nes's rum he also smiled as he shook it. Nor was he more reasonable
about Robin. On the contrary, he declared that he would think mightily
little of a young man who did not immediately fall head over ears in
love with such a pretty girl.

"You don't mind our boy's heart being broken, then?" questioned his
wife bitterly; of her plans for Netta she had never cared to speak.

"My dear, if it is to be broken there is no young lady I would sooner
entrust with the job."

"You don't mind his marrying an adventuress, then?"

"My dear, I know of no adventuress."

"You rather like our old people to be tempted to drink, to have it
thrust upon them on their very dying beds?"

"Kate, are you not bitter?"

"Psha," said his wife, drumming her foot.

"Psha, Kate?" inquired the vicar mildly; and it is not always that
the saintly produce a soothing effect on their wives.

It really seemed as if the girl were to have her own way in Symford,
unchecked even by Lady Shuttleworth, whose attitude was entirely
incomprehensible. She was to be allowed to corrupt the little hamlet
that had always been so good, to lead it astray, to lure it down paths
of forbidden indulgence, to turn it topsy turvy to an extent not even
reached by the Dissenting family that had given so much trouble a few
years before. It was on the Sunday morning as the church bells were
ringing, that Mrs. Morrison, prayer-book in hand, looked in at Mrs.
Jones's on her way to service and discovered the five-pound note.

The old lady was propped up in bed with her open Bible on her lap and
her spectacles lying in it, and as usual presented to her visitor the
perfect realization of her ideal as to the looks and manners most
appropriate to ailing Christians. There was nowhere a trace of rum,
and the only glass in the room was innocently filled with the china
roses that flowered so profusely in the garden at Baker's Farm. But
Mrs. Morrison could not for all that dissemble the disappointment and
sternness of her heart, and the old lady glanced up at her as she came
in with a kind of quavering fearfulness, like that of a little child
who is afraid it may be going to be whipped, or of a conscientious dog
who has lapsed unaccountably from rectitude.

"I have come to read the gospel for the day to you," said Mrs.
Morrison, sitting down firmly beside her.

"Thank you mum," said Mrs. Jones with meekness.

"My prayer-book has such small print--give me your Bible."

A look of