their poorer neighbours,
the trusted friend and providence of numerous families; but she had not
in the least what is called a parochial mind. She had no touch of the
bustling and efficient Lady Bountiful. The simple people she visited
were her friends and neighbours, not her patients and dependents. She
was simply an overflowing fountain of goodness, and it was a natural to
her to hurry to a scene of sorrow and suffering as it is for most
people to desire to stay away. My friend himself had not the same
taste; it was always rather an effort to him to accommodate himself to
people in a different way of life; but it ought to be said that he was
universally liked and respected for his quiet courtesy and simplicity,
and fully as much for his own sake as for that of his wife. This fact
could hardly be inferred from his Diary, and indeed he was wholly
unconscious of it himself, because he never realised his natural charm,
and indeed was unduly afraid of boring people by his presence.

He was not exactly a hard worker, but he was singularly regular;
indeed, though he sometimes took a brief holiday after writing a book,
he seldom missed a day without writing some few pages. One of the
reasons why they paid so few visits was that he tended, as he told me,
to feel so much bored away from his work. It was at once his occupation
and his recreation. He was not one of those who write fiercely and
feverishly, and then fall into exhaustion; he wrote cheerfully and
temperately, and never appeared to feel the strain. They lived quietly,
but a good many friends came and went. He much preferred to have a
single quest, or a husband and wife, at a time, and pursued his work
quietly all through. He used to see that one had all one could need,
and then withdrew after tea-time, not reappearing until dinner. His
wife, it was evident, was devoted to him with an almost passionate
adoration. The reason why life went so easily there was that she
studied unobtrusively his smallest desires and preferences; and thus
there was never any sense of special contrivance or consideration for
his wishes: the day was arranged exactly as he liked, without his ever
having to insist upon details. He probably did not realise this, for
though he liked settled ways, he was sensitively averse to feeling that
his own convenience was in any way superseding or overriding the
convenience of others. It used to be a great delight and refreshment to
stay there. He was fond