rming little Surrey village of Bishopstowe, I
could see that it bore out Kitwater's description of it. A prettier
little place could scarcely have been discovered, with its tree-shaded
high-road, its cluster of thatched cottages, its blacksmith's shop,
rustic inn with the signboard on a high post before the door, and last
but not least, the quaint little church standing some hundred yards back
from the main road, and approached from the lych-gate by an avenue
of limes.

"Here," I said to myself, "is a place where a man might live to be a
hundred, undisturbed by the rush and bustle of the Great World."

That was my feeling then, but since I have come to know it better, and
have been permitted an opportunity of seeing for myself something of the
inner life of the hamlet, I have discovered that it is only the life of
a great city, on a small scale. There is the same keen competition in
trade, with the same jealousies and bickerings. However, on this
peaceful Sunday morning it struck me as being delightful. There was an
old-world quiet about it that was vastly soothing. The rooks cawed
lazily in the elms before the church as if they knew it were Sunday
morning and a day of rest. A dog lay extended in the middle of the
road, basking in the sunshine, a thing which he would not have dared to
do on a weekday. Even the little stream that runs under the old stone
bridge, which marks the centre of the village, and then winds its
tortuous course round the churchyard, through the Squire's park, and
then down the valley on its way to the sea, seemed to flow somewhat more
slowly than was its wont.

Feeling just in the humour for a little moralizing, I opened the
lych-gate and entered the churchyard. The congregation were singing the
last hymn, the Old Hundredth, if I remember rightly, and the sound of
their united voices fitted perfectly into the whole scheme, giving it
the one touch that was lacking. As I strolled along I glanced at the
inscriptions on the various tomb-stones, and endeavoured to derive from
them some notion of the lives and characters of those whose memories
they perpetuated.

"Sacred to the memory of Erasmus Gunning, twenty-seven years
Schoolmaster of this Parish. Born 24th of March, 1806, and rested from
his labours on September the 19th, 1876." Seating myself on the low wall
that surrounded the churchyard, I looked down upon the river, and while
so doing, reflected upon Erasmus Gunning. What had he been like,