ns, that in later years hundreds of men and women will
date the beginnings of a new absorbing life. There came a time, indeed,
when, instead of meeting criticism by argument, Robert was able simply
to point to accomplished facts. 'You ask me,' he would say in effect,
'to prove to you that men can love, can make a new and fruitful use, for
daily life and conduct, of a merely human Christ. Go amongst our men,
talk to our children, and satisfy yourself. A little while ago scores of
these men either hated the very name of Christianity or were entirely
indifferent to it. To scores of them now the name of the teacher of
Nazareth, the victim of Jerusalem, is dear and sacred; his life, his
death, his words, are becoming once more a constant source of moral
effort and spiritual hope. See for yourself!'

However, we are anticipating. Let us go back to May.

One beautiful morning Robert was sitting working in his study, his
windows open to the breezy blue sky and the budding plane-trees outside,
when the door was thrown open and 'Mr. Wendover' was announced.

The squire entered; but what a shrunken and aged squire! The gait was
feeble, the bearing had lost all its old erectness, the bronzed strength
of the face had given place to a waxen and ominous pallor. Robert,
springing up with joy to meet the great gust of Murewell air which
seemed to blow about him with the mention of the squire's name, was
struck, arrested. He guided his guest to a chair with an almost filial
carefulness.

'I don't believe, Squire,' he exclaimed, 'you ought to be doing
this--wandering about London by yourself!'

But the squire, as silent and angular as ever when anything personal to
himself was concerned, would take no notice of the implied anxiety and
sympathy. He grasped his umbrella between his knees with a pair of brown
twisted hands, and, sitting very upright, looked critically round the
room. Robert, studying the dwindled figure, remembered with a pang the
saying of another Oxford scholar, _a propos_ of the death of a young man
of extraordinary promise, '_What learning has perished with him! How
vain seems all toil to acquire!_'--and the words, as they passed through
his mind, seemed to him to ring another death-knell.

But after the first painful impression he could not help losing himself
in the pleasure of the familiar face, the Murewell associations.

'How is the village, and the Institute? And what sort of man is my
successor--the man, I