The reader's imagination will supply
the gist of the argument.
Another rector, who had lost his favourite setter, told his clerk to
make inquiries about it, but was much astonished to hear him give it out
as a notice in church, coupled with the offer of a reward of three
pounds if the dog should be restored to his owner.
The clerk of the sporting parson was often quite as keen as his master
in following the chase. It was not unusual for rectors to take
"occasional services," weddings or funerals, on the way to a meet,
wearing "pink" under their surplices. A wedding was proceeding in a
Devonshire church, and when the happy pair were united and the Psalm was
just about to be said, the clerk called out, "Please to make 'aste, sir,
or he'll be gone afore you have done." The parson nodded and looked
inquiringly at the clerk, who said, "He's turned into the vuzz bushes
down in ten acres. Do look sharp, sir[72]."
[Footnote 72: This story is told by Mrs. Hewett in her _Peasant Speech
of Devon_, but I have ventured to anglicise the broad Devonshire a
little, and to suggest that the scene could scarcely have taken place on
a Sunday morning, as Mrs. Hewett suggests in her admirable book.]
The story is told of a rector who, when walking to church across the
squire's park during a severe winter, found a partridge apparently
frozen to death.
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