"Pray be seated," said Mrs. Ramshorn, without looking up from her
knitting--the seat she offered being the wide meadow.

But they had already done so, and presently were deep in a gentle
talk, of which at length certain words that had been foolhardy
enough to wander within her range, attracted the notice of Mrs.
Ramshorn, and she began to listen. But she could not hear
distinctly.

"There should be one bishop at least," the little man was saying,
"or I don't know but he ought to be the arch-arch-bishop,--a poor
man, if possible,--one like the country parson Chaucer sets up in
contrast with the regular clergy,--whose main business should be to
travel about from university to university, from college to college,
from school to school, warning off all young men who did not know
within themselves that it was neither for position, nor income, nor
study, nor influence, that they sought to minister in the temple,
from entering the church. As from holy ground, he would warn them
off."

Mrs. Ramshorn fancied, from certain obscure associations in her own
mind, that he was speaking of dissenting ministers and persons of
low origin, who might wish to enter the church for the sake of
BETTERING THEMSELVES, and holding as she did, that no church
preferment should be obtained except by persons of good family and
position, qualified to keep up the dignity of the profession, she
was not a little gratified to hear, as she supposed, the same
sentiments from the mouth of such an illiterate person as, taking no
note of his somewhat remarkable utterance, she imagined Polwarth to