"What can there be in common between Theobald and his parishioners?"
said Christina to me, in the course of the evening, when her husband
was for a few moments absent. "Of course one must not complain, but
I assure you it grieves me to see a man of Theobald's ability thrown
away upon such a place as this. If we had only been at Gaysbury, where
there are the A's, the B's, the C's, and Lord D's place, as you
know, quite close, I should not then have felt that we were living
in such a desert; but I suppose it is for the best," she added more
cheerfully, "and then of course the Bishop will come to us whenever he
is in the neighbourhood, and if we were at Gaysbury he might have gone
to Lord D's."
Perhaps I have now said enough to indicate the kind of place in
which Theobald's lines were cast, and the sort of woman he had
married. As for his own habits, I see him trudging through muddy lanes
and over long sweeps of plover-haunted pastures to visit a dying
cottager's wife. He takes her meat and wine from his own table, and
that not a little only but liberally. According to his lights also, he
administers what he is pleased to call spiritual consolation.
Pages:
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120