s still an avocation suitable for gentlemen,
and one in which they could indulge without any taint of
professionalism being laid to their charge. He was immensely respected
and admired by the poor people of the parish (none of whom were
included in his small and well-to-do congregation), the fact that he
was what is known as "old stock," giving him a prestige among the
poorer Roman Catholics, that they would have denied to St. Peter. He
shared with Major Talbot-Lowry the position of consultant in feuds,
and relieving officer in distress, and, being rich, liberal, easily
bored, and not particularly sympathetic to affliction, he was
accustomed to stanch the flow of tears and talk alike, with a form of
solace that rarely failed to meet the case, and was always acceptable.
With Miss Coppinger, he felt, regretfully, that five shillings could
in no way be brought to bear upon her problem, and with an effort he
withdrew his mind from a new hinge that he thought of fitting to a
garden-gate, and applied it to Larry.

"How old is the boy now? Sixteen last October? He doesn't look as
much--you'll see he'll outgrow all that nonsense of Nationalism! Send
him to Oxford as soon as you can. He'll soon get hold of some other
tomfoolery there, and forget this. Seven devils worse than the first,
in fact!"

The Reverend Charles laughed, wheezily, and began, automatically, to
fill a pipe, an indication of a change of mental outlook.

"Worse?" cried Miss Frederica, ardently; "no indeed, Mr. Fetherston!
Better! Far better! _Any_thing is preferable to this--this
Second-rate Sedition!"

When Frederica perorated, and this remark partook of the nature of
peroration, it was as though she took a header into deep water. By the
time she had again risen to the surface of her emotions, the Reverend
Charles Fetherston had returned to the hinge of the garden-gate, and
Miss Coppinger, knowing her man, made no attempt to recall him. She
had a very special regard for her rector, of a complex sort that is
not quite easy to define. There was veneration in it, the veneration
that was inculcated in her youth for the clergy; there was the
compassion that many capable and self-confident women bestow upon any
man to whom Providence has denied a feminine protector; there was a
regretful pity for his shortcomings--(but half-acknowledged, even to
herself)--as a Minister of the Word, counterbalanced by respect for
his worldly wisdom; above all, there was the deep