loose my soul sits from these things - how I view them all as implements for
tilling Thy garden rescued here and there from the wilderness.«
    Metaphors and precedents were not wanting; peculiar spiritual experiences
were not wanting which at last made the retention of his position seem a service
demanded of him: the vista of a fortune had already opened itself, and
Bulstrode's shrinking remained private. Mr. Dunkirk had never expected that
there would be any shrinking at all: he had never conceived that trade had
anything to do with the scheme of salvation. And it was true that Bulstrode
found himself carrying on two distinct lives; his religious activity could not
be incompatible with his business as soon as he had argued himself into not
feeling it incompatible.
    Mentally surrounded with that past again, Bulstrode had the same pleas -
indeed, the years had been perpetually spinning them into intricate thickness,
like masses of spider-web, padding the moral sensibility; nay, as age made
egoism more eager but less enjoying, his soul had become more saturated with the
belief that he did everything for God's sake, being indifferent to it for his
own. And yet - if he could be back in that far-off spot with his youthful
poverty - why, then he would choose to be a missionary.
    But the train of causes in which he had locked himself went on. There was
trouble in the fine villa at Highbury. Years before, the only daughter had run
away, defied her parents, and gone on the stage; and now the only boy died, and
after a short time Mr. Dunkirk died also. The wife, a simple pious woman, left
with all the wealth in and out of the magnificent trade, of which she never knew
the precise nature, had come to believe in Bulstrode, and innocently adore him
as women often adore their priest or »man-made« minister. It was natural that
after a time marriage should have been thought of between them. But Mrs. Dunkirk
had qualms and yearnings about her daughter, who had long been regarded as lost
both to God and her parents. It was known that the daughter had married, but she
was utterly gone out of sight. The mother, having lost her boy, imagined a
grandson, and wished is a double sense to reclaim her daughter. If she were
found, there would be a channel for property - perhaps a wide one, in the
provision for several grandchildren. Efforts to find her must be made before
Mrs. Dunkirk would marry again. Bulstrode concurred; but after advertisement as
well as other