wife was one of those people who have a serene and unaffected interest in human beings.  She was a religious woman, but her relations with others were rather based on the purest kindliness and sympathy.  She knew every one in the place, and, having no touch of shyness, she went in and out among their poorer neighbours, the trusted friend and providence of numerous families; but she had not in the least what is called a parochial mind.  She had no touch of the bustling and efficient Lady Bountiful.  The simple people she visited were her friends and neighbours, not her patients and dependents.  She was simply an overflowing fountain of goodness, and it was a natural to her to hurry to a scene of sorrow and suffering as it is for most people to desire to stay away.  My friend himself had not the same taste; it was always rather an effort to him to accommodate himself to people in a different way of life; but it ought to be said that he was universally liked and respected for his quiet courtesy and simplicity, and fully as much for his own sake as for that of his wife.  This fact could hardly be inferred from his Diary, and indeed he was wholly unconscious of it himself, because he never realised his natural charm, and indeed was unduly afraid of boring people by his presence.

He was not exactly a hard worker, but he was singularly regular; indeed, though he sometimes took a brief holiday after writing a book, he seldom missed a day without writing some few pages.  One of the reasons why they paid so few visits was that he tended, as he told me, to feel so much bored away from his work.  It was at once his occupation and his recreation.  He was not one of those who write fiercely and feverishly, and then fall into exhaustion; he wrote cheerfully and temperately, and never appeared to feel the strain.  They lived quietly, but a good many friends came and went.  He much preferred to have a single quest, or a husband and wife, at a time, and pursued his work quietly all through.  He used to see that one had all one could need, and then withdrew after tea-time, not reappearing until dinner.  His wife, it was evident, was devoted to him with an almost passionate adoration.  The reason why life went so easily there was that she studied unobtrusively his smallest desires and preferences; and thus there was never any sense of special contrivance or consideration for his wishes:  the day was arranged exactly as he liked, without his ever having to insist upon details.  He probably did not realise this, for though he liked settled ways, he was sensitively averse to feeling that his own convenience was in any way superseding or overriding the convenience of others.  It used to be a great delight and refreshment to stay there.  He was fond of rambling about the country, and was an enchanting companion in a tete-a-tete.  In the evening he used to expand very much into a genial humour which was very attractive; he had, too, the art of making swift and subtle transitions into an emotional mood; and here his poetical gift of seeing unexpected analogies and delicate characteristics gave his talk a fragrant charm which I have seldom heard equalled.