The next day, Friday, at five o’clock by the sun-dial, the large
bow-window of Mrs. Jerome’s parlour was open; and that lady herself was
seated within its ample semicircle, having a table before her on which
her best tea-tray, her best china, and her best urn-rug had already been
standing in readiness for half an hour. Mrs. Jerome’s best tea-service
was of delicate white fluted china, with gold sprigs upon it--as pretty a
tea-service as you need wish to see, and quite good enough for chimney
ornaments; indeed, as the cups were without handles, most visitors who
had the distinction of taking tea out of them, wished that such charming
china had already been promoted to that honorary position. Mrs. Jerome
was like her china, handsome and old-fashioned. She was a buxom lady of
sixty, in an elaborate lace cap fastened by a frill under her chin, a
dark, well-curled front concealing her forehead, a snowy neckerchief
exhibiting its ample folds as far as her waist, and a stiff grey silk
gown. She had a clean damask napkin pinned before her to guard her dress
during the process of tea-making; her favourite geraniums in the
bow-window were looking as healthy as she could desire; her own handsome
portrait, painted when she was twenty years younger, was smiling down on
her with agreeable flattery; and altogether she seemed to be in as
peaceful and pleasant a position as a buxom, well-drest elderly lady need
desire. But, as in so many other cases, appearances were deceptive. Her
mind was greatly perturbed and her temper ruffled by the fact that it was
more than a quarter past five even by the losing timepiece, that it was
half-past by her large gold watch, which she held in her hand as if she
were counting the pulse of the afternoon, and that, by the kitchen clock,
which she felt sure was not an hour too fast, it had already struck six.
The lapse of time was rendered the more unendurable to Mrs. Jerome by her
wonder that Mr. Jerome could stay out in the garden with Lizzie in that
thoughtless way, taking it so easily that tea-time was long past, and
that, after all the trouble of getting down the best tea-things, Mr.
Tryan would not come.
This honour had been shown to Mr. Tryan, not at all because Mrs. Jerome
had any high appreciation of his doctrine or of his exemplary activity as
a pastor, but simply because he was a ‘Church clergyman’, and as such was
regarded by her with the same sort of exceptional respect that a white
woman who had married a native of the Society Islands might be supposed
to feel towards a white-skinned visitor from the land of her youth. For
Mrs. Jerome had been reared a Churchwoman, and having attained the age of
thirty before she was married, had felt the greatest repugnance in the
first instance to renouncing the religious forms in which she had been
brought up. ‘You know,’ she said in confidence to her Church
acquaintances, ‘I wouldn’t give no ear at all to Mr. Jerome at fust; but
after all, I begun to think as there was a maeny things worse nor goin’
to chapel, an’ you’d better do that nor not pay your way. Mr. Jerome had
a very pleasant manner with him, an’ there was niver another as kept a
gig, an’ ’ud make a settlement on me like him, chapel or no chapel. It
seemed very odd to me for a long while, the preachin’ without book, an’
the stannin’ up to one long prayer, istid o’ changin’ your postur. But
la! there’s nothin’ as you mayn’t get used to i’ time; you can al’ys sit
down, you know, before the prayer’s done. The ministers say pretty nigh
the same things as the Church parsons, by what I could iver make out, an’
we’re out o’ chapel i’ the mornin’ a deal sooner nor they’re out o’
church. An’ as for pews, ourn’s is a deal comfortabler nor aeny i’ Milby
Church.’
Mrs. Jerome, you perceive, had not a keen susceptibility to shades of
doctrine, and it is probable that, after listening to Dissenting
eloquence for thirty years, she might safely have re-entered the
Establishment without performing any spiritual quarantine. Her mind,
apparently, was of that non-porous flinty character which is not in the
least danger from surrounding damp. But on the question of getting start
of the sun on the day’s business, and clearing her conscience of the
necessary sum of meals and the consequent ‘washing up’ as soon as
possible, so that the family might be well in bed at nine, Mrs. Jerome
_was_ susceptible; and the present lingering pace of things, united with
Mr. Jerome’s unaccountable obliviousness, was not to be borne any longer.
