d
visit the Holy Land, or Syria, or Armenia, where the dreadful massacres
of Christians were taking place, Dr. McTeague clung to his post with a
tenacity worthy of the best traditions of Scotland. His only internal
perplexity was that he didn't see how, when the time came for him to
die, twenty or thirty years hence, they would ever be able to replace
him. Such was the situation of the two churches on a certain beautiful
morning in June, when an unforeseen event altered entirely the current
of their fortunes.

* * * * *

"No, thank you, Juliana," said the young rector to his sister across
the breakfast table--and there was something as near to bitterness in
his look as his saintly, smooth-shaven face was capable of
reflecting--"no, thank you, no more porridge. Prunes? no, no, thank
you; I don't think I care for any. And, by the way," he added, "don't
bother to keep any lunch for me. I have a great deal of business--that
is, of work in the parish--to see to, and I must just find time to get
a bite of something to eat when and where I can."

In his own mind he was resolving that the place should be the Mausoleum
Club and the time just as soon as the head waiter would serve him.

After which the Reverend Edward Fareforth Furlong bowed his head for a
moment in a short, silent blessing--the one prescribed by the episcopal
church in America for a breakfast of porridge and prunes.

It was their first breakfast together, and it spoke volumes to the
rector. He knew what it implied. It stood for his elder sister
Juliana's views on the need of personal sacrifice as a means of grace.
The rector sighed as he rose. He had never missed his younger sister
Philippa, now married and departed, so keenly. Philippa had had
opinions of her own on bacon and eggs and on lamb chops with watercress
as a means of stimulating the soul. But Juliana was different. The
rector understood now exactly why it was that his father had exclaimed,
on the news of Philippa's engagement, without a second's hesitation,
"Then, of course, Juliana must live with you! Nonsense, my dear boy,
nonsense! It's my duty to spare her to you. After all, I can always eat
at the club; they can give me a bite of something or other, surely. To
a man of my age, Edward, food is really of no consequence. No, no;
Juliana must move into the rectory at once."

The rector's elder sister rose. She looked tall and sallow and
forbidding in the plain black dress