envious who could not succeed in winning the social popularity that
everywhere attended Mr. Dyceworthy's movements. For he was
undoubtedly popular,--no one could deny that. In the small Yorkshire
town where he usually had his abode, he came little short of being
adored by the women of his own particular sect, who crowded to
listen to his fervent discourses, and came away from them on the
verge of hysteria, so profoundly moved were their sensitive souls by
his damnatory doctrines. The men were more reluctant in their
admiration, yet even they were always ready to admit "that he was an
excellent fellow, with his heart in the right place."

He had a convenient way of getting ill at the proper seasons, and of
requiring immediate change of air, whereupon his grateful flock were
ready and willing to subscribe the money necessary for their beloved
preacher to take repose and relaxation in any part of the world he
chose. This year, however, they had not been asked to furnish the
usual funds for travelling expenses, for the resident minister of
Bosekop, a frail, gentle old man, had been seriously prostrated
during the past winter with an affection of the lungs, which
necessitated his going to a different climate for change and rest.
Knowing Dyceworthy as a zealous member of the Lutheran persuasion,
and, moreover, as one who had in his youth lived for some years in
Christiania,--thereby gaining a knowledge of the Norwegian tongue,--
he invited him to take his place for his enforced time of absence,
offering him his house, his servants, his pony-carriage and an
agreeable pecuniary douceur in exchange for his services,--proposals
which the Reverend Charles eagerly accepted. Though Norway was not
exactly new to him, the region of the Alton Fjord was, and he at
once felt, though he knew not why, that the air there would be the
very thing to benefit his delicate constitution. Besides, it looked