"Very likely not, if they go on appointing the best lawyers. Under that system, I should never have been one either."
"I think, on the whole, sir, that it's better fun to be a Marshal."
Certainly it was very good fun—an existence full of change and movement, richly peopled with various personalities. From the Bar they lived rather apart, except for three or four dinner-parties, but they entertained and were entertained by local notables. The High Sheriffs themselves afforded piquant contrasts. Bluff and glossy Sir Quintin, the country gentleman, was one type. Another was the self-made man, newly rich, proud of himself, but very nervous of doing something wrong, and with stories in his mind of judges savagely tenacious of their dignity and free with heavy fines for any breach of etiquette: many an anxious question from him about his lordship's likes and dislikes Arthur had to answer. And once the office was ornamented by the son and heir of a mighty Grandee, who did the thing most splendidly in the matter of equipage and escort—even though his liveries were only the family's "semi-state"—treated his lordship with a deference even beyond the custom, and dazzled Arthur, as they waited for Mr. Justice Lance (who was sometimes late), with easy and unaffected anecdotes of the youth of Princes with whom he had played in childhood—the perfect man of the Great World, with all its graces. Between this High Personage and the man who stole the pig there ranged surely Entire Humanity!
But the most gracious impression—one that made its abiding mark on memory—was more aloof from their work and everyday experience. It was of an old man, tall and thin, white-haired, very courtly, yet very simple and infinitely gentle in manner. He was an old friend of Sir Christopher's, a famous leader of his school of thought in the Church, and now, after long years of labour, was passing the evening of his days in the haven of his Deanery beneath the walls of a stately Cathedral. They spent Sunday in the city, and, after attending service, went to lunch with him. He knew little of their work, and had never known much of the world they moved in. But he knew the poor by his labours among them, and the hearts of men by the strangely keen intuition of holiness. There was no sanctimoniousness, no pursing-up of lips or turning-away of eyes; on the contrary, a very straight dealing with facts and reality. But all things were seen by him in a light which suffused the Universe, in the rays of a far-off yet surely dawning splendour; Sorrow endureth for the night, but Joy cometh in the morning.
As they walked back to the Lodgings, Sir Christopher was silent for awhile. Then he said abruptly: "That's a Saint! I don't know that it's much use for most of us to try to be saints—that's a matter of vocation, I think—but it does us good to meet one sometimes, doesn't it? All that you and I think—or, speaking for myself perhaps, used to think—so wonderful, so interesting, has for him no importance—hardly any real existence. It's at the most a sort of mist, or mirage, or something of that sort—or a disease of mortal eyes—what you like! Are you in any way a religious man?"
"No, I'm afraid I'm not." He hesitated a moment and went on: "I don't quite see how one can be, you know, sir."
"Not as he is, no—I don't either. And I suppose the world couldn't get on, as a working world, if by a miracle everybody became like him. The world wants its own children too—though no doubt it begets some devilishly extreme specimens, as you and I have seen in the last few weeks. Well, you'll probably make some sort of creed for yourself presently—oh, a very provisional sketchy sort of affair, I daresay, but still a bit better than club codes and that kind of thing. And——" He laid his hand on Arthur's shoulder—"the beginning of it may just as well be this: Earn your money honestly. Such work as you do get or take, put your back into it."
"That after all is just what the Dean has done with his job, isn't it?"
"Why, yes, so it is, though he doesn't do it for money—not even money of his currency. Upon my word, I believe he'd sooner be damned than let you or me be, if he could help it! So I've shown you one more variety of human nature, Arthur."
"It's at least as well worth seeing as any of the rest."