ow I might possibly
assist your wife in this strait--"

"I want no assistance; none, at least, from man," said Crawley,
bitterly.

"Oh, my friend, think of what you are saying! Think of the wickedness
which must accompany such a state of mind! Have you ever known any
man able to walk alone, without assistance from his brother men?"
Mr. Crawley did not make any immediate answer, but putting his arms
behind his back and closing his hands, as was his wont when he walked
alone thinking of the general bitterness of his lot in life, began to
move slowly along the road in front of his house. He did not invite
the other to walk with him, but neither was there anything in his
manner which seemed to indicate that he had intended to be left to
himself. It was a beautiful summer afternoon, at that delicious
period of the year when summer has just burst forth from the growth
of spring; when the summer is yet but three days old, and all the
various shades of green which nature can put forth are still in their
unsoiled purity of freshness. The apple blossoms were on the trees,
and the hedges were sweet with May. The cuckoo at five o'clock was
still sounding his soft summer call with unabated energy, and even
the common grasses of the hedgerows were sweet with the fragrance of
their new growth. The foliage of the oaks was complete, so that every
bough and twig was clothed; but the leaves did not yet hang heavy in
masses, and the bend of every bough and the tapering curve of every
twig were visible through their light green covering. There is no
time of the year equal in beauty to the first week in summer: and
no colour which nature gives, not even the gorgeous hues of autumn,
which can equal the verdure produced by the first warm suns of May.

Hogglestock, as has been explained, has little to offer in the way
of landskip beauty, and the clergyman's house at Hogglestock was not
placed on a green slopy bank of land, retired from the road, with its
windows opening on to a lawn, surrounded by shrubs, with a view of
the small church tower seen through them; it had none of that beauty
which is so common to the cosy houses of our spiritual pastors in
the agricultural parts of England. Hogglestock parsonage stood bleak
beside the road, with no pretty paling lined inside by hollies and
laburnum, Portugal laurels and rose-trees. But, nevertheless, even
Hogglestock was pretty now. There were apple-trees there covered with
blossom, and the hed