e parlour-maid who waited upon us, on the summer evening I
speak of were standing--I cannot tell why--on each side of my
bed. I shut my eyes, and lay quite still, in order to escape
conversing with them, and they spoke to one another. 'Ah, poor
lamb,' Kate said trivially, '_he's_ not long for this world; going
home to Jesus, he is,--in a jiffy, I should say by the look of
'un.' But Susan answered: 'Not so. I dreamed about 'un, and I
know for sure that he is to be spared for missionary service.'
'Missionary service?' repeated Kate, impressed. 'Yes,' Susan went
on, with solemn emphasis, 'he'll bleed for his Lord in heathen
parts, that's what the future have in store for _'im_.' When they
were gone, I beat upon the coverlid with my fists, and I
determined that whatever happened, I would not, not, _not_, go out
to preach the Gospel among horrid, tropical niggers.

CHAPTER VII

IN the history of an infancy so cloistered and uniform as mine,
such a real adventure as my being publicly and successfully
kidnapped cannot be overlooked. There were several 'innocents' in
our village--harmless eccentrics who had more or less
unquestionably crossed the barrier which divides the sane from
the insane. They were not discouraged by public opinion; indeed,
several of them were favoured beings, suspected by my Father of
exaggerating their mental density in order to escape having to
work, like dogs, who, as we all know, could speak as well as we
do, were they not afraid of being made to fetch and carry. Miss
Mary Flaw was not one of these imbeciles. She was what the French
call a _detraquee_; she had enjoyed good intelligence and an active
mind, but her wits had left the rails and were careening about
the country. Miss Flaw was the daughter of a retired Baptist
minister, and she lived, with I remember not what relations, in a
little solitary house high up at Barton Cross, whither Mary Grace
and I would sometimes struggle when our pastoral duties were
over. In later years, when I met with those celebrated verses in
which the philosopher expresses the hope

In the downhill of life, when I find I'm declining,
May my lot no less fortunate be
Than a snug elbow-chair can afford for reclining,
And a cot that o'erlooks the wide sea

my thoughts returned instinctively, and they still return, to the
high abode of Miss Flaw. There was a porch at her door, both for
shelter and shade, and it was covered with jasmine; but the charm
of