So she rang the bell for Sally.
‘Goodness me, Sally! go into the garden an’ see after your master. Tell
him it’s goin’ on for six, an’ Mr. Tryan ’ull niver think o’ comin’ now,
an’ it’s time we got tea over. An’ he’s lettin’ Lizzie stain her frock, I
expect, among them strawberry beds. Mek her come in this minute.’
No wonder Mr. Jerome was tempted to linger in the garden, for though the
house was pretty and well deserved its name--‘the White House’, the tall
damask roses that clustered over the porch being thrown into relief by
rough stucco of the most brilliant white, yet the garden and orchards
were Mr. Jerome’s glory, as well they might be; and there was nothing in
which he had a more innocent pride--peace to a good man’s memory! all his
pride was innocent--than in conducting a hitherto uninitiated visitor
over his grounds, and making him in some degree aware of the incomparable
advantages possessed by the inhabitants of the White House in the matter
of red-streaked apples, russets, northern greens (excellent for baking),
swan-egg pears, and early vegetables, to say nothing of flowering
‘srubs,’ pink hawthorns, lavender bushes more than ever Mrs. Jerome could
use, and, in short, a superabundance of everything that a person retired
from business could desire to possess himself or to share with his
friends. The garden was one of those old-fashioned paradises which hardly
exist any longer except as memories of our childhood: no finical
separation between flower and kitchen garden there; no monotony of
enjoyment for one sense to the exclusion of another; but a charming
paradisiacal mingling of all that was pleasant to the eyes and good for
food. The rich flower-border running along every walk, with its endless
succession of spring flowers, anemones, auriculas, wall-flowers,
sweet-williams, campanulas, snapdragons, and tiger-lilies, had its taller
beauties, such as moss and Provence roses, varied with espalier
apple-trees; the crimson of a carnation was carried out in the lurking
crimson of the neighbouring strawberry-beds; you gathered a moss-rose one
moment and a bunch of currants the next; you were in a delicious
fluctuation between the scent of jasmine and the juice of gooseberries.
Then what a high wall at one end, flanked by a summer-house so lofty,
that after ascending its long flight of steps you could see perfectly
well there was no view worth looking at; what alcoves and garden-seats in
all directions; and along one side, what a hedge, tall, and firm, and
unbroken, like a green wall!
It was near this hedge that Mr. Jerome was standing when Sally found him.
He had set down the basket of strawberries on the gravel, and had lifted
up little Lizzie in his arms to look at a bird’s nest. Lizzie peeped, and
then looked at her grandpa with round blue eyes, and then peeped again.
‘D’ye see it, Lizzie?’ he whispered.
‘Yes,’ she whispered in return, putting her lips very near grandpa’s
face. At this moment Sally appeared.
‘Eh, eh, Sally, what’s the matter? Is Mr. Tryan come?’
‘No, sir, an’ Missis says she’s sure he won’t come now, an’ she wants you
to come in an’ hev tea. Dear heart, Miss Lizzie, you’ve stained your
pinafore, an’ I shouldn’t wonder if it’s gone through to your frock.
There’ll be fine work! Come alonk wi’ me, do.’
‘Nay, nay, nay, we’ve done no harm, we’ve done no harm, hev we, Lizzie?
The wash-tub’ll make all right again.’
Sally, regarding the wash-tub from a different point of view, looked
sourly serious, and hurried away with Lizzie, who trotted submissively
along, her little head in eclipse under a large nankin bonnet, while Mr.
Jerome followed leisurely with his full broad shoulders in rather a
stooping posture, and his large good-natured features and white locks
shaded by a broad-brimmed hat.
‘Mr. Jerome, I wonder at you,’ said Mrs. Jerome, in a tone of indignant
remonstrance, evidently sustained by a deep sense of injury, as her
husband opened the parlour door. ‘When will you leave off invitin’ people
to meals an’ not lettin’ ’em know the time? I’ll answer for’t, you niver
said a word to Mr. Tryan as we should take tea at five o’clock. It’s just
like you!’
