have liked to help Mr Dale with her advice; but these young men are so conceited, that they will not take advice from girls. Ned Harefel, too, who had always consulted her, had gone abroad, without announcing his intention, or even saying goodbye. Why should he wander away alone, and prefer picture-galleries full of guides, and churches desecrated by Cockneys, to the most eligible country-houses? Young men are very silly and very wilful. The longer Miss Katharine lived, the more certain was she of this fact. She determined to think little about them. She had no intention of playing the hen on the edge of the duck-pond. To the young lady thinking such thoughts, the quiet of her country home was not so satisfactory as usual. She was glad to start on a round of visits, and to amuse herself with the humours of new people. It was perhaps a little dull when the men were shooting, but the evenings were sometimes gay, and she was generally able to occupy her thoughts with the passing show. Her progress was a triumph. Men eminent and men fashionable, elderly bachelors and solemn boys, were all more or less attentive. So she amused herself with no intent of harm, and escaped uninjured.

At Oxford the winter passed more slowly, but still it passed away. Finding that he had kept terms enough, and that the dons had ceased to expect that he would do much honour to the college, Irvine went in for a pass and took his degree. He pleaded the state of his district as a reason for spending Christmas in Oxford. He could not yet bear the numberless associations of home. He began the new year with a purpose of servile obedience to Dick Romney. He nursed his respect for this good man carefully and jealously. He felt that an object of veneration was necessary for his life.

"Is there no man worthy?" he had asked in his bitterness, and had feared the answer as he feared death. One Sunday morning in early summer he prepared to go to church as usual, because Romney expected his voice in the choir. He was overworked, tired and restless, but pleased to obey in spite of disinclination. ""Ere's old Dismal," said a small boy at the corner, and Dale heard him with no sense of amusement. He recognised a pupil, and wondered if his mission was to damp all youthful gaiety. Within the church was a Sunday morning congregation, far more respectable than the gatherings on week-day evenings. The folk

whose gala clothes were in pawn, showed a proper pride by remaining at home. Those with whom the world went better, were gay with cheap bits of excruciating colour. Few workmen were present, and their wives were subdued by the neighbourhood of the tradesmen's ladies, who only came on Sundays. These latter were rendered somewhat uneasy by new ideas of Christian charity, supported by a secret belief that the High Church was fashionable, but depressed by an hereditary horror of the slums. Their dress, though of better material, was no whit more beautiful than that of their poorer neighbours. With them came their substantial husbands in shiny black, willing to humour the weaker vessels, but themselves preferring a less compromising service. In her accustomed corner might be discerned some slight faded lady, inclined to pious observance-a cheese-parer, perhaps certainly a mighty fusser over little things-something of a tyrant, descending in her guarded ladyism, but working honestly, and with a very tender heart for dirty little children. But these were few and far between. Regarded as a whole, the congregation was not impressive, nor was the church so beautiful in the broad pitiless light of day. The sun shone through the windows, and the mean was

laid bare in all its meanness. The loving work and prayer of generations had been put into the foreign cathedral which had furnished the model. The copy had been done in a hurry. The architect had made money. The contractor had made a good deal of money. The work had been scamped.

In came the procession. It was the lot of Irvine Dale that morning to walk by a greasy man of sensual aspect, swelling in his crumpled white gown, an amateur who valued himself in the choir -possessor of a loose bass voice. Irvine had a horror of this yoke-fellow. Before them walked the curate, Ambrose Hart, who went as far as he was allowed in decoration, and seemed to lie in wait for filching further concessions, slipping out his foot and peering, as one who loves to get the better of his bishop. A strip of some green stuff was about his neck. Things did not go very well.

that day. The first slaughter, and the great deeds of the warriors of Israel were read by the Rev. Ambrose Hart in a soft, careful voice, which was not his own, but the echo of a greater man. The singing was pretentious, but uncertain. Romney was overworked, and took little part in the service. Perhaps it was fatigue which prevented him from seeing that the

lesson was a chronicle of

choir boys had invented a new game. Dale touched the small singer who sat before him, accused himself of finding a vent for his irritation, and blamed himself for his self-accusation. To what end was this perpetual thinking through and through every thought? Should he never do the smallest action. without solemnly arraigning himself? Were his motives so vastly important? Thinking in this dull accustomed round, he sat and looked so dreary, that kindly women thought that he worked too hard, and one gentle sister allowed her thoughts to wander to a pattern of consoling slippers. She wondered if she might extend these female ministrations to one who was not a curate. She turned up her meek eyes, and met a scowl, which was not intended for her. The current of Irvine's thoughts was interrupted by Mr Hart's quick ascent of the pulpit-stairs. This rising ecclesiastic had long practised an eager rush into the pulpit. A neck thrust out, a whisk of robes, and there he was, and the impromptu sermon had begun. Before old ladies had rubbed their eyes, he was at them. He had just been ordained priest, and was full of enthusiasm for the priestly office. This youth, who looked younger than he was, with high, smooth forehead and carefully-arranged hair, a tonsure or