The awe of it came back on me every month when the fair white linen covered the rustiness of the old velvet altar-cloth which the marsh damps were rotting, and the silver vessels shone, and the village organist played out the non-communicants with a somewhat inappropriate triumphal march, and little Mrs. Rampant knelt on with buried face as we went out, and Mr. Rampant came out with us, looking more glum than usual, and with such a short neck!

Now I think poor Mr. Rampant was wrong, and that he ought to have gone with Mrs. Rampant to the Lord’s Supper that Christmas.  He might have found grace to have got through all the little ups and downs and domestic disturbances of a holiday season without being very ferocious; and if he had tried and failed I think GOD would have forgiven him.  And he might—­it is possible that he might—­during that calm and solemn Communion, have forgiven his son as he felt that Our Father forgave him.  So Aunt Isobel says; and I have good reason to think that she is likely to be right.

I think so too now, but then I was simply impressed by the thought that an ill-tempered person was, as Nurse expressed it, “unfit” to join in the highest religious worship.  It is true that I was also impressed by her other saying, “It’s an awful thing, Miss Isobel, to be taken sudden and unprepared;” but there was a temporary compromise in my own case.  I could not be a communicant till I was confirmed.

CHAPTER IV.

CASES OF CONSCIENCE—­ETHICS OF ILL-TEMPER.

Confirmations were not very frequent in our little village at this time.  About once in three years the Bishop came to us.  He came when I was twelve years old.  Opinions were divided as to whether I was old enough, but I decided the matter by saying I would rather wait till the next opportunity.

“I may be more fit by that time,” was my thought, and it was probably not unlike some of Mr. Rampant’s self-communings.

The time came, and the Bishop also; I was fifteen.

I do not know why, but nobody had proposed that Philip should be confirmed at twelve years old.  Fifteen was thought to be quite early enough for him, and so it came about that we were confirmed together.

I am very thankful that, as it happened, I had Aunt Isobel to talk to.

“You’re relieved from one perplexity at any rate,” said she, when I had been speaking of that family failing which was also mine.  “You know your weak point.  I remember a long talk I had, years ago, with Mrs. Rampant, whom I used to know very well when we were young.  She said one of her great difficulties was not being able to find out her besetting sin.  She said it always made her so miserable when clergymen preached on that subject, and said that every enlightened Christian must have discovered one master passion amongst the others of his soul.  She had tried so hard, and could only find a lot, none much bigger or much less than the others.  Some vanity, some selfishness, some distrust and weariness, some peevishness, some indolence, and a lapful of omissions.  Since she married,” continued my aunt, slowly pulling her thick black eyelashes, after a fashion she had, “I believe she has found the long-lost failing.  It is impatience with Mr. Rampant, she thinks.”