‘Nay, nay, Susan,’ answered the husband in a soothing tone, ‘there’s
nothin’ amiss. I told Mr. Tryan as we took tea at five punctial; mayhap
summat’s a detainin’ on him. He’s a deal to do, an’ to think on,
remember.’
‘Why, it’s struck six i’ the kitchen a’ready. It’s nonsense to look for
him comin’ now. So you may’s well ring for th’ urn. Now Sally’s got th’
heater in the fire, we may’s well hev th’ urn in, though he doesn’t come.
I niver see’d the like o’ you, Mr. Jerome, for axin’ people an’ givin’ me
the trouble o’ gettin’ things down an’ hevin’ crumpets made, an’ after
all they don’t come. I shall hev to wash every one o’ these tea-things
myself, for there’s no trustin’ Sally--she’d break a fortin i’ crockery
i’ no time!’
‘But why will you give yourself sich trouble, Susan? Our everyday
tea-things would ha’ done as well for Mr. Tryan, an’ they’re a deal
convenenter to hold.’
‘Yes, that’s just your way, Mr. Jerome, you’re al’ys a-findin’ faut wi’
my chany, because I bought it myself afore I was married. But let me tell
you, I knowed how to choose chany if I didn’t know how to choose a
husband. An’ where’s Lizzie? You’ve niver left her i’ the garden by
herself, with her white frock on an’ clean stockins?’
‘Be easy, my dear Susan, be easy; Lizzie’s come in wi’ Sally. She’s
hevin’ her pinafore took off, I’ll be bound. Ah! there’s Mr. Tryan
a-comin’ through the gate.’
Mrs. Jerome began hastily to adjust her damask napkin and the expression
of her countenance for the reception of the clergyman, and Mr. Jerome
went out to meet his guest, whom he greeted outside the door.
‘Mr. Tryan, how do you do, Mr. Tryan? Welcome to the White House! I’m
glad to see you, sir--I’m glad to see you.’
If you had heard the tone of mingled good-will, veneration, and
condolence in which this greeting was uttered, even without seeing the
face that completely harmonized with it, you would have no difficulty in
inferring the ground-notes of Mr. Jerome’s character. To a fine ear that
tone said as plainly as possible--‘Whatever recommends itself to me,
Thomas Jerome, as piety and goodness, shall have my love and honour. Ah,
friends, this pleasant world is a sad one, too, isn’t it? Let us help one
another, let us help one another.’ And it was entirely owing to this
basis of character, not at all from any clear and precise doctrinal
discrimination, that Mr. Jerome had very early in life become a
Dissenter. In his boyish days he had been thrown where Dissent seemed to
have the balance of piety, purity, and good works on its side, and to
become a Dissenter seemed to him identical with choosing God instead of
mammon. That race of Dissenters is extinct in these days, when opinion
has got far ahead of feeling, and every chapel-going youth can fill our
ears with the advantages of the Voluntary system, the corruptions of a
State Church, and the Scriptural evidence that the first Christians were
Congregationalists. Mr. Jerome knew nothing of this theoretic basis for
Dissent, and in the utmost extent of his polemical discussion he had not
gone further than to question whether a Christian man was bound in
conscience to distinguish Christmas and Easter by any peculiar observance
beyond the eating of mince-pies and cheese-cakes. It seemed to him that
all seasons were alike good for thanking God, departing from evil and
doing well, whereas it might be desirable to restrict the period for
indulging in unwholesome forms of pastry. Mr. Jerome’s dissent being of
this simple, non-polemical kind, it is easy to understand that the report
he heard of Mr. Tryan as a good man and a powerful preacher, who was
stirring the hearts of the people, had been enough to attract him to the
Paddiford Church, and that having felt himself more edified there than he
had of late been under Mr. Stickney’s discourses at Salem, he had driven
thither repeatedly in the Sunday afternoons, and had sought an
opportunity of making Mr. Tryan’s acquaintance. The evening lecture was a
subject of warm interest with him, and the opposition Mr. Tryan met with
gave that interest a strong tinge of partisanship; for there was a store
of irascibility in Mr. Jerome’s nature which must find a vent somewhere,
and in so kindly and upright a man could only find it in indignation
against those whom he held to be enemies of truth and goodness. Mr. Tryan
had not hitherto been to the White House, but yesterday, meeting Mr.
