collegiate training. She was the eldest
daughter of our chief member—I don't
mean a member of parliament: but a
member of the church—a well-to-do man,
owning several coal-pits, who at first looked
coldly upon my suit, but at length was
brought to the point of promising his
consent, and a thousand pounds, as soon as
the debt should be cleared off the chapel.
This debt became the burden of my
existence. It amounted to four hundred
pounds, for which he held a mortgage at
five per cent, which deducted twenty
pounds a year from the salary the church
would otherwise have given me. With
the exception of the mortgagee himself,
there was not a man in the congregation
who could raise his yearly contribution by
a single sovereign. I had no influence
elsewhere, and the benevolent strangers of
our sect to whom I applied considered the
liability small, and knew a hundred chapels
worse off. I began to be haunted by a
vision of "four hundred pounds in debt,"
staring at me in large characters upon the
red brick front of my chapel. It was as
much as I could do to keep it out of my
extempore prayers and sermons. As for
my thoughts by day, and my dreams by
night, I could not by any effort banish it
from them, until the canvassing for a
forthcoming election began.

It was the first time the Liberals had
started a candidate for Much Coalmoor;
and I spent my whole time and energy
for some weeks beforehand in welding
my church members into a solid body
of electors, who would no more vote for a
Conservative than for the devil. They were
a set of honest, sturdy men, a little stubborn
and thick-headed perhaps; not quite
able to discern the central truth of a question,
but very wide-awake as to the swing
of the outer grievance which caught them.
Incorruptible voters they all swore to be;
and the other side tempted them in vain.
Like Wordsworth's cattle, they would be
"forty voting like one;" and I awaited with
peaceful confidence the day for polling.

The canvass was very close, and there
were some flagrant cases of bribery and
corruption on the part of the Conservatives.
Of course our hands were clean, were snow
white; but I found it necessary to wink
pretty hard at some of the proceedings of
our agents. I knew all that went on among
my people, and I could swear that they
were, one and all, incorruptible.

Nomination day passed, and the canvassing,
hot before, grew to a white heat now.
Nobody could predict how the election
would end; but it made one shudder to
hear the confident assertions of success
made by the other side. I had not thought
of the debt, and scarcely of Mary, for several
days. I was going busily about among my
flock, solidifying them. In a few days
they were to march in a formidable phalanx
to the polling booth, and there register
their votes for our Liberal candidate.

I had returned home very weary, and
was setting to at my Sunday sermons in
my study, which was a small, upper room
in the roof, with shelving ceilings and a
dormer window, when the door was flung
open, and my landlady's daughter
announced, in tremulous tones, "Gentlemen
as wants to see you." I looked up, and,
to my utter amazement, recognised the slim,
dainty, foppish Anglican curate who had so
often glanced at me from the corner of his
eye. Behind him entered a gentleman,
aristocratic and somewhat haughty in
aspect. Behind him, again, an individual
whom I knew as one of the Conservative
agents. At sight of them I felt considerable
stiffness in my neck and back; but the curate
advanced with an outstretched hand, which
I could not well refuse.

"Mr. Romilly, my fellow-labourer, I
believe?" said he, smiling all over his face.

"I am Samuel Romilly," I replied.

"A relative of the great Sir Samuel
Romilly?" he remarked.

I wasn't, but I did not say so, and I felt
my joints relax a little. I invited my
guests to be seated, and sat down myself
in an easy attitude on the corner of my
table, as there were only three chairs in the
room.

"You have no vote, I think, Mr. Romilly?"
said the Conservative agent, very blandly.

"I have not," I answered.

"But you have influence," he continued.

"I have influence."

"Which is exercised upon the Liberal
side," said he.

"On the Liberal side, solely," I repeated,
emphatically.

There was a pause for a full minute,
during which I was conscious of being
closely scanned by my three visitors, with
a desire to find out what sort of stuff I was
made of. I felt a strong inclination to
invite them to walk out, but I kept myself
still, until one of them broke the silence.

"Mr. Romilly," said the curate, in a
conciliatory tone, which was also a tone of
suggestion, "there is a debt upon your
chapel."