Mrs. Ried had the benefit of a full, steady look from Abbie's great solemn eyes now, as she said:

"Mother, I want God's help. No other will do me any good."

"Well," answered Mrs. Ried, after just a moment of rather awe-struck silence, "can't you find that help any where but in that plain, common little meeting-house? I thought people with your peculiar views believed that God was every-where."

An expression not unlike that of a hunted deer shone for a moment in Abbie's eyes. Then she spoke, in tones almost despairing:

"O mother, mother, you can not understand."

Tone, or words, or both, vexed Mrs. Ried afresh, and she spoke with added sharpness.

"At least I can understand this much, that my daughter is very anxious to do a thing utterly unheard of in its propriety, and I am thoroughly ashamed of you. If I were Ester I should not like to uphold you in such a singularly conspicuous parade. Remember, you have no one now but John to depend upon as an escort."

Ralph had remained a silent, immovable listener to this strange, sad conversation up to this moment. Now he came suddenly forward with a quick, firm tread, and encircled Abbie's trembling form with his arm, while with eyes and voice he addressed his mother.

"In that last proposition you are quite mistaken, my dear mother. Abbie chances to have a brother, who considers himself honored by being permitted to accompany her any where she may choose to go."

Mrs. Ried looked up at her tall, haughty son in unfeigned astonishment, and for an instant was silent.

"Oh," she said at last, "if you have chosen to rank yourself on this ridiculous fanatical side, I have nothing more to say."

As for Mr. Ried, he had long before this shadded his eyes with his hand, and was looking through half-closed fingers with mournful eyes at the sable robes and pallid face of his golden-haired darling, apparently utterly unconscious of or indifferent to the talk that was going on.

But will Ralph ever forget the little sweet smile which illumined for a moment the pure young face, as she turned confiding eyes on him?

Thenceforth there dawned a new era in Abbie's life. Ralph, for reasons best known to himself, chose to be released from his vacation engagements in a neighboring city, and remained closely at home. And Abbie went as usual to her mission-class, to her Bible-class, to the teacher's prayer-meeting, to the regular church prayer-meeting, every-where she had been wont to go, and she was always and every-where accompanied and sustained by her brother.

As for Ester, these were days of great opportunity and spiritual growth to her.

So we bridge the weeks between and reach the afternoon of a September day, bright and beautiful, as the month draws toward its closing; and Ester is sitting alone in her room in the low, easy chair by the open window, and in her lap lies an open letter, while she, with thoughtful, earnest eyes seems reading, not it, but the future, or else her own heart. The letter is from Sadie, and she has written thus:

"MY DEAR CITY SISTER,—Mother said to-night, as we were promenading the dining-room for the sake of exercise, and also to clear off the table (Maggie had the toothache and was off duty): 'Sadie, my dear child, haven't you written to Ester yet? Do you think it is quite right to neglect her so, when she must be very anxious to hear from home?' Now, you know, when mother says, 'Sadie, my dear child,' and looks at me from out those reproachful eyes of hers, there is nothing short of mixing a mess of bread that I would not do for her. So here I am—place, third story front; time, 11:30 P.M.; position, foot of the bed (Julia being soundly sleeping at the head), one gaiter off and one gaiter on, somewhat after the manner of 'my son John' so renowned in history. Speaking of bread, how abominably that article can act. I had a solemn conflict with a batch of it this morning. Firstly, you must know, I forgot it. Mother assured me it was ready to be mixed before I awakened, so it must have been before that event took place that the forgetfulness occurred; however, be that as it may, after I was thoroughly awake, and up, and down, I still forgot it. The fried potatoes were frying themselves fast to that abominable black dish in which they are put to sizzle, and which, by the way, is the most nefarious article in the entire kitchen list to get clean (save and excepting the dish-cloth). Well, as I was saying, they burned themselves, and I ran to the rescue. Then Minie wanted me to go to the yard with her, to see a 'dear cunning little brown and gray thing, with some greenish spots, that walked and spoke to her.' The interesting stranger proved to be a fair-sized frog! While examining into, and explaining minutely the nature and character and occupations of the entire frog family, the mixture in the tin pail, behind the kitchen stove, took that opportunity to sour. My! what a bubble it was in, and what an interesting odor it emitted, when at last I returned from frogdom to the ordinary walks of life, and gave it my attention. Maggie was above her elbows in the wash-tub, so I seized the pail, and in dire haste and dismay ran up two flights of stairs in search of mother. I suppose you know what followed. I assure you, I think mothers and soda are splendid! What a remarkable institution that ingredient is. While I made sour into sweet with the aid of its soothing proclivities, I moralized; the result of which was that after I had squeezed and mushed and rolled over, and thumped and patted my dough the requisite number of times, I tucked it away under blankets in a corner, and went out to the piazza to ask Dr. Douglass if he knew of an article in the entire round of Materia Medica which could be given to human beings when they were sour and disagreeable, and which, after the manner of soda in dough, would immediately work a reform. On his acknowledging his utter ignorance of any such principle, I advanced the idea that cooking was a much more developed science than medicine; thence followed an animated discussion.