Jerome in the street, he had at once accepted the invitation to tea,
saying there was something he wished to talk about. He appeared worn and
fatigued now, and after shaking hands with Mrs. Jerome, threw himself
into a chair and looked out on the pretty garden with an air of relief.
‘What a nice place you have here, Mr. Jerome! I’ve not seen anything so
quiet and pretty since I came to Milby. On Paddiford Common, where I
live, you know, the bushes are all sprinkled with soot, and there’s never
any quiet except in the dead of night.’
‘Dear heart! dear heart! That’s very bad--and for you, too, as hev to
study. Wouldn’t it be better for you to be somewhere more out i’ the
country like?’
‘O no! I should lose so much time in going to and fro, and besides I like
to be _among_ the people. I’ve no face to go and preach resignation to
those poor things in their smoky air and comfortless homes, when I come
straight from every luxury myself. There are many things quite lawful for
other men, which a clergyman must forego if he would do any good in a
manufacturing population like this.’
Here the preparations for tea were crowned by the simultaneous appearance
of Lizzie and the crumpet. It is a pretty surprise, when one visits an
elderly couple, to see a little figure enter in a white frock with a
blond head as smooth as satin, round blue eyes, and a cheek like an apple
blossom. A toddling little girl is a centre of common feeling which makes
the most dissimilar people understand each other; and Mr. Tryan looked at
Lizzie with that quiet pleasure which is always genuine.
‘Here we are, here we are!’ said proud grandpapa. ‘You didn’t think we’d
got such a little gell as this, did you, Mr. Tryan? Why, it seems but th’
other day since her mother was just such another. This is our little
Lizzie, this is. Come an’ shake hands wi’ Mr. Tryan, Lizzie; come.’
Lizzie advanced without hesitation, and put out one hand, while she
fingered her coral necklace with the other, and looked up into Mr.
Tryan’s face with a reconnoitring gaze. He stroked the satin head, and
said in his gentlest voice, ‘How do you do, Lizzie? will you give me a
kiss?’ She put up her little bud of a mouth, and then retreating a little
and glancing down at her frock, said,--‘Dit id my noo fock. I put it on
’tod you wad toming. Tally taid you wouldn’t ’ook at it.’
‘Hush, hush, Lizzie, little gells must be seen and not heard,’ said Mrs.
Jerome; while grandpapa, winking significantly, and looking radiant with
delight at Lizzie’s extraordinary promise of cleverness, set her up on
her high cane-chair by the side of grandma, who lost no time in shielding
the beauties of the new frock with a napkin.
‘Well now, Mr. Tryan,’ said Mr. Jerome, in a very serious tone, when tea
had been distributed, ‘let me hear how you’re a-goin’ on about the
lectur. When I was i’ the town yisterday, I heared as there was
pessecutin’ schemes a-bein’ laid again’ you. I fear me those raskills ’ll
mek things very onpleasant to you.’
‘I’ve no doubt they will attempt it; indeed, I quite expect there will be
a regular mob got up on Sunday evening, as there was when the delegates
returned, on purpose to annoy me and the congregation on our way to
church.’
