vicar. "There can't be a doubt of it, when
one thinks of the alterations they have just made in that fine old
Book. There are innovations from morning till night, and nothing
gained by them. Surely, if we got to heaven up to this by the teaching
of the Bible as it _was_, it serves no cause to alter a word here and
there, or a sentence that was dear to us from our childhood. It brings
us no nearer God, but only unsettles beliefs that, perhaps, up to this
were sound enough. The times are not to be trusted."

"Is anything worthy of trust?" says Dorian, bitterly.

"I doubt I'm old-fashioned," says the dear vicar, with a deprecating
smile. "I dare say change is good, and works wonders in many ways. We
old people stick fast, and can't progress. I suppose I should be
content to be put on one side."

"I hope you will be put on my side," says Dorian: "I should feel
pretty safe then. Do you know, I have not been in this room for so
many years that I am afraid to count them? When last here, it was
during a holiday term; and I remember sitting beside you and thinking
how awfully jolly glad I was to be well out of it, when other children
were doing their lesson."

"Comfortable reflection, and therefore, as a rule, selfish," says the
vicar, with a laugh.

"Was it selfish? I suppose so." His face clouds again: a sort of
reckless defiance shadows it. "You must not expect much from me," he
says, slowly: "they don't accredit me with any good nowadays."

"My dear fellow," says the vicar, quietly, "there is something wrong
with you, or you would not so speak. I don't ask you now what it is:
you shall tell me when and where you please. I only entreat you to
believe that no one, knowing you as I do, could possibly think
anything of you but what is kind and good and true."

Branscombe draws his breath quickly. His pale face flushes; and a
gleam, that is surely born of tears, shines in his eyes. Clarissa,
who, up to this, has been talking to some of the children, comes up to
him at this moment and slips her hand through his arm. Is he not
almost her brother?

Only his wife stands apart, and, with white lips and dry eyes and a
most miserable heart, watches him without caring--or daring--to go
near to him. She is silent, _distraite_, and has altogether forgotten
the fact of Kennedy's existence (though he still stands close beside
her),--a state of things that young gentleman hardly affects.

"Has your class been too much for you? Or d