beginning of February-February, which was to carry Algernon Errington away t

ne side-and had ordered Powell out of his house. This was a serious step, and was sure to be searchingly canvassed. Maxfield absented himself from the next class-meeting on

w Wesleyans; the influence of wealth, and a strong will, and the long habit of being a leading

en this-among the fundamental peculiarities of Methodism-was very seldom applied to the Whitfordians. Circumstances, and their own apathy, had brought it to pass that two elderly preachers-steady, jog-trot old roadsters-had alternately succeeded each other in exhorting and preaching to this quiet flock for several years. There was, besides, Nick Green, foreman to Mr. Glad

of a trumpet. Yet, after the effects of the first start and shock had subsided, the Methodists began to take pride in the attention which their preacher attracted. Their little chapel was crowded. His field-preaching drew throngs of people from all the country side. Instead of

inherited more than the traditional eloquence of John Wesley; and that, like that

not share that exaltation of spirit which supported Powell in his disdain of earthly comfor

de at Whitford. What! Go to pray in the cold little meeting-house at five o'clock on a winter's m

coolly expect you to deprive yourself not only of superfluities, but of necessaries-such, for instance, a

g sum which was needful to clothe him with decency, and to feed him in a manner which the Whitfordians considered reprehensibly ina

all his flock on his side, when they sus

greatly exercised respecting his daughter. He

da's reception by the Bodkins manifestly a preliminary step to her permanent rise in the social scale?) to talk openly to Algernon

elt his ignorance. He did not understand the ways of gentlefolks. He might injure his daughter by his attempt to serve her. And although he had fits of self-assertio

him against letting Rhoda associate with them. Powell had even gone so far as to reprehend him for having done so. To pr

ns, which might-yes, he could not help seeing that it might-result in a total breach between his family and them, and this increased his hesitation as to the line of conduct

or the fashionable, or the famous-supposed him to be greatly chagrined and exercised in spirit on this account. And people sympathised with him, or blamed him, according to thei

old comfortable days of sleepy concord. And was he now to become a less important

no lack of partisans in Whitford, as has been stated; but then there was the superintendent! In those days the superintendent (or, as some old-fashioned Methodists

m of Methodism, it may be well briefly t

temporal business-so far as they were connected with the aims and interests of Methodism-was under the regulation of the assistant (afterwards styled the superintendent), who

dgment. Had this superintendent, Mr. John Bateson by name, been a Whitford man, one of the old, comfortable, narrow-minded tradesmen over whom "old Max" had exercised supremacy in things Methodistical for years, Maxfield would have

new-fangled, upsetting, meddling sort, and would doubtless declare David Powell to

than, "I should not be

st private family affairs, the conclusion was a pretty just one. Moreover, it was one to which the very constitution of Methodism pointed à priori. But old Max

rayer-meetings, and field-preachings, and such like occasions; whilst his practice

n. His stay among them had already been longer than was usual with the itinerant preachers; but it was understood to have been specially prolonged, in consequence of the abundant fruits brought forth by his minis

fore leaving Whitford, the preacher might compass

ok a great

ith Elizabeth Grimshaw, were seen at the morning service in

he congregation to whom they were known by sight-and these were the great majority

James looked pretty much as usual; Rhoda trembled, and blushed, and looked painfully shy whenever the forms of the service required her

e family conversion from the errors of Methodism, and supported her brother-in-law in it with great warmth. Her Methodism had, in truth, been a mere piece of conformity, for "peace and quietness' sake," as she avowed with

ith his family, had been seen at St. Chad's. No one deemed it strange that the whole family should have seceded in a body from their own place of worship. It appeared quite natural to all his old acquaintances that, whither Jonathan Maxfield went, his son, and his daughter,

on, will cleave its way through the world like a wedge. We have seen, however, that into Maxfield's mind a doubt of himself on one subject had entered. And, as doubt will do, it weakened his action very consid

Jonathan refused to see him, and walked out of his shop when the superintendent walked into it. Maxfield was grim

inst Powell, who was looked upon as the prime cause of it. What if the preacher did possess awakening eloquence and burning zeal to save sinners? He

had hitherto enjoyed a reputation for unmitigated blackguardism; by Sam Smith, the cobbler, once drunken, now drunken no lon

vent earnestness, quote some New Testament text, which stopped one's mouth, if it didn't change one's opinion. As

ntness to some of our Whitford acquaintance. Of these was Minnie Bodkin. By degrees the habit had establ

to her advice. There was Algernon, whose sparkling spirits made him invaluable. There was Mrs. Errington, who was made welcome, as other mothers sometimes are, in right of the merits of her offspring. There was Miss Chubb very often

rl, partly because it seemed pretty clear that Minnie was resolved to have her own way about seeing more of her new protégée, and Mrs. Errington was minded that this should come to pass with her co-operation, so as to retain her post of first patroness-the good l

conflicting feelings, and hopes, and illusions. It was a game at cros

he deluge," might be taken to epitomise his sentiments in view of possible complications which threatened to arise among his own intimate circle of friends. To whatever degree the time mig

save the most winning good-humour, the most insouciant hilarity, ever peeped for an in