not that I think him crazy, I should say that it was unmanly."

"But he is crazy."

"And will be still worse before he has done with it. Anything would
be good now which would take him away from Bullhampton. It would be a
mercy that his house should be burned down, or that some great loss
should fall upon him. He sits there at home, and does nothing. He
will not even look after the farm. He pretends to read, but I don't
believe that he does even that."

"And all because he is really in love, Frank."

"I am very glad that I have never been in love with the same
reality."

"You never had any need, sir. The plums fell into your mouth too
easily."

"Plums shouldn't be too difficult," said the Vicar, "or they lose
their sweetness."

A few days after this Mr. Fenwick was standing at his own gate,
watching the building of the chapel and talking to the men, when
Fanny Brattle from the mill came up to him. He would stand there by
the hour at a time, and had made quite a friendship with the foreman
of the builder from Salisbury, although the foreman, like his master,
was a Dissenter, and had come into the parish as an enemy. All
Bullhampton knew how infinite was the disgust of the Vicar at what
was being done; and that Mrs. Fenwick felt it so strongly, that she
would not even go in and out of her own gate. All Bullhampton was
aware that Mr. Puddleham spoke openly of the Vicar as his enemy,--in
spite of the peaches and cabbages on which the young Puddlehams
had been nourished; and that the Methodist minister had, more than
once within the last month or two, denounced his brother of the
Established Church from his own pulpit. All Bullhampton was talking
of the building of the chapel,--some abusing the Marquis and Mr.
Puddleham and the Salisbury builder; others, on the other hand,
declaring that it was very good that the Establishment should have a
fall. Nevertheless there Mr. Fenwick would stand and chat with the
men, fascinated after a fashion by the misfortune which had come upon
him. Mr. Packer, the Marquis's steward, had seen him there, and had
endeavoured to slink away unobserved,--for Mr. Packer was somewhat
ashamed of the share he had had in the matter,--but Mr. Fenwick had
called to him, and had spoken to him of the progress of the building.

"Grimes never could have done it so fast," said the Vicar.

"Well,--not so fast, Mr. Fenwick, certainly."

"I suppose it won't signify about the frost?" said the Vicar. "I