I had hoped, good reader, to have jotted down some more of my personal reminiscences of travel—in Algiers, the “Pirate City,” at the Cape of Good Hope, and elsewhere—but bad health is not to be denied, and I find that I must hold my hand.
Perchance this may be no misfortune, for possibly the “garrulity of age” is descending on me!
Before closing this sketch, however, I would say briefly, that in all my writings I have always tried—how far successfully I know not—to advance the cause of Truth and Light, and to induce my readers to put their trust in the love of God our Saviour, for this life as well as the life to come.
Chapter Seven.
The Burglars and the Parson.
A Country mansion in the south of England. The sun rising over a laurel-hedge, flooding the ivy-covered walls with light, and blazing in at the large bay-window of the dining-room.
“Take my word for it, Robin, if ever this ’ouse is broke into, it will be by the dinin’-room winder.”
So spake the gardener of the mansion—which was also the parsonage—to his young assistant as they passed one morning in front of the window in question. “For why?” he continued; “the winder is low, an’ the catches ain’t overstrong, an there’s no bells on the shutters, an’ it lies handy to the wall o’ the back lane.”