356 THE OLD MANOR HOUSE 



great leveller lends a natural dignity, and invests 

 with supreme interest and pathos any one, be he 

 high or low, rich or poor, who is about to tread the 

 path which he needs must tread all alone. This is 

 true everywhere ; but it is, I think, especially true 

 of the poor, and of the poor of Dorset. The dignity 

 and importance of the dying man is shared, in their 

 various degrees, by all who have to do with him. 

 The relatives often discuss, in his presence, with the 

 utmost plainness of speech, the question of how long 

 he can "last," and talk, in all too familiar and positive 

 language, of the secrets of that unseen world, 



" The future and its viewless things, 

 That undiscovered mystery, 

 Which one who feels Death's winnowing wings 

 Must needs read clearer far than they." 



To tell the sick man, under such circumstances, 

 when you are taken up to see him, that he is 

 looking better, is often regarded as something of 

 an affront both to himself and to his belongings ; 

 while, should he himself, in some faint access, some 

 feeble flicker of hope, when the bystanders know 

 that no hope is, remark one day, that "he feels better 

 in himself," there will seldom be wanting, among those 

 who crowd round his bedside, a Job's comforter to 

 tell him, with the kindest intentions, but in the 



