On this special Sunday, the worthy farmers and their wives, with their various cronies and confidants, gathered together in larger groups than usual, and lingered about more than was even their ordinary habit.  Their curiosity was excited,—­so were their faculties of criticism.  The new servants from the Manor had attended church, sitting all together in a smart orderly row, and suggesting in their neat spick-and-span attire an unwonted note of novelty, of fashion, of change, nay, even of secret and suppressed society wickedness.  Their looks, their attitudes, their whisperings, their movements, furnished plenty of matter to talk about,—­particularly as Mrs. Spruce had apparently ‘given herself airs’ and marshalled them in and marshalled them out again, without stopping to talk to her village friends as usual,—­which was indeed a veritable marvel,- -or to vouchsafe any information respecting the expected return of her new mistress, an impending event which was now well known throughout the whole neighbourhood.  Oliver Leach, the land agent, had arrived at the church-door in an open dog-cart, and had sat through the service looking as black as thunder, or as Bainton elegantly expressed it:  ’as cheerful as a green apple with a worm in it.’  Afterwards, he had driven off at a rattling pace, exchanging no word with anyone.  Such conduct, so the village worthies opined, was bound to be included among the various signs and tokens which were ominous of a coming revolution in the moral and domestic atmosphere of St. Rest.

Then again, the ‘Passon’s’ sermon that morning had been something of a failure.  Walden himself, all the time he was engaged in preaching it, had known that it was a lame, halting and perfunctory discourse, and he had felt fully conscious that a patient tolerance of him on the part of his parishioners had taken the place of the respectful interest and attention they usually displayed.  He was indeed sadly at a loss concerning ‘the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit.’  He had desired to recommend the cultivation of such a grace in the most forcible manner, yet he found himself wondering why fashionable women wore pink shoes much smaller than the natural size of the human foot?  To be ‘meek and quiet’ was surely an excellent thing, but then it was impossible for any man with blood in his veins to feel otherwise than honestly indignant at the extravagance displayed by certain modern ladies in the selection of their gowns!  Flashing sparks of pearl and crystal sewn on cloud-like tissues and chiffons, danced before his eyes, as he ponderously weighed out the spiritual advantages of being meek and quiet; and his metaphors became as hazy as the deductions he drew from his text were vague and difficult to follow.  He was uncomfortably conscious of a slight flush rising to his face, as he met the bland enquiring stare of Sir Morton Pippitt’s former butler—­now on ‘temp’ry’ service at the Manor,—­he became aware that there was also a new and rather pretty housemaid beside