around, things which ought to have been cursed, and things which really
ought not--for half of the worst sanatory sinners, in this blessed age
of ignorance, yclept of progress and science (how our grandchildren will
laugh at the epithets!) are utterly unconscious and guiltless ones.

But cursing leaves him, as it leaves other men, very much where he had
started.

To do him justice, he was in one thing a true nobleman, for he was above
all pride; as are most men of rank, who know what their own rank means.
It is only the upstart, unaccustomed to his new eminence, who stands on
his dignity, and "asserts his power."

So Scoutbush begged humbly of Thurnall only to tell him what he could
do.

"You might use your moral influence, my lord."

"Moral influence?" in a tone which implied naively enough, "I'd better
get a little morals myself before I talk of using the same."

"Your position in the parish--"

"My good sir!" quoth Scoutbush in his shrewd way; "do you not know
yourself what these fine fellows who were ready yesterday to kiss the
dust off my feet would say, if I asked leave to touch a single hair of
their rights?--'Tell you what, my lord; we pays you your rent, and you
takes it. You mind your business, and we'll mind our'n.' You forget that
times are changed since my seventeenth progenitor was lord of life and
limb over man and maid in Aberalva."