The Morris County chronicle. [volume] (Morristown, N.J.) 1877-1915, 1906-01-02
CHAPTER ".

In these later days Of earnestness
one seldom meets in real life-never, 1
think, in fiction-a clergyman SO stoical-
ly Indifferent to all parties and to all
party. opinions as was Mr.. Follett.
Very early in life he had married,
and lost his wife in less than a year;
and, never having had any womanly
presence in his house since, all his hab-
its and ways of thought were those of
lonely, unloved man. He was neither
morose nor unkindly -only Indifferent
to whatever affairs of other people
were rot actually thrust upon him;
and a good deal taken up in the farm
ing of his own glebe-and in his own
garden-and in his own books.
If he had attained to all he hoped
for when he was lad, would he, at
eight-and-thirty, rise, and walk, and
dine, and go to sleep again, with any
very greater zest than he did now, as
the lonely curate of souls in Chester
ford st. Mary? This, if it had been
put into words, would have pretty just
~ summed up the semi-consolatory,
sem-bitter view with which Mr.. Follett
had brought himself to think of his
own moral state and Of his life.
But the world in general saw in the
Vicar of Chesterford an excellent, quiet
paTson, Of no particular views, char
table to his poor, on terms of good
will with his richer neighbors-all that
country clergyman ought to be. Els
pecially did single ladies' Of certain
age nasmuch as he was widower,
and possessed of a fair competency
give Mr.. Follett the palm over all his
fellows, whether Wears or curates, in
the neighborhood.
And Of all this band Of virgin con-
! fessors Miss Lynch was the head and
chief. Long ago, when she first came
| to Chesterford, Mr. Follett had been
sensible that this elderly woman perse-
cuted him, and had striven to avoid
| her, but his constitution was too es-
sentially averse to trouble for him to
sustain any very heightened conflict on
such a point; and for many years now
| he had received all Miss Lynch's at
tent;ons without struggle. They
wearied him, certainly; but would it
not have W earied him vast deal more
to resist? And if he was obliged to
see much of Jane Grand's governess,
was be not also obliged to see much of
Jane Grand herself? Not shade of
| sentiment which men of his age oc-
casionally feel for very young girls,
and call love not the remotest APP
proach to personal admiration, even to
paternal tenderness had ever yet en-
tered into his feeling for her. Indeed,
| if had not just horror Of using an
affected term, would say that (up to
the time when Clifford began to fall
| in love with Jane Grand Mr.. Folletts
regard for her was simply and purely
an aesthetic one; her fresh and graceful
youth ministering to his innate sense
of refinement, as a fine painting or ex-
quisite music might have done, could
such gifts have miraculously come to
him in his unlovely and prosaic life
among the Devonshire marshes.
However this may have been, Miss
Lynch, with the one instinct that re-
mains true even to the most foolish Of
women Miss Lynch hadearly seen the
superior hold she maintained over the
vicar through little James agency and,
seeing, had improved her position to
| the uttermost.
MI. h0lett was The only person TO
fwhom she felt il her duty to contde the
past history Of her charge. In James
/ childhood, Mr. FolIett must direct her
education; dis she grew older would j
( be asking too much Of Mr.. Follett to SO
through little course Of English read
ling with the poor girl himselfs All Of