uff into your head."

"It's just that," said the Rector. "When I was a boy, I was far from
strong, and being rather bookish, I was constantly overworking my
head. What weird fancies and fads I had then, to be sure! I was
haunted by a lot of nervous plagues which it's best not to explain to
people who have never been tormented with them. One of the least
annoying was a sensation which now and then took possession of me
that everything I saw, heard, or did, was 'for the last time.' I've
often run back down a lane to get another glimpse of home, and done
over again something I had just finished--to break the charm! The old
childish folly has been plaguing me the last few days. It is strong on
me to-night."

"Then we'll talk of something else," said I.

Eventually our conversation became a religious one. It was like the
old days before I went to school. We had not had much religious talk
of late years. To say the truth, since I became an Eton man the
religious fervour of my childhood had died out. A strong belief in the
practical power of prayer (especially "when everything else failed")
was almost all that remained of that resolution to which Polly had
alluded in her letter. In discussions with her, I took Leo's view of
the subject. I warned her in a common-sense way against being
"religious overmuch" (not that I had any definite religious measure in
my mind); I laughed at Helen; I indulged a little cheap wit, and made
Polly furious, by smart sneers about women and parsons. I puzzled her
with scraps of old philosophy, and theological difficulties of
venerable standing, and was as proud to discomfit her faith as if my
own soul had no stake in the matter. I fairly drove her to tears about
the origin of evil. Sometimes I would have "Sunday talks" with her in
a different spirit, but even then she said I "did her no good," for I
would not believe that she could "have anything to repent of."

I fancy Mr. Andrewes had asked me to come to him that evening greatly
for the purpose of having a "Sunday talk." My father had wished me to
be confirmed at home rather than at school, and as Bishops did not
hold confirmations at such short intervals then as they do now, an
opportunity had only just occurred. Mr. Andrewes was preparing me, and
it was a great annoyance to him that his ill-health obliged him to go
away in the middle of his instructions. I think he was feverish that
night. Every now and then he spoke so rapidly that I could