CHAPTER XVI.
It was with a wrath suppressed in the presence of the fair ambassadress, that Mr.Vigors had received from Mrs.Poyntz the intelligence that I had replaced Dr.Jones at Abbots' House not less abruptly than Dr.Jones had previously supplanted me.

As Mrs.Poyntz took upon herself the whole responsibility of this change, Mr.Vigors did not venture to condemn it to her face; for the Administrator of Laws was at heart no little in awe of the Autocrat of Proprieties; as Authority, howsoever established, is in awe of Opinion, howsoever capricious.
To the mild Mrs.Ashleigh the magistrate's anger was more decidedly manifested.

He ceased his visits; and in answer to a long and deprecatory letter with which she endeavoured to soften his resentment and win him back to the house, he replied by an elaborate combination of homily and satire.

He began by excusing himself from accepting her invitations, on the ground that his time was valuable, his habits domestic; and though ever willing to sacrifice both time and habits where he could do good, he owed it to himself and to mankind to sacrifice neither where his advice was rejected and his opinion contemned.

He glanced briefly, but not hastily, at the respect with which her late husband had deferred to his judgment, and the benefits which that deference had enabled him to bestow.