I rather think Jennie is right.  It is not youth we want at Wheathedge, but spiritual life and earnestness.  At least it is to be thought of.

But as to salary-how we are to get a first class man at a third class salary puzzles me.  I shall have to refer that to Mr. Wheaton.  He is the financier of our church I believe.

CHAPTER XIII.

Maurice Mapleson declines to submit to a competitive examination.

“I have a letter from Maurice Mapleson,” said I to Jennie.

“What does he say?  Will he come?” said she eagerly.

“No!” said I.  “He won’t come.”

“I am sorry,” said she.  “It’s too bad of him.”

“You won’t think so, my dear,” said I, “when you hear his letter.  You’ll be more sorry; but you’ll think better of him than you did before.”

We were at the tea-table.  It is the rule of our meal hour to have the conversation one in which the children can engage-in which at all events they can take an interest.  So the topic was suffered to drop till they were in bed, and we were alone in the library.

Maurice Mapleson was a young minister that I thought a good deal of.  So when two Sundays before, Mr. Wheaton suggested him to me as a successor to our retiring pastor, I welcomed the suggestion.

“You know that young Mapleson, don’t you Mr. Laicus,” said he, “who preached for us two Sundays last summer.  I think he stopped at your house.”

I assented.

“I wish you would write him, quite informally you know, to come down and preach for us a Sunday or two.  The folks at our house were quite taken with him, and I think the people were generally.  I shouldn’t wonder if he were the ‘coming man,’ Mr. Laicus.”

So that evening I stayed at home from church and wrote to him.  I remembered what Mr. Wheaton had said about this being a peculiar parish, and our people a peculiar people, and I waxed eloquent as I wrote.  I reminded Mr. Mapleson of our glorious scenery.  I told him we were but a suburb of New York and he would have a city congregation, and I did not tell him that he would have to pay very nearly city prices for everything, and would not have anything that would approximate a city salary.  I told him of the Mill village and the opportunities of Christian labor it opened before him.  I assured him that he would find the people remembering him kindly, and ready to welcome him warmly.  In short I considered myself retained as advocate In re the Calvary Presbyterian Church, and I rather laid myself out to produce an impression.

And I rather flatter myself that I did produce an impression.  But I did not get a verdict.  Here is his answer as I read it to Jennie that evening.  Koniwasset corners, Tuesday.  John Laicus, Esq.,

Dear Sir,—­I thank you very warmly for your kind letter of the 6th instant.  Kind it certainly is, and though I must decline the invitation it presents so cordially to me, I am none the less grateful for it, notwithstanding the fact that it has been a strong and not easily resisted temptation to violate my settled convictions of duty.