THE PARISH TRILOGY - Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood, The Seaboard Parish & The Vicar's Daughter. George MacDonald
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very moment, taking away Mr Templeton's table because he won't pay the church-rate."
"What church-rate?" I cried, starting up from the sofa. "I never heard of a church-rate."
Now, before I go farther, it is necessary to explain some things. One day before I was taken ill, I had had a little talk with Mr Brownrigg about some repairs of the church which were necessary, and must be done before another winter. I confess I was rather pleased; for I wanted my people to feel that the church was their property, and that it was their privilege, if they could regard it as a blessing to have the church, to keep it in decent order and repair. So I said, in a by-the-by way, to my churchwarden, "We must call a vestry before long, and have this looked to." Now my predecessor had left everything of the kind to his churchwardens; and the inhabitants from their side had likewise left the whole affair to the churchwardens. But Mr Brownrigg, who, I must say, had taken more pains than might have been expected of him to make himself acquainted with the legalities of his office, did not fail to call a vestry, to which, as usual, no one had responded; whereupon he imposed a rate according to his own unaided judgment. This, I believe, he did during my illness, with the notion of pleasing me by the discovery that the repairs had been already effected according to my mind. Nor did any one of my congregation throw the least difficulty in the churchwarden's way.—And now I must refer to another circumstance in the history of my parish.
I think I have already alluded to the fact that there were Dissenters in Marshmallows. There was a little chapel down a lane leading from the main street of the village, in which there was service three times every Sunday. People came to it from many parts of the parish, amongst whom were the families of two or three farmers of substance, while the village and its neighbourhood contributed a portion of the poorest of the inhabitants. A year or two before I came, their minister died, and they had chosen another, a very worthy man, of considerable erudition, but of extreme views, as I heard, upon insignificant points, and moved by a great dislike to national churches and episcopacy. This, I say, is what I had made out about him from what I had heard; and my reader will very probably be inclined to ask, "But why, with principles such as yours, should you have only hearsay to go upon? Why did you not make the honest man's acquaintance? In such a small place, men should not keep each other at arm's length." And any reader who says so, will say right. All I have to suggest for myself is simply a certain shyness, for which I cannot entirely account, but which was partly made up of fear to intrude, or of being supposed to arrogate to myself the right of making advances, partly of a dread lest we should not be able to get on together, and so the attempt should result in something unpleasantly awkward. I daresay, likewise, that the natural SHELLINESS of the English had something to do with it. At all events, I had not made his acquaintance.
Mr Templeton, then, had refused, as a point of conscience, to pay the church-rate when the collector went round to demand it; had been summoned before a magistrate in consequence; had suffered a default; and, proceedings being pushed from the first in all the pride of Mr Brownrigg's legality, had on this very day been visited by the churchwarden, accompanied by a broker from the neighbouring town of Addicehead, and at the very time when I was hearing of the fact was suffering distraint of his goods. The porcine head of the churchwarden was not on his shoulders by accident, nor without significance.
But I did not wait to understand all this now. It was enough for me that Tom bore witness to the fact that at that moment proceedings were thus driven to extremity. I rang the bell for my boots, and, to the open-mouthed dismay of Mrs Pearson, left the vicarage leaning on Tom's arm. But such was the commotion in my mind, that I had become quite unconscious of illness or even feebleness. Hurrying on in more terror than I can well express lest I should be too late, I reached Mr Templeton's house just as a small mahogany table was being hoisted into a spring-cart which stood at the door. Breathless with haste, I was yet able to call out,—
"Put that table down directly."
At the same moment Mr Brownrigg appeared from within the door. He approached with the self-satisfied look of a man who has done his duty, and is proud of it. I think he had not heard me.
"You see I'm prompt, Mr Walton," he said. "But, bless my soul, how ill you look!"
Without answering him—for I was more angry with him than I ought to have been—I repeated—
"Put that table down, I tell you."
They did so.
"Now," I said, "carry it back into the house."
"Why, sir," interposed Mr Brownrigg, "it's all right."
"Yes," I said, "as right as the devil would have it."
"I assure you, sir, I have done everything according to law."
"I'm not so sure of that. I believe I had the right to be chairman at the vestry-meeting; but, instead of even letting me know, you took advantage of my illness to hurry on matters to this shameful and wicked excess."
I did the poor man wrong in this, for I believe he had hurried things really to please me. His face had lengthened considerably by this time, and its rubicund hue declined.
"I did not think you would stand upon ceremony about it, sir. You never seemed to care for business."
"If you talk about legality, so will I. Certainly YOU don't stand upon ceremony."
"I didn't expect you would turn against your own churchwarden in the execution of his duty, sir," he said in an offended tone. "It's bad enough to have a meetin'-house in the place, without one's own parson siding with t'other parson as won't pay a lawful church-rate."
"I would have paid the church-rate for the whole parish ten times over before such a thing should have happened. I feel so disgraced, I am ashamed to look Mr Templeton in the face. Carry that table into the house again, directly."
"It's my property, now," interposed the broker. "I've bought it of the churchwarden, and paid for it."
I turned to Mr Brownrigg.
"How much did he give you for it?" I asked.
"Twenty shillings," returned he, sulkily, "and it won't pay expenses."
"Twenty shillings!" I exclaimed; "for a table that cost three times as much at least!—What do you expect to sell it for?"
"That's my business," answered the broker.
I pulled out my purse, and threw a sovereign and a half on the table, saying—
"FIFTY PER CENT. will be, I think, profit enough even on such a transaction."
"I did not offer you the table," returned the broker. "I am not bound to sell except I please, and at my own price."
"Possibly. But I tell you the whole affair is illegal. And if you carry away that table, I shall see what the law will do for me. I assure you I will prosecute you myself. You take up that money, or I will. It will go to pay counsel, I give you my word, if you do not take it to quench strife."
I stretched out my hand. But the broker was before me. Without another word, he pocketed the money, jumped into his cart with his man, and drove off, leaving the churchwarden and the parson standing at the door of the dissenting minister with his mahogany table on the path between them.
"Now, Mr Brownrigg," I said, "lend me a hand to carry this table in again."
He yielded, not graciously,—that could not be expected,—but in silence.
"Oh! sir," interposed young Tom, who had stood by during the dispute, "let me take it. You're not able to lift it."
"Nonsense! Tom. Keep away," I said. "It is all the reparation I can make."
And so Mr Brownrigg and I blundered into the little parlour with our burden—not a great one, but I began to find myself failing.
Mr Templeton sat in a Windsor chair in the middle of the room. Evidently the table had been carried away from before him, leaving his position uncovered. The floor was strewed with the books which had lain upon it. He sat reading an old folio, as if nothing had happened. But when we entered he rose.
He was a man of middle