nderstood that her malice should have condescended to anything, however
low. But from the Bishop!"

"How will you be the worse? Who will know?"

"I know it," said he, striking his breast. "I know it. The wound is
here. Do you think that when a coarse libel is welcomed in the Bishop's
palace, and treated there as true, that it will not be spread abroad among
other houses? When the Bishop has thought it necessary to send it me,
what will other people do,--others who are not bound to be just and
righteous in their dealings with me as he is? '"Amo" in the cool of the
evening!'" Then he seized his hat and rushed out into the garden.

The gentleman who had written the paragraph certainly had had no idea that
his words would have been thus effectual. The little joke had seemed to
him to be good enough to fill a paragraph, and it had gone from him
without further thought. Of the Doctor or of the lady he had conceived no
idea whatsoever. Somebody else had said somewhere that a clergyman had
sent a lady's reputed husband away to look for another husband, while he
and the lady remained together. The joke had not been much of a joke, but
it had been enough. It had gone forth, and had now brought the whole
palace of Broughton into grief, and had nearly driven our excellent Doctor
mad! "'Amo' in the cool of the evening!" The words stuck to him like the
shirt of Nessus, lacerating his very spirit. That words such as those
should have been sent to him in a solemn sober spirit by the bishop of his
diocese! It never occurred to him that he had, in truth, been imprudent
when paying his visits alone to Mrs. Peacocke.

It was late in the evening, and he wandered away up through the green
rides of a wood the borders of which came down to the glebe fields. He
had been boiling over with indignation while talking to his wife. But as
soon as he was alone he endeavoured,--purposely endeavoured to rid himself
for a while of his wrath. This matter was so important to him that he
knew well that it behoved him to look at it all round in a spirit other
than that of anger. He had talked of giving up his school, and giving up
his parish, and had really for a time almost persuaded himself that he
must do so unless he could induce the Bishop publicly to withdraw the
censure which he felt to have been expressed against him.

And then what would his life be afterwards? His parish and his school had
not been only sources of income to