quite forgotten the "manly
young fellows" and their sports, and only wished as the land began to
shimmer and gleam in the moonlight that he knew by some medium of words
or color how to represent the loveliness about his way.

"Had a pleasant evening, Lucian?" said his father when he came in.

"Yes, I had a nice walk home. Oh, in the afternoon we played cricket. I
didn't care for it much. There was a boy named De Carti there; he is
staying with the Dixons. Mrs. Dixon whispered to me when we were going in
to tea, 'He's a second cousin of Lord De Carti's,' and she looked quite
grave as if she were in church."

The parson grinned grimly and lit his old pipe.

"Baron De Carti's great-grandfather was a Dublin attorney," he remarked.
"Which his name was Jeremiah M'Carthy. His prejudiced fellow-citizens
called him the Unjust Steward, also the Bloody Attorney, and I believe
that 'to hell with M'Carthy' was quite a popular cry about the time of
the Union."

Mr. Taylor was a man of very wide and irregular reading and a tenacious
memory; he often used to wonder why he had not risen in the Church. He
had once told Mr. Dixon a singular and _drolatique_ anecdote concerning
the bishop's college days, and he never discovered why the prelate did
not bow according to his custom when the name of Taylor was called at the
next visitation. Some people said the reason was lighted candles, but
that was impossible, as the Reverend and Honorable Smallwood Stafford,
Lord Beamys's son, who had a cure of souls in the cathedral city, was
well known to burn no end of candles, and with him the bishop was on the
best of terms. Indeed the bishop often stayed at Coplesey (pronounced
"Copsey") Hall, Lord Beamys's place in the west.

Lucian had mentioned the name of De Carti with intention, and had perhaps
exaggerated a little Mrs. Dixon's respectful manner. He knew such
incidents cheered his father, who could never look at these subjects from
a proper point of view, and, as people said, sometimes made the strangest
remarks for a clergyman. This irreverent way of treating serious things
was one of the great bonds between father and son, but it tended to
increase their isolation. People said they would often have liked to
asked Mr. Taylor to garden-parties, and tea-parties, and other cheap
entertainments, if only he had not been such an _extreme_ man and so
_queer_. Indeed, a year before, Mr. Taylor had gone to a garden-party at
the Castle, Caermaen,