One evening he walked in, accompanied by a fine-looking young fellow, whom I thought I must know, and presently recognized as Home, our old school-fellow, with whom I had fought in Switzerland. We had become good friends before we parted, and Charley and he had met repeatedly since.
‘What are you doing now, Home?’ I asked him.
‘I’ve just taken deacon’s orders,’ he answered. ‘A friend of my father’s has promised me a living. I’ve been hanging-about quite long enough now. A fellow ought to do something for his existence.’
‘I can’t think how a strong fellow like you can take to mumbling prayers and reading sermons,’ said Charley.
‘It ain’t nice,’ said Home, ‘but it’s a very respectable profession. There are viscounts in it, and lots of honourables.’
‘I dare say,’ returned Charley, with drought. ‘But a nerveless creature like me, who can’t even hit straight from the shoulder, would be good enough for that. A giant like you, Home!’
‘Ah! by-the-by, Osborne,’ said Home, not in love with the prospect, and willing to turn the conversation, ‘I thought you were a church-calf yourself.’
‘Honestly, Home, I don’t know whether it isn’t the biggest of all big humbugs.’
‘Oh, but--Osborne!--it ain’t the thing, you know, to talk like that of a profession adopted by so many great men fit to honour any profession,’ returned Home, who was not one of the brightest of mortals, and was jealous for the profession just in as much as it was destined for his own.
‘Either the profession honours the men, or the men dishonour themselves,’ said Charley. ‘I believe it claims to have been founded by a man called Jesus Christ, if such a man ever existed except in the fancy of his priesthood.’
‘Well, really,’ expostulated Home, looking, I must say, considerably shocked, ‘I shouldn’t have expected that from the son of a clergyman!’
‘I couldn’t help my father. I wasn’t consulted,’ said Charley, with an uncomfortable grin. ‘But, at any rate, my father fancies he believes all the story. I fancy I don’t.’
‘Perhaps. Do you think that so very horrible?’
‘Yes, I do. Tom Paine, and all the rest of them, you know!’
‘Well, Home, I’ll tell you one thing I think worse than being an infidel.’
‘Either the so-called truths it advocates are things to live and die for, or they are the veriest old wives’ fables going. Do you know who was the first to do what you are about now?’