s; he had
lunched in Mr Sharnall's room, and had partaken of the cold lamb, and
the Stilton, and even of the cider-cup, to just such an extent as became
a healthy and good-hearted and host-considering bishop.

"You have given me a regular Oxford lunch," he said. "Your landlady has
been brought up in the good tradition." And he smiled, never doubting
that he was partaking of the ordinary provision of the house, and that
Mr Sharnall fared thus sumptuously every day. He knew not that the
meal was as much a set piece as a dinner on the stage, and that cold
lamb and Stilton and cider-cup were more often represented by the bottom
of a tin of potted meat and--a gill of cheap whisky.

"A regular Oxford lunch." And then they fell to talking of old days,
and the Bishop called Mr Sharnall "Nick," and Mr Sharnall called the
Bishop of Carum "John"; and they walked round the room looking at
pictures of college groups and college eights, and the Bishop examined
very tenderly the little water-colour sketch that Mr Sharnall had once
made of the inner quad; and they identified in it their own old rooms,
and the rooms of several other men of their acquaintance.

The talk did Mr Sharnall good; he felt the better for it every moment.
He had meant to be very proud and reserved with the Bishop--to be most
dignified and coldly courteous. He had meant to show that, though John
Willis might wear the gaiters, Nicholas Sharnall could retain his sturdy
independence, and was not going to fawn or to admit himself to be the
mental inferior of any man. He had meant to _give_ a tirade against
Confirmation, against the neglect of music, against rectors, with
perhaps a back-thrust at the Bench of Bishops itself. But he had done
none of these things, because neither pride nor reserve nor
assertiveness were possible in John Willis's company. He had merely
eaten a good lunch, and talked with a kindly, broad-minded gentleman,
long enough to warm his withered heart, and make him feel that there
were still possibilities in life.

There is a bell that rings for a few strokes three-quarters of an hour
before every service at Cullerne. It is called the Burgess Bell--some
say because it was meant to warn such burgesses as dwelt at a distance
that it was time to start for church; whilst others will have it that
Burgess is but a broken-down form of _expergiscere_--"Awake! awake!"--
that those who dozed might rise for prayer. The still air of the
afterno