, and
+then returned to the vicarage and the duties of the parish, in which my
+wife was quite ready to assist me.
+
+Perhaps it would help the wives of some clergymen out of some
+difficulties, and be their protection against some reproaches, if they
+would at once take the position with regard to the parishioners which
+Mrs Walton took, namely, that of their servant, but not in her own
+right--in her husband's. She saw, and told them so, that the best thing
+she could do for them was to help me, that she held no office whatever
+in the parish, and they must apply to me when anything went amiss. Had
+she not constantly refused to be a "judge or a divider," she would have
+been constantly troubled with quarrels too paltry to be referred to me,
+and which were the sooner forgotten that the litigants were not drawn
+on further and further into the desert of dispute by the mirage of
+a justice that could quench no thirst. Only when any such affair was
+brought before me, did she use her good offices to bring about a right
+feeling between the contending parties, generally next-door neighbours,
+and mostly women, who, being at home all day, found their rights clash
+in a manner that seldom happened with those that worked in the fields.
+Whatever her counsel could do, however, had full scope through me,
+who earnestly sought it. And whatever she gave the poor, she gave as
+a private person, out of her own pocket. She never administered the
+communion offering--that is, after finding out, as she soon did, that
+it was a source of endless dispute between some of the recipients, who
+regarded it as their common property, and were never satisfied with what
+they received. This is the case in many country parishes, I fear. As
+soon as I came to know it, I simply told the recipients that, although
+the communion offering belonged to them, yet the distribution of
+it rested entirely with me; and that I would distribute it neither
+according to their fancied merits nor the degree of friendship I felt
+for them, but according to the best judgment I could form as to their
+necessities; and if any of them thought these were underrated, they were
+quite at liberty to make a fresh representation of them to me; but that
+I, who knew more about their neighbours than it was likely they did, and
+was not prejudiced by the personal regards which they could hardly fail
+to be influenced by, was more likely than they were to arrive at an
+equitable distribution of the money--upon my principles if not on
+theirs. And at the same time I tried to show them that a very great part
+of the disputes in the world came from our having a very keen feeling of
+our own troubles, and a very dull feeling of our neighbour's; for if the
+case was reversed, and our neighbour's condition became ours, ten to one
+our judgment would be reversed likewise. And I think some of them got
+some sense out of what I said. But I ever found the great difficulty in
+my dealing with my people to be the preservation of the authority which
+was needful for service; for when the elder serve the younger--and in
+many cases it is not age that determines seniority--they must not forget
+that without which the service they offer will fail to be received as
+such by those to whom it is offered. At the same time they must ever
+take heed that their claim to authority be founded on the truth, and
+not on ecclesiastical or social position. Their standing in the church
+accredits their offer of service: the service itself can only be
+accredited by the Truth and the Lord of Truth, who is the servant of
+all.
+
+But it cost both me and my wife some time and some suffering before we
+learned how to deport ourselves in these respects.
+
+In the same manner she avoided the too near, because unprofitable,
+approaches of a portion of the richer part of the community. For from
+her probable position in time to come, rather than her position in time
+past, many of the fashionable people in the county began to call upon
+her--in no small degree to her annoyance, simply from the fact that she
+and they had so little in common. So, while she performed all towards
+them that etiquette demanded, she excused herself from the closer
+intimacy which some of them courted, on the ground of the many duties
+which naturally fell to the parson's wife in a country parish like ours;
+and I am sure that long before we had gained the footing we now have, we
+had begun to reap the benefits of this mode of regarding our duty in the
+parish as one, springing from the same source, and tending to the same
+end. The parson's wife who takes to herself authority in virtue of her
+position, and the parson's wife who disclaims all connexion with the
+professional work of her husband, are equally out of place in being
+parsons' wives. The one who refuses to serve denies her greatest
+privilege; the one who will be a mistress receives the greater
+condemnation. When the wife is one with her husband, and the husband is
+worthy, the position will soon reveal itself.
+
+But there cannot be many clergymen's wives amongst my readers; and I may
+have occupied more space than reasonable with this "large discourse." I
+apologize, and, there is room to fear, go on to do the same again.
