scold; but Mrs. Amble succumbed only to the first impulse.  Discovering that all effort unaided to climb the bank was fruitless, she agreed to wait patiently and make the best of circumstances; and she did; and she learnt to enjoy it.  There is marrow in every bone.  My dear.  Jane, I have never admired you so much.  I tried her, Pollingray, in metaphysics.  I talked to her of the opera we last heard, I think fifty years ago.  And as it is less endurable for a woman to be patient in tribulation—­the honour is greater, when she overcomes the fleshy trial.  Insomuch,’ the vicar put on a bland air of abnegation of honour, ’that I am disposed to consider any male philosopher our superior; when you’ve found one, ha, ha—­when you’ve found one.  O sol pulcher!  I am ready to sing that the day has been glorious, so far.  Pulcher ille dies.’

Mrs. Amble appealed to me.  ’Would anybody not swear that he is mad to see him standing waist-deep in the water and the sun on his bald head, I am reduced to entreat you not to—­though you have no family of your own—­not to encourage him.  It is amusing to you.  Pray, reflect that such folly is too often fatal.  Compel him to come on shore.’

The logic of the appeal was no doubt distinctly visible in the lady’s mind, though it was not accurately worded.  I saw that I stood marked to be the scape goat of the day, and humbly continued to deserve well, notwithstanding.  By dint of simple signs and nods of affirmative, and a constant propulsion of my friend’s arm, I drew him into the boat, and thence projected him up to the level with his wife, who had perhaps deigned to understand that it was best to avoid the arresting of his divergent mind by any remark during the passage, and remained silent.  No sooner was he established on his feet, than she plucked him away.

‘Your papa’s hat,’ she called, flashing to her daughter, and streamed up the lawn into the rose-trellised pathways leading on aloft to the vicarage house.  Behind roses the weeping couple disappeared.  The last I saw of my friend was a smiting of his hand upon his head in a vain effort to catch at one of the fleeting ideas sowed in him by the quick passage of objects before his vision, and shaken out of him by abnormal hurry.  The Rev. Abraham Amble had been lord of his wife in the water, but his innings was over.  He had evidently enjoyed it vastly, and I now understood why he had chosen to prolong it as much as possible.  Your eccentric characters are not uncommonly amateurs of petty artifice.  There are hours of vengeance even for henpecked men.

I found myself sighing over the enslaved condition of every Benedict of my acquaintance, when the thought came like a surprise that I was alone with Alice.  The fair and pleasant damsel made a clever descent into the boat, and having seated herself, she began to twirl the scull in the rowlock, and said:  ’Do you feel disposed to join me in looking after the other scull and papa’s hat, Mr. Pollingray?’ I suggested ’Will you not get your feet wet?  I couldn’t manage to empty all the water in the boat.’