Mary's, and Emily and I shared to the full her hero-worship. It was
the nearest compensation my sister had had for the loss of Ellen,
with this difference, that Mrs. Henderson was older, had read more,
and had conversed thoughtfully with some of the leading spirits in
religious thought, so that she opened a new world to us.
People would hardly believe in our eagerness and enthusiasm over the
revelations of church doctrine; how we debated, consulted our books,
and corresponded with Clarence over what now seems so trite; how we
viewed the British Critic and Tracts for the Times as our oracles,
and worried the poor Wattlesea bookseller to get them for us at the
first possible moment.
Church restoration was setting in. Henderson had always objected to
christening from a slop-basin on the altar, and had routed out a
dilapidated font; and now one, which was termed by the country paper
chaste and elegant, was by united efforts, in which Clarence had the
lion's share, presented in time for the christening of the first
child at the Parsonage. It is that which was sent off to the
Mission Chapel as a blot on the rest of Earlscombe Church. Yet what
an achievement it was deemed at the time!
The same may be said of most of our doings at that era. We effected
them gradually, and have ever since been undoing them, as our
architectural and ecclesiastical perceptions have advanced.
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