The Reverend friend thus wrote back a letter, the chief paragraph of which, in reply to Bishop Rocket, ran to this effect:—"Most dear and Right Reverend Lord, as your Lordship requires the statues which you specify, to adorn the portico of a Christian bishop's palace, what would your Lordship think—(and oh, good, my Lord, I pray you not to be offended at the voice of truth, which is seldom heard with patience either within the precincts of courts or the palaces of prelates!)—what, I pray, my Lord, would you think if I should select for you, instead of the heathen gods of antiquated Greece and Rome, videlicet: Jupiter, Vulcan, Mars, Venus, Apollo, Bacchus, and Co., shall I, most dear and Reverend Lord, transmit to you statues of the twelve apostles, which surely, most venerated Prelate, you will find to be, upon mature deliberation, every way far more episcopal, apostolical, more in good taste, and indeed I must add, quite orthodox. And assuredly, my good Lord, I feel, and am most fully confident to say and pronounce it, that the Reverend Head of the holy see would most freely and cheerfully acquiesce in yielding his assent and consent to permit these said apostolical statues to be removed and transported to 'the Island of Saints,' so soon as His Holiness shall be informed that these stone-sculptured saints are destined for a brother bishop!"
But know, gentle reader, that Bishop Rocket, whatever might have been the cause, never even deigned to return any answer to this remonstrative letter of his too candid friend; and here consequently the proposal fell to the ground, and never was again resumed. The portico, however, still stood, presenting its dark facadé to the bleak northern blast, unsurmounted by statue either mythological or apostolical.
Mrs. Rocket had been—we must speak here historically in the past tense—had once been a fine woman, and still a portion of that beauty, though somewhat clipped by the shears of old Father Chronos, still remained. It was this attracted the bishop when only a curate, and
"Passing rich on forty pounds a year."
But all powerful love, whose transcendant sway remains undisputed from the days of the Teian bard down to those of the mighty minstrel of our own time, in whose own words we are told,
"Love rules the court, the camp, the grove, And men below, and saints above, For love is heaven, and heaven is love!"
This potent urchin slily sprung a shaft, which securely settled in the curate's reverend breast, but which was not long permitted by the compassionate lady hopelessly to rankle in the bosom of her accepted mate; for ere long the "happy, happy pair" were indissolubly united in the bands of holy wedlock. Some folks however, and, by the bye, not few in number, gave it as their opinion, that the lady happening to be the niece and nearest relative to the bishop of——who was unmarried, and besides much attached to his niece, that there appeared to be more of prudent calculation for the future, than ardent love at the present, in the transaction; inasmuch, that a large portion of the uncle's fortune, if not the entire, would ultimately vest in the selected fair one; and perchance, moreover, a rich benefice to boot, which might be expected from his Lordship's great episcopal patronage, that in the developement of time would be bestowed upon Curate Rocket. And all these conjectures, in due and ordinary course, finally and fully occurred. Indeed, in confirmation of these conjectures, there existed an additional cause for nobody's doubting the truth of this popular surmise; it was no less a cogent reason than this, that the lady was by some ten years, at least, elder than the man to whom she was affianced. This was indeed an objection not to be overruled by any thesis or syllogism of the schools; there was here
"No quirk left, no quiddit,"