"But in the meantime what do you suppose that bread was doing? Just spreading itself in the most remarkable manner over the nice blanket under which I had cuddled it! Then I had an amazing time. Mother said the patting process must all be done over again; and there was abundant opportunity for more moralizing. That bread developed the most remarkable stick-to-a-tive-ness that I ever beheld. I assure you, if total depravity is a mark of humanity, then I believe my dough is human.

"Well, we are all still alive, though poor Mr. Holland is, I fear, very little more than that. He was thrown from his carriage one evening last week, and brought home insensible. He is now in a raging fever, and very ill indeed. For once in their lives both doctors agree. He is delirious most of the time; and his delirium takes the very trying form which leads him to imagine that only mother can do any thing for him. The doctors think he fancies she is his own mother, and that he is a boy again. All this makes matters rather hard on mother. She is frequently with him half the night; and often Maggie and I are left to reign supreme in the kitchen for the entire day. Those are the days that 'try men's souls,' especially women's.

"I am sometimes tempted to think that all the book knowledge the world contains is not to be compared to knowing just what, and how, and when, to do in the kitchen. I quite think so for a few hours when mother, after a night of watching in a sick room, comes down to undo some of my blundering. She is the patientest, dearest, lovingest, kindest mother that ever a mortal had, and just because she is so patient shall I rejoice over the day when she can give a little sigh of relief and leave the kitchen, calm in the assurance that it will be right-side up when she returns. Ester, how did you make things go right? I'm sure I try harder than I ever knew you to, and yet salt will get into cakes and puddings, and sugar into potatoes. Just here I'm conscience smitten. I beg you will not construe one of the above sentences as having the remotest allusion to your being sadly missed at home. Mother said I was not even to hint such a thing, and I'm sure I haven't. I'm a remarkable housekeeper. The fall term at the academy opened week before last. I have hidden my school-books behind that old barrel in the north-east corner of the attic. I thought they would be safer there than below stairs. At least I was sure the bread would do better in the oven because of their ascent.

"To return to the scene of our present trials: Mr. Holland is, I suppose, very dangerously sick; and poor Mrs. Holland is the very embodiment of despair. When I look at her in prospective misery, I am reminded of poor, dear cousin Abbie (to whom I would write if it didn't seem a sacrilege), and I conclude there is really more misery in this world of ours than I had any idea of. I've discovered why the world was made round. It must be to typify our lives—sort of a tread-mill existence, you know; coming constantly around to the things which you thought you had done yesterday and put away; living over again to-day the sorrows which you thought were vanquished last week. I'm sleepy, and it is nearly time to bake cakes for breakfast. 'The tip of the morning to you,' as Patrick O'Brien greets Maggie.

"Yours nonsensically; SADIE."



CHAPTER XX.

AT HOME.

Over this letter Ester had laughed and cried, and finally settled, as we found her, into quiet thought. When Abbie came in after a little, and nestled on an ottoman in front of her, with an inquiring look, Ester placed the letter in her hands, without note or comment, and Abbie read and laughed considerably, then grew more sober, and at last folded the letter with a very thoughtful face.

"Well," said Ester, at last, smiling a little.

And Abbie answered: "Oh, Ester."

"Yes," said Ester, "you see they need me."

Then followed a somewhat eager, somewhat sorrowful talk, and then a moment of silence fell between them, which Abbie broke by a sudden question:

"Ester, isn't this Dr. Douglass gaining some influence over Sadie? Have I imagined it, or does she speak of him frequently in her letters, in a way that gives me an idea that his influence is not for good?"

"I'm afraid it is very true; his influence over her seems to be great, and it certainly is not for good. The man is an infidel, I think. At least he is very far indeed from being a Christian. Do you know I read a verse in my Bible this morning which, when I think of my past influence over Sadie, reminds me bitterly of myself. It was like this: 'While men slept his enemy came and sowed tares—.' If I had not been asleep I might have won Sadie for the Savior before this enemy came."

"Well," Abbie answered gently, not in the least contradicting this sad statement, but yet speaking hopefully, "you will try to undo all this now."

"Oh, Abbie, I don't know. I am so weak—like a child just beginning to take little steps alone, instead of being the strong disciple that I might have been. I distrust myself. I am afraid."

"I'm not afraid for you," Abbie said, speaking very earnestly. "Because, in the first place you are unlike the little child, in that you must never even try to take one step alone. And besides, there are more verses in the Bible than that one. See here, let me show you mine."

