Francis Arabin was the younger son of a country gentleman from the north of England. He was educated at an excellent school, and then studied at Oxford University. Here he developed his skill in debating, and became known as an intelligent, humorous, and successful speaker. He was almost always able to make the arguments of the opposing team sound unbelievable, and he aimed to win every debate by using both humour and reason.

But his main interest was in religion, and he gave himself completely to the Church. For it he wrote poems, speeches, and sermons, for it he ate and drank and dressed and breathed. Soon he was ordained as a clergyman, and remained in Oxford as a professor of poetry at one of the university colleges.

Now came the moment of his greatest danger. After much thought, Mr Newman, a well-known Oxford clergyman, left the Church of England to join the Church of Rome, and Mr Arabin was strongly tempted to follow him. In order to consider what he should do, Arabin left Oxford for a while and stayed in a quiet little village by the sea, far from the complications of civilized life.

Everything seemed to point to his choosing the Church of Rome. He loved and admired Mr Newman, and was eager to follow in his footsteps. He approved of Rome's strictness. "How much simpler it would be," he thought, "to live under religious laws which are certain, how much easier to recognize sin and therefore avoid it!" And he wanted so much to show God that he believed in Him; what better proof could there be than making the great sacrifice of the religion in which he had been brought up, and which was supposed to provide his income?

At the time, Mr Arabin was a very young man, too confident in his own powers, and with too little respect for the common sense of ordinary people. But it was an ordinary country vicar, in that small village, who made him see that all true religious guidance comes from within the person, and not from laws made by priests. Arabin also realized that by looking for safety and comfort in the Church of Rome, he was running away from the difficult choice between good and evil. He returned to Oxford a humbler, but a better and a happier man.

When he became vicar of St Ewold's, the church near Plumstead, he was about forty and unmarried. He was above medium height, with slightly greying dark hair. He was not handsome, but his face was pleasant to look at, and there was a humorous look in his eyes. He was popular with women, but living in an Oxford college had meant that he could not marry, so he thought of women as pretty, amusing creatures, nothing more.

He came to stay for a month with the Grantlys, because the vicar's house at St Ewold's needed some repairs. After dinner with the archdeacon, his wife, and their daughters, Mr Arabin went up to his bedroom, and sat at the open window looking out at his church, which he could just see in the moonlight beyond the archdeacon's garden. It was a lovely evening, but Francis Arabin felt sad. It had struck him suddenly, when he saw Dr Grantly's charming wife and children and their comfortable house and garden, how alone in the world he was. He had given his whole life to the Church, and now he thought that had been a mistake. He knew he could have had a high position and great wealth, and probably a family to bring him joy, but now it was too late. He was the vicar of a small country church, and that was all.

It was very easy to turn the conversation to Mr Slope, and Mrs Grantly was soon criticizing him, which she did with her whole heart, and Mrs Bold was defending him almost as eagerly. Eleanor actually disliked the man; she had almost a fear of him, and would have been delighted never to see him again, but somehow she constantly found herself protecting him against what she considered the injustice of his enemies' attacks.

The following morning Mr Harding and Eleanor arrived at Plumstead to stay there for a few days. Dr Grantly and Mr Arabin were at St Ewold's, and Mr Harding wanted to walk round the garden, so the two sisters naturally fell into conversation. They had never told each other all their secrets, as Mrs Grantly was ten years older than Eleanor, and they did not see each other often. Mrs Grantly did not, therefore, expect Eleanor to talk to her of love, but she was still very anxious to find out whether her sister had any liking for Mr Slope.

The conversation moved on to the Stanhopes, and Mrs Grantly heard about Eleanor's recent evening with them. Suddenly she realized Mr Slope had also been there.

Susan Grantly sighed. "Well, perhaps it will never happen. I hope, now that Eleanor is here, she will forget her fatal passion."

"What!" she cried in horror. "Why, Eleanor, he must be very fond of you. He seems to follow you everywhere!"

Even this did not open Eleanor's eyes. She just laughed, and said she thought he found someone else to attract him at the Stanhopes'. And so the sisters parted. Mrs Grantly felt quite convinced that the hated marriage would take place, and Mrs Bold was just as convinced that the unfortunate chaplain was yet again being unjustly criticized.

The archdeacon was furious when his wife told him, in private, how she feared Eleanor's relationship with Mr Slope was developing. "I am sorry, my dear," he said, "but if she marries that man, I shall not allow either of them within my doors."

Poor Eleanor, who felt no fatal passion for any man, spent a rather dull evening. Mr Arabin did not seem to notice her much, and he and the Grantlys spent all the time after dinner discussing the various local clergymen. Eleanor began to think, on reaching her bedroom that night, that she was getting tired of clergymen and their respectable, boring way of life, and that she would have had a much pleasanter evening with the Stanhopes.

Mr Arabin, on the other hand, had enjoyed his evening; he appreciated not only the well-informed conversation of the Grantlys, but also the sight of Eleanor's very pretty face under her widow's cap. He began to look forward to the rest of his stay at Plumstead, because she would be there for some of the time.

The next day the whole party drove in the archdeacon's carriage to visit the vicar's house at St Ewold's. In the carriage Eleanor found herself opposite Mr Arabin, and was surprised to discover how easy he was to talk to.

"I suppose," suggested Eleanor, "that in the past the priestess had all the power. Perhaps Mr Arabin thinks that might happen again if St Ewold's had a modern priestess."

Mr Harding told them an old story he had heard from local people that, a long time ago, a priestess had lived at St Ewold's; she was famous for curing the villagers of all kinds of diseases. Mr Arabin declared he would not want the villagers to rely on a priestess these days, but Mrs Grantly disagreed. "Every church should have its priestess as well as its priest," she said, smiling.

