ad been at Beechfield in the days before Sydney Vane's
death, he would never have let poor Andrew Westwood and his child remain
outcasts from the interests of religious life. He would have visited
them, talked to them, persuaded the child to go to school, perhaps even
induced the poacher to give up his vagrant ways; at any rate, he would
not have let them alone, but would have grappled fearlessly with the
difficulties of their position, and with that hostility which seemed to
exist between Westwood and the rest of the village. Whether he would
have been successful or not it were indeed hard to say, but that he
would have made a great effort to be so there can be no manner of doubt.

Mr. Evandale's new system produced a great sensation in the parish--not
altogether a favorable sensation either; for the villagers, who had gone
on so long in quiet, comfortable, self-complacent ways, did not regard
with a favorable eye the changes which the Rector introduced. All the
old abuses which had slumbered peacefully in darkness for so many years
were exposed relentlessly by this too energetic young man. He swept away
the village band of stringed instruments from the church gallery; he
erected an organ in the chancel, and set the schoolmistress to play it;
he introduced new tunes into the choir, new doctrines into the pulpit;
he played havoc amongst all that was fusty and musty and venerable in
the villagers' eyes. He talked about drainage, and had an inspector down
to investigate the state of the village water-supply; he waged war upon
the publicans, set up an institute and a library for the village youths,
taught the boys, played with them--thrashed them too occasionally--and
made himself a terror to evil-doers and the idol of the young ladies of
the place. Naturally much was said against him, especially behind his
back. To his face, people did not venture to say much. The young Rector
had such a fearless way of looking straight into people's eyes, of
saying what he meant and expecting other people to do the same, that he
inspired something like fear in the shiftier and less trustworthy part
of the community. On the other hand, the weak, the sick, the very
young, instinctively loved and trusted him. "He is beautiful in a
sick-room," averred the elder women. Perhaps his words seemed beautiful
to them because they felt that by some mysterious law of sympathy he
understood their sorrows without having been a partaker in them, that he