land, where there might be danger even in ordination, but
in good, wholesome, Protestant Ireland, where a Church of England
clergyman was a clergyman of the Church of England, and not a priest,
slipping about in the mud half way between England and Rome.

Herbert himself was anxious to get some employment by which he might
immediately earn his bread, but not unnaturally wished that London
should be the scene of his work. Anywhere in Ireland he would be
known as the Fitzgerald who ought to have been Fitzgerald of Castle
Richmond. And then too, he, as other young men, had an undefined
idea, that as he must earn his bread London should be his ground.
He had at first been not ill inclined to that Church project, and
had thus given a sort of ground on which Aunt Letty was able to
stand,--had, as it were, given her some authority for carrying on an
agitation in furtherance of her own views; but Herbert himself soon
gave up this idea. A man, he thought, to be a clergyman should have
a very strong predilection in favour of that profession; and so he
gradually abandoned that idea,--actuated, as poor Aunt Letty feared,
by the agency of the evil one, working through the means of Puseyism.

His mother and sisters were in favour of Mr. Prendergast's views, and
as it was gradually found by them all that there would not be any
immediate pressure as regarded pecuniary means, that seemed at last
to be their decision. Herbert would remain yet for three or four
weeks at Castle Richmond, till matters there were somewhat more
thoroughly settled, and would then put himself into the hands of Mr.
Prendergast in London. Mr. Prendergast would select a legal tutor
for him, and proper legal chambers; and then not long afterwards his
mother and sisters should follow, and they would live together at
some small villa residence near St. John's Wood Road, or perhaps out
at Brompton.

It is astonishing how quickly in this world of ours chaos will settle
itself into decent and graceful order, when it is properly looked
in the face, and handled with a steady hand which is not sparing of
the broom. Some three months since, everything at Castle Richmond
was ruin; such ruin, indeed, that the very power of living under it
seemed to be doubtful. When first Mr. Prendergast arrived there, a
feeling came upon them all as though they might hardly dare to live
in a world which would look at them as so thoroughly degraded. As
regards means, they would be beggars!