From the low Bedford level, what a flight to the wildest spot in wild Yorkshire, Haworth, and its venerable old parish church, celebrated now as a classic region, haunted by the memory of the author of _Jane Eyre_, and all the Brontë family; but in the times of which we are writing, the vicar, William Grimshaw, was quite as queer and quaint a creature as Berridge. A wild spot now—a stern, grand place; desolate moors still seeming to stretch all round it; though more easily reached in this day, it must indeed have been a rough solitude when William Grimshaw became its vicar, in 1742. He was born in 1708; he died in 1763. He was a man something of the nature of the wild moors around him. When he became the pastor of the parish, the people all round him were plunged in the most sottish heathenism. The pastor was a kind of son of the desert, and he became such an one as the Baptist, crying in the wilderness. The people were rough, they perhaps needed a rough shepherd; they had one. The character of Grimshaw is that of a rough, faithful, and not less beautiful shepherd’s dog. On the Sabbath morning he would commence his service, giving out the psalm, and having taken note of the absentees from the congregation, would start off, while the psalm was being sung, to drive in the loiterers, visiting the ale-houses, routing out the drinkers, and literally compelling them to come into the parish church. One Sabbath morning, a stranger riding through Haworth, seeing some men scrambling over a garden wall, and some others leaping through a low window, imagined the house was on fire. He inquired what was the matter. One of them cried out, “The parson’s a coming!” and that explained the riddle. Upon another occasion, as a man was passing through the village, on the Sabbath day, on his way to call a doctor, his horse lost a shoe. He found his way to the village smithy to have his loss repaired. The blacksmith told him that it was the Lord’s day, and the work could not be done unless the minister gave his permission. So they went to the parson, who, of course, as the case was urgent and necessary, gave his consent. But the story illustrates the mastery the vicar attained over the rough minds around him. He was a man of a hardy mould. He was intensely earnest. He not only effected a mighty moral change in his own parish, but Haworth was visited every Sabbath by pilgrims from miles round to listen to this singular, strong, mountain voice; so that the church became unequal to the great congregations, and he often had to preach in the churchyard, a desolate looking spot now, but alive with mighty concourses then. It is said that his strong, pithy words haunted men long after they were spoken, as the infidel nobleman, who, in an affected manner, told him he was unable to see the truth of Christianity. “The fault,” said the rough vicar, “is not so much in your lordship’s head as in your heart.” [Illustration: GRIMSHAW’S HOUSE. ]