score, if Mr. Fenwick would have
submitted himself to become one of his people. The Marquis was master
at home, and the Ladies Sophie and Carolina would have been proud to
entertain Mr. Fenwick by the week together at Turnover, had he been
willing, infidel or believer, to join that faction. But he never
joined that faction, and he was not only the bosom friend of the
"gentleman who owned some land in the parish;" but he was twice more
rebellious than that gentleman himself. He had contradicted the
Marquis flat to his face,--so the Marquis said himself,--when they
met once about some business in the parish; and again, when, in the
Vicar's early days in Bullhampton, some gathering for school-festival
purposes was made in the great home field behind Farmer Trumbull's
house, Mrs. Fenwick misbehaved herself egregiously.

"Upon my word, she patronised us," said Lady Sophie, laughing. "She
did, indeed! And you know what she was. Her father was just a common
builder at Loring, who made some money by a speculation in bricks and
mortar."

When Lady Sophie said this she was, no doubt, ignorant of the fact
that Mr. Balfour had been the younger son of a family much more
ancient than her own, that he had taken a double-first at Oxford,
had been a member of half the learned societies in Europe, and had
belonged to two or three of the best clubs in London.

From all this it will be seen that the Marquis of Trowbridge would
be disposed to think ill of whatever might be done in regard to the
murder by the Gilmore-Fenwick party in the parish. And then there
were tales about for which there was perhaps some foundation, that
the Vicar and the murderer had been very dear friends. It was
certainly believed at Turnover that the Vicar and Sam Brattle had
for years past spent the best part of their Sundays fishing together.
There were tales of rat-killing matches in which they had been
engaged,--originating in the undeniable fact of a certain campaign
against rats at the mill, in which the Vicar had taken an ardent
part. Undoubtedly the destruction of vermin, and, in regard to one
species, its preservation for the sake of destruction,--and the
catching of fish,--and the shooting of birds,--were things lovely
in the Vicar's eyes. He, perhaps, did let his pastoral dignity go
a little by the board, when he and Sam stooped together, each with
a ferret in his hand, grovelling in the dust to get at certain
rat-advantages in the mill. Gilmore, who