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She had an uncle at the Rectory as well as at the Hall, but there were no young people in the clerical house. This was how things stood with the Prescotts and Mary Burnet, when the new curate arrived, of whom Uncle Hugh at the Rectory had heard so very good an account. Uncle Hugh was a very conscientious clergyman. He liked to keep the parish in thoroughly good working order, but if truth must be told he preferred that some one else should do the work for him. He had the very best recommendations with the new curate. He was hard-working, he was moderate, not too much of a ritualist, and yet a very good Churchman, and a man who socially took nothing upon him; a retiring, modest young man. The Rector was most fortunate in getting a curate like Mr. Asquith, everybody said.

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A CURATE is a very useful member of the Church militant. He is the stuff out of which all its more dignified functionaries are made; and he does a great deal of the hard work, with a very limited proportion of the pay. But notwithstanding all this, he has a great deal to put up with in the way of snubs from his superiors, and indifference from the public, who accept his services often without prizing them very much. He has compensation in his youth, which makes him acceptable to the younger and fairer portion of the flock, and in his hopes of better things, as well as, no doubt, to leave pleasantry apart, in the satisfaction of performing important duties, and doing the sacred work to which he has dedicated himself.