to get down to bedrock, so to speak, and find out just
what is the trouble."

"But how will your going as a farm-hand help you?"

"I shall have a better chance to see things in their true light. If I
go as a clergyman, people will naturally be somewhat suspicious of me,
and will say things behind my back which they will not say to my face.
But John Handyman will be of little account in their estimation, and
they will express their views in his presence freely and openly."

"Does it not seem like taking a mean advantage of them?" Garton queried.

"I can't see it that way. I wish to diagnose that parish and find out
what is the trouble. There is a serious disease of some kind there,
and unless I know what it is before taking charge I may make all kinds
of mistakes, and thus render the work much more difficult. If, in this
way, I can accomplish my object and do good to the people of Rixton, I
cannot see how I shall be taking a mean advantage of them. If the
fault has been with the clergymen who have been there, I want to know
it; but if the people are to blame, I want to know that as well."

"I see you believe in understanding the people among whom you work,"
Garton remarked.

"Certainly. It seems to me that too many of our clergy do not
understand their parishioners, especially so in country districts. It
was not always so, but changes have taken place in recent years. How
well I remember my old rector, the one whose life I so revere, and
principally through whose influence my mind was first turned toward the
Ministry. He was a saint, if ever there was one, and he looked well
after his flock. He knew his people intimately, not merely officially,
but in a sympathetic and loving way. He knew them all by name, even to
the smallest child. Their concerns were his, and he entered into their
joys and sorrows as one of them, and not as a mere outsider. Why, it
was wonderful how much he knew about farming, stock-raising, and such
like. He could talk as intelligently to the men about their farms as
he could to the women about their children. He was one of them; he
loved them and they knew it."

Douglas' eyes shone as he thus bore testimony to the worth of his old
rector, and when he suddenly ceased he sat gazing straight before him
as if he beheld a vision.

"Is he living yet?" Garton asked.

"No, he died years ago, when I was about seventeen."

"He must have been a remarkable man."

"He certainly was,