some time past
I have been living in a flat, ugly, barren, agricultural district. You
can't think how pleasant I found the picture presented by the Gardens,
as a contrast. The ladies in their rich winter dresses, the smart
nursery maids, the lovely children, the ever moving crowd skating on the
ice of the Round Pond; it was all so exhilarating after what I have been
used to, that I actually caught myself whistling as I walked through the
brilliant scene! (In my time boys used always to whistle when they were
in good spirits, and I have not got over the habit yet.) Who do you
think I met when I was in full song?"

As well as her amazement would let her, Mercy excused herself from
guessing. She had never in all her life before spoken to any living
being so confusedly and so unintelligently as she now spoke to Julian
Gray!

He went on more gayly than ever, without appearing to notice the effect
that he had produced on her.

"Whom did I meet," he repeated, "when I was in full song? My bishop! If
I had been whistling a sacred melody, his lordship might perhaps have
excused my vulgarity out of consideration for my music. Unfortunately,
the composition I was executing at the moment (I am one of the loudest
of living whistlers) was by Verdi--"La Donna e Mobile"--familiar, no
doubt, to his lordship on the street organs. He recognized the tune,
poor man, and when I took off my hat to him he looked the other way.
Strange, in a world that is bursting with sin and sorrow, to treat such
a trifle seriously as a cheerful clergyman whistling a tune!" He
pushed away his plate as he said the last words, and went on simply and
earnestly in an altered tone. "I have never been able," he said, "to
see why we should assert ourselves among other men as belonging to a
particular caste, and as being forbidden, in any harmless thing, to do
as other people do. The disciples of old set us no such example; they
were wiser and better than we are. I venture to say that one of the
worst obstacles in the way of our doing good among our fellow-creatures
is raised by the mere assumption of the clerical manner and the clerical
voice. For my part, I set up no claim to be more sacred and more
reverend than any other Christian man who does what good he can." He
glanced brightly at Mercy, looking at him in helpless perplexity. The
spirit of fun took possession of him again. "Are you a Radical?" he
asked, with a humorous twinkle in his large lustrous eyes. "