ented to a living in a densely-populated town in the
midland counties. He bade the parishioners of his old place a reluctant
farewell and departed, the touching sermon he preached on the occasion
being published by the local printer. Everybody was sorry to lose him;
and it was with genuine grief that his Casterbridge congregation learnt
later on that soon after his induction to his benefice, during some
bitter weather, he had fallen seriously ill of inflammation of the lungs,
of which he eventually died.

We now get below the surface of things. Of all who had known the dead
curate, none grieved for him like the man who on his first arrival had
called him a 'lath in a sheet.' Mrs. Maumbry had never greatly
sympathized with the impressive parson; indeed, she had been secretly
glad that he had gone away to better himself. He had considerably
diminished the pleasures of a woman by whom the joys of earth and good
company had been appreciated to the full. Sorry for her husband in his
loss of a friend who had been none of hers, she was yet quite unprepared
for the sequel.

'There is something that I have wanted to tell you lately, dear,' he said
one morning at breakfast with hesitation. 'Have you guessed what it is?'

She had guessed nothing.

'That I think of retiring from the army.'

'What!'

'I have thought more and more of Sainway since his death, and of what he
used to say to me so earnestly. And I feel certain I shall be right in
obeying a call within me to give up this fighting trade and enter the
Church.'

'What--be a parson?'

'Yes.'

'But what should I do?'

'Be a parson's wife.'

'Never!' she affirmed.

'But how can you help it?'

'I'll run away rather!' she said vehemently;

'No, you mustn't,' Maumbry replied, in the tone he used when his mind was
made up. 'You'll get accustomed to the idea, for I am constrained to
carry it out, though it is against my worldly interests. I am forced on
by a Hand outside me to tread in the steps of Sainway.'

'Jack,' she asked, with calm pallor and round eyes; 'do you mean to say
seriously that you are arranging to be a curate instead of a soldier?'

'I might say a curate is a soldier--of the church militant; but I don't
want to offend you with doctrine. I distinctly say, yes.'

Late one evening, a little time onward, he caught her sitting by the dim
firelight in her room. She did not know he had entered; and he found her
weeping. 'What are you cr