And Abbie produced her little pocket Bible, and pointed with her finger while Ester read; "When I am weak, then am I strong." Then turning the leaves rapidly, as one familiar with the strongholds of that tower of safety, she pointed again, and Ester read: "What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee."

Almost five o'clock of a sultry October day, one of those days which come to us sometimes during that golden month, like a regretful turning back of the departing summer. A day which, coming to people who have much hard, pressing work, and who are wearied and almost stifled with the summer's heat, makes them thoroughly uncomfortable, not to say cross. Almost five o'clock, and in the great dining-room of the Rieds Sadie was rushing nervously back and forth, very much in the same manner that Ester was doing on that first evening of our acquaintance, only there was not so much method in her rushing. The curtains were raised as high as the tapes would take them, and the slant rays of the yellow sun were streaming boldly in, doing their bravest to melt into oil the balls of butter on the table, for poor, tired, bewildered Sadie had forgotten to let down the shades, and forgotten the ice for the butter, and had laid the table cloth crookedly, and had no time to straighten it. This had been one of her trying days. The last fierce look of summer had parched anew the fevered limbs of the sufferer up stairs, and roused to sharper conflict the bewildered brain. Mrs. Ried's care had been earnest and unremitting, and Sadie, in her unaccustomed position of mistress below stairs, had reached the very verge of bewildered weariness. She gave nervous glances at the inexorable clock as she flew back and forth. There were those among Mrs. Ried's boarders whose business made it almost a necessity that they should be promptly served at five o'clock. Maggie had been hurriedly summoned to do an imperative errand connected with the sick room; and this inexperienced butterfly, with her wings sadly drooping, was trying to gather her scattered wits together sufficiently to get that dreadful tea-table ready for the thirteen boarders who were already waiting the summons.

"What did I come after?" she asked herself impatiently, as she pressed her hand to her frowning forehead, and stared about the pantry in a vain attempt to decide what had brought her there in such hot haste. "Oh, a spoon—no, a fork, I guess it was. Why, I don't remember the forks at all. As sure as I'm here, I believe they are, too, instead of being on the table; and—Oh, my patience, I believe those biscuits are burning. I wonder if they are done. Oh, dear me!" And the young lady, who was Mr. Hammond's star scholar, bent with puzzled, burning face, and received hot whiffs of breath from the indignant oven while she tried to discover whether the biscuits were ready to be devoured. It was an engrossing employment. She did not hear the sound of carriage wheels near the door, nor the banging of trunks on the side piazza. She was half way across the dining-room, with her tin of puffy biscuits in her hands, with the puzzled, doubtful look still on her face, before she felt the touch of two soft, loving arms around her neck, and turning quickly, she screamed, rather than said: "Oh, Ester!" And suddenly seating her tin of biscuit on one chair and herself on another, Sadie covered her face with both hands and actually cried.

"Why, Sadie, you poor dear child, what can be the matter?"

And Ester's voice was full of anxiety, for it was almost the first time that she had ever seen tears on that bright young face.

Sadie's first remark caused a sudden revulsion of feeling. Springing suddenly to her feet, she bent anxious eyes on the chair full of biscuit.

"Oh, Ester," she said, "are these biscuits done, or will they be sticky and hateful in the middle?"

How Ester laughed! Then she came to the rescue. "Done—of course they are, and beautifully, too. Did you make them? Here, I'll take them out. Sadie, where is mother?"

"In Mr. Holland's room. She has been there nearly all day. Mr. Holland is no better, and Maggie has gone on an errand for them. Why have you come? Did the fairies send you?"

"And where are the children?"

"They have gone to walk. Minie wanted mother every other minute, so Alfred and Julia have carried her off with them. Say, you dear Ester, how did you happen to come? How shall I be glad enough to see you?"

Ester laughed. "Then I can't see any of them," she said by way of answer. "Never mind, then we'll have some tea. You poor child, how very tired you look. Just seat yourself in that chair, and see if I have forgotten how to work."

And Sadie, who was thoroughly tired, and more nervous than she had any idea she could be, leaned luxuriously back in her mother's chair, with a delicious sense of unresponsibility about her, and watched a magic spell come over the room. Down came the shades in a twinkling, and the low red sun looked in on them no more; the table-cloth straightened itself; pickles and cheese and cake got out of their confused proximity, and marched each to their appropriate niche on the well-ordered table; a flying visit into well-remembered regions returned hard, sparkling, ice-crowned butter. And when at last the fragrant tea stood ready to be served, and Ester, bright and smiling, stationed herself behind her mother's chair, Sadie gave a little relieved sigh, and then she laughed.

"You're straight from fairy land, Ester; I know it now. That table-cloth has been crooked in spite of me for a week. Maggie lays it, and I can not straighten it. I don't get to it. I travel five hundred miles every night to get this supper ready, and it's never ready. I have to bob up for a fork or a spoon, or I put on four plates of butter and none of bread. Oh there is witch work about it, and none but thoroughbred witches can get every thing, every little insignificant, indispensable thing on a table. I can't keep house."

