144 THE EULOGY OF RICHARD JEFFERIES. 



bind its feeble walls together. Of the pave- 

 ments, whose flag-stones are monuments, the 

 dates and names worn by footsteps ; of the 

 vaults beneath, with their grim and ghastly 

 traditions of coffins moved out of place, as was 

 supposed, by supernatural agency, but, as ex- 

 plained, by water; of the thick walls in which, 

 in at least one village church, the trembling 

 victim of priestly cruelty was immured alive 

 of these, and a thousand other matters that 

 suggest themselves, there is no time to speak. 

 But just a word must be spared to notice one 

 lovely spot where two village churches stand 

 not a hundred yards apart, separated by a 

 stream, both in the hands of one vicar, whose 

 1 cure ' is, nevertheless, so scant of souls, that 

 service in the morning in one, and in the even- 

 ing in the other church, is amply sufficient. 

 And where is there a place where spring-time 

 possesses such a tender yet melancholy interest 

 to the heart, as in a village churchyard, where 

 the budding leaves, and flowers in the grass, 

 may naturally be taken as symbolical of a still 

 more beautiful spring-time yet in store for the 

 soul?" 



