nity of
finding in the grave the peace denied him in life, she really and truly
believed that she had been a model wife. The egotism of first person
singular was so firmly ingrained in the woman that she could not
conceive what a scourge she was to mankind in general; what a trial she
had been to her poor departed husband in particular. If the late
Archdeacon Pansey had not died he would doubtless have become a
missionary to some cannibal tribe in the South Seas in the hope that
his tough helpmate would be converted into 'long-pig.' But, unluckily
for Beorminster, he was dead and his relict was a mourning widow, who
constantly referred to her victim as a perfect husband. And yet Mrs
Pansey considered that Anthony Trollope's celebrated Mrs Proudie was an
overdrawn character.

As to Miss Norsham, she was in the depths of despair, for, if Mrs Pansey
was to be believed, there was no eligible husband for her in
Beorminster. It was with a heavy heart that the spinster entered the
palace, and it was with the courage born of desperation that she perked
up and smiled on the gay crowd she found within.

CHAPTER II

THE BISHOP IS WANTED

The episcopalian residence, situate some distance from the city, was a
mediaeval building, enshrined in the remnant of a royal chase, and in its
perfect quiet and loneliness resembled the palace of the Sleeping
Beauty. Its composite architecture was of many centuries and many
styles, for bishop after bishop had pulled down portions and added
others, had levelled a tower here and erected a wing there, until the
result was a jumble of divers designs, incongruous but picturesque. Time
had mellowed the various parts into one rich coloured whole of perfect
beauty, and elevated on a green rise, surrounded by broad stone
terraces, with towers and oriels and turrets and machicolated
battlements; clothed with ivy, buried amid ancient trees, it looked like
the realisation of a poet's dream. Only long ages and many changing
epochs; only home-loving prelates, ample monies, and architects of
genius, could have created so beautiful and unique a fabric. It was the
admiration of transatlantic tourists with a twang; the desire of
millionaires. Aladdin's industrious genii would have failed to build
such a masterpiece, unless their masters had arranged to inhabit it five
centuries or so after construction. Time had created it, as Time would
destroy it, but at present it was in perfect preservation, and