if it should fall vacant before the young lord was twenty-five
years of age, and in the young lord's hands if it should fall
afterwards. But the mother and the heir consented to give a joint
promise to Dr Robarts. Now, as the present incumbent was over
seventy, and as the living was worth 900 pounds a year, there could
be no doubt as to the eligibility of the clerical profession. And
I must further say, that the dowager and the doctor were justified
in their choice by the life and principles of the young man--as
far as any father can be justified in choosing such a profession
for his son, and as far as any lay impropriator can be justified in
making such a promise. Had Lady Lufton had a second son, that
second son would probably have had the living, and no one would
have thought it wrong;--certainly not if that second son had been
such a one as Mark Robarts.

Lady Lufton herself was a woman who thought much on religious
matters, and would by no means have been disposed to place any one
in a living, merely because such a one had been her son's friend.
Her tendencies were High Church, and she was enabled to perceive
that those of young Mark Robarts ran in the same direction. She
was very desirous that her son should make an associate of his
clergyman, and by this step she would ensure, at any rate, that.
She was anxious that the parish vicar should be one with whom she
could herself fully co-operate, and was perhaps unconsciously
wishful that he might in some measure be subject to her influence.
Should she appoint an elder man, this might probably not be the
case to the same extent; and should her son have the gift, it might
probably not be the case at all. And, therefore, it was resolved
that the living should be given to young Robarts.