all hours from five
o'clock onwards; that prime was said at seven, and was followed by the
_Missa familiaris_ for the servants and work-people of the house.
Breakfast would be ready in the guest-house at eight; the chapter-mass
would be said at the half-hour and after the daily chapter which
followed it had taken place, the Prior wished to see Christopher. The
high mass was sung at ten, and dinner would be served at eleven. He
directed his attention, too, to the card that hung by the door on which
these hours were notified.

Christopher already knew that for the first three or four days he would
have to remain in the guest-house before any formal step was taken with
regard to him, but he said a word to Father Anthony about this.

"Yes," said the monk, "my Lord Prior will tell you about that. But you
will be here as a guest until Sunday, and on that day you will come to
the morning chapter to beg for admission. You will do that for three
days, and then, please God, you will be clothed as a novice."

And once more he looked at him with deep smiling eyes.

Chris asked him a few more questions, and Dom Anthony told him what he
wished to know, though protesting with monastic etiquette that it was
not his province.

"Dom James Berkely is the novice-master," he said, "you will find him
very holy and careful. The first matter you will have to learn is how to
wear the habit, carry your hands, and to walk with gravity. Then you
will learn how to bow, with the hands crossed on the knees, so--" and he
illustrated it by a gesture--"if it is a profound inclination; and when
and where the inclinations are to be made. Then you will learn of the
custody of the eyes. It is these little things that help the soul at
first, as you will find, like--like--the bindings of a peach-tree, that
it may learn how to grow and bear its fruit. And the Rule will be given
you, and what a monk must have by rote, and how to sing. You will not be
idle, Chris."

It was no surprise to Christopher to hear how much of the lessons at
first were concerned with external behaviour. In his visits to Lewes
before, as well as from the books that Mr. Carleton had lent him, he had
learnt that the perfection of the Religious Life depended to a
considerable extent upon minutiae that were both aids to, and the result
of, a tranquil and recollected mind, the acquirement of which was part
of the object of the monk's ambition. The ideal, he knew, was the
perfect direc