s the
invention of one of the Reporters.

Bridget, the housemaid, always insisted that he died a Catholic. She had
seen the crucifix, and believed that he prayed on his knees before it.
The last circumstance is very probably true; indeed, there was a
spot worn on the carpet just before this cabinet which might be thus
accounted for. Why he, whose whole life was a crucifixion, should not
love to look on that divine image of blameless suffering, I cannot see;
on the contrary, it seems to me the most natural thing in the world
that he should. But there are those who want to make private property of
everything, and can't make up their minds that people who don't think as
they do should claim any interest in that infinite compassion expressed
in the central figure of the Christendom which includes us all.

The divinity-student expressed a hope before the boarders that he should
meet him in heaven.--The question is, whether he'll meet you,--said the
young fellow John, rather smartly. The divinity-student had n't thought
of that.

However, he is a worthy young man, and I trust I have shown him in a
kindly and respectful light. He will get a parish by-and-by; and, as he
is about to marry the sister of an old friend,--the Schoolmistress, whom
some of us remember,--and as all sorts of expensive accidents happen
to young married ministers, he will be under bonds to the amount of his
salary, which means starvation, if they are forfeited, to think all
his days as he thought when he was settled,--unless the majority of
his people change with him or in advance of him. A hard ease, to which
nothing could reconcile a man, except that the faithful discharge of
daily duties in his personal relations with his parishioners will make
him useful enough in his way, though as a thinker he may cease to exist
before he has reached middle age.

--Iris went into mourning for the Little Gentleman. Although, as I
have said, he left the bulk of his property, by will, to a public
institution, he added a codicil, by which he disposed of various pieces
of property as tokens of kind remembrance. It was in this way I became
the possessor of the wonderful instrument I have spoken of, which had
been purchased for him out of an Italian convent. The landlady was
comforted with a small legacy. The following extract relates to Iris:
"in consideration of her manifold acts of kindness, but only in token
of grateful remembrance, and by no means as a reward for