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 to me again. He already deplored the levity of the magazine and regretted its want of serious matter.

"Perhaps," he said, "I shall some day send you a paper myself. I have long felt that some attempt ought to be made to instruct our people in the history of the monastic orders."

This was an embarrassing suggestion. I owe a good deal to my uncle Ambrose, but I am running a magazine with the object of making money. And, besides, a paper on the monastic orders would not be fair to Egerton.

"Surely," I said, "your time must be too fully occupied to allow you to undertake such work. Your contemplated monograph on the English Benedictines, your cathedral sermons, your functions as a rural dean, the round of your parochial duties"

"I have a curate. Mr. Metcalf takes a great deal of routine work off my hands."

I reached out gratefully toward a new subject, one less likely to prove dangerous to my magazine.

"I'm glad you've got a good curate. Is he all you could wish?"

Uncle Ambrose smiled. No curate is all that can be wished.

"Metcalf is a worthy fellow, hard-working and strictly orthodox, a sound churchman; but a little dull. He is very far from being an intellectual companion. You will be able to judge for yourself when you hear him preach this evening."