"You poor kitten," said Ester, filled with very tender sympathy for this pretty young sister and feeling very glad indeed that she had come home, "Who would think of expecting a butterfly to spin? You shall bring those dear books down from the attic to-morrow. In the meantime, where is the tea-bell?"

"Oh, we don't ring," said Sadie, rising as she spoke. "The noise disturbs Mr. Holland. Here comes my first lieutenant, who takes charge of that matter. My sister, Miss Ried, Dr. Douglass."

And Ester, as she returned the low, deferential bow bestowed upon her, felt anew the thrill of anxiety which had come to her of late when she thought of this dangerous stranger in connection with her beautiful, giddy, unchristian sister.

On the whole, Ester's home coming was pleasant. To be sure it was a wonderful change from her late life; and there was perhaps just the faintest bit of a sigh as she drew off her dainty cuffs and prepared to wipe the dishes which Sadie washed, while Maggie finished her interrupted ironing. What would John, the stylish waiter at Uncle Ralph's, think if he could see her now, and how funny Abbie would look engaged in such employment; but Sadie looked so bright and relieved and rested, and chatted so gayly, that presently Ester gave another little sigh and said:

"Poor Abbie! how very, very lonely she must be to-night. I wish she were here for you to cheer her, Sadie."

Later, while she dipped into the flour preparatory to relieving Sadie of her fearful task of sponge setting, the kitchen clock struck seven. This time she laughed at the contrast. They were just going down to dinner now at Uncle Ralph's. Only night before last she was there herself. She had been out that day with Aunt Helen, and so was attired in the lovely blue silk and the real laces, which were Aunt Helen's gift, fastened at the throat by a tiny pearl, Abbie's last offering. Now they were sitting down to dinner without her, and she was in the great pantry five hundred miles away, a long, wide calico apron quite covering up her traveling dress, sleeves rolled above her elbows, and engaged in scooping flour out of the barrel into her great wooden bowl! But then how her mother's weary, careworn face had brightened, and glowed into pleased surprise as she caught the first glimpse of her; how lovingly she had folded her in those dear motherly arms, and said, actually with lips all a tremble: "My dear daughter! what an unexpected blessing, and what a kind providence, that you have come just now." Then Alfred and Julia had been as eager and jubilant in their greeting as though Ester had been always to them the very perfection of a sister; and hadn't little Minie crumpled her dainty collar into an unsightly rag, and given her "Scotch kisses," and "Dutch kisses," and "Yankee kisses," and genuine, sweet baby kisses, in her uncontrollable glee over dear "Auntie Essie."

And besides, oh besides! this Ester Ried who had come home was not the Ester Ried who had gone out from them only two months ago. A whole lifetime of experience and discipline seemed to her to have been crowded into those two months. Nothing of her past awakened more keen regret in this young girl's heart than the thought of her undutiful, unsisterly life. It was all to be different now. She thanked God that he had let her come back to that very kitchen and dining-room to undo her former work. The old sluggish, selfish spirit had gone from her. Before this every thing had been done for Ester Ried, now it was to be done for Christ—every thing, even the mixing up of that flour and water; for was not the word given: "Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God?" How broad that word was, "whatsoever." Why that covered every movement—yes, and every word. How could life have seemed to her dull and uninteresting and profitless?

Sadie hushed her busy tongue that evening as she saw in the moonlight Ester kneeling to pray; and a kind of awe stole over her for a moment as she saw that the kneeler seemed unconscious of any earthly presence. Somehow it struck Sadie as a different matter from any kneeling which she had ever watched in the moonlight before.

And Ester, as she rested her tired, happy head upon her own pillow, felt this word ringing sweetly in her heart: "And ye are Christ's, and Christ is God's."



CHAPTER XXI.

TESTED.

Ester was winding the last smooth coil of hair around her head when Sadie opened her eyes the next morning.

"My!" she said. "Do you know, Ester, it is perfectly delightful to me to lie here and look at you, and remember that I shall not be responsible for those cakes this morning? They shall want a pint of soda added to them for all that I shall need to know or care."

Ester laughed. "You will surely have your pantry well stocked with soda," she said, gayly. "It seems to have made a very strong impression on your mind."

