At its rear was a house with broken gablets and round dormers stuck deep into the thatch.

A burial ground lay in front of both edifices, and looked dreary and chilling now, with the snow covering its many mounds and dripping from the warm wood of its rude old crosses.
"This will be the minister's house," said Ralph.
They drew up in front and knocked at the door of a deep porch.

An old man opened it and looked closely at his visitors through sharp, watchful eyes.

He wore a close jerkin of thick blue homespun, and his broad-topped boots were strapped round his short pantaloons.
"Does the priest live here ?" said Ralph, from the road, where he held the mare's head.
"No priest lives here," said the old man, somewhat curtly.
"Does the minister ?" "No, nor a minister." The changes of ecclesiastical administration had been so frequent of late that it was impossible to say what formula was now in the ascendent.

Ralph understood the old man's laconic answers to imply a remonstrance, and he tried again.
"Do you preach in this church ?" "_I_ preach?
No; I practise." It transpired after much wordy fencing, which was at least as irritating as amusing to a man in Ralph's present temper, that there was no minister now in possession of the benefice, and that the church had for some months been closed, the spiritual welfare of the parishioners being consequently in a state of temporary suspension.
The old man who replied to Ralph's interrogations proved to be the parish clerk, and whether his duties were also suspended--whether the parishioners did not die, and did not require to be buried--during the period in which the parish was deprived of a parson, was a question of more consequence to Ralph than the cause of the religious bankruptcy which the old man described.
Ralph explained in a few words the occasion of his visit, and begged the clerk to dig a grave at once.
"I fear it will scarce conform to the articles," the clerk said with a grave shake of his old head; "I'm sore afraid I'll suffer a penalty if it's known." Ralph passed some coins into the old man's hand with as little ostentation as possible; whereupon the clerk, much mollified, continued,-- "But it's not for me to deny to any Christian a Christian burial--that is to say, as much of it as stands in no need of the book.