The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Rector, by Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant

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Title: The Rector

Author: Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant

Release Date: September 2, 2009 [EBook #29891]

Language: English

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Chronicles of Carlingford

THE RECTOR

BY

MRS OLIPHANT

NEW EDITION
_WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS_
EDINBURGH AND LONDON

CHRONICLES OF CARLINGFORD

THE RECTOR

CHAPTER I.

It is natural to suppose that the arrival of the new Rector was a rather
exciting event for Carlingford. It is a considerable town, it is true,
nowadays, but then there are no alien activities to disturb the place--no
manufactures, and not much trade. And there is a very respectable amount
of very good society at Carlingford. To begin with, it is a pretty
place--mild, sheltered, not far from town; and naturally its very
reputation for good society increases the amount of that much-prized
article. The advantages of the town in this respect have already put
five per cent upon the house-rents; but this, of course, only refers
to the _real_ town, where you can go through an entire street of high
garden-walls, with houses inside full of the retired exclusive comforts,
the dainty economical refinement peculiar to such places; and where the
good people consider their own society as a warrant of gentility less
splendid, but not less assured, than the favour of Majesty itself.
Naturally there are no Dissenters in Carlingford--that is to say, none
above the rank of a greengrocer or milkman; and in bosoms devoted to
the Church it may be well imagined that the advent of the new Rector was
an event full of importance, and even of excitement.

He was highly spoken of, everybody knew; but nobody knew who had spoken
highly of him, nor had been able to find out, even by inference, what
were his views. The Church had been Low during the last Rector's
reign--profoundly Low--lost in the deepest abysses of Evangelicalism. A
determined inclination to preach to everybody had