Page:Early Reminiscences.djvu/297

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1854-1857 243 acquired a perfume very much like that of a cabin on board a passenger vessel. I believe that the last time it was employed was when a governess was leaving, to whom the children were warmly attached. They insisted on accompanying her to Bridestowe Station, six miles off. They all went in the Coffin. On its return, and being drawn up at the front door, howls and whines issued from the interior, and the children tumbled out in such a condition that they had at once to be unclothed and given fresh garments, and the interior of the machine had to be cleaned out with a pail of water and a mop. The top of the vehicle was removable, and then travelling in it was not so trying. But I did on a certain occasion take a foreign friend with me in it to Tintagel. His colour gradually changed. As a shower came on I expressed my regret that the lid was not on. " Gott bewahr ! " exclaimed the foreigner, springing to his feet. " Let me get out and walk back to Lew Trenchard. I am a bad sailor." Never did Inquisitors of the Holy Office so gloat over the burning of heretics at the stake, as did my children at the breaking up and consumption of the machine in the pigs' court. All this time the episcopal and decanal appointments were unsatisfactory. At Exeter was a dean named Lowe, and the cathedral was in a slumbrous condition. I was in it one Sunday afternoon, and during the sermon, feeling unwell, I attempted to leave the church, but found that the doors were locked. A verger on guard said to me : " We are obliged to lock the congregation in, or they would scamper out so soon as the music was over. Are you really ill, sir ? " I admitted that I was. " Then," said he, " I think I may let you out. Follow me to the door in the transept leading to the chapter-house ; and do not look as if you were running away from the sermon." And then I made my escape. In the matter of presentations, we shared the disadvantage with the churches elsewhere. Many a bishopric and abbey in France before the Revolution was given at the solicitation of a Royal mistress; and in Germany an archbishopric became the appanage of juniors in royal or electoral families. We cannot regard ourselves as singular, when a Jew, or a