"That is the kind of priest we want, sir," said Dick.

"Eh?"

"That is the kind of priest we want, sir," repeated Dick solemnly. "We
should do better with natives than foreigners. We want priests who know
the county and the ways of the people--and men too, I think, sir, who
can ride and know something of sport, and can talk of it. I told Mr.
Simpson, sir, of the sport we were to have to-day, and he seemed to care
nothing about it!"

Robin sighed aloud.

"I suppose so," he said.

"Mr. John looked well, sir," pursued Dick, and proceeded to speak at
length of the FitzHerbert troubles, and the iniquities of the Queen's
Grace. He was such a man as was to be found throughout all England
everywhere at this time--a man whose religion was a part of his
politics, and none the less genuine for that. He was a shrewd man in his
way, with the simplicity which belongs to such shrewdness; he disliked
the new ways which he experienced chiefly in the towns, and put them
down, not wholly without justice, to the change of which religion formed
an integral part; he hated the beggars and would gladly have gone to see
one flogged; and he disliked the ministers and their sermons and their
"prophesyings" with all the healthy ardour of prejudice. Once in the
year did Dick approach the sacraments, and a great business he made of
it, being unusually morose before them and almost indecently boisterous
after them. He was feudal to the very heart of him; and it was his
feudality that made him faithful to his religion as well as to his