parish
may not follow your example; or that you and I may never be caught
straying!"

* * * * *

CHAPTER III.

Parson Dale and Squire Hazeldean parted company; the latter to inspect
his sheep, the former to visit some of his parishioners, including Lenny
Fairfield, whom the donkey had defrauded of his apple.

Lenny Fairfield was sure to be in the way, for his mother rented a few
acres of grass land from the Squire, and it was now hay-time. And
Leonard, commonly called Lenny, was an only son, and his mother a widow.
The cottage stood apart, and somewhat remote, in one of the many nooks of
the long green village lane. And a thoroughly English cottage it
was--three centuries old at least; with walls of rubble let into oak
frames, and duly whitewashed every summer, a thatched roof, small panes
of glass, and an old doorway raised from the ground by two steps. There
was about this little dwelling all the homely rustic elegance which
peasant life admits of: a honeysuckle was trained over the door; a few
flower-pots were placed on the window-sills; the small plot of ground in
front of the house was kept with great neatness, and even taste; some
large rough stones on either side the little path having been formed into
a sort of rock-work, with creepers that were now in flower; and the
potatoe ground was screened from the eye by sweet peas and lupine. Simple
elegance all this, it is true; but how well it speaks for peasant and
landlord, when you see that the peasant is fond of his home, and has some
spare time and heart to bestow upon mere embellishment. Such a peasant is
sure to be a bad customer to the ale-house, and a safe neighbor to the
Squire's preserves. All honor and praise to him, except a small tax upon
both, which is due to the landlord!

Such sights were as pleasant to the Parson as the most beautiful
landscapes of Italy can be to the dilettante. He paused a moment at the
wicket to look around him, and distended his nostrils voluptuously to
inhale the smell of the sweet peas, mixed with that of the new-mown hay
in the fields behind, which a slight breeze bore to him. He then moved
on, carefully scraped his shoes, clean and well polished as they
were--for Mr. Dale was rather a beau in his own clerical way--on the
scraper without the door, and lifted the latch.

Your virtuoso looks with artistical delight on the figure of some nymph
painted on an Etruscan vase, engaged in pour