But the greeting had chimed with her previous thoughts and sounded pleasant to her. She had come home to be the helper; her mother and Sadie should feel and realize after this how very much of a helper she could be. That very day should be the commencement of her old, new life. It was baking day—her detestation heretofore, her pleasure now. No more useful day could be chosen. How she would dispatch the pies and cakes and biscuits, to say nothing of the wonderful loaves of bread. She smiled brightly on her young sister, as she realized in a measure the weight of care which she was about to lift from her shoulders; and by the time she was ready for the duties of the day she had lived over in imagination the entire routine of duties connected with that busy, useful, happy day. She went out from her little clothes-press wrapped in armor—the pantry and kitchen were to be her battle-field, and a whole host of old temptations and trials were there to be met and vanquished. So Ester planned, and yet it so happened that she did not once enter the kitchen during all that long busy day, and Sadie's young shoulders bore more of the hundred little burdens of life that Saturday than they had ever felt before. Descending the stairs, Ester met Dr. Van Anden for the first time since her return. He greeted her with a hurried "good-morning," quite as if he had seen her only the day before, and at once pressed her into service:

"Miss Ester, will you go to Mr. Holland immediately? I can not find your mother. Send Mrs. Holland from the room, she excites him. Tell her I say she must come immediately to the sitting-room; I wish to see her. Give Mr. Holland a half teaspoonful of the mixture in the wine-glass every ten minutes, and on no account leave him until I return, which will be as soon as possible."

And seeming to be certain that his directions would be followed, the doctor vanished.

For only about a quarter of a minute did Ester stand irresolute. Dr. Van Anden's tone and manner were full of his usual authority—a habit with him which had always annoyed her. She shrank with a feeling amounting almost to terror from a dark, quiet room, and the position of nurse. Her base of operations, according to her own arrangements, had been the light, airy kitchen, where she felt herself needed at this very moment. But one can think of several things in a quarter of a minute. Ester had very lately taken up the habit of securing one Bible verse as part of her armor to go with her through the day. On this particular morning the verse was: "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." Now if her hands had found work waiting for her down this first flight of stairs instead of down two, as she had planned, what was that to her? Ester turned and went swiftly to the sick room, dispatched the almost frantic wife according to the doctor's peremptory orders, gave the mixture as directed, waited patiently for the doctor's return, only to hear herself installed as head nurse for the day; given just time enough to take a very hurried second table meal with Sadie, listen to her half pitiful, half comic complainings, and learn that her mother was down with sick headache.

So it was that this first day at home drew toward its closing; and not one single thing that Ester had planned to do, and do so well, had she been able to accomplish. It had been very hard to sit patiently there and watch the low breathings of that almost motionless man on the bed before her, to rouse him at set intervals sufficiently to pour some mixture down his unwilling lips, to fan him occasionally, and that was all. It had been hard, but Ester had not chafed under it; she had recognized the necessity—no nurse to be found, her mother sick, and the young, frightened, as well as worn-out wife, not to be trusted. Clearly she was at the post of duty. So as the red sun peeped in a good-night from a little corner of the closed curtain, it found Ester not angry, but very sad. Such a weary day! And this man on the bed was dying; both doctors had looked that at each other at least a dozen times that day. How her life of late was being mixed up with death. She had just passed through one sharp lesson, and here at the threshold awaited another. Different from that last though—oh, very different—and herein lay some of the sadness. Mr. Foster had said "every thing was ready for the long journey, even should there be no return." Then she went back for a minute to the look of glory on that marble face, and heard again that wonderful sentence: "So he giveth his beloved sleep." But this man here! every thing had not been made ready by him. So at least she feared. Yet she was conscious, professed Christian though she had been, living in the same house with him for so many years, that she knew very little about him. She had seen much of him, had talked much with him, but she had never mentioned to him the name of Christ, the name after which she called herself. The sun sank lower, it was almost gone; this weary day was nearly done; and very sad and heavy-hearted felt this young watcher—the day begun in brightness was closing in gloom. It was not all so clear a path as she had thought; there were some things that she could not undo. Those days of opportunity, in which she might at least have invited this man to Jesus, were gone; it seemed altogether probable that there would never come another. There was a little rustle of the drapery about the bed, and she turned suddenly, to meet the great searching eyes of the sick man, bent full upon her. Then he spoke in low, but wonderfully distinct and solemn tones. And the words he slowly uttered were yet more startling:

"Am I going to die?"

Oh, what was Ester to say? How those great bright eyes searched her soul! Looking into them, feeling the awful solemnity of the question, she could not answer "No;" and it seemed almost equally impossible to tell him "Yes." So the silence was unbroken, while she trembled in every nerve, and felt her face blanch before the continued gaze of those mournful eyes. At length the silence seemed to answer him; for he turned his head suddenly from her, and half buried it in the pillow, and neither spoke nor moved.

That awful silence! That moment of opportunity, perhaps the last of earth for him, perhaps it was given to her to speak to him the last words that he would ever hear from mortal lips. What could she say? If she only knew how—only had words. Yet something must be said.

Then there came to Ester one of those marked Bible verses which had of late grown so precious, and her voice, low and clear, filled the blank in the room.

"God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble."

No sound from the quiet figure on the bed. She could not even tell if he had heard, yet perhaps he might, and so she gathered them, a little string of wondrous pearls, and let them fall with soft and gentle cadence from her lips.

"Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him, and he shall bring it to pass."

"The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him—the Lord is gracious, and full of compassion."

"Thus saith the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins."

"Look unto me and be ye saved, all ye ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none else."

"Incline your ear, and come unto me; hear, and your soul shall live."

Silence for a moment, and then Ester repeated, in tones that were full of sweetness, that one little verse, which had become the embodiment to her of all that was tender, and soothing and wonderful: "What time I am afraid I will trust in thee." Was this man, moving toward the very verge of the river, afraid? Ester did not know, was not to know whether those gracious invitations from the Redeemer of the world had fallen once more on unheeding ears, or not; for with a little sigh, born partly of relief, and partly of sorrow, that the opportunity was gone, she turned to meet Dr. Van Anden, and was sent for a few moments out into the light and glory of the departing day, to catch a bit of its freshness.

It was as the last midnight stroke of that long, long day was being given, that they were gathered about the dying bed. Sadie was there, solemn and awe-stricken. Mrs. Ried had arisen from her couch of suffering, and nerved herself to be a support to the poor young wife. Dr. Douglass, at the side of the sick man, kept anxious watch over the fluttering pulse. Ester, on the other side, looked on in helpless pity, and other friends of the Hollands were grouped about the room. So they watched and waited for the swift down-coming of the angel of death The death damp had gathered on his brow, the pulse seemed but a faint tremble now and then, and those whose eyes were used to death thought that his lips would never frame mortal sound again, when suddenly the eyelids raised, and Mr. Holland, fixing a steady gaze upon the eyes bent on him from the foot of the bed, whither Ester had slipped to make more room for her mother and Mrs. Holland, said, in a clear, distinct tone, one unmistakable word—"Pray!"

Will Ester ever forget the start of terror which thrilled her frame as she felt that look and heard that word? She cast a quick, frightened glance around her of inquiry and appeal; but her mother and herself were the only ones present whom she had reason to think ever prayed. Could she, would she, that gentle, timid, shrinking mother? But Mrs. Ried was supporting the now almost fainting form of Mrs. Holland, and giving anxious attention to her. "He says pray!" Sadie murmured, in low, frightened tones. "Oh, where is Dr. Van Anden?"

Ester knew he had been called in great haste to the house across the way, and ere he could return, this waiting spirit might be gone—gone without a word of prayer. Would Ester want to die so, with no voice to cry for her to that listening Savior? But then no human being had ever heard her pray. Could she?—must she? Oh, for Dr. Van Anden—a Christian doctor! Oh, if that infidel stood anywhere but there, with his steady hand clasping the fluttering pulse, with his cool, calm eyes bent curiously on her—but Mr. Holland was dying; perhaps the everlasting arms were not underneath him—and at this fearful thought, Ester dropped upon her knees, giving utterance to her deepest need in the first uttered words, "Oh, Holy Spirit, teach me just what to say!" Her mother, listening with startled senses as the familiar voice fell on her ear, could but think that that petition was answered; and Ester felt it in her very soul, Dr. Douglass, her mother, Sadie, all of them were as nothing—there was only this dying man and Christ, and she pleading that the passing soul might be met even now by the Angel of the covenant. There were those in the room who never forgot that prayer of Ester's. Dr. Van Anden, entering hastily, paused midway in the room, taking in the scene in an instant of time, and then was on his knees, uniting his silent petitions with hers. So fervent and persistent was the cry for help, that even the sobs of the stricken wife were hushed in awe, and only the watching doctor, with his finger on the pulse, knew when the last fluttering beat died out, and the death-angel pressed his triumphant seal on pallid lip and brow.

"Dr. Van Anden," Ester said, as they stood together for a moment the next morning, waiting in the chamber of death for Mrs. Ried's directions—. "Was—Did he," with an inclination of her head toward the silent occupant of the couch, "Did he ever think he was a Christian?"

The doctor bent on her a grave, sad look, and slowly shook his head.

"Oh, Doctor! you can not think that he—" and Ester stopped, her face blanching with the fearfulness of her thought.

"Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" This was the doctor's solemn answer. After a moment, he added: "Perhaps that one eagerly-spoken word, 'Pray,' said as much to the ears of Him whose thoughts are not as our thoughts, as did that old-time petition—'Remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.'"

Ester never forgot that and the following day, while the corpse of one whom she had known so well lay in the house; and when she followed him to the quiet grave, and watched the red and yellow autumn leaves flutter down around his coffin—dead leaves, dead flowers, dead hopes, death every-where—not just a going up higher, as Mr. Foster's death had been—this was solemn and inexorable death. More than ever she felt how impossible it was to call back the days that had slipped away while she slept, and do their neglected duties. She had come for this, full of hope; and now one of those whom she had met many times each day for years, and never said Jesus to, was at this moment being lowered into his narrow house, and, though God had graciously given her an inch of time, and strength to use it, it was as nothing compared with those wasted years, and she could never know, at least never until the call came for her, whether or not at the eleventh hour this "poor man cried, and the Lord heard him," and received him into Paradise.

