lain to you
that, circumstanced as you are, you cannot with decency
perform the church services of your parish. I have that
confidence in you that I doubt not you will agree with
me in this, and will be grateful to me for relieving you
from the immediate perplexities of your position. I have,
therefore, appointed the Rev. Caleb Thumble to perform the
duties of incumbent of Hogglestock till such time as a
jury shall have decided upon your case at Barchester; and
in order that you may at once become acquainted with Mr
Thumble, as will be most convenient that you should do, I
will commission him to deliver this letter into your hand
personally to-morrow, trusting that you will receive him
with that brotherly spirit in which he is sent on this
painful mission.

Touching the remuneration to which Mr. Thumble will become
entitled for his temporary ministrations in the parish
of Hogglestock, I do not at present lay down any strict
injunction. He must, at any rate, be paid at a rate not
less than that ordinarily afforded for a curate.

I will once again express my fervent hope that the Lord
may bring you to see the true state of your own soul, and
that He may fill you with the grace of repentance, so that
the bitter waters of the present hour may not pass over
your head and destroy you.

I have the honour to be,
Reverend Sir,
Your faithful servant in Christ,

T. BARNUM. [1]

[Footnote 1. _Baronum Castrum_ having been the old Roman name from
which the modern Barchester is derived, the bishops of the diocese
always signed themselves Barnum.]

The bishop had hardly finished his letter when Mrs. Proudie returned
to the study, followed by the Rev. Caleb Thumble. Mr. Thumble was a
little man, about forty years of age, who had a wife and children
living in Barchester, and who existed on such chance clerical crumbs
as might fall from the table of the bishop's patronage. People in
Barchester said that Mrs. Thumble was a cousin of Mrs. Proudie's; but
as Mrs. Proudie stoutly denied the connexion, it may be supposed that
the people of Barchester were wrong. And, had Mr. Thumble's wife in
truth been a cousin, Mrs. Proudie would surely have provided for him
during the many years in which the diocese had been in her hands. No
such provision had been made, and Mr. Thumble, who had now been living
in the diocese for three years, had received noth