o
change her cap.

"I have heard what has happened, John, so I have come to see you," said
the Prime Minister.

Was he thinking of the money? John felt uneasy and ashamed.

"I'm sorry, my boy, very sorry!"

"Thank you, uncle."

"But it all comes, you see, of the ridiculous idea that we are a
Christian nation! Such a thing couldn't have occurred at the shrine of a
pagan god!"

"It was only a proprietary church, uncle. I was much to blame."

"I do not deny that you have acted unwisely, but what difference does
that make, my boy? To sell a church seems like the climax of irreverence;
but they are doing as bad every day. If you want to see what times the
Church has fallen on, look at the advertisements in your religious
papers--your Benefice and Church Patronage Gazette, and so forth. A
traffic, John, a slave traffic, worse than anything in Africa, where they
sell bodies, not souls!"

"It is a crime which cries to the avenging anger of Heaven," said John;
"but it is the Establishment that is to blame, not the Church, uncle."

"We are a nation of money-lenders, my boy, and the Church is the worst
usurer of them all, with its learned divines in scarlet hoods, who hold
shares in music halls, and its Fathers in God living at ease and leasing
out public-houses. _You_ have been lending money on usury too, and on a
bad security. What are you going to do now?"

"Go on with my work, uncle, and do two hours where I did one before."

"And get yourself kicked where you got yourself kicked before!"

"Why not? If God puts ten pounds on a man, he gives him strength to bear
twenty."

"John, John, I am feeling rather sore, and I can't bear much more of it.
I'm growing old, and my life is rather lonely too. Except your father,
you are my only kinsman now, and it seems as if our old family must die
with you. But come, my boy, come, throw up all this sorry masquerade.
Isn't there a woman in the world who can help me to persuade you? I don't
care who she is, or what, or where she comes from."

John had coloured to the eyes, and was stammering something about the
true priest cut off from earthly marriage, therefore free to commit
himself completely to his work, when Mrs. Callender came back, spruce and
smart, with many smiles and curtsies. The Prime Minister greeted her with
the same old-fashioned courtesy, and they cooed away like two old doves,
until a splendid equipage drove up to the door, and the plain old
gentleman drove