"And I am certain," said Mr. Blackstone, "that if the loin set before the king, whoever he was, had been boiled, he would never have knighted it." Thanks to the loin, the last possible touch of constraint had vanished, and the party grew a very merry one. The apple-pudding which followed was declared perfect, and eaten up. Percivale produced some good wine from somewhere, which evidently added to the enjoyment of the gentlemen, my father included, who likes a good glass of wine as well as anybody. But a tiny little whimper called me away, and Miss Clare accompanied me; the gentlemen insisting that we should return as soon as possible, and bring the homuncle, as Roger called the baby, with us. When we returned, the two clergymen were in close conversation, and the other two gentlemen were chiefly listening. My father was saying,-- "My dear sir, I don't see how any man can do his duty as a clergyman who doesn't visit his parishioners." "In London it is simply impossible," returned Mr. Blackstone. "In the country you are welcome wherever you go; any visit I might pay would most likely be regarded either as an intrusion, or as giving the right to pecuniary aid, of which evils the latter is the worse. There are portions of every London parish which clergymen and their coadjutors have so degraded by the practical teaching of beggary, that they have blocked up every door to a healthy spiritual relation between them and pastor possible." "Would you not give alms at all, then?" "One thing, at least, I have made up my mind upon,--that alms from any but the hand of personal friendship tend to evil, and will, in the long run, increase misery." "What, then, do you suppose the proper relation between a London clergyman and his parishioners?" "One, I am afraid, which does not at present exist,--one which it is his first business perhaps to bring about. I confess I regard with a repulsion amounting to horror the idea of walking into a poor man's house, except either I have business with him, or desire his personal acquaintance." "But if our office"-- "Makes it my business to serve--not to assume authority over them especially to the degree of forcing service upon them. I will not say how far intimacy may not justify you in immediate assault upon a man's conscience; but I shrink from any plan that seems to take it for granted that the poor are more wicked than the rich. Why don't we send missionaries to Belgravia? The outside of the cup and platter may sometimes be dirtier than the inside." "Your missionary could hardly force his way through the servants to the boudoir or drawing-room." "And the poor have no servants to defend them." I have recorded this much of the conversation chiefly for the sake of introducing Miss Clare, who now spoke. "Don't you think, sir," she asked, addressing my father, "that the help one can give to another must always depend on the measure in which one is free one's self?"