For the Verjooses, the Rogerses, the Swaynes, and the rest, were people whom John not only did not know, but whom he neither expected nor cared to know; and so his present interest in them was extremely small.
Outside of his regular occupations, and despite the improvement in his domestic environment, life was so dull for him that he could not imagine its ever being otherwise in Homeville.

It was a year since the world--his world--had come to an end, and though his sensations of loss and defeat had passed the acute stage, his mind was far from healthy.

He had evaded David's question, or only half answered it, when he merely replied that the rector had called upon him.

The truth was that some tentative advances had been made to him, and Mr.Euston had presented him to a few of the people in his flock; but beyond the point of mere politeness he had made no response, mainly from indifference, but to a degree because of a suspicion that his connection with Mr.Harum would not, to say the least, enhance his position in the minds of certain of the people of Homeville.

As has been intimated, it seemed at the outset of his career in the village as if there had been a combination of circumstance and effort to put him on his guard, and, indeed, rather to prejudice him against his employer; and Mr.Harum, as it now appeared to our friend, had on one or two occasions laid himself open to misjudgment, if no more.