324 REMINISCENCES OF A HUNTSMAN 



" he is provided for." Why, if that young man is to eat and 

 di-ink, and clothe himself so as not to be cut for a beggarly 

 appearance by his silver-spooned friends, and to have an 

 occasional penny in his pocket to relieve the deserving poor, 

 how on earth is he to live? At home he had every luxury 

 given him, at college he was forced into wine parties when he 

 should have trained his stomach as well as his brains to " the 

 living," forsooth, that was to be his portion, and then when he 

 commenced to live on his own account it was expected that he 

 should at once fall into the fare of the cheapest and smallest 

 beer and bacon. His father dies, perhaps his elder brother 

 having succeeded to the estates calls to see him, and hears a 

 tradesman dun him for money, and then asks him the question 

 of " Why don't he pay his debts ? " " Why don't you go in 

 and win ? " is often said to a boy at school in a battle in which 

 he is getting thrashed, and there is as much wisdom in the 

 question of " Why don't you pay your debts ? " as there is in 

 the advice to " go in and win." How can a man pay who has 

 no money, or a boy " go in and win " who is knocked down 

 whenever he faces his antagonist .'' There is nothing so respect- 

 able, or more to be admired, or more useful than a good parish 

 priest, and yet I have known them well acquit themselves of 

 their arduous duties on a salary that had I offered it to my first 

 whipper-in he would have left me. There is nothing more 

 despicable than a bad or neglectful clergyman ; I fell among 

 two or three in Bedfordshire, and had plenty of opportunities 

 of seeing how the dissenter, and in short every form of religionist, 

 added to their congregations from the flocks of the established 

 shepherd, whose ministry and life were alike erroneous ; and 

 also how vain it was to expect the bishop of the diocese to check 

 or punish them. I have a remarkable letter by me now from 

 the bishop of that ilk in which, in reply to a letter of mine 

 enumerating sins enough to have got a gentlemanly layman 

 shot, or any one but the colonel of a militia regiment, who 

 was in the army or navy, cashiered, he tells me that unless 

 I can bring forward charges against the delinquent touching 



