She tried a
delicate remonstrance, but though he was most courteous, it was not to
be mistaken that the Rector of Dacrefield meant to go his own way:
"the way of a better man than I shall ever be," he said. Failing to
change his principles, or guide his practice, my aunt next became
anxious to find him a wife. "Medical men and country parsons ought to
be married," said she, "and it will settle him."
She selected a young lady of the neighbourhood, the daughter of a
medical man. "Most suitable," said my aunt (by which she meant not
_quite_ up to the standard she would have exacted for a son of her
own), "and with a little money." She patronised this young lady, and
even took her with us one day to lunch at the Rectory; but when she
said something to Mr. Clerke on the subject, she found him utterly
obdurate. "What does he expect, I wonder?" cried my aunt, rather
unfairly, for the Rector had not given utterance to any matrimonial
hopes. She always said, "She never could feel that Mr. Clerke had
behaved well to poor Letitia Ramsay," which used to make downright
Polly very indignant. "He didn't behave badly to her. It was mamma who
always took her everywhere where he was; and how she could stand it, I
don't know! He never flirted with her, Regie.
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