The Vicar devoted a week to the consideration of his grievance about the chapel, and then did write to the Marquis. Indeed, there was no time to be lost if he intended to do anything, as on the second day after his interview with Mr. Grimes, Grimes himself, with two men to assist him, began their measuring on the devoted spot, sticking in little marks for the corners of the projected building, and turning up a sod here and there. Mr. Grimes was a staunch Churchman; and though in the way of business he was very glad to have the building of a Methodist chapel,—or of a Pagan temple, if such might come in his way,—yet, even though he possibly might give some offence to the great man’s shadow in Bullhampton, he was willing to postpone his work for two or three days at the Vicar’s request. “Grimes,” the Vicar said, “I’m not quite sure that I like this.”

“Well, sir;—no, sir. I was thinking myself, sir, that maybe you might take it unkind in the Marquis.”

“I think I shall write to him. Perhaps you wouldn’t mind giving over for a day or two.” Grimes yielded at once, and took his spade and measurements away, although Mr. Puddleham fretted a good deal. Mr. Puddleham had been much elated by the prospect of his new Bethel, and had, it must be confessed, received into his mind an idea that it would be a good thing to quarrel with the Vicar under the auspices of the landlord. Fenwick’s character had hitherto been too strong for him, and he had been forced into parochial quiescence and religious amity almost in spite of his conscience. He was a much older man than Mr. Fenwick, having been for thirty years in the ministry, and he had always previously enjoyed the privilege of being on bad terms with the clergyman of the Establishment. It had been his glory to be a poacher on another man’s manor, to filch souls, as it were, out of the keeping of a pastor of a higher grade than himself, to say severe things of the short comings of an endowed clergyman, and to obtain recognition of his position by the activity of his operations in the guise of a blister. Our Vicar, understanding something of this, had, with some malice towards the gentleman himself, determined to rob Mr. Puddleham of his blistering powers. There is no doubt a certain pleasure in poaching which does not belong to the licit following of game; but a man can’t poach if the right of shooting be accorded to him. Mr. Puddleham had not been quite happy in his mind amidst the ease and amiable relations which Mr. Fenwick enforced upon him, and had long since begun to feel that a few cabbages and peaches did not repay him for the loss of those pleasant and bitter things, which it would have been his to say in his daily walks and from the pulpit of his Salem, had he not been thus hampered, confined, and dominated. Hitherto he had hardly gained a single soul from under Mr. Fenwick’s grasp,—had indeed on the balance lost his grasp on souls, and was beginning to be aware that this was so because of the cabbages and the peaches. He told himself that though he had not hankered after these flesh-pots, that though he would have preferred to be without the flesh-pots, he had submitted to them. He was painfully conscious of the guile of this young man, who had, as it were, cheated him out of that appropriate acerbity of religion, without which a proselyting sect can hardly maintain its ground beneath the shadow of an endowed and domineering Church. War was necessary to Mr. Puddleham. He had come to be hardly anybody at all, because he was at peace with the vicar of the parish in which he was established. His eyes had been becoming gradually open to all this for years; and when he had been present at the bitter quarrel between the Vicar and the Marquis, he had at once told himself that now was his opportunity. He had intended to express a clear opinion to Mr. Fenwick that he, Mr. Fenwick, had been very wrong in speaking to the Marquis as he had spoken, and as he was walking out of the farm-house he was preparing some words as to the respect due to those in authority. It happened, however, that at that moment the wind was taken out of his sails by a strange comparison which the Vicar made to him between the sins of them two, ministers of God as they were, and the sins of Carry Brattle. Mr. Puddleham at the moment had been cowed and quelled. He was not quite able to carry himself in the Vicar’s presence as though he were the Vicar’s equal. But the desire for a quarrel remained, and when it was suggested to him by Mr. Packer, the Marquis’s man of business, that the green opposite to the Vicarage gate would be a convenient site for his chapel, and that the Marquis was ready to double his before-proffered subscription, then he saw plainly that the moment had come, and that it was fitting that he should gird up his loins and return all future cabbages to the proud donor.

Mr. Puddleham had his eye keenly set on the scene of his future ministration, and was aware of Grimes’s default almost as soon as that man with his myrmidons had left the ground. He at once went to Grimes with heavy denunciations, with threats of the Marquis, and with urgent explanation as to the necessity of instant work. But Grimes was obdurate. The Vicar had asked him to leave the work for a day or two, and of course he must do what the Vicar asked. If he couldn’t be allowed to do as much as that for the Vicar of the parish, Bullhampton wouldn’t be, in Mr. Grimes’s opinion, any place for anybody to live in. Mr. Puddleham argued the matter out, but he argued in vain. Mr. Grimes declared that there was time enough, and that he would have the work finished by the time fixed,—unless, indeed, the Marquis should change his mind. Mr. Puddleham regarded this as a most improbable supposition. “The Marquis doesn’t change his mind, Mr. Grimes,” he said; and then he walked forth from Mr. Grimes’s house with much offence.

By this time all Bullhampton knew of the quarrel,—knew of it, although Mr. Fenwick had been so very careful to guard himself from any quarrelling at all. He had not spoken a word in anger on the subject to anyone but his wife; and in making his request to Grimes had done so with hypocritical good humour. But, nevertheless, he was aware that the parish was becoming hot about it; and when he sat down to write his letter to the Marquis he was almost minded to give up the idea of writing, to return to Grimes, and to allow the measuring and sod-turning to be continued. Why should a place of worship opposite to his gate be considered by him as an injury? Why should the psalm-singing of Christian brethren hurt his ears as he walked about his garden? And if, through the infirmity of his nature, his eyes and his ears were hurt, what was that to the great purport for which he had been sent into the parish? Was he not about to create enmity by his opposition; and was it not his special duty to foster love and goodwill among his people? After all he, within his own Vicarage grounds, had all that it was intended that he should possess; and that he held very firmly. Poor Mr. Puddleham had no such firm holding; and why should he quarrel with Mr. Puddleham because that ill-paid preacher sought to strengthen the ground on which his Salem stood?

As he paused, however, to think of all this, there came upon him the conviction that in this thing that was to be done the Marquis was determined to punish him personally, and he could not resist the temptation of fighting the Marquis. And then, if he succumbed easily in this matter, would it not follow almost as a matter of course that the battle against him would be carried on elsewhere? If he yielded now, resolving to ignore altogether any idea of his own comfort or his own taste, would he thereby maintain that tranquillity in his parish which he thought so desirable? He had already seen that in Mr. Puddleham’s manner to himself which made him sure that Mr. Puddleham was ambitious to be a sword in the right hand of the Marquis. Personally the Vicar was himself pugnacious. Few men, perhaps, were more so. If there must be a fight let them come on, and he would do his best. Turning the matter thus backwards and forwards in his mind, he came at last to the conclusion that there must be a fight, and consequently he wrote the following letter to the Marquis;—

Bullhampton Vicarage, January 3, 186—.

My Lord Marquis,

I learned by chance the other day in the village that a new chapel for the use of the Methodist congregation of the parish was to be built on the little open green immediately opposite the Vicarage gate, and that this special spot of ground had been selected and given by your lordship for this purpose. I do not at all know what truth there may be in this,—except that Mr. Grimes, the carpenter here, has received orders from your agent about the work. ............