A WALK TO CHUECH. 381 



rising exclamation, but it was more than he could do to swal- 

 low with it the remainder of his breakfast. Presently he put 

 the letter in his pocket, rose, and left the room, bidding Lucy 

 prepare for church, but in a tone as altered as his looks. 



We walked with him, as usual, to our place of worship, 

 crossing a field behind the parsonage, which cut off an angle 

 of the road leading seawards and to church. Fresh snow had 

 fallen in the night, and the swept foot-path was bordered by 

 heaped-up ridges ; but not as usual did my uncle threaten to 

 roll Lucy in the flaky feather-beds, nor, when we reached the 

 high stile between the field and road, did he, as usual, jump 

 her over it ; and even when the few villagers, bound church- 

 wards like ourselves, doffed their hats and dropped their curt- 

 seys, they failed to receive, as always, the returning nod or 

 smile, or word of recognition, from their good humoured, easy 

 pastor. 



The effects of the vicar's letter of the morning were no less 

 discernible in his little antique reading-desk of carved oak. 

 To the consternation of Mr. Caligraph, who sat under it, next 

 the clerk, and the sore bewilderment of those of the congrega- 

 tion who possessed prayer-books and could read them, the 

 three psalrns appointed for the morning's service were omitted 

 in favour of those for the 23d of December, the date, pro- 

 bably, of that mischief-working spell. In the pulpit it was 

 still worse. Each accustomed ear pricked up, as usual, for the 

 sermon, and, expectant of a text appropriate to the day of 



