To finish my chapter on a merrier note, I will mention an amusing episode connected with the evening of the black kitten's appearance.
Amongst the guests invited to that dinner-party was a clergyman-squire, a man of some means who had taken orders. A "squarson" is the "portmanteau name" for such a gentleman in Yorkshire, I believe; one who combines squire and parson.
This particular specimen of the genus was both a vegetarian and a celibate. The latter fact had been made clear to me by the many regrets expressed in the neighbourhood that he had remained a bachelor owing to religious scruples. The vegetarianism was equally certain, for I had heard orders given for special dishes to be prepared for this guest; and sitting next to him at the dinner-table, I knew that he had not touched either meat or game, although it was not a fast day.
After dinner, when the gentlemen had joined us in the drawing-room, the conversation turned upon psychic matters and my experiences in America of a few years before. This extreme High Churchman denounced all these, "lock, stock, and barrel."
He believed that everything might have happened as described, but was equally certain that the devil alone could have had a hand in "such goings on"! Perhaps it will be wise to explain that he did not make use of this latter expression!
My host, instead of coming to the rescue, which he might have done, as one of "the Cloth"; looked much amused when I fielded most of my adversary's theological balls.
At length, being unaccustomed to such irreverent handling, my enemy lost his temper, and, as usual on such occasions, he tried to "take my wicket" by quoting texts against me!
"Well, all I can say is that everything you have told us is in direct opposition to Holy Writ. In fact, _we are specially warned in the Scriptures that in the latter days seducing spirits shall arise_."
At this fatal moment, when the Theological Closure was descending upon my unhappy head, a really brilliant thought occurred to me.
Was it a seducing spirit or a friendly intelligence who reminded me that my opponent had only quoted half the text--_the half that suited him_?
He looked puzzled, and probably had honestly forgotten what he did not wish to remember.