blanche_ by the "Good Earl of Shrewsbury" to build as he liked, with no fear of the "accursed blue pencil" (as he called it) {232} which so often mutilated his elaborate designs.[5] "As attractive an example of the architect's skill as could be quoted," a severe critic[6] had called the Cheadle church; and the tribute was well deserved. Two days after my return to our abbey I was formally installed in office as prior, by my good friend the abbot of Ampleforth, with the same ceremonial which I had witnessed thirty-four years previously, when Dom Jerome Vaughan was inducted into office in the vaulted guard-room of the old Fort, afterwards incorporated into the monastic guest-house. The burden of superiorship, a heavy one enough, was lightened not only by the unanimous kindness of my own brethren, but by the cordiality with which my appointment was greeted by friends outside, including the bishop and clergy of our diocese of Aberdeen, who were the guests of the abbey for their annual retreat, a few days after my installation. A consoling message, too, came to me from the Holy Father himself through Père Lépicier, who had come from Rome in the quality of Apostolic Visitor to Scotland, and stayed with us for some days; a Franco-Roman diplomatist with the suavest possible manner and address, masking (it struck me) no little acuteness and a strong personality. His visit, and that of the diocesan clergy, coincided with {233} St. Oswald's Day, which we kept very happily, many of our neighbours in the village and district, including my old friend the parish minister, dining with us in the monastic refectory. A still older friend, George Lane Fox, sent me a cordial telegram; and I was able to send one in return congratulating him on the handsome testimonial he had just received on his retirement from a quarter of a century's office as Vice-chancellor of the Primrose League. A grief to us both, only a few days later, was the news of the death, at our abbey of Cesena in Italy, of his eldest son, who had been closely connected with Fort Augustus from his childhood, first as a little boy in the abbey-school, and later as a monk and priest of our community.