Her very blots are not bold like this [here a bold blot], but poor smears [here a poor smear] half left in and half scratched out with another smear left in their place.

The only apparent blots on existence at Putney were the noise and danger of the High Street, the dearth of reliable laundries, the manners of a middle-aged lady engaged at the post office (Mrs. Challice liked the other ladies in the post office), and the absence of a suitable man in the house.

The punishment of this in Blackstone's day was death[407]; but in the next century the death penalty was repealed and transportation for life substituted.[408] The saddest blot on a presumably Christian civilisation connected with this matter is the so-called "age of legal consent."

The one dark blot in the existence of the school teacher is the small salary received.

The beauty of the English Church in this time was its family life of purity and simplicity; its blot was quiet worldliness.