The lad scratched his head as he replied in the slow drawl of his native place-- “’Tisn’t ezactly that, my lady. Passon isn’t zick; but he du have one of his hens a settin’ in the pulpit, and zo he du not wish her distarbed.” Eustace broke into a peal of laughter. It seemed a delicious notion to him that the service of the parish church was to be suspended because an erratic hen had chosen to sit herself in the sacred building. It chimed in with many notions he already held of the effeteness and deadness of the Church. He glanced into his companion’s face for an answering smile, but Bride was looking straight before her with an expression in her liquid dark eyes which he was quite unable to fathom. “You can go to hear Mr. St. Aubyn at St. Erme, George,” she said kindly to the lad, after a moment’s pause, but he only scratched his head again, and said-- “Mappen I’ll go tu Dan’s and year Maister Tresithny. They du zay as he’ll read a bit out o’ the book and tell folks what it all means.” “That will be better than getting into mischief,” said the lady, with a grave though kindly look at the lad; and then she passed onwards to the house, Eustace walking beside her, smiling still. “Are the services of the Church often suspended here for such weighty reasons?” he asked. “Not often,” answered Bride, still in the same gravely quiet way; “but Mr. Tremodart is hardly alive to the sacredness of his calling nor the sanctity of his office. He is a kind man, but he does not win souls by his teaching. The church is very badly attended: no doubt he thinks one service more or less of small importance. The people, I believe, like him all the better for giving them an occasional holiday from attendance, even though they may be very irregular in coming.” “I should think that highly probable,” answered Eustace, still examining Bride’s face with some curiosity, as if anxious to gauge her thoughts on this subject and to seek to find in them some accord with his own. “My experiences of the services at St. Bride’s Church are not very stirring. The smell of dry-rot suggests the idea that it has been caught from the calibre of the discourses heard there. Our friend Mr. Tremodart may have many virtues, but he has not the gift of eloquence.” Bride made no response. In her eyes there was a look akin to pain, as though she felt the truth of the stricture, and yet it went against her to admit its truth. Eustace waited for a moment and then continued in the same light way-- “And will the service of the parish church be suspended for three Sundays?--for, if my boyish recollections serve me, that is the time required by a hen for bringing off her brood.”