Page:Diary of a Pilgrimage (1891).pdf/67

 to the silly fellow to get under the table and finish his dinner there.

We had half-an-hour to spare between dinner and the starting of our train, and B. suggested that we should go into the cathedral. That is B.'s one weakness, churches. I have the greatest difficulty in getting him past a churchdoor. We are walking along a street, arm in arm, talking as rationally and even as virtuously as need be, when all at once I find that B. has become silent and abstracted.

I know what it is; he has caught sight of a church. I pretend not to notice any change in him, and endeavour to hurry him on. He lags more and more behind, however, and at last stops altogether.

"Come, come," I say to him, encouragingly, "pull yourself together, and be a man. Don't think about it. Put it behind you, and determine that you won't be conquered. Come, we shall be round the corner in another minute, where you won't be able to see it. Take my hand, and let's run!"

He makes a few feeble steps forward with me, and then stops again.

"It's no good, old man," he says, with a sickly smile, so full of pathos that it is impossible to find it in one's heart to feel anything but pity for him. "I can't help it. I have given way to this sort of thing too long. It is too