too, but not with so delicious a gratification. She felt
that there were people, even in Salem, who might be jealous of him.

"The end of it all is, we must not stay here," she said. "You must find
another sphere for your talents, Henery, and I'm sure it will not be
difficult. If you get put on that deputation that is going down to the
North, suppose you take a few of your best sermons, dear. That can never
do any harm--indeed it's sure to do good, to some poor benighted soul at
least, that perhaps never heard the truth before. And likewise, perhaps,
to some vacant congregation. I have always heard that chapels in the
North were very superior to here. A different class of society, and
better altogether. These Pigeons and Browns, and people are not the sort
of society for you."

"Well, there's truth in that," said Mr. Beecham, pulling up his
shirt-collar. "Certainly it isn't the sort of thing one was accustomed
to." And he lent a serious ear to the suggestion about the sermons. The
consequence was that an invitation followed from a chapel in the North,
where indeed Mrs. Phoebe found herself in much finer society, and grew
rapidly in importance and in ideas. After this favourable start, the
process went on for many years by which a young man from Homerton was
then developed into the influential and highly esteemed pastor of an
important flock. Things may be, and probably are, differently managed
now-a-days. Mr. Beecham had unbounded fluency and an unctuous manner of
treating his subjects. It was eloquence of a kind, though not of an
elevated kind. Never to be at a loss for what you have to say is a
prodigious advantage to all men in all positions, but doubly so to a
popular minister. He had an unbounded wealth of phraseology. Sentences
seemed to melt out of his mouth without any apparent effort, all set in
a certain cadence. He had not, perhaps, much power of thought, but it is
easy to make up for such a secondary want when the gift of expression is
so strong. Mr. Beecham rose, like an actor, from a long and successful
career in the provinces, to what might be called the Surrey side of
congregational eminence in London; and from thence attained his final
apotheosis in a handsome chapel near Regent's Park, built of the whitest
stone, and cushioned with the reddest damask, where a very large
congregation sat in great comfort and listened to his sermons with a
satisfaction no doubt increased by the fact that the cushions wer