"There is a beautiful view from here," said Eleanor, looking out at the cathedral, the bishop's palace, and the trees surrounding Hiram's Hospital. "This will be your study, I imagine?"

"Such accidents do happen," said Mrs Grantly. "They say there is a priestess in Barchester who gives the orders in spiritual matters. Perhaps the fear of that is before your eyes, Mr Arabin."

"I think it is safer not to run the risk of it," laughed Mr Arabin.

This amusing conversation came to an end when they arrived at St Ewold's. Soon the archdeacon and his wife were walking all round the house, telling Mr Arabin what repairs and improvements he needed to make, in order to live comfortably. But while the Grantlys were in the dining room, making plans for a larger fireplace, Eleanor and Mr Arabin found themselves in a small upstairs sitting room.

"Yes," he said, joining her at the window, "I shall have a perfect view of my enemies. I can fire at them very conveniently from here."

"You clergymen are always thinking of fighting each other!" said Eleanor, half laughing.

Eleanor was impressed by his quiet seriousness. She was used to religious discussion, but she realized, with a certain pleasurable excitement, that this newcomer among them was different from the other churchmen she knew. Instead of arguing bitterly about details, he was only interested in the truth, and was searching humbly for it.

They were interrupted by the archdeacon's shouts of "Arabin! Arabin!" and went to join the Grantlys in the dining room. Dr Grantly suggested the whole room should be enlarged, which Mr Arabin considered would be far too expensive.

"But are we not here to fight? If we have differences of opinion, should we not go into battle? There is no easy path in religion -- I have looked for one and did not find it." He was silent for a moment, thinking of the time when he had so nearly sacrificed his freedom and his intelligence for that easy path.

"Then she must do it herself," replied Mr Arabin lightly.

"But," said Mrs Grantly with a smile, "what if the priestess, who will surely arrive here one day, insists on it?"

And, having done their work, the party returned home to Plumstead, well satisfied with their visit.

The squire of Ullathorne, the area of farmland, villages and churches which included St Ewold's, was a gentleman called William Thorne. He was about fifty, single, and more than a little proud of his appearance. But he was prouder still of his family name. He had a great respect for long, unbroken bloodlines, and his own family line stretched back to the eighth or ninth century. He believed firmly that all traditions and customs should be kept exactly as they always had been.

The following Sunday Mr Arabin was to give his first sermon at St Ewold's. He, the archdeacon, and Eleanor were to go there for the morning service, have lunch with the local squire, and return to Plumstead after attending the afternoon service.

Mr Thorne did not live alone at Ullathorne House. He had a sister, who was ten years older than him, and an even greater believer in tradition. Once when her brother suggested making a small alteration to the front door of their house, she took to her bed and was ill for a week; she would not come downstairs until she received his promise that it would not be changed in her lifetime. She would not have a modern magazine in her sitting room, and she refused to read poems or novels by living writers. She had thought her brother dangerously liberal-minded when he was younger, and was pleased that the passing of the years had shown him the importance of traditional values. Looking back over five or six centuries of English history, as Miss Thorne liked to do, she often found reason to sigh deeply. She imagined that an innocence and a goodness had existed in the past, which were not to be found in her own time. However wrong she was, no one would deny her the sweetness of her soft regrets!

And then Miss Thorne was very knowledgeable about teeth. Little Johnny Bold had been troubled for the last few days with his first tooth, and Miss Thorne was shocked to find that Eleanor was giving him some dreadfully modern medicine, recommended by one of the local doctors.

Then came the lunch at Ullathorne House. Miss Thorne took special care of Eleanor, piling cold meat on her plate and filling her glass with wine. "It's your duty, you know, to support yourself," she whispered in the young mother's ear. "There's more than yourself depending on it."

Mr Arabin, Dr Grantly, and Eleanor met Mr and Miss Thorne at the gates of Ullathorne House, and walked to church together. Large numbers of villagers had gathered there, to see their new vicar. In spite of his long experience of public speaking, Mr Arabin felt a little nervous, knowing that he was being compared with the previous vicar. But fortunately most people in the church considered that Arabin did his work well enough, especially as his sermon was only twenty minutes long.

"Indeed, my dear, and a sad day it was for Barchester."

"What are you putting on your fields now, Thorne? Is it guano?" asked Dr Grantly.

"Why, Miss Thorne, he died when I was a little girl."

"Yes, archdeacon, I get it from Bristol. You'll find a lot of Barchester people, Mr Arabin, who come to services at St Ewold's in the summer, if it isn't too hot for them to walk."

The archdeacon was enjoying his lunch. He talked to his host Mr Thorne about farming; while Mr Thorne, thinking it only polite to pay attention to a stranger, tried to talk to Mr Arabin about religious matters. The two conversations ran on together.

"Take care, my dear," she said, looking very serious, "that that man doesn't harm your little boy. But then," speaking more in pity than in anger, "I don't know which doctor you can trust now. Poor dear old Dr Bumpwell, of course --"

"I drove there myself this year, and bought it straight off the ship. I'm afraid, Mr Arabin, that as the evenings get darker, you'll find it difficult to read in the church. I shall send a man to cut off some branches of the trees outside the south window."

"Who do you buy it from in Bristol, Thorne?"

"I'm glad they stayed away today," said Mr Arabin, smiling, "as it was my first sermon."

At three o'clock they all went to church again. This time the archdeacon gave the sermon, and half an hour later he, Mr Arabin, and Eleanor shook hands with their Ullathorne friends and drove back to Plumstead.

"The morning light is perfect, at least," said Mr Arabin. And then he and Eleanor took a walk round the garden, while Miss Thorne cut some flowers, and the archdeacon and the squire finished their discussion about the Bristol guano.