Chapter 8.

The Elf Child and the Minister

Governor Bellingham, in a loose gown and easy cap, such as elderly gentleman, loved

to undo themselves with in their domestic privacy, walked foremost and appeared to be showing

off his estate and expatiating on his projected improvements.

The widespread circumference of an elaborate rough beneath his grey beard in the antiquated

fashion of King James's reign cost his head to look not a little like that of John the

Baptist in a charger.

The impression, made by his aspect so rigid and severe and frostbun with more than

autumnal age, was hardly in keeping with the appliances of worldly enjoyment, wherewith

he'd evidently done his utmost to surround himself.

But it is an error to suppose that our grave forefathers, though accustomed to speak and

think of human existence, as estate merely of trial and warfare, and though, unfeinently,

prepared to sacrifice goods and life at the behest of duty, made it a matter of conscience

to reject such means of comfort, or even luxury, as lay fairly within their grasp.

This creed was never taught, for instance, by the venerable pastor John Wilson, whose beard

white as a snow-dreft, was seen over Governor Bellingham's shoulder, while it's wearer

suggested that payers and peaches might yet be naturalized in the New England climate,

and that purple grapes might possibly be compelled to nourish against the sunny garden wall.

The old clergyman, nurtured at the rich bosom of the English church, had a long established

and legitimate taste for all good and comfortable things, and, however, stern, he might show himself

in the pulpit, or in his public reproof of such transgressions, as that of Hester Prin,

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