He whom I call Parson West is now dead. He was
an entirely conscientious man; which means that he would rather do wrong
himself than persuade or advise another man--above all, a young man--to
do it. I am sure therefore that in burying the body of John Emmet as he
did, and enlisting my help, he did what he thought right, though the
action was undoubtedly an illegal one. Still, the question is one for
casuists; and remembering how modest a value my old friend set on his
own wisdom, I dare say that by keeping his real name out of the
narrative I am obeying what would have been his wish. His small breach
of the law he was (I know) prepared to answer for cheerfully, should the
facts come to light. He has now gone where their discovery affects him
not at all.
Parson West, then, when I made his acquaintance in 188-, had for thirty
years been vicar of the coast-parish of Lansulyan. He had come to it
almost fresh from Oxford, a young scholar with a head full of Greek,
having accepted the living from his old college as a step towards
preferment. He was never to be offered another. Lansulyan parish is a
wide one in acreage, and the stipend exiguous even for a bachelor. From
the first the Parson eked out his income by preparing small annotated
editions of the Classics for the use of Schools and by taking occasional
pupils, of whom in 188- I was the latest.
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