[I think these remarks were received rather coolly. A temporary
boarder from the country, consisting of a somewhat more than
middle-aged female, with a parchment forehead and a dry little
"frisette" shingling it, a sallow neck with a necklace of gold beads, a
black dress too rusty for recent grief, and contours in basso-rilievo,
left the table prematurely, and was reported to have been very
virulent about what I said. So I went to my good old minister, and
repeated the remarks, as nearly as I could remember them, to him. He
laughed good-naturedly, and said there was considerable truth in
them. He thought he could tell when people's minds were wandering, by
their looks. In the earlier years of his ministry he had sometimes
noticed this, when he was preaching;--very little of late
years. Sometimes, when his colleague was preaching, he observed this
kind of inattention; but after all, it was not so very unnatural. I
will say, by the way, that it is a rule I have long followed, to tell
my worst thoughts to my minister, and my best thoughts to the young
people I talk with.
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