ly quarrels, our sectarian propensities,
and scandalous differences. It will, however, give you no trouble to
write another article next week in which we, or some of us, shall be
twitted with an unseemly apathy in matters of our vocation. It will
not fall on you to reconcile the discrepancy; your readers will
never ask you how the poor parson is to be urgent in season and out
of season and yet never come in contact with men who think widely
differently from him. You, when you condemn this foreign treaty, or
that official arrangement, will have to incur no blame for the graver
faults of any different measure. It is so easy to condemn--and so
pleasant too, for eulogy charms no listeners as detraction does."

Eleanor only half-followed him in his raillery, but she caught his
meaning. "I know I ought to apologize for presuming to criticize
you," she said, "but I was thinking with sorrow of the ill-will that
has lately come among us at Barchester, and I spoke more freely than
I should have done."

"Peace on earth and goodwill among men, are, like heaven, promises
for the future;" said he, following rather his own thoughts than
hers. "When that prophecy is accomplished, there will no longer be
any need for clergymen."

Here they were interrupted by the archdeacon, whose voice was heard
from the cellar shouting to the vicar.

"Arabin, Arabin,"--and then, turning to his wife, who was apparently
at his elbow--"where has he gone to? This cellar is perfectly
abominable. It would be murder to put a bottle of wine into it till
it has been roofed, walled, and floored. How on earth old Goodenough
ever got on with it I cannot guess. But then Goodenough never had a
glass of wine that any man could drink."

"What is it, Archdeacon?" said the vicar, running downstairs and
leaving Eleanor above to her meditations.

"This cellar must be roofed, walled, and floored," repeated the
archdeacon. "Now mind what I say, and don't let the architect
persuade you that it will do; half of these fellows know nothing
about wine. This place as it is now would be damp and cold in winter
and hot and muggy in summer. I wouldn't give a straw for the best
wine that ever was vinted, after it had lain here a couple of years."

Mr. Arabin assented and promised that the cellar should be
reconstructed according to the archdeacon's receipt.

"And, Arabin, look here; was such an attempt at a kitchen grate ever
seen?"

"The grate is really very bad," said