use before his sermon, for which, during a hymn, he was duly escorted to the vestry by the Clerk. I wonder, in these temperate days, what my parishioners would think of this. The Clerk, too, a fine old fellow, over six feet, in his long coat, breeches and gaiters, almost an episcopal figure; a survival of old days, regarding himself as the guardian of the Parish and the special mentor of Vicar and Curate.
"Mr. Henry," he said to me, as I was visiting him in his old age, "I've had a sight o' Curates under me in my time; take an old man's advice, don't be only in the pulpit; go and see the people in their homes." For more than fifty years he had given loyal service to the Church; village schoolmaster; friend, adviser, and counsellor of several generations who had passed through his hands.
Before leaving, I went with some friends for a month's run in Ireland. Irishmen there are, not a few, in New Zealand, good colonists, and doing well, but it is another matter to find yourself in Ireland. Interesting as Ireland is in its contrast to England, its pastures everywhere, its wild western scenery, and spots of beauty like Killarney, its relics of the past, ruins of abbeys and monasteries which covered the land in the old times of the Celtic Church, it is the general character of the people that impressed me most. Not that they are a people of alien lips, or different nationality, yet so different to the Anglo-Saxon in temperament, unfailing humour, kindly welcoming friendliness, the absence of self-consciousness, readiness of repartee, and always a sense of the joy of living. Imagine the contrast between a London hansom cabby and the driver of an outside car in Dublin, which we engaged for a day's excursion to