+
+As I write I am seated in that little octagonal room overlooking the
+quarry, with its green lining of trees, and its deep central well. It
+is my study now. My wife is not yet too old to prefer the little room
+in which she thought and suffered so much, to every other, although
+the stair that leads to it is high and steep. Nor do I object to her
+preference because there is no ready way to reach it save through this:
+I see her the oftener. And although I do not like any one to look over
+my shoulder while I write--it disconcerts me somehow--yet the moment
+the sheet is finished and flung on the heap, it is her property, as the
+print, reader, is yours. I hear her step overhead now. She is opening
+her window. Now I hear her door close; and now her foot is on the stair.
+
+"Come in, love. I have just finished another sheet. There it is. What
+shall I end the book with? What shall I tell the friends with whom I
+have been conversing so often and so long for the last thing ere for a
+little while I bid them good-bye?"
+
+And Ethelwyn bends her smooth forehead--for she has a smooth forehead
+still, although the hair that crowns it is almost white--over the last
+few sheets; and while she reads, I will tell those who will read, one
+of the good things that come of being married. It is, that there is one
+face upon which the changes come without your seeing them; or rather,
+there is one face which you can still see the same through all the
+shadows which years have gathered and heaped upon it. No, stay; I have
+got a better way of putting it still: there is one face whose final
+beauty you can see the mere clearly as the bloom of youth departs, and
+the loveliness of wisdom and the beauty of holiness take its place;
+for in it you behold all that you loved before, veiled, it is true, but
+glowing with gathered brilliance under the veil ("Stop one moment, my
+dear") from which it will one day shine out like the moon from under a
+cloud, when a stream of the upper air floats it from off her face.
+
+"Now, Ethelwyn, I am ready. What shall I write about next?"
+
+"I don't think you have told them anywhere about Tom."
+
+"No more I have. I meant to do so. But I am ashamed of it."
+
+"The more reason to tell it."
+
+"You are quite right. I will go on with it at once. But you must not
+stand there behind me. When I was a child, I could always confess best
+when I hid my face with my hands."
+
+"Besides," said Ethelwyn, without seeming to hear what I said, "I do not
+want to have people saying that the vicar has made himself out so good
+that nobody can believe in him."
+
+"That would be a great fault in my book, Ethelwyn. What does it come
+from in me? Let me see. I do not think I want to appear better than I
+am; but it sounds hypocritical to make merely general confessions, and
+it is indecorous to make particular ones. Besides, I doubt if it is good
+to write much about bad things even in the way of confession---"
+
+"Well, well, never mind justifying it," said Ethelwyn. "_I_ don't want
+any justification. But here is a chance for you. The story will, I
+think, do good, and not harm. You had better tell it, I do think. So
+if you are inclined, I will go away at once, and let you go on without
+interruption. You will have it finished before dinner, and Tom is
+coming, and you can tell him what you have done."
+
+So, reader, now my wife has left me, I will begin. It shall not be a
+long story.
+
+As soon as my wife and I had settled down at home, and I had begun to
+arrange my work again, it came to my mind that for a long time I had
+been doing very little for Tom Weir. I could not blame myself much for
+this, and I was pretty sure neither he nor his father blamed me at all;
+but I now saw that it was time we should recommence something definite
+in the way of study. When he came to my house the next morning, and I
+proceeded to acquaint myself with what he had been doing, I found to my
+great pleasure that he had made very considerable progress both in Latin
+and Mathematics, and I resolved that I would now push him a little. I
+found this only brought out his mettle; and his progress, as it seemed
+to me, was extraordinary. Nor was this all. There were such growing
+signs of goodness in addition to the uprightness which had first led to
+our acquaintance, that although I carefully abstained from making the
+suggestion to him, I was more than pleased when I discovered, from some
+remark he made, that he would gladly give himself to the service of the
+Church. At the same time I felt compelled to be the more cautious in
+anything I said, from the fact that the prospect of the social elevation
+which would be involved in the change might be a temptation to him,
+as no doubt it has been to many a man of humble birth. However, as I
+continued to observe him closely, my conviction was deepened that he was
+rarely fitted for ministering to his fellows; and soon it came to speech
+between his father and me, when I found that Thomas, so far from being
+unfavourably inclined to the proposal, was prepared to spend the few
+savings of his careful life upon his education. To this, however, I
+could not listen, because there was his daughter Mary, who was very
+delicate, and his grandchild too, for whom he ought to make what little
+provision he could. I therefore took the matter in my own hands, and by
+means of a judicious combination of experience and what money I could
+spare, I managed, at less expense than most parents suppose to be
+unavoidable, to maintain my young friend at Oxford till such time as he
+gained a fellowship. I felt justified in doing so in part from the fact
+that some day or other Mrs Walton would inherit the Oldcastle property,
+as well as come into possession of certain moneys of her own, now in the
+trust of her mother and two gentlemen in London, which would be nearly
+sufficient to free the estate from incumbrance, although she could not
+touch it as long as her mother lived and chose to refuse her the use of
+it, at least without a law-suit, with which neither of us was inclined
+to have anything to do. But I did not lose a penny by the affair. For
+of the very first money Tom received after he had got his fellowship,
+he brought the half to me, and continued to do so until he had repaid
+me every shilling I had spent upon him. As soon as he was in deacon's
+orders, he came to assist me for a while as curate, and I found him a
+great help and comfort. He occupied the large room over his father's
+shop which had been his grandfather's: he had been dead for some years.
