A JOURNAL KEPT IN THE COUNTRY. 223 



an adjournment to the lane behind the School House), 

 the Council has achieved absolutely nothing. The 

 impression that there is nothing for it to do seems to 

 be growing. We surmise that this was perhaps in- 

 tended from the first ; and I think that for some little 

 time we have been breathing freely again. 



At the next station to Tisfield there got into our 

 compartment three County Councillors going to 

 Lewes for a Council meeting, well-set-up men in 

 tweeds and straw hats, with a pleasant country look 

 about them. Two are retired Army men, the other a 

 landowner. General Rich, who represents Arnington 

 with the half-dozen adjacent parishes, a grey- 

 moustached cavalryman, with a fine earnest face and 

 masterful eyes, nods to Mr. Biles, who replies with 

 jerky nervousness. The fame of the demagogue has 

 not reached the other councillors, who represent the 

 Seckington and Ashcombe divisions. The land- 

 owner is lean, grey-whiskered, with something of a 

 Royal Society look through his pince-nez ; the other 

 officer is a big handsome man, burned to leather by 

 Indian sun, grave and quiet, with all the discipline of 

 the world about him. The three talk in easy half- 

 slang (which must be scandal to Mr. Biles, whose 

 lightest moments are Macaulayan), looking over the 

 agenda-papers of their meeting. We hear of such 



