will be getting cold, gentlemen.'

So we went back to table. After a while, Mr Holdsworth broke the
silence:--'If I were you, Manning, I'd look up these relations of
yours. You can go and see what they're like while we re waiting
for Dobson's estimates, and I'll smoke a cigar in the garden
meanwhile.'

'Thank you, sir. But I don't know them, and I don't think I want
to know them.'

'What did you ask all those questions for, then?' said he,
looking quickly up at me. He had no notion of doing or saying
things without a purpose. I did not answer, so he
continued,--'Make up your mind, and go off and see what this
farmer-minister is like, and come back and tell me--I should like
to hear.'

I was so in the habit of yielding to his authority, or influence,
that I never thought of resisting, but went on my errand, though
I remember feeling as if I would rather have had my head cut off.
The landlord, who had evidently taken an interest in the event of
our discussion in a way that country landlords have, accompanied
me to the house-door, and gave me repeated directions, as if I
was likely to miss my way in two hundred yards. But I listened to
him, for I was glad of the delay, to screw up my courage for the
effort of facing unknown people and introducing myself. I went
along the lane, I recollect, switching at all the taller roadside
weeds, till, after a turn or two, I found myself close in front
of the Hope Farm. There was a garden between the house and the