+
+I was now engaged on a work which I had been contemplating for a long
+time, upon the development of the love of Nature as shown in the earlier
+literature of the Jews and Greeks, through that of the Romans, Italians,
+and other nations, with the Anglo-Saxon for a fresh starting-point, into
+its latest forms in Gray, Thomson, Cowper, Crabbe, Wordsworth, Keats,
+and Tennyson; and Tom supplied me with much of the time which I bestowed
+upon this object, and I was really grateful to him. But, in looking
+back, and trying to account to myself for the snare into which I fell,
+I see plainly enough that I thought too much of what I had done for Tom,
+and too little of the honour God had done me in allowing me to help Tom.
+I took the high-dais-throne over him, not consciously, I believe, but
+still with a contemptible condescension, not of manner but of heart, so
+delicately refined by the innate sophistry of my selfishness, that the
+better nature in me called it only fatherly friendship, and did not
+recognize it as that abominable thing so favoured of all those
+that especially worship themselves. But I abuse my fault instead of
+confessing it.
+
+One evening, a gentle tap came to my door, and Tom entered. He looked
+pale and anxious, and there was an uncertainty about his motions which I
+could not understand.
+
+"What is the matter, Tom?" I asked.
+
+"I wanted to say something to you, sir," answered Tom.
+
+"Say on," I returned, cheerily.
+
+"It is not so easy to say, sir," rejoined Tom, with a faint smile. "Miss
+Walton, sir--"
+
+"Well, what of her? There's nothing happened to her? She was here a few
+minutes ago--though, now I think of it--"
+
+Here a suspicion of the truth flashed on me, and struck me dumb. I am
+now covered with shame to think how, when the thing approached myself on
+that side, it swept away for the moment all my fine theories about the
+equality of men in Christ their Head. How could Tom Weir, whose father
+was a joiner, who had been a lad in a London shop himself, dare to
+propose marrying my sister? Instead of thinking of what he really was,
+my regard rested upon this and that stage through which he had passed
+to reach his present condition. In fact, I regarded him rather as of my
+making than of God's.
+
+Perhaps it might do something to modify the scorn of all classes for
+those beneath them, to consider that, by regarding others thus, they
+justify those above them in looking down upon them in their turn. In
+London shops, I am credibly informed, the young women who serve in the
+show-rooms, or behind the counters, are called LADIES, and talk of
+the girls who make up the articles for sale as PERSONS. To the learned
+professions, however, the distinction between the shopwomen and
+milliners is, from their superior height, unrecognizable; while doctors
+and lawyers are again, I doubt not, massed by countesses and other
+blue-blooded realities, with the literary lions who roar at soirees and
+kettle-drums, or even with chiropodists and violin-players! But I am
+growing scornful at scorn, and forget that I too have been scornful.
+Brothers, sisters, all good men and true women, let the Master seat us
+where He will. Until he says, "Come up higher," let us sit at the foot
+of the board, or stand behind, honoured in waiting upon His guests. All
+that kind of thing is worth nothing in the kingdom; and nothing will be
+remembered of us but the Master's judgment.
+
+I have known a good churchwoman who would be sweet as a sister to
+the abject poor, but offensively condescending to a shopkeeper or a
+dissenter, exactly as if he was a Pariah, and she a Brahmin. I have
+known good people who were noble and generous towards their so-called
+inferiors and full of the rights of the race--until it touched their own
+family, and just no longer. Yea I, who had talked like this for years,
+at once, when Tom Weir wanted to marry my sister, lost my faith in the
+broad lines of human distinction judged according to appearances in
+which I did not even believe, and judged not righteous judgment.
