watched him since her mother had told her that he would die
wifeless and childless because she would not be his wife and the
mother of his children.

The bishop was a man sixty years of age, very healthy and handsome,
with hair just becoming grey, clear eyes, a kindly mouth, and
something of a double chin. He was all but six feet high, with a broad
chest, large hands, and legs which seemed to have been made for
clerical breeches and clerical stockings. He was a man of fortune
outside his bishopric; and, as he never went up to London, and had no
children on whom to spend his money, he was able to live as a nobleman
in the country. He did live as a nobleman, and was very popular. Among
the poor around him he was idolized, and by such clergy of his diocese
as were not enthusiastic in their theology either on the one side or
on the other, he was regarded as a model bishop. By the very high and
the very low,--by those rather who regarded ritualism as being either
heavenly or devilish,--he was looked upon as a timeserver, because he
would not put to sea in either of those boats. He was an unselfish
man, who loved his neighbour as himself, and forgave all trespasses,
and thanked God for his daily bread from his heart, and prayed
heartily to be delivered from temptation. But I doubt whether he was
competent to teach a creed,--or even to hold one, if it be necessary
that a man should understand and define his creed before he can hold
it. Whether he was free from, or whether he was scared by, any inward
misgivings, who shall say? If there were such he never whispered a
word of them even to the wife of his bosom. From the tone of his voice
and the look of his eye, you would say that he was unscathed by that
agony which doubt on such a matter would surely bring to a man so
placed. And yet it was observed of him that he never spoke of his
faith, or entered into arguments with men as to the reasons on which
he had based it. He was diligent in preaching,--moral sermons that were
short, pithy, and useful. He was never weary in furthering the welfare
of his clergymen. His house was open to them and to their wives. The
edifice of every church in his diocese was a care to him. He laboured
at schools, and was zealous in improving the social comforts of the
poor; but he was never known to declare to man or woman that the human
soul must live or die for ever according to its faith. Perhaps there
was no bishop in England more loved or more us