‘Ah, they’re capible o’ anything, such men as Dempster an’ Budd; an’
Tomlinson backs ’em wi’ money, though he can’t wi’ brains. Howiver,
Dempster’s lost one client by his wicked doins, an’ I’m deceived if he
won’t lose more nor one. I little thought, Mr. Tryan, when I put my
affairs into his hands twenty ’ear ago this Michaelmas, as he was to turn
out a pessecutor o’ religion. I niver lighted on a cliverer, promisiner
young man nor he was then. They talked of his bein’ fond of a extry glass
now an’ then, but niver nothin’ like what he’s come to since. An’ it’s
head-piece you must look for in a lawyer, Mr. Tryan, it’s head-piece. His
wife, too, was al’ys an uncommon favourite o’ mine--poor thing! I hear
sad stories about her now. But she’s druv to it, she’s druv to it, Mr.
Tryan. A tender-hearted woman to the poor, she is, as iver lived; an’ as
pretty-spoken a woman as you need wish to talk to. Yes! I’d al’ys a
likin’ for Dempster an’ his wife, spite o’ iverything. But as soon as
iver I heared o’ that dilegate business, I says, says I, that man shall
hev no more to do wi’ my affairs. It may put me t’ inconvenience, but
I’ll encourage no man as pessecutes religion.’
‘He is evidently the brain and hand of the persecution,’ said Mr. Tryan.
‘There may be a strong feeling against me in a large number of the
inhabitants--it must be so from the great ignorance of spiritual things
in this place. But I fancy there would have been no formal opposition to
the lecture, if Dempster had not planned it. I am not myself the least
alarmed at anything he can do; he will find I am not to be cowed or
driven away by insult or personal danger. God has sent me to this place,
and, by His blessing, I’ll not shrink from anything I may have to
encounter in doing His work among the people. But I feel it right to call
on all those who know the value of the Gospel, to stand by me publicly. I
think--and Mr. Landor agrees with me--that it will be well for my friends
to proceed with me in a body to the church on Sunday evening. Dempster,
you know, has pretended that almost all the respectable inhabitants are
opposed to the lecture. Now, I wish that falsehood to be visibly
contradicted. What do you think of the plan? I have to-day been to see
several of my friends, who will make a point of being there to accompany
me, and will communicate with others on the subject.’
‘I’ll mek one, Mr. Tryan, I’ll mek one. You shall not be wantin’ in any
support as I can give. Before you come to it, sir, Milby was a dead an’
dark place; you are the fust man i’ the Church to my knowledge as has
brought the word o’ God home to the people; an’ I’ll stan’ by you, sir,
I’ll stan’ by you. I’m a Dissenter, Mr. Tryan; I’ve been a Dissenter ever
sin’ I was fifteen ’ear old; but show me good i’ the Church, an’ I’m a
Churchman too. When I was a boy I lived at Tilston; you mayn’t know the
place; the best part o’ the land there belonged to Squire Sandeman; he’d
a club-foot, had Squire Sandeman--lost a deal o’ money by canal shares.
Well, sir, as I was sayin’, I lived at Tilston, an’ the rector there was
a terrible drinkin’, fox-huntin’ man; you niver see’d such a parish i’
your time for wickedness; Milby’s nothin’ to it. Well, sir, my father was
a workin’ man, an’ couldn’t afford to gi’ me ony eddication, so I went to
a night-school as was kep by a Dissenter, one Jacob Wright; an’ it was
from that man, sir, as I got my little schoolin’ an’ my knowledge o’
religion. I went to chapel wi’ Jacob--he was a good man was Jacob--an’ to
chapel I’ve been iver since. But I’m no enemy o’ the Church, sir, when
the Church brings light to the ignorant and the sinful; an’ that’s what
you’re a-doin’, Mr. Tryan. Yes, sir, I’ll stan’ by you. I’ll go to church
wi’ you o’ Sunday evenin’.’
‘You’d far better stay at home, Mr. Jerome, if I may give my opinion,’
interposed Mrs. Jerome. ‘It’s not as I hevn’t ivery respect for you, Mr.
Tryan, but Mr. Jerome ’ull do you no good by his interferin’. Dissenters
are not at all looked on i’ Milby, an’ he’s as nervous as iver he can be;
he’ll come back as ill as ill, an’ niver let me hev a wink o’ sleep all
night.’
