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."