Dr. Van Anden moved around to where she was standing, with tightly clasped hands and colorless lips. He had been watching her, and this was what he said: "Ester, shall you and I ever stand again beside a new-made grave, receiving one whom we have known ever so slightly, and have to settle with our consciences and our Savior, because we have not invited that one to come to Jesus?"

And Ester answered, with firmly-drawn lips "As that Savior hears me, and will help me never!"



CHAPTER XXII.

"LITTLE PLUM PIES."

Ester was in the kitchen trimming off the puffy crusts of endless pies—the old brown calico morning dress, the same huge bib apron which had been through endless similar scrapes with her—every thing about her looking exactly as it had three months ago, and yet so far as Ester and her future—yes, and the future of every one about her was concerned, things were very different. Perhaps Sadie had a glimmering of some strange change as she eyed her sister curiously, and took note that there was a different light in her eye, and a sort of smoothness on the quiet face that she had never noticed before. In fact, Sadie missed some wrinkles which she had supposed were part and parcel of Ester's self.

"How I did hate that part of it," she remarked, watching the fingers that moved deftly around each completed sphere. "Mother said my edges always looked as if a mouse had marched around them nibbling all the way. My! how thoroughly I hate housekeeping. I pity the one who takes me for better or worse—always provided there exists such a poor victim on the face of the earth."

"I don't think you hate it half so much as you imagine," Ester answered kindly. "Any way you did nicely. Mother says you were a great comfort to her."

There was a sudden mist before Sadie's eyes.

"Did mother say that?" she queried. "The blessed woman, what a very little it takes to make a comfort for her. Ester, I declare to you, if ever angels get into kitchens and pantries, and the like, mother is one of them. The way she bore with my endless blunderings was perfectly angelic. I'm glad, though, that her day of martyrdom is over, and mine, too, for that matter."

And Sadie, who had returned to the kingdom of spotless dresses and snowy cuffs, and, above all, to the dear books and the academy, caught at that moment the sound of the academy bell, and flitted away. Ester filled the oven with pies, then went to the side doorway to get a peep at the glowing world. It was the very perfection of a day—autumn meant to die in wondrous beauty that year. Ester folded her bare arms and gazed. She felt little thrills of a new kind of restlessness all about her this morning. She wanted to do something grand, something splendidly good. It was all very well to make good pies; she had done that, given them the benefit of her highest skill in that line—now they were being perfected in the oven, and she waited for something. If ever a girl longed for an opportunity to show her colors, to honor her leader, it was our Ester. Oh yes, she meant to do the duty that lay next her, but she perfectly ached to have that next duty something grand, something that would show all about her what a new life she had taken on.

Dr. Van Anden was tramping about in his room, over the side piazza, a very unusual proceeding with him at that hour of the day; his windows were open, and he was singing, and the fresh lake wind brought tune and words right down to Ester's ear:

"I would not have the restless will That hurries to and fro, Seeking for some great thing to do, Or wondrous thing to know; I would be guided as a child, And led where'er I go.

"I ask thee for the daily strength, To none that ask denied, A mind to blend with outward life, While keeping at thy side; Content to fill a little space If thou be glorified."

Of course Dr. Van Anden did not know that Ester Ried stood in the doorway below, and was at that precise moment in need of just such help as this; but then what mattered that, so long as the Master did?

Just then another sense belonging to Ester did its duty, and gave notice that the pies in the oven were burning; and she ran to their rescue, humming meantime:

"Content to fill a little space If thou be glorified."

Eleven o'clock found her busily paring potatoes—hurrying a little, for in spite of swift, busy fingers their work was getting a little the best of Maggie and her, and one pair of very helpful hands was missing.

Alfred and Julia appeared from somewhere in the outer regions, and Ester was too busy to see that they both carried rather woe-begone faces.

"Hasn't mother got back yet?" queried Alfred.

"Why, no," said Ester. "She will not be back until to-night—perhaps not then. Didn't you know Mrs. Carleton was worse?"

Alfred kicked his heels against the kitchen door in a most disconsolate manner.

"Somebody's always sick," he grumbled out at last. "A fellow might as well not have a mother. I never saw the beat—nobody for miles around here can have the toothache without borrowing mother. I'm just sick and tired of it."

Ester had nearly laughed, but catching a glimpse of the forlorn face, she thought better of it, and said:

"Something is awry now, I know. You never want mother in such a hopeless way as that unless you're in trouble; so you see you are just like the rest of them, every body wants mother when they are in any difficulty."

