270 A FARMER'S YEAR 



in a more ideally managed institution, would be reserved as the 

 resting-places of its aged and work-worn servants. Sundry sine- 

 cures and abuses have vanished during the last few generations, 

 yet the Church still finds faithful ministers, and many believe that 

 the more she is purified the greater will be the opportunity of her 

 true votaries of those who serve her first for herself and afterwards 

 for their own advantage. Amongst plentiful examples, the exist- 

 ence of such noble and self-denying corporations as the Universi- 

 ties Mission to Central Africa, whose devoted members, I am told, 

 in most instances receive nothing but food, lodging and an allow- 

 ance for clothes, proves that such men exist, and will come forward 

 when the call for them arises. But the labourer is not grudged his 

 hire in the vast majority of cases I, for one, should like to see 

 that hire considerably augmented and doubtless these are 

 counsels of perfection. Yet is it not towards such counsels, by 

 many a thorny avenue of doubt, failure, and derision, that the 

 spiritual nature of man, as expressed in faith and works, should 

 and does make good its slow advance ? 



Of one thing I am almost certain if the Church does not or 

 cannot reform itself, ere long the laity will lose patience and take 

 the matter into their own hands. Then perchance may come not 

 reform but revolution. 



July 9. To-day is exceptionally cold and dull, with the usual 

 strong north-east wind, and a temperature this evening on a south 

 wall of about 50. Even in this climate it strikes one as a little 

 strange on the Qth of July to see people driving about the roads 

 wrapped up in thick shawls and ulsters. I said some days ago 

 that the farming position was becoming critical, and now for 

 * becoming ' we must read * become.' Suitable weather may yet 

 save the situation, but if so it must be met with soon, as, if we do 

 not have sunshine within a week, the corns will, I think, be poor. 



July 12. After Sunday the loth, which was cold and dull 

 with a nor'-east wind, the weather seems to have taken a turn, 



