ain on his donkey, and
they returned to Jerusalem; nor did George ever again talk to him
about the Mount of Olives.

And he was not very much more successful with another friend into
whose mind he endeavoured to inculcate his own high feelings. He got
Miss Baker up to his favourite seat, and with her Miss Waddington;
and then, before he had left Jerusalem, he succeeded in inducing the
younger lady to ramble thither with him alone.

"I do not know that I think so highly of the church as you do," said
Caroline. "As far as I have seen them, I cannot find that clergymen
are more holy than other men; and yet surely they ought to be so."

"At any rate, there is more scope for holiness if a man have it
in him to be holy. The heart of a clergyman is more likely to be
softened than that of a barrister or an attorney."

"I don't exactly know what you mean by heart-softening, Mr. Bertram."

"I mean--" said Bertram, and then he paused; he was not quite able,
with the words at his command, to explain to this girl what it was
that he did mean, nor was he sure that she would appreciate him if
he did do so; and, fond as he still was of his idea of a holy life,
perhaps at this moment he was fonder still of her.

"I think that a man should do the best he can for himself in a
profession. You have a noble position within your grasp, and if I
were you, I certainly would not bury myself in a country parsonage."

What this girl of twenty said to him had much more weight than the
time-honoured precepts of his father; and yet both, doubtless, had
their weight. Each blow told somewhat; and the seed too had been sown
upon very stony ground.

They sat there some three or four minutes in silence. Bertram was
looking over to Mount Moriah, imaging to himself the spot where
the tables of the money-changers had been overturned, while Miss
Waddington was gazing at the setting sun. She had an eye to see
material beauty, and a taste to love it; but it was not given to her
to look back and feel those things as to which her lover would fain
have spoken to her. The temple in which Jesus had taught was nothing
to her.

Yes, he was her lover now, though he had never spoken to her of love,
had never acknowledged to himself that he did love her--as so few
men ever do acknowledge till the words that they have said make it
necessary that they should ask themselves whether those words are
true. They sat there for some minutes in silence, but not as lover