+
+"For," reasoned the world in me, "is it not too bad to drag your wife
+in for such an alliance? Has she not lowered herself enough already? Has
+she not married far below her accredited position in society? Will she
+not feel injured by your family if she see it capable of forming such a
+connexion?"
+
+What answer I returned to Tom I hardly know. I remember that the poor
+fellow's face fell, and that he murmured something which I did not heed.
+And then I found myself walking in the garden under the great cedar,
+having stepped out of the window almost unconsciously, and left Tom
+standing there alone. It was very good of him ever to forgive me.
+
+Wandering about in the garden, my wife saw me from her window, and met
+me as I turned a corner in the shrubbery.
+
+And now I am going to have my revenge upon her in a way she does not
+expect, for making me tell the story: I will tell her share in it.
+
+"What is the matter with you, Henry?" she asked.
+
+"Oh, not much," I answered. "Only that Weir has been making me rather
+uncomfortable."
+
+"What has he been doing?" she inquired, in some alarm. "It is not
+possible he has done anything wrong."
+
+My wife trusted him as much as I did.
+
+"No--o--o," I answered. "Not anything exactly wrong."
+
+"It must be very nearly wrong, Henry, to make you look so miserable."
+
+I began to feel ashamed and more uncomfortable.
+
+"He has been falling in love with Martha," I said; "and when I put one
+thing to another, I fear he may have made her fall in love with him
+too." My wife laughed merrily.
+
+"Whal a wicked curate!"
+
+"Well, but you know it is not exactly agreeable."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"You know why well enough."
+
+"At least, I am not going to take it for granted. Is he not a good man?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Is he not a well-educated man?"
+
+"As well as myself--for his years."
+
+"Is he not clever?"
+
+"One of the cleverest fellows I ever met"
+
+"Is he not a gentleman?"
+
+"I have not a fault to find with his manners."
+
+"Nor with his habits?" my wife went on.
+
+"No."
+
+"Nor with his ways of thinking?"
+
+"No.--But, Ethelwyn, you know what I mean quite well. His family, you
+know."
+
+"Well, is his father not a respectable man?"
+
+"Oh, yes, certainly. Thoroughly respectable."
+
+"He wouldn't borrow money of his tailor instead of paying for his
+clothes, would he?"
+
+"Certainly not"
+
+"And if he were to die to-day he would carry no debts to heaven with
+him?"
+
+"I believe not."
+
+"Does he bear false witness against his neighbour?"
+
+"No. He scorns a lie as much as any man I ever knew."
+
+"Which of the commandments is it in particular that he breaks, then?"
+
+"None that I know of; excepting that no one can keep them yet that is
+only human. He tries to keep every one of them I do believe."
+
+"Well, I think Tom very fortunate in having such a father. I wish my
+mother had been as good."
+
+"That is all true, and yet--"
+
+"And yet, suppose a young man you liked had had a fashionable father who
+had ruined half a score of trades-people by his extravagance--would you
+object to him because of his family?"
+
+"Perhaps not."
+
+"Then, with you, position outweighs honesty--in fathers, at least."
+
+To this I was not ready with an answer, and my wife went on.
+
+"It might be reasonable if you did though, from fear lest he should turn
+out like his father.--But do you know why I would not accept your offer
+of taking my name when I should succeed to the property?"
+
+"You said you liked mine better," I answered.
+
+"So I did. But I did not tell you that I was ashamed that my good
+husband should take a name which for centuries had been borne by
+hard-hearted, worldly minded people, who, to speak the truth of
+my ancestors to my husband, were neither gentle nor honest, nor
+high-minded."
+
+"Still, Ethelwyn, you know there is something in it, though it is not so
+easy to say what. And you avoid that. I suppose Martha has been talking
+you over to her side."
+
+"Harry," my wife said, with a shade of solemnity, "I am almost ashamed
+of you for the first time. And I will punish you by telling you the
+truth. Do you think I had nothing of that sort to get over when I began
+to find that I was thinking a little more about you than was quite
+convenient under the circumstances? Your manners, dear Harry, though
+irreproachable, just had not the tone that I had been accustomed to.
+There was a diffidence about you also that did not at first advance you
+in my regard."
