"Of course not. It is because, as I say, I do not know my neighbours." "I think, here in Suffolk, they must be chiefly the poor," said Mr. Hepworth. "They were chiefly the poor who at first put their faith in our Saviour," said the priest. "I think the analogy is hardly correctly drawn," said the bishop, with a curious smile. "We were speaking of those who are still attached to an old creed. Our Saviour was the teacher of a new religion. That the poor in the simplicity of their hearts should be the first to acknowledge the truth of a new religion is in accordance with our idea of human nature. But that an old faith should remain with the poor after it has been abandoned by the rich is not so easily intelligible." [Illustration: The bishop thinks that the priest's analogy is not correct.] "The Roman population still believed," said Carbury, "when the patricians had learned to regard their gods as simply useful bugbears." "The patricians had not ostensibly abandoned their religion. The people clung to it thinking that their masters and rulers clung to it also." "The poor have ever been the salt of the earth, my lord," said the priest. "That begs the whole question," said the bishop, turning to his host, and beginning to talk about a breed of pigs which had lately been imported into the palace styes. Father Barham turned to Mr. Hepworth and went on with his argument, or rather began another. It was a mistake to suppose that the Catholics in the county were all poor. There were the A----s and the B----s, and the C----s and the D----s. He knew all their names and was proud of their fidelity. To him these faithful ones were really the salt of the earth, who would some day be enabled by their fidelity to restore England to her pristine condition. The bishop had truly said that of many of his neighbours he did not know to what Church they belonged; but Father Barham, though he had not as yet been twelve months in the county, knew the name of nearly every Roman Catholic within its borders. "Your priest is a very zealous man," said the bishop afterwards to Roger Carbury, "and I do not doubt but that he is an excellent gentleman; but he is perhaps a little indiscreet." "I like him because he is doing the best he can according to his lights; without any reference to his own worldly welfare." "That is all very grand, and I am perfectly willing to respect him. But I do not know that I should care to talk very freely in his company." "I am sure he would repeat nothing." "Perhaps not; but he would always be thinking that he was going to get the best of me." "I don't think it answers," said Mrs. Yeld to her husband as they went home. "Of course I don't want to be prejudiced; but Protestants are Protestants, and Roman Catholics are Roman Catholics." "You may say the same of Liberals and Conservatives, but you wouldn't have them decline to meet each other." "It isn't quite the same, my dear. After all religion is religion."