n
ribbons, were in flower by now, and bore feathery yellow blossoms side
by side with nutty capsules. His horse had been ambling forward
unpressed. Now it laid its ears flat, and a minute later its master's
slower senses caught the clop-clop of a second set of hoofs, the noise
of wheels. Mahony had reached a place where two roads joined, and saw a
covered buggy approaching. He drew rein and waited.

The occupant of the vehicle had wound the reins round the empty
lamp-bracket, and left it to the sagacity of his horse to keep the
familiar track, while he dozed, head on breast, in the corner. The
animal halted of itself on coming up with its fellow, and Archdeacon
Long opened his eyes.

"Ah, good-day to you, doctor!--Yes, as you see, enjoying a little nap.
I was out early."

He got down from the buggy and, with bent knees and his hands in his
pockets, stretched the creased cloth of his trousers, where this had
cut into his flesh. He was a big, brawny, handsome man, with a massive
nose, a cloven chin, and the most companionable smile in the world. As
he stood, he touched here a strap, there a buckle on the harness of his
chestnut--a well-known trotter, with which he often made a match--and
affectionately clapped the neck of Mahony's bay. He could not keep his
hands off a horse. By choice he was his own stableman, and in earlier
life had been a dare-devil rider. Now, increasing weight led him to
prefer buggy to saddle; but his recklessness had not diminished. With
the reins in his left hand, he would run his light, two-wheeled trap up
any wooded, boulder-strewn hill and down the other side, just as in his
harum-scarum days he had set it at felled trees, and, if rumour spoke
true, wire-fences.

Mahony admired the splendid vitality of the man, as well as the
indestructible optimism that bore him triumphantly through all the
hardships of a colonial ministry. No sick bed was too remote for Long,
no sinner sunk too low to be helped to his feet. The leprous Chinaman
doomed to an unending isolation, the drunken Paddy, the degraded white
woman--each came in for a share of his benevolence. He spent the
greater part of his life visiting the outcasts and outposts, beating up
the unbaptised, the unconfirmed, the unwed. But his church did not
suffer. He had always some fresh scheme for this on hand: either he was
getting up a tea-meeting to raise money for an organ; or a series of
penny-readings towards funds for a chancel; or he wa