Reform has been
busy even among these stalls, attaching some amount of
work to the pay, and paring off some superfluous wealth
from such of them as were over full; but reform has been
lenient with them, acknowledging that it was well to have
some such places of comfortable and dignified retirement
for those who have worn themselves out in the hard work of
their profession. There has of late prevailed a taste for
the appointment of young bishops, produced no doubt by a
feeling that bishops should be men fitted to get through
really hard work; but we have never heard that young
prebendaries were considered desirable. A clergyman
selected for such a position should, we have always
thought, have earned an evening of ease by a long day of
work, and should, above all things, be one whose life
has been, and therefore in human probability will be,
so decorous as to be honourable to the cathedral of his
adoption.
We were, however, the other day given to understand
that one of these luxurious benefices, belonging to the
cathedral of Barchester, had been bestowed on the Rev.
Mark Robarts, the vicar of a neighbouring parish, on the
understanding that he should hold the living and the stall
together; and on making further inquiry we were surprised
to learn that this fortunate gentleman is as yet
considerably under thirty years of age.
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