It will be readily conceived that these events rendered Cambridge no pleasant place of residence for Thirlwall, deprived of his occupation as a teacher and unsupported by any particularly strong force of liberal opinion in the University. Yet he had the courage to make the experiment of continuing to live in college. He went abroad for the Long Vacation of 1834, and returned at the beginning of the October term. In a few weeks, however, the course of his life was changed by an unexpected event. Lord Melbourne’s first Ministry broke up, and just as Lord Chancellor Brougham was regretting that Sedgwick and Thirlwall were the only clergymen who had deserved well of the Liberal party for whom he had been unable to provide, came the news of the death of a gentleman who was both canon of Norwich and rector of Kirby Underdale, a valuable but very secluded living in Yorkshire. He at once offered the canonry to Sedgwick and the rectory to Thirlwall. Both offers were accepted, we believe, without hesitation; and both appointments, though evidently made without regard to the special fitness of the persons selected, were thoroughly successful. Sedgwick threw himself into the duties of a cathedral dignitary with characteristic vigour; and Thirlwall, whose only experience of parochial work had been at Over, in Cambridgeshire, a small village without a parsonage, of which he was vicar for a few months in 1829, became a zealous and popular parish priest. We are told that ‘the recollection still survives of regular services with full and attentive congregations, including incomers from neighbouring villages; of the frequent visits to the village school; of the extempore prayers with his flock, of which the larger number were Dissenters; of the assiduous attentions to the sick and poor.’ And his old friend Hare, writing to Whewell in 1840, describes his work in his parish as ‘perfect,’ and holds up his example as ‘an encouragement’ to his correspondent to go and do likewise[56].