The vicar and his sister Eleanor were sitting at breakfast in the small Georgian house, which, as the vicarage, played a still important part in the village of Ipscombe. The Church may be in a bad way, as her own children declare; revolution may be in sight, as our English Bolshevists love to believe--not too seriously; but meanwhile, if a stranger in any normal English village wants to lay his finger on the central ganglion of its various activities, he will still look for the church and the vicarage--or rectory, as the case may be. If the parson is bad or feeble, the pulse of the village life will show it; and if he is energetic and self-devoted, his position will give him a power in the community--power, tempered of course by the necessary revolts and reactions which keep the currents of life flowing--not to be easily attained by other energetic and self-devoted persons. The parson may still easily make himself a tyrant, but only to find, in the language of the Greek poet, that it was "folly even to wish" to tyrannize. The vicar had come downstairs that morning in a mood of depression, irritable--almost snappish depression. His sister Eleanor had seldom seen him so unlike himself. Being an affectionate sister, she was sorry for him; though, as she rightly guessed, it was that very news which had brought such great relief of mind to herself which was almost certainly responsible for her brother's gloom. Miss Henderson was engaged to Captain Ellesborough. There was therefore no question of her becoming Mrs. Shenstone, and a weight was lifted from the spirits of the vicar's sister. Towards Rachel, Eleanor Shenstone felt one of those instinctive antipathies of life which are far more decisive than any of the ordinary causes of quarrel. Miss Shenstone was thin, methodical, devoted; of small speech and great virtue. Such persons so securely anchored and self-determined can have but small sympathy for the drifters of this world. And that Rachel Henderson was--at least as compared with herself and her few cherished friends--morally and religiously adrift, Miss Shenstone had decided after half an hour's conversation.