uch is not the case. Wit is the
outward mental casing of the man, and has no more to do with the inner
mind of thoughts and feelings than have the rich brocaded garments of
the priest at the altar with the asceticism of the anchorite below
them, whose skin is tormented with sackcloth and whose body is
half-flayed with rods. Nay, will not such a one often rejoice more
than any other in the rich show of his outer apparel? Will it not be
food for his pride to feel that he groans inwardly while he shines
outwardly? So it is with the mental efforts which men make. Those
which they show forth daily to the world are often the opposites of
the inner workings of the spirit.

In the archdeacon's drawing-room, Mr. Arabin had sparkled with his
usual unaffected brilliancy, but when he retired to his bedroom, he
sat there sad, at his open window, repining within himself that he
also had no wife, no bairns, no soft sward of lawn duly mown for him
to lie on, no herd of attendant curates, no bowings from the banker's
clerks, no rich rectory. That apostleship that he had thought of had
evaded his grasp, and he was now only vicar of St. Ewold's, with a
taste for a mitre. Truly he had fallen between two stools.

CHAPTER XXI

St. Ewold's Parsonage

When Mr. Harding and Mrs. Bold reached the rectory on the following
morning, the archdeacon and his friend were at St. Ewold's. They
had gone over that the new vicar might inspect his church and be
introduced to the squire, and were not expected back before dinner.
Mr. Harding rambled out by himself and strolled, as was his wont at
Plumstead, about the lawn and round the church; and as he did so, the
two sisters naturally fell into conversation about Barchester.

There was not much sisterly confidence between them. Mrs. Grantly was
ten years older than Eleanor, and had been married while Eleanor was
yet a child. They had never, therefore, poured into each other's ears
their hopes and loves; and now that one was a wife and the other a
widow, it was not probable that they would begin to do so. They lived
too much asunder to be able to fall into that kind of intercourse
which makes confidence between sisters almost a necessity; moreover,
that which is so easy at eighteen is often very difficult at
twenty-eight. Mrs. Grantly knew this, and did not, therefore, expect
confidence from her sister; yet she longed to ask her whether in real
truth Mr. Slope was agreeable to her.

It was by n