considering his habits, occasionally in the most self-denying manner,
whenever Mr. Gibson, or any one else, made them clearly known to him.
'Use my purse as freely as if it was your own, Gibson,' he was wont to
say. 'I'm such a bad one at going about and making talk to poor folk--I
dare say I don't do enough in that way--but I am most willing to give
you anything for any one you may consider in want.'

'Thank you; I come upon you pretty often, I believe, and make very
little scruple about it; but if you'll allow me to suggest, it is, that
you should not try to make talk when you go into the cottages; but just
talk.'

'I don't see the difference,' said the vicar, a little querulously;
'but I dare say there is a difference, and I have no doubt what you say
is quite true. I should not make talk, but talk; and as both are
equally difficult to me, you must let me purchase the privilege of
silence by this ten-pound note.'

'Thank you. It is not so satisfactory to me; and, I should think, not
to yourself. But probably the Joneses and Greens will prefer it.'

Mr. Ashton would look with plaintive inquiry into Mr. Gibson's face
after some such speech, as if asking if a sarcasm was intended. On the
whole they went on in the most amicable way; only beyond the gregarious
feeling common to most men, they had very little actual pleasure in
each other's society. Perhaps the man of all others to whom Mr. Gibson
took the most kindly--at least, until Lord Hollingford came into the
neighbourhood--was a certain Squire Hamley. He and his ancestors had
been called squire as long back as local tradition extended. But there
was many a greater landowner in the county, for Squire Hamley's estate