
the ministry again, and lived with the utmost sparingness that Esther might be
so educated as to be able to get her own bread in case of his death. Her
probable facility in acquiring French naturally suggested his sending her to a
French school, which would give her a special advantage as a teacher. It was a
Protestant school, and French Protestantism had the high recommendation of being
non-prelatical. It was understood that Esther would contract no papistical
superstitions; and this was perfectly true; but she contracted, as we see, a
good deal of non-papistical vanity.
    Mr Lyon's reputation as a preacher and devoted pastor had revived; but some
dissatisfaction beginning to be felt by his congregation at a certain laxity
detected by them in his views as to the limits of salvation, which he had in one
sermon even hinted might extend to unconscious recipients of mercy, he had found
it desirable seven years ago to quit this ten years' pastorate and accept a call
from the less important church in Malthouse Yard, Treby Magna.
    This was Rufus Lyon's history, at that time unknown in its fulness to any
human being besides himself. We can perhaps guess what memories they were that
relaxed the stringency of his doctrine on the point of salvation. In the deepest
of all senses his heart said -
 
»Though she be dead, yet let me think she lives,
And feed my mind, that dies for want of her.«
 

                                   Chapter 7

 M. It was but yesterday you spoke him well -
 You've changed your mind so soon?
N. Not I - 'tis he
 That, changing to my thought, has changed my mind.
 No man puts rotten apples in his pouch
 Because their upper side looked fair to him.
 Constancy in mistake is constant folly.
 
The news that the rich heir of the Transomes was actually come back, and had
been seen at Treby, was carried to some one else who had more reasons for being
interested in it than the Reverend Rufus Lyon was yet conscious of having. It
was owing to this that at three o'clock, two days afterwards, a carriage and
pair, with coachman and footman in crimson and drab, passed through the
lodge-gates of Transome Court. Inside there was a hale good-natured-looking man
of sixty, whose hands rested on a knotted stick held between his knees; and a
blue-eyed, well-featured lady, fat and middle-aged - a mountain of satin, lace,
and exquisite muslin embroidery. They were not persons of highly remarkable
appearance, but to most Trebians they