Mrs. Jerome had been frightened at the mention of a mob, and her
retrospective regard for the religious communion of her youth by no means
inspired her with the temper of a martyr. Her husband looked at her with
an expression of tender and grieved remonstrance, which might have been
that of the patient patriarch on the memorable occasion when he rebuked
his wife.
‘Susan, Susan, let me beg on you not to oppose me, and put
stumblin’-blocks i’ the way o’ doing’ what’s right. I can’t give up my
conscience, let me give up what else I may.’
‘Perhaps,’ said Mr. Tryan, feeling slightly uncomfortable, ‘since you are
not very strong, my dear sir, it will be well, as Mrs. Jerome suggests,
that you should not run the risk of any excitement.’
‘Say no more, Mr. Tryan. I’ll stan’ by you, sir. It’s my duty. It’s the
cause o’ God, sir; it’s the cause o’ God.’
Mr. Tryan obeyed his impulse of admiration and gratitude, and put out his
hand to the white-haired old man, saying, ‘Thank you, Mr. Jerome, thank
you.’
Mr. Jerome grasped the proffered hand in silence, and then threw himself
back in his chair, casting a regretful look at his wife, which seemed to
say, ‘Why don’t you feel with me, Susan?’
The sympathy of this simple-minded old man was more precious to Mr. Tryan
than any mere onlooker could have imagined. To persons possessing a great
deal of that facile psychology which prejudges individuals by means of
formulæ, and casts them, without further trouble, into duly lettered
pigeon-holes, the Evangelical curate might seem to be doing simply what
all other men like to do--carrying out objects which were identified not
only with his theory, which is but a kind of secondary egoism, but also
with the primary egoism of his feelings. Opposition may become sweet to a
man when he has christened it persecution: a self-obtrusive, over-hasty
reformer complacently disclaiming all merit, while his friends call him a
martyr, has not in reality a career the most arduous to the fleshly mind.
But Mr. Tryan was not cast in the mould of the gratuitous martyr. With a
power of persistence which had been often blamed as obstinacy, he had an
acute sensibility to the very hatred or ridicule he did not flinch from
provoking. Every form of disapproval jarred him painfully; and, though he
fronted his opponents manfully, and often with considerable warmth of
temper, he had no pugnacious pleasure in the contest. It was one of the
weaknesses of his nature to be too keenly alive to every harsh wind of
opinion; to wince under the frowns of the foolish; to be irritated by the
injustice of those who could not possibly have the elements indispensable
for judging him rightly; and with all this acute sensibility to blame,
this dependence on sympathy, he had for years been constrained into a
position of antagonism. No wonder, then, that good old Mr. Jerome’s
cordial words were balm to him. He had often been thankful to an old
woman for saying ‘God bless you’; to a little child for smiling at him;
to a dog for submitting to be patted by him.
Tea being over by this time, Mr. Tryan proposed a walk in the garden as a
means of dissipating all recollection of the recent conjugal dissidence.
Little Lizzie’s appeal, ‘Me go, gandpa!’ could not be rejected, so she
was duly bonneted and pinafored, and then they turned out into the
evening sunshine. Not Mrs. Jerome, however; she had a deeply-meditated
plan of retiring _ad interim_ to the kitchen and washing up the best
tea-things, as a mode of getting forward with the sadly-retarded business
of the day.
‘This way, Mr. Tryan, this way,’ said the old gentleman; ‘I must take you
to my pastur fust, an’ show you our cow--the best milker i’ the county.
An’ see here at these backbuildins, how convenent the dairy is; I planned
it ivery bit myself. An’ here I’ve got my little carpenter’s shop an’ my
blacksmith’s shop; I do no end o’ jobs here myself. I niver could bear to
be idle, Mr. Tryan; I must al’ys be at somethin’ or other. It was time
for me to lay by business an mek room for younger folks. I’d got money
enough, wi’ only one daughter to leave it to, an’ I says to myself, says
I, it’s time to leave off moitherin’ myself wi’ this world so much, an’
give more time to thinkin’ of another. But there’s a many hours atween
getting up an’ lyin’ down, an’ thoughts are no cumber; you can move about
wi’ a good many on ’em in your head. See, here’s the pastur.’
