I rose to go.  As I reached the door, I remembered the tobacco in my pocket.  I had not bought it for myself.  I never could smoke.  Nor do I conceive that smoking is essential to a clergyman in the country; though I have occasionally envied one of my brethren in London, who will sit down by the fire, and, lighting his pipe, at the same time please his host and subdue the bad smells of the place.  And I never could hit his way of talking to his parishioners either.  He could put them at their ease in a moment.  I think he must have got the trick out of his pipe.  But in reality, I seldom think about how I ought to talk to anybody I am with.

That I didn’t smoke myself was no reason why I should not help Old Rogers to smoke.  So I pulled out the tobacco.

“You smoke, don’t you, Rogers?” I said.

“Well, sir, I can’t deny it.  It’s not much I spend on baccay, anyhow.  Is it, dame?

“No, that it bean’t,” answered his wife.

“You don’t think there’s any harm in smoking a pipe, sir?”

“Not the least,” I answered, with emphasis.

“You see, sir,” he went on, not giving me time to prove how far I was from thinking there was any harm in it; “You see, sir, sailors learns many ways they might be better without.  I used to take my pan o’ grog with the rest of them; but I give that up quite, ’cause as how I don’t want it now.”

“’Cause as how,” interrupted his wife, “you spend the money on tea for me, instead.  You wicked old man to tell stories!”

“Well, I takes my share of the tea, old woman, and I’m sure it’s a deal better for me.  But, to tell the truth, sir, I was a little troubled in my mind about the baccay, not knowing whether I ought to have it or not.  For you see, the parson that’s gone didn’t more than half like it, as I could tell by the turn of his hawse-holes when he came in at the door and me a-smokin’.  Not as he said anything; for, ye see, I was an old man, and I daresay that kep him quiet.  But I did hear him blow up a young chap i’ the village he come upon promiscus with a pipe in his mouth.  He did give him a thunderin’ broadside, to be sure!  So I was in two minds whether I ought to go on with my pipe or not.”

“And how did you settle the question, Rogers?”

“Why, I followed my own old chart, sir.”

“Quite right.  One mustn’t mind too much what other people think.”

“That’s not exactly what I mean, sir.”

“What do you mean then?  I should like to know.”

“Well, sir, I mean that I said to myself, ’Now, Old Rogers, what do you think the Lord would say about this here baccay business?"’

“And what did you think He would say?”

“Why, sir, I thought He would say, ’Old Rogers, have yer baccay; only mind ye don’t grumble when you ‘aint got none.’”

Something in this—­I could not at the time have told what—­touched me more than I can express.  No doubt it was the simple reality of the relation in which the old man stood to his Father in heaven that made me feel as if the tears would come in spite of me.