self-interest . . . an increasing tendency to verbose expression . . . an all but utter lack of what old-fashioned people still call principle. . . .” these phrases recurred to his memory, with disagreeable significance.  Was that in truth a picture of his son, of the boy whom he had loved and watched over and so zealously hoped for?  Possibly he wronged Dyce, for the young man’s mind and heart had long ceased to be clearly legible to him.  “Worst, perhaps, of all these frequent traits is the affectation of—­to use a silly word—­altruism.  The most radically selfish of men seem capable of persuading themselves into the belief that their prime motive is to ‘live for others.’  Of truly persuading themselves—­that is the strange thing.  This, it seems to us, is morally far worse than the unconscious hypocrisy which here and there exists in professors of the old religion; there is something more nauseous about self-deceiving ‘altruism’ than in the attitude of a man who, thoroughly worldly in fact, believes himself a hopeful candidate for personal salvation.”  Certain recent letters of Dyce appeared in a new light when seen from this point of view.  It was too disagreeable a subject; the vicar strove to dismiss it from his mind.

In the afternoon, he had to visit a dying man, an intelligent shopkeeper, who, while accepting the visit as a proof of kindness, altogether refused spiritual comfort, and would speak of nothing but the future of his children.  Straightway Mr. Lashmar became the practical consoler, lavish of kindly forethought.  Only when he came forth did he ask himself whether he could possibly fulfil half of what he had undertaken.

“It is easier,” he reflected, “to make promises for the world to come.  Is it not also better?  After all, can I not do it with a clearer conscience?”

He walked slowly, worrying about this and fifty other things, feeling a very Atlas under the globe’s oppression.  Rig way took him across a field in which there was a newly bourgeoned copse; he remembered that, last spring, he had found white violets about the roots of the trees.  A desire for their beauty and odour possessed him; he turned across the grass.  Presently a perfume guided him to a certain mossy corner where pale sweet florets nestled amid their leaves.  He bent over them, and stretched his hand to pluck, but in the same moment checked himself; why should he act the destroyer in this spot of perfect quietness and beauty?

“Dyce would not care much about them,” was another thought that came into his mind.

He rose from his stooping posture with ache of muscles and creaking of joints.  Alas for the days when he ran and leapt and knew not pain!  Walking slowly away, he worried himself about the brevity of life.

By a stile he passed into the highroad, at the lower end of the long village of Alverholme.  He had an appointment with his curate at the church school, and, not to be unpunctual, he quickened his pace in that direction.  At a little distance behind him was a young lady whom he had not noticed; she, recognizing the vicar, pursued with light, quick step, and soon overtook him.