"You must not come to a country parish with the idea that it is Arcadia," said Mr. St. John; "such ideas lead to a great deal of disappointment; but you must not let yourself be discouraged either. I don't think that Cicely knows all the outs and ins of the story about the cottages."
"Miss St. John said nothing about the cottages."
"Ah! I thought she had put you out of spirits; that would be foolish," said the curate kindly. "You see, Mr. Mildmay, everybody here thinks a great deal of a little money; it is so, I believe, in every small place; they have little, very little, Heaven knows; and somehow, when one is very poor, that gets to look of more importance than anything else. I don't say so from personal experience, though I have always been poor enough. My way, I am afraid, is to think too little of the money, not too much--which is, perhaps, as great a mistake the other way; but it is much easier, you know, to condemn those faults we have no mind to," Mr. St. John added with a smile. The visit of an intelligent stranger had quite brightened the good man up, though it ought to have depressed him, according to all principles of good sense. The curate forgot how much he himself must suffer from the change that was coming. Mildmay pleased him; he was deferential to his own grey hairs and long experience; he was willing to hear and apparently to take, his predecessor's opinion, and Mr. St. John liked the novelty, the new companion, the attentive listener. He walked on quite briskly, with the easy steps of a man to whom the way is so familiar that he does not need to pause to look where he is going. Now and then he would stop to point out a view, a glimpse of the distant forest, a slope opening down upon the lower level of the common, or even a pretty cottage; and one of them, a most picturesque refuge of misery, with tiny little casement windows bulging anyhow from the ruddy old wall, and a high roof of the most indescribable and beautiful mixture of tints, set him easily afloat again upon the subject of which his mind was full.
"Look at it!" he said; "it is a picture. If one could only clear them out and shut them up--or rather throw them open, that the winds of heaven might enter, but not our fellow-creatures, Mr. Mildmay! As I was saying, they are all poor here. The people think you do them an injury when you speak of anything that has to be paid for. Because I have tried to get the cottages put into good repair, the arrangements made a little more decent, and the places fit to live in, more than two or three of the people have left the parish church. Yes, that is quite true--I thought Cicely must have told you--well-to-do people, who might have spared a few pounds well enough. It was a trial; but what of that? I have outlived it, and perhaps done a little good."