ist love him.'

'So you're not a Papist?' I inquired, smiling.

'No' me,' responded he grimly. 'I come o' the reet auld Presbyterian
stock, and I keep off the maister some o' thae hairpies that are aye
after him and his gear.'

He pulled up as he spoke at the porch of the Hall, and as I descended I
noted a stooping figure clad in a black soutane coming round the corner
of the house evidently to greet me.

As I shook hands with him I could see in a glance that though he might
be a recluse and an antiquary he had a lively and gentle heart; for if
his face was yellow and his pupils sere there was a wonderfully shy and
sympathetic mobility about his lips and face.

'You have had a long, wet drive, I fear,' he said, 'and these wild
Yorkshire moorlands are often inhospitable to strangers, yet in time one
gets to love them for this, their very bold and uncompromising
character. Also, they make one rejoice the more in a warm fireside.'

So speaking he led the way through a rounded hall, very poorly
furnished, but hung with family portraits interspersed with heads of
deer, and many masks of foxes, badgers, and hares.

Turning to the left he opened a door into a small library, which was
lined with books from skirting-board to cornice; a ripe fire glowed upon
the hearth, and two easy full-bottomed leathern chairs stood on either
side.

'The rougher the weather without,' said my uncle genially, 'the warmer
the welcome within, and here one may warm both body and soul,' he
pointed to the fire and the well-filled bookshelves.

'Most of them are my own treasures,' he added, 'for the Startington
family was given to keep up cellar and stable, rather than the library,
as probably you know. Most of my time now, however,' he said in
conclusion, 'is spent in the muniment room upstairs, so that you may
count this room as your own, and may smoke as much as you please. Since
you are an Oxford man, and all Oxford men smoke, you are bound,
syllogistically, to be a smoker. For myself,' he added, his hand upon
the door-handle, 'I--like most priests--do not smoke, yet tobacco is not
in the index, and we usually take a little snuff occasionally,' and he
tapped upon a small box hidden within his waistband.

Therewith he was gone, and left me to my own devices till dinner-time,
or supper rather, for he did not dress.

The next few days passed very enjoyably for me, since the weather was
fine, and after studying in my Aristotle all morning,