But all this was just part of the game.
It seemed to him as inevitable and eternal as the changes of the weather.

Matstead Church, he knew, had once been Catholic; but how long ago he did not care to inquire.

He only knew that for awhile there had been some doubt on the matter; and that before Mr.Barton's time, who was now minister there, there had been a proper priest in the place, who had read English prayers there and a sort of a mass, which he had attended as a little boy.

Then this had ceased; the priest had gone and Mr.Barton come, and since that time he had never been to church there, but had heard the real mass wherever he could with a certain secrecy.
And there might be further perils in future, as there might be thunderstorms or floods.

There was still the memory of the descent of the Commissioners a year or two after his birth; he had been brought up on the stories of riding and counter-riding, and the hiding away of altar-plate and beads and vestments.