But it was not the feebleness or weariness of age that made him seem at times indifferent to what was going on around him--it was the intensity and fervour of a great and growing idea of happiness in his soul,--an idea which he cherished so fondly and in such close secrecy, as to be almost afraid to whisper it to himself lest by some unhappy chance it should elude his grasp and vanish into nothingness.
And so the time went on to Christmas and New Year.

Weircombe kept these festivals very quietly, yet not without cheerfulness.

There was plenty of holly about, and the children, plunging into the thick of the woods at the summit of the "coombe" found mistletoe enough for the common need.

The tiny Church was prettily decorated by the rector's wife and daughters, assisted by some of the girls of the village, and everybody attended service on Christmas morning, not only because it was Christmas, but because it was the last time their own parson would preach to them, before he went away for three months or more to a warm climate for the benefit of his health.

But Helmsley did not join the little crowd of affectionate parishioners--he stayed at home while Mary went, as she said "to pray for him." He watched her from the open cottage door, as she ascended the higher part of the "coombe," dressed in a simple stuff gown of darkest blue, with a prim little "old maid's" bonnet, as she called it, tied neatly under her rounded white chin--and carrying in her hand a much worn "Book of Common Prayer" which she held with a certain delicate reverence not often shown to holy things by the church-going women of the time.