+
+"Yes, yes," I answered, a little piqued, "I dare say. I have no doubt
+you thought me a boor."
+
+"Dear Harry!"
+
+"I beg your pardon, wifie. I know you didn't. But it is quite bad enough
+to have brought you down to my level, without sinking you still lower."
+
+"Now there you are wrong, Harry. And that is what I want to show you.
+I found that my love to you would not be satisfied with making an
+exception in your favour. I must see what force there really was in the
+notions I had been bred in."
+
+"Ah!" I said. "I see. You looked for a principle in what you had thought
+was an exception."
+
+"Yes," returned my wife; "and I soon found one. And the next step was to
+throw away all false judgment in regard to such things. And so I can see
+more clearly than you into the right of the matter.--Would you hesitate
+a moment between Tom Weir and the dissolute son of an earl, Harry?"
+
+"You know I would not."
+
+"Well, just carry out the considerations that suggests, and you will
+find that where there is everything personally noble, pure, simple, and
+good, the lowliness of a man's birth is but an added honour to him; for
+it shows that his nobility is altogether from within him, and therefore
+is his own. It cannot then have been put on him by education or
+imitation, as many men's manners are, who wear their good breeding like
+their fine clothes, or as the Pharisee his prayers, to be seen of men."
+
+"But his sister?"
+
+"Harry, Harry! You were preaching last Sunday about the way God thinks
+of things. And you said that was the only true way of thinking about
+them. Would the Mary that poured the ointment on Jesus's head have
+refused to marry a good man because he was the brother of that Mary who
+poured it on His feet? Have you thought what God would think of Tom for
+a husband to Martha?"
+
+I did not answer, for conscience had begun to speak. When I lifted my
+eyes from the ground, thinking Ethelwyn stood beside me, she was gone.
+I felt as if she were dead, to punish me for my pride. But still I could
+not get over it, though I was ashamed to follow and find her. I went and
+got my hat instead, and strolled out.
+
+What was it that drew me towards Thomas Weir's shop? I think it must
+have been incipient repentance--a feeling that I had wronged the man.
+But just as I turned the corner, and the smell of the wood reached me,
+the picture so often associated in my mind with such a scene of human
+labour, rose before me. I saw the Lord of Life bending over His bench,
+fashioning some lowly utensil for some housewife of Nazareth. And He
+would receive payment for it too; for He at least could see no disgrace
+in the order of things that His Father had appointed. It is the vulgar
+mind that looks down on the earning and worships the inheriting of
+money. How infinitely more poetic is the belief that our Lord did
+His work like any other honest man, than that straining after His
+glorification in the early centuries of the Church by the invention of
+fables even to the disgrace of his father! They say that Joseph was a
+bad carpenter, and our Lord had to work miracles to set the things
+right which he had made wrong! To such a class of mind as invented these
+fables do those belong who think they honour our Lord when they judge
+anything human too common or too unclean for Him to have done.
+
+And the thought sprung up at once in my mind--"If I ever see our Lord
+face to face, how shall I feel if He says to me; 'Didst thou do well to
+murmur that thy sister espoused a certain man for that in his youth he
+had earned his bread as I earned mine? Where was then thy right to say
+unto me, Lord, Lord?'"
+
+I hurried into the workshop.
+
+"Has Tom told you about it?" I said.
+
+"Yes, sir. And I told him to mind what he was about; for he was not a
+gentleman, and you was, sir."
+
+"I hope I am. And Tom is as much a gentleman as I have any claim to be."
+
+Thomas Weir held out his hand.
+
+"Now, sir, I do believe you mean in my shop what you say in your pulpit;
+and there is ONE Christian in the world at least.--But what will your
+good lady say? She's higher-born than you--no offence, sir."
+
+"Ah, Thomas, you shame me. I am not so good as you think me. It was my
+wife that brought me to reason about it."
+
+"God bless her."
+
+"Amen. I'm going to find Tom."
+
+At the same moment Tom entered the shop, with a very melancholy face. He
+started when he saw me, and looked confused.
+
+"Tom, my boy," I said, "I behaved very badly to you. I am sorry for it.
+Come back with me, and have a walk with my sister. I don't think she'll
+be sorry to see you."
+
+His face brightened up at once, and we left the shop together. Evidently
+with a great effort Tom was the first to speak.
