. He found
that, on behalf of the children, he must "renounce the devil and all his
work, the vain pomp and glory of the world;" that he must pledge himself
to see that these infants would "crucify the old man and utterly abolish
the whole body of sin." It was rather doubtful whether they would do so,
he reflected, as he felt them squirming in his arms while Mrs. Spaniel
was busy trying to keep their socks on. When the curate exhorted him "to
follow the innocency" of these little ones, it was disconcerting to have
one of them burst into a piercing yammer, and wriggle so forcibly that
it slipped quite out of its little embroidered shift and flannel band.
But the actual access to the holy basin was more seemly, perhaps due to
the children imagining they were going to find tadpoles there. When Mr.
Poodle held them up they smiled with a vague almost bashful simplicity;
and Mrs. Spaniel could not help murmuring "The darlings!" The curate,
less experienced with children, had insisted on holding all three at
once, and Gissing feared lest one of them might swarm over the surpliced
shoulder and fall splash into the font. But though they panted a little
with excitement, they did nothing to mar the solemn instant. While Mrs.
Spaniel was picking up the small socks with which the floor was strewn,
Gissing was deeply moved by the poetry of the ceremony. He felt that
something had really been accomplished toward "burying the Old Adam."
And if Mrs. Spaniel ever grew disheartened at the wash-tubs, he was
careful to remind her of the beautiful phrase about the mystical washing
away of sin.

They had been christened Groups, Bunks, and Yelpers, three traditional
names in his family.

Indeed, he was reflecting as he walked in the dusk, Mrs. Spaniel was
now his sheet anchor. Fortunately she showed signs of becoming
extraordinarily attached to the puppies. On the two days a week when she
came up from the village, it was even possible for him to get a little
relaxation--to run down to the station for tobacco, or to lie in the
hammock briefly with a book. Looking off from his airy porch, he could
see the same blue distances that had always tempted him, but he felt too
passive to wonder about them. He had given up the idea of trying to get
any other servants. If it had been possible, he would have engaged Mrs.
Spaniel to sleep in the house and be there permanently; but she had
children of her own down in the shantytown quarter of the village, a