“I wish to tell you, sir, that I have never eaten a worse dinner at any hotel in my life,” he said. “There was not a dish that any one could eat--I consider it simply outrageous.” Not one word did the man understand, for the Canon had spoken in English. The proprietor smiled and bowed most placidly, saying--“_Je vous remercie mille fois, m'sieur--votre compliment est très distingué--très gracieux; je suis heureux--merci!_” He had too hastily assumed that the clergyman had offered him the usual congratulations upon his cuisine, and he had replied with more than his customary politeness, the visitor having shown himself to be much more enthusiastic than the ordinary run of people had time to be, considering that most of them were counting the moments until they should be in the Casino at Monte Carlo. I did not know who the very frank clergyman was at that time; but four or five years later I recognised him at Broadminster. His brother, the second best preacher, assuming the correctness of the Canon's judgment, though perhaps it might have been reversed on appeal, was rector of one of the parishes, and it was rumoured that he was not disposed at any time to take too humble a view of his claims to distinction, however slow other people might be to admit their validity. It is said that upon one occasion, on his return from a visit to the Holy Land, he preached a sermon giving some striking examples of the fulfilment of prophecy in connection with the topography of Palestine. “My dear friends,” he said, “I was particularly struck with the accuracy of some of the details of the prophecies, when one day I was among the ruins of one of those cities referred to in the Sacred Writings. I had the Book in my hand, and I read that the land should be in heaps: I looked up, and there were heaps on every side. I read that the bittern should cry there: I looked up, and, lo, a bittern was standing there in its loneliness. I read that the minister of the Lord should mourn there. My dear friends, _I was that minister_.” II.--THE “CHARPSON”