king that kind of composed
simplicity: she thanked her more for cutting short the doctor's fanatical
nonsense. It was perceptible to her that a species of mad metaphor had
been wriggling and tearing its passage through a thorn-bush in his
discourse, with the furious urgency of a sheep in a panic; but where the
ostensible subject ended and the metaphor commenced, and which was which
at the conclusion, she found it difficult to discern--much as the sheep
would, be when he had left his fleece behind him. She could now have
said, 'Silly old man!'

Dr. Shrapnel appeared most placable. He was gazing at his Authority in
the heavens, tangled among gold clouds and purple; his head bent acutely
on one side, and his eyes upturned in dim speculation. His great feet
planted on their heels faced him, suggesting the stocks; his arms hung
loose. Full many a hero of the alehouse, anciently amenable to
leg-and-foot imprisonment in the grip of the parish, has presented as
respectable an air. His forelock straggled as it willed.

Rosamund rose abruptly as soon as the terminating notes of the Mass had
been struck.

Dr. Shrapnel seemed to be concluding his devotions before he followed her
example.

'There, ma'am, you have a telegraphic system for the soul,' he said. 'It
is harder work to travel from this place to this' (he pointed at ear and
breast) 'than from here to yonder' (a similar indication traversed the
distance between earth and sun). 'Man's aim has hitherto been to keep men
from having a soul for this world: he takes it for something infernal.
He?--I mean, they that hold power. They shudder to think the conservatism
of the earth will be shaken by a change; they dread they won't get men
with souls to fetch and carry, dig, root, mine, for them. Right!--what
then? Digging and mining will be done; so will harping and singing. But
then we have a natural optimacy! Then, on the one hand, we whip the
man-beast and the man-sloth; on the other, we seize that old fatted
iniquity--that tyrant! that tempter! that legitimated swindler cursed of
Christ! that palpable Satan whose name is Capital! by the neck, and have
him disgorging within three gasps of his life. He is the villain! Let him
live, for he too comes of blood and bone. He shall not grind the faces of
the poor and helpless--that's all.'

The comicality of her having such remarks addressed to her provoked a
smile on Rosamund's lips.

'Don't go at him like Samson blind,' said Mr.