him were those of good Miss Wodehouse,
who had been the witness and the participator of his humiliation. Lucy
was not there. Doubtless Lucy was at St Roque's, where the sermons of
the perpetual curate differed much from those of the Rector of Carlingford.
Ah me! the rectorship, with all its responsibilities, was a serious
business; and what was to become of it yet, Mr Proctor could not see.
He was not a hasty man--he determined to wait and see what events might
make of it; to consider it ripely--to take full counsel with himself.
Every time he came out of his mother's presence, he came affected and
full of anxiety to preserve to her that home which pleased her so much.
She was the strong point in favour of Carlingford; and it was no small
tribute to the good man's filial affection, that for her chiefly he kept
his neck under the yoke of a service to which he know himself unequal,
and, sighing, turned his back upon his beloved cloisters. If there had
been no other sick-beds immediately in Carlingford, Mrs Proctor would
have won the day.

CHAPTER IV.

Such a blessed exemption, however, was not to be hoped for. When the
Rector was solemnly sent for from his very study to visit a poor man
who was not expected to live many days, he put his prayer-book under
his arm, and went off doggedly, feeling that now was the crisis. He
went through it in as exemplary a manner as could have been desired, but
it was dreadful work to the Rector. If nobody else suspected him, he
suspected himself. He had no spontaneous word of encouragement or
consolation to offer; he went through it as his duty with a horrible
abstractness. That night he went home disgusted beyond all possible
power of self-reconciliation. He could not continue this. Good evangelical
Mr Bury, who went before him, and by nature loved preaching, had
accustomed the people to much of such visitations. It was murder to the
Fellow of All-Souls.

That night Mr Proctor wrote a long letter to his dear cheery old mother,
disclosing all his heart to her. It was written with a pathos of which
the good man was wholly unconscious, and finished by asking her advice
and her prayers. He sent it up to her next morning on her breakfast
tray, which he always furnished with his own hands, and went out to
occupy himself in paying visits till it should be time to see her, and
ascertain her opinion. At Mr Wodehouse's there was nobody at home but
Lucy, who was very friendly, and took n