A very pretty pasture it was, where the large-spotted short-horned cow
quietly chewed the cud as she lay and looked sleepily at her admirers--a
daintily-trimmed hedge all round, dotted here and there with a
mountain-ash or a cherry-tree.
‘I’ve a good bit more land besides this, worth your while to look at, but
mayhap it’s further nor you’d like to walk now. Bless you! I’ve welly an’
acre o’ potato-ground yonders; I’ve a good big family to supply, you
know.’ (Here Mr. Jerome winked and smiled significantly.) ‘An’ that puts
me i’ mind, Mr. Tryan, o’ summat I wanted to say to you. Clergymen like
you, I know, see a deal more poverty an’ that, than other folks, an’ hev
a many claims on ’em more nor they can well meet; an’ if you’ll mek use
o’ my purse any time, or let me know where I can be o’ any help, I’ll tek
it very kind on you.’
‘Thank you, Mr. Jerome, I will do so, I promise you. I saw a sad case
yesterday; a collier--a fine broad-chested fellow about thirty--was
killed by the falling of a wall in the Paddiford colliery. I was in one
of the cottages near, when they brought him home on a door, and the
shriek of the wife has been ringing in my ears ever since. There are
three little children. Happily the woman has her loom, so she will be
able to keep out of the workhouse; but she looks very delicate.’
‘Give me her name, Mr. Tryan,’ said Mr. Jerome, drawing out his
pocket-book. ‘I’ll call an’ see her.’
Deep was the fountain of pity in the good old man’s heart! He often ate
his dinner stintingly, oppressed by the thought that there were men,
women, and children, with no dinner to sit down to, and would relieve his
mind by going out in the afternoon to look for some need that he could
supply, some honest struggle in which he could lend a helping hand. That
any living being should want, was his chief sorrow; that any rational
being should waste, was the next. Sally, indeed, having been scolded by
master for a too lavish use of sticks in lighting the kitchen fire, and
various instances of recklessness with regard to candle ends, considered
him ‘as mean as aenythink;’ but he had as kindly a warmth as the morning
sunlight, and, like the sunlight, his goodness shone on all that came in
his way, from the saucy rosy-cheeked lad whom he delighted to make happy
with a Christmas box, to the pallid sufferers up dim entries, languishing
under the tardy death of want and misery.
It was very pleasant to Mr. Tryan to listen to the simple chat of the old
man--to walk in the shade of the incomparable orchard, and hear the story
of the crops yielded by the red-streaked apple-tree, and the quite
embarrassing plentifulness of the summer-pears--to drink-in the sweet
evening breath of the garden, as they sat in the alcove--and so, for a
short interval, to feel the strain of his pastoral task relaxed.
Perhaps he felt the return to that task through the dusty roads all the
more painfully, perhaps something in that quiet shady home had reminded
him of the time before he had taken on him the yoke of self-denial. The
strongest heart will faint sometimes under the feeling that enemies are
bitter, and that friends only know half its sorrows. The most resolute
soul will now and then cast back a yearning look in treading the rough
mountain-path, away from the greensward and laughing voices of the
valley. However it was, in the nine o’clock twilight that evening, when
Mr. Tryan had entered his small study and turned the key in the door, he
threw himself into the chair before his writing-table, and, heedless of
the papers there, leaned his face low on his hand, and moaned heavily.
It is apt to be so in this life, I think. While we are coldly discussing
a man’s career, sneering at his mistakes, blaming his rashness, and
labelling his opinions--‘he is Evangelical and narrow’, or
‘Latitudinarian and Pantheistic’ or ‘Anglican and supercilious’--that
man, in his solitude, is perhaps shedding hot tears because his sacrifice
is a hard one, because strength and patience are failing him to speak the
difficult word, and do the difficult deed.