; insecurity, by reason of the everpresent possibility of
missiles on the part of the younger inhabitants, a class eternally
Conservative. Elated with isolation, I went even more nose-in-air than
usual: and 'even so,' I mused, 'might Mungo Park have threaded the
trackless African forest and. . . .' Here I plumped against a soft, but
resisting body.

Recalled to my senses by the shock, I fell back in the attitude every
boy under these circumstances instinctively adopts--both elbows well up
over your ears. I found myself facing a tall elderly man, clean-shaven,
clad in well-worn black--a clergyman evidently; and I noted at once a
far-away look in his eyes, as if they were used to another plane of
vision, and could not instantly focus things terrestrial, being suddenly
recalled thereto. His figure was bent in apologetic protest. 'I ask a
thousand pardons, sir,' he said; 'I am really so very absent-minded. I
trust you will forgive me.'

Now most boys would have suspected chaff under this courtly style of
address. I take infinite credit to myself for recognising at once the
natural attitude of a man to whom his fellows were gentlemen all,
neither Jew nor Gentile, clean nor unclean. Of course, I took the blame
on myself; adding, that I was very absent-minded too. Which was indeed
the case.

'I perceive,' he said pleasantly, 'that we have something in common. I,
an old man, dream dreams; you, a young one, see visions. Your lot is the
happier. And now--' his hand had been resting all this time on a
wicket-gate--'you are hot, it is easily seen;--the day is advanced,
_Virgo_ is the Zodiacal sign. Perhaps I may offer you some poor
refreshment, if your engagements will permit?'

My only engagement that afternoon was an arithmetic lesson, and I had
not intended to keep it in any case; so I passed in, while he held the
gate open politely, murmuring, '_Venit Hesperus, ite capellae_: come,
little kid!' and then apologising abjectly for a familiarity which (he
said) was less his than the Roman poet's. A straight flagged walk led up
to the cool-looking old house, and my host, lingering in his progress at
this rose-tree and that, forgot all about me at least twice, waking up
and apologising humbly after each lapse. During these intervals I put
two and two together, and identified him as the Rector: a bachelor,
eccentric, learned exceedingly, round whom the crust of legend was
already beginning to form; to myself an object of special a