Page:The Prussian officer, and other stories, Lawrence, 1914.djvu/151

 man of more complete tolerance and generosity scarcely exists. Let the boors mock him, he merely smiles on the other side, and there is no malice in his eyes, only a quiet expression of waiting till they have finished. His people do not like him, yet none could bring forth an accusation against him, save that “You never can tell when he’s having you.”

I dined the other evening with the vicar in his study. The room scandalizes the neighbourhood because of the statuary which adorns it: a Laocoön and other classic copies, with bronze and silver Italian Renaissance works. For the rest, it is all dark and tawny.

Mr. Colbran is an archæologist. He does not take himself seriously, however, in his hobby, so that nobody knows the worth of his opinions on the subject.

“Here you are,” he said to me after dinner, “I’ve found another paragraph for my great work.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Haven’t I told you I was compiling a Bible of the English people—the Bible of their hearts—their exclamations in presence of the unknown? I’ve found a fragment at home, a jump at God from Beauvale.”

“Where?” I asked, startled.

The vicar closed his eyes whilst looking at me.

“Only on parchment,” he said.

Then, slowly, he reached for a yellow book, and read, translating as he went:

“Then, while we chanted, came a crackling at the window, at the great east window, where hung our