ef joy of such a temperament, when
he suddenly sprang up as if in fear. And fear had in fact seized him.
Suppose he forgot those belongings on the rack? Suppose, sublimely
careless, he descended from the train and left them there? What a
calamity! And similar misadventures had happened to him before. It was
the cheese that disquieted him. No one would be sufficiently
unprincipled to steal the coffin, and he would ultimately recover it at
the lost luggage office, babies' coffins not abounding on the North
Staffordshire Railway. But the cheese! He would never see the cheese
again! No integrity would be able to withstand the blandishments of
that cheese. Moreover, his wife would be saddened. And for her he had a
sincere and profound affection.

His act of precaution was to lift the coffin down from the rack, and
place it on the seat beside him, and then to put the parcel of cheese
on the coffin. He surveyed the cheese on the coffin; he surveyed it
with the critical and experienced eye of an undertaker, and he decided
that, if anyone else got into the carriage, it would not look quite
decent, quite becoming--in a word, quite nice. A coffin is a coffin,
and people's feelings have to be considered.

So he whipped off the lid of the coffin, stuck the cheese inside, and
popped the lid on again. And he kept his hand on the coffin that he
might not forget it. When the train halted at Knype, Mr Till was glad
that he had put the cheese inside, for another passenger got into the
compartment. And it was a clergyman. He recognized the clergyman,
though the clergyman did not recognize him. It was the Reverend Claud
ffolliott, famous throughout the Five Towns as the man who begins his
name with a small letter, doesn't smoke, of course doesn't drink, but
goes to football matches, has an average of eighteen at cricket, and
makes a very pretty show with the gloves, in spite of his thirty-eight
years; celibate, very High, very natty and learned about vestments,
terrific at sick couches and funerals. Mr Till inwardly trembled to
think what the Reverend Claud ffolliott might have said had he seen the
cheese reposing in the coffin, though the coffin was empty.

The parson, whose mind was apparently occupied, dropped into the
nearest corner, which chanced to be the corner farthest away from Mr
Till. He then instantly opened a copy of The Church Times and began to
read it, and the train went forward. The parson sniffed, absently, as
if he had