lar than he was willing to
allow. The vicar delighted in his society and when the two found
themselves together in the great room which Mr. Juxon had lined with
well-filled shelves, they remained for hours absorbed in literary and
scholastic talk. But whenever the vicar approached the subject of the
squire's past life, the latter became vague and gave ambiguous answers to
any direct questions addressed to him. He evidently disliked talking of
himself, though he would talk about anything else that occurred to him
with a fluency which Mrs. Ambrose declared was the only un-English thing
about him. The consequence was that the vicar became more and more
interested in his new acquaintance, and though the squire was so frank
and honest a man that it was impossible to suspect him of any doubtful
action in the past, Mr. Ambrose suspected that he had a secret. Indeed
after hearing the story Mrs. Goddard had confided to his ears, nothing
would have surprised the vicar. After finding that so good, so upright
and so honourable a woman as the fair tenant of the cottage could be put
into such a singularly painful position as that in which she now found
herself, it was not hard to imagine that this singular person who had
inherited the Hall might also have some weighty reason for loving the
solitude of Billingsfield.

To chronicle the small events which occurred in that Arcadian parish,
would be to overstep the bounds of permissible tediousness. In such
places all events move slowly and take long to develop to their results.
The passions which in our own quickly moving world spring up, flourish,
wither and are cut down in a month require, when they are not stimulated
by the fertilising heat of artificial surroundings, a longer period for
their growth; and when that growth is attained they are likely to be
stronger and more deeply rooted. It is not true that the study of them is
less interesting, nor that they have less importance in themselves. The
difficulty of narrative is greater when they are to be described, for it
is necessary to carry the imagination in a short time over a long period,
to show how from small incidents great results follow, and to show also
how the very limited and trivial nature of the surroundings may cause
important things to be overlooked. Amidst such influences acquaintance is
soon made between the few persons so thrown together, but each is apt to
regard such new acquaintance merely as bearing upon his or h