+
+"I know, sir, how many difficulties my presumption must put you in."
+
+"Not another word about it, Tom. You are blameless. I wish I were. If
+we only act as God would have us, other considerations may look after
+themselves--or, rather, He will look after them. The world will never be
+right till the mind of God is the measure of things, and the will of
+God the law of things. In the kingdom of Heaven nothing else is
+acknowledged. And till that kingdom come, the mind and will of God must,
+with those that look for that kingdom, over-ride every other way of
+thinking, feeling, and judging. I see it more plainly than ever I did.
+Take my sister, in God's name, Tom, and be good to her."
+
+Tom went to find Martha, and I to find Ethelwyn.
+
+"It is all right," I said, "even to the shame I feel at having needed
+your reproof."
+
+"Don't think of that. God gives us all time to come to our right minds,
+you know," answered my wife.
+
+"But how did you get on so far a-head of me, wifie?"
+
+Ethelwyn laughed.
+
+"Why," she said, "I only told you back again what you have been telling
+me for the last seven or eight years."
+
+So to me the message had come first, but my wife had answered first with
+the deed.
+
+And now I have had my revenge on her.
+
+Next to her and my children, Tom has been my greatest comfort for many
+years. He is still my curate, and I do not think we shall part till
+death part us for a time. My sister is worth twice what she was before,
+though they have no children. We have many, and they have taught me
+much.
+
+Thomas Weir is now too old to work any longer. He occupies his father's
+chair in the large room of the old house. The workshop I have had turned
+into a school-room, of the external condition of which his daughter
+takes good care, while a great part of her brother Tom's time is devoted
+to the children; for he and I agree that, where it can be done, the
+pastoral care ought to be at least equally divided between the sheep
+and the lambs. For the sooner the children are brought under right
+influences--I do not mean a great deal of religious speech, but the
+right influences of truth and honesty, and an evident regard to what
+God wants of us--not only are they the more easily wrought upon, but the
+sooner do they recognize those influences as right and good. And
+while Tom quite agrees with me that there must not be much talk about
+religion, he thinks that there must be just the more acting upon
+religion; and that if it be everywhere at hand in all things taught and
+done, it will be ready to show itself to every one who looks for it. And
+besides that action is more powerful than speech in the inculcation of
+religion, Tom says there is no such corrective of sectarianism of every
+kind as the repression of speech and the encouragement of action.
+
+Besides being a great help to me and everybody else almost in
+Marshmallows, Tom has distinguished himself in the literary world j and
+when I read his books I am yet prouder of my brother-in-law. I am
+only afraid that Martha is not good enough for him. But she certainly
+improves, as I have said already.
+
+Jane Rogers was married to young Brownrigg about a year after we were
+married. The old man is all but confined to the chimney-corner now, and
+Richard manages the farm, though not quite to his father's satisfaction,
+of course. But they are doing well notwithstanding. The old mill has
+been superseded by one of new and rare device, built by Richard; but the
+old cottage where his wife's parents lived has slowly mouldered back to
+the dust.
+
+For the old people have been dead for many years.
+
+Often in the summer days as I go to or come from the vestry, I sit down
+for a moment on the turf that covers my old friend, and think that every
+day is mouldering away this body of mine till it shall fall a heap of
+dust into its appointed place. But what is that to me? It is to me the
+drawing nigh of the fresh morning of life, when I shall be young and
+strong again, glad in the presence of the wise and beloved dead, and
+unspeakably glad in the presence of my God, which I have now but hope to
+possess far more hereafter.
+
+I will not take a solemn leave of my friends iust yet. For I hope to
+hold a little more communion with them ere I go hence. I know that my
+mental faculty is growing weaker, but some power yet remains; and I say
+to myself, "Perhaps this is the final trial of your faith--to trust in
+God to take care of your intellect for you, and to believe, in weakness,
+the truths He revealed to you in strength. Remember that Truth depends
+not upon your seeing it, and believe as you saw when your sight was at
+its best. For then you saw that the Truth was beyond all you could see."
+Thus I try to prepare for dark days that may come, but which cannot come
+without God in them.
+
+And meantime I hope to be able to communicate some more of the good
+things experience and thought have taught me, and it may be some more of
+the events that have befallen my friends and myself in our pilgrimage.
+So, kind readers, God be with you. That is the older and better form of
+GOOD-BYE.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood, by
+George MacDonald
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