Page:The Warden.djvu/111

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TRIBULATION.
103

was pleasant no longer; may be it was no longer his; the old neighbours, whose welfare had been so desired by him, were his enemies; his daughter was as wretched as himself, and even the bishop was made miserable by his position. He could never again lift up his voice boldly as he had hitherto done among his brethren, for he felt that he was disgraced; and he feared even to touch his bow, for he knew how grievous a sound of wailing, how piteous a lamentation, it would produce.

He was still sitting in the same chair and the same posture, having hardly moved a limb for two hours, when Eleanor came back to tea, and succeeded in bringing him with her into the drawing-room.

The tea seemed as comfortless as the dinner, though the warden, who had hitherto eaten nothing all day, devoured the plateful of bread and butter, unconscious of what he was doing.

Eleanor had made up her mind to force him to talk to her, but she hardly knew how to commence: she must wait till the urn was gone, till the servant would no longer be coming in and out.

At last everything was gone, and the drawing-room door was permanently closed; then Eleanor, getting up and going round to her father, put her arm round his neck, and said, "Papa, won't you tell me what it is?"

"What what is, my dear?"

"This new sorrow that torments you; I know you are unhappy, papa."

"New sorrow! it's no new sorrow, my dear, we have all our cares sometimes," and he tried to smile, but it was a ghastly failure; "but I shouldn't be so dull a companion; come, we'll have some music."

"No, papa, not to-night—it would only trouble you tonight:" and she sat upon his knee, as she sometimes would in