Year: 1879

He was vicar ol DerSey, TelnaIhauit
poor living, and, except in the matter OF
he could not be considered rlehly



Well born, we'll bred, well educated, it
might have been thought that he had many
chances in his favor, and that IL was not
impossible he might yet achieve great things;
but the only member of his house who had
ever held out helping hand was dead; ms
breeding was of that prepossessing but
not very serviceable description which
shrinks from contact with those who might
possibly prove of benefit; his education he
used in a manner only calculated to make
him bookworm; and so at eight-and forty
he found himself as regards fortune, just so
much worse than when he was ordained dea-
con that he had aged quarter of century,
and was sadded, moreover, wi h live serious
responsibilities IN the persons OF Wlfe ana
four daughters.


Sons had been given to him, but they
were dead; opportunities had presented
themselves, bu he was not the man to avail
himself of them. The list Of authors with
whose works he was intimately acquainted
could not be considered other than appall-
ing, but no writer among them had been
able to teach him how to compose really
fine sermon.


Even il ne had managed to do so, it would
not have been much appreciated by the
members of his congregation. Better for
him at Bersey to have known something
about sheep and roots, and the points OF a
good milch COW, and so win his way to inti-
macy with his people, than to excel IN ora
tory. But Mr.. Yarrell, though unblessed by
geuius, was not blessed with common sense.
If ever man were made butt Tor the irony
of fortune, he was the man. Ii ever round
peg found itself dropped into square hole,
n loff OF ha l,naW
even less than he did of courts. With the
tillers of the soil, and with the men who
looked to their laborers and their wheat
fields to provide bread for their families, the
wherewithal to satisfy their landlords re-
uuirements, he had as much understanding
sympathy as with Chinese. In return his
people did not in the least understand him.
That they liked and respected him, and in
vaguely were proud OF parson who could
read all the books ranged round the walls OF
his study, arose more perhaps from instinct
than from reason.


Mr.. FARRELL was Christian and a gentle
man, and if he buried his talent and rem
dere both qualities as useless as such quail
tiles ever can be made, it was more MS mis-
fortune than his fault.


Such men usually marry young wife
destitute of fortune. Mr.. Yarrell married
young lady who would have brought a
better dowry to him had she come with
empty hands.


As matters were,' she had dot of three
thousand pounds, which was so invested
and tied up that it brought in under hun
dred year; but if it had yielded a revenue
of thirty thousand, it could not have proved
a source of greater annoyance to Mr.. 4ar-
rell.


College debts, an unlucky signature-a
mere matter of form to oblige friend-eX-
penses incurred at first entering the Church,
an easy temperament and generous heart
had swallowed up the small fortune which
his father. younger son, left to him at his
death.


The living of Bersey, was, as l have said,
poor. Year by year Mr.. 4arrell failed to
make his outgoings balance his incomings
He had no personal eXtravagances; he was
co tent to sit down to cold mutton, or to no
mutton at all; but Mrs. Yarrell thought the
ninety odd pounds she possessed warranted
certain expenditure which might not have
been necessary had Mr.. Yarrell married a
"wife without siXpence;' and consequent
ly the rector had, when debts accumulated,
to make an effort and ask assistance from
his grandfather


So long as his grandfather lived the peri
odica famine at Bersey Vicarage was re-
lieved, not in any generous or agreeable
manner, perhaps, but still relieved.


Sir Bolton Yarrell did not give penny
more than he was asked-very often indeed,
not so much as he was asked ;and though he
might have procured his grandson better
and more congenial living, he never made
the least effort to do so. But still, to GER
tain extent he did help, and it was only
when he died, that the actual bitterness OF
insufficient means began to make itself felt
at Bersev Vicarage.


In due time there came the accustomed
difficulty, and when it had lasted for long
er period than usual, Mr.. Yarrell, though his
pride WINGED during the operation, asked the
now baronet, his cousin, for help.


Which was refused as curtly and discour-
teously as can well be imagined.


The latest owner had always been jealous
of the favor shown to Mr.. Yarrell, slight
though the evinences of that.fav were,
and he told the clergyman in so many words
that he did not intend to admit the claims
of relationship or to burden himself with
the maintenance of any of his kindred.


1t was merciful letter, inasmuch as it
was perfectly straightforward and conclsive.
The writer encouraged no false hopes, and
expressed no sympathy with misfortune, de-
served or undeserved. 81 have my wife
and family to see to- he concluded; land
having been kept out of the property for an
unreasonable period, must now try to
make the best Lean of it,"


He was right enough, no doubt, according
to his light. If the old baronet had lived
another year, he would have been century
old; and the new baronet was not young
man; so as he said, it behooved him to make
the best use of his time.


Though title may run in family, old
age can scarcely be expected to do so like
wise.


On a certain spring morning in the six
ties, then, things were, in spite Of glorious
sunrising, looking very black indeed at Ber-
sey Vicarage. +


Susie, the eldest daughter, girl in age, a
mind, acknowledged this fact with a
sigh as she laid her fathers letters on her
fathers study-table and saw that there were
even more than the usual number of sus-
picious-looking envelopes amongst them.


Susie, though still in her teens, was in
that family a very tower of strength. Ii
she had been a man she would have gone
out and fought lions; she would have striven
to STAY Goliaths. She was strong in her
love, her loyalty and her tenderness, and it
almost broke her young heart to see the
gray hairs in her fathers head and to notice
how he was getting to stoop, also how much
meeker than ever the dear face was grow
ing.


When the trouble and the trial seemed
more than she could bear, he was wont to
run out into the vicarage gasrden, and, bury
ing her face against the soft turf growing at
the root of some old tree, sob,


80 papa! my own dear, dear, sweet
papap'


Mrs. Yarrell met her trials differently.
She breakfasted in bed, and lay on the sofa
most part of the day. Each of us has his or
her peculiar way of encountering misfor-
tune, and Mrs. Yarrell generally got the
best of hers by maintaining, as far as the
outside world was concerned, a mastery in
activity.


Things had arrived at very bad pass in
deed on that especial spring morning; they
were so bad Susie could not even cry about
them. Her tears seemed dried up, and with
reason, for the dignity of existence was be-
ginning to Cypress her. She was old
enough now to suffer the keenest pang a
girls heart can know. News had come that
week of the success of our arms in Abyssinia
and to her that the man she had loved al
her young life-ever since she could re-
member anything-loved as boy, STRIPPING,
soldier, was badly, though not mortally
wounded.


That morning the perfume of the flowers
was not grateful to her or the gladstone
sunshine pleasant. Across the house these
seemed to lie the shadow of impending ruin !;