"Next time, then, steal the pig. Frankly, friend Purdon, thy name is none of the sweetest, and I doubt if the bishop would consent. Meantime, you are living, as usual, I suppose, at great expense——"
"At small expense, considering my abilities; but still at greater expense than my slender income will allow. Am I not your lordship's domestic chaplain? Must I not keep up the dignity due to the position?"
"Your dignity is costly. I must get a bishopric or a deanery for you. Meantime I have a small service to ask of you."
"Small? My lord, let it be great: it cannot be too great."
"It is that you go into the country for me."
"Not to Bath—or to Oxford?" His reverence betrayed an anxiety on this point which was not quite in harmony with his previous declarations.
"Not to either. To another place, where they know not thy name or thy fame. Very good. I thought I could depend upon your loyalty. As for arrangements and time, you will hear from my secretary." So my lord turned on his heel and his chaplain was dismissed. He remained for a moment, looking after his master doubtfully. The order liked him not. He was growing old and would have chosen, had he the power of choice, some fat city benefice with two or three country livings thrown in. He was tired of his dependence: perhaps he was tired of a life that ill became his profession: perhaps he could no longer enjoy it as of old. There was, at least, no sign of repentance as there was no touch of the spiritual life in his face, which was stamped with the plain and visible marks of the world, the flesh and the devil. What is that stamp? Nobody can paint it, or describe it: yet it is understood and recognised whenever one sees it. And it stood out legible so that all those who ran might read upon the face of this reverend and learned divine.
When the levee was finished and everybody gone, Lord Fylingdale sank into a chair. I know not the nature of his thoughts save that they were not pleasant, for his face grew darker every moment. Finally, he sprang to his feet and rang the bell. "Tell Mr. Semple that I would speak with him," he ordered.
Mr. Semple, the same Samuel whom you have seen under a basting from the captain, was now changed and for the better. His dress was simple. No one could guess from his apparel the nature of his occupation. For all professions and all crafts there is a kind of uniform. The divine wears gown and cassock, bands and wig, which proclaim his calling: the lawyer is also known by his gown and marks his rank at the bar by coif and wig: the attorney puts on broadcloth black of hue: the physician assumes black velvet, a magisterial wig, and a gold-headed cane. The officer wears the King's scarlet; the nobleman his star: the sprig of quality puts on fine apparel and assumes an air and manner unknown to Cheapside and Ludgate Hill: you may also know him by his speech. The merchant wears black velvet with gold buttons, gold buckles, white silk stockings and a gold-laced hat; the shopkeeper substitutes silver for gold and cloth for velvet: the clerk has brown cloth metal buttons and worsted stockings. As for the crafts, has not each its own jacket, sleeves, apron, cap, and badge?
But for this man, where would we place him? What calling did he represent? For he wore the flowered waist-coat—somewhat frayed and stained, of a beau, and the black coat of the merchant: the worsted stockings of the clerk and his metal buttons. Yet he was neither gentleman, merchant, shopkeeper, clerk, nor craftsman. He was a member of that fraternity which is no fraternity because there is no brotherhood among them all; in which every man delights to slander, gird at, and to depreciate his brother. In other words he wore the dress—which is no uniform—of a poet. At this time he also called himself secretary to his lordship having by ways known only to himself, and by wrigglings up back stairs, and services of a kind never proclaimed to the world, made himself useful. The position also granted him, as it granted certain tradesmen, immunity from arrest. He had the privilege of walking abroad through a street full of hungering creditors, and that, not on Sundays only, like most of his tribe, but on every day in the week.