This eBook was created by Charles Aldarondo (pg@aldarondo.net).
1862.
One very happy circumstance in a clergyman's lot, is that he issaved from painful perplexity as regards his choice of the scenein which he is to spend his days and years. I am sorry for theman who returns from Australia with a large fortune; and with nofurther end in life than to settle down somewhere and enjoy it.For in most cases he has no special tie to any particular place;and he must feel very much perplexed where to go. Should any personwho may read this page cherish the purpose of leaving me a hundredthousand pounds to invest in a pretty little estate, I beg thathe will at once abandon such a design. He would be doing me nokindness. I should be entirely bewildered in trying to make up mymind where I should purchase the property. I should be rent asunderby conflicting visions of rich English landscape, and heathery Scottishhills: of seaside breezes, and inland meadows: of horse-chestnutavenues, and dark stern pine-woods. And after the estate had beenbought, I should always be looking back and thinking I might havedone better. So, on the whole, I would prefer that my reader shouldhimself buy the estate, and bequeath it to me: and then I couldsoon persuade myself that it was the prettiest estate and thepleasantest neighbourhood in Britain.
Now, as a general rule, the Great Disposer says to the parson, Hereis your home, here lies your work through life: go and reconcileyour mind to it, and do your best in it. No doubt there are men inthe Church whose genius, popularity, influence, or luck is such,that they have a bewildering variety of livings pressed upon them:but it is not so with ordinary folk; and certainly it was not sowith me. I went where Providence bade me go, which was not whereI had wished to go, and not where I had thought to go. Many whoknow me through the pages which make this and a preceding volume,have said, written, and printed, that I was specially cut out fora country parson, and specially adapted to relish a quiet countrylife. Not more, believe me, reader, than yourself. It is in everyman who sets himself to it to attain the self-same characteristics.It is quite true I have these now: but, a few years since, neverwas mortal less like them. No cockney set down near Sydney Smithat Foston-le-Clay: no fish, suddenly withdrawn from its nativestream: could feel more strange and cheerless than did I when Iwent to my beautiful country parish, where I have spent