t back to his own work new names would occur to him, and full of the
scholar's avaricious sense of the shortness of time, he would shake his
head and frown over the three months which young Elsmere had already
passed, grappling with problems like Teutonic Arianism, the spread of
Monasticism in Gaul, and Heaven knows what besides, half a mile from the
man and the library which could have supplied him with the best help to
be got in England, unbenefited by either! Mile End was obliterated, and
the annoyance, of the morning forgotten.

The next day was Sunday, a wet January Sunday, raw and sleety, the frost
breaking up on all sides and flooding the roads with mire.

Robert, rising in his place to begin morning service, and wondering to
see the congregation so good on such a day, was suddenly startled, as
his eye travelled mechanically over to the Hall pew, usually tenanted
by Mrs. Darcy in solitary state, to see the characteristic figure of
the Squire. His amazement was so great that he almost stumbled in the
exhortation, and his feeling was evidently shared by the congregation,
which throughout the service showed a restlessness, an excited tendency
to peer round corners and pillars, that was not favorable to devotion.

'Has he come to spy out the land?' the Rector thought to himself, and
could not help a momentary tremor at the idea of preaching before
so formidable an auditor. Then he pulled himself together by a great
effort, and fixing his eyes on a shockheaded urchin half way down the
church, read the service to him. Catherine meanwhile in her seat on the
northern side of the nave, her soul lulled in Sunday peace, knew nothing
of Mr. Wendover's appearance.

Robert preached on the first sermon of Jesus, on the first appearance of
the young Master in the synagogue at Nazareth:--

'_This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears!_'

The sermon dwelt on the Messianic aspect of Christ's mission, on the
mystery and poetry of that long national expectation, on the pathos of
Jewish disillusion, on the sureness and beauty of Christian insight as
faith gradually transferred trait after trait of the Messiah of prophecy
to the Christ of Nazareth. At first there was a certain amount of
hesitation, a slight wavering hither and thither--a difficult choice of
words--and then the soul freed itself from man, and the preacher forgot
all but his Master and his people.'

At the door as he came out stood Mr. Wendover and Catherine