"But she is my mother, and I have a right to her, and the rest of 'em haven't."

"Well," said Ester, soothingly, "suppose I be mother this time. Tell me what's the matter and I'll act as much like her as possible."

"You!" And thereupon Alfred gave a most uncomplimentary sniff. "Queer work you'd make of it."

"Try me," was the good-natured reply.

"I ain't going to. I know well enough you'd say 'fiddlesticks' or 'nonsense,' or some such word, and finish up with 'Just get out of my way.'"

Now, although Ester's cheeks were pretty red over this exact imitation of her former ungracious self, she still answered briskly:

"Very well, suppose I should make such a very rude and unmotherlike reply, fiddlesticks and nonsense would not shoot you, would they?"

At which sentence Alfred stopped kicking his heels against the door, and laughed.

"Tell us all about it," continued Ester, following up her advantage.

"Nothing to tell, much, only all the folks are going a sail on the lake this afternoon, and going to have a picnic in the grove, the very last one before snow, and I meant to ask mother to let us go, only how was I going to know that Mrs. Carleton would get sick and come away down here after her before daylight; and I know she would have let me go, too; and they're going to take things, a basketful each one of 'em—and they wanted me to bring little bits of pies, such as mother bakes in little round tins, you know, plum pies, and she would have made me some, I know; she always does; but now she's gone, and it's all up, and I shall have to stay at home like I always do, just for sick folks. It's mean, any how."

Ester smothered a laugh over this curious jumble, and asked a humble question:

"Is there really nothing that would do for your basket but little bits of plum pies?"

"No," Alfred explained, earnestly. "Because, you see, they've got plenty of cake and such stuff; the girls bring that, and they do like my pies, awfully. I most always take 'em. Mr. Hammond likes them, too; he's going along to take care of us, and I shouldn't like to go without the little pies, because they depend upon them."

"Oh," said Ester, "girls go, too, do they?" And she looked for the first time at the long, sad face of Julia in the corner.

"Yes, and Jule is in just as much trouble as I am, cause they are all going to wear white dresses, and she's tore hers, and she says she can't wear it till it's ironed, cause it looks like a rope, and Maggie says she can't and won't iron it to-day, so; and mother was going to mend it this very morning, and—. Oh, fudge! it's no use talking, we've got to stay at home, Jule, so now." And the kicking heels commenced again.

Ester pared her last potato with a half troubled, half amused face. She was thoroughly tired of baking for that day, and felt like saying fiddlesticks to the little plum pies; and that white dress was torn cris-cross and every way, and ironing was always hateful; besides it did seem strange that when she wanted to do some great, nice thing, so much plum pies and torn dresses should step right into her path. Then unconsciously she repeated:

"Content to fill a little space If Thou art glorified."

Could He be glorified, though, by such very little things? Yet hadn't she wanted to gain an influence over Alfred and Julia, and wasn't this her first opportunity; besides there was that verse: "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do—." At that point her thoughts took shape in words.

"Well, sir, we'll see whether mother is the only woman in this world after all. You tramp down cellar and bring me up that stone jar on the second shelf, and we'll have those pies in the oven in a twinkling; and that little woman in the corner, with two tears rolling down her cheeks, may bring her white dress and my work-box and thimble, and put two irons on the stove, and my word for it you shall both be ready by three o'clock, spry and span, pies and all."

By three o'clock on the afternoon in question Ester was thoroughly tired, but little plum pies by the dozen were cuddling among snowy napkins in the willow basket, and Alfred's face was radiant as he expressed his satisfaction, after this fashion:

"You're just jolly, Ester! I didn't know you could be so good. Won't the boys chuckle over these pies, though? Ester, there's just seven more than mother ever made me."

"Very well," answered Ester, gayly; "then there will be just seven more chuckles this time than usual."

Julia expressed her thoughts in a way more like her. She surveyed her skillfully-mended and beautifully smooth white dress with smiling eyes; and as Ester tied the blue sash in a dainty knot, and stepped back to see that all was as it should be, she was suddenly confronted with this question:

"Ester, what does make you so nice to-day; you didn't ever used to be so?"

How the blood rushed into Ester's cheeks as she struggled with her desire to either laugh or cry, she hardly knew which. These were very little things which she had done, and it was shameful that, in all the years of her elder sisterhood, she had never sacrificed even so little of her own pleasure before; yet it was true, and it made her feel like crying—and yet there was rather a ludicrous side to the question, to think that all her beautiful plans for the day had culminated in plum pies and ironing. She stooped and kissed Julia on the rosy cheek, and answered gently, moved by some inward impulse:

"I am trying to do all my work for Jesus nowadays."

"You didn't mend my dress and iron it, and curl my hair, and fix my sash, for him, did you?"

"Yes; every little thing."

"Why, I don't see how. I thought you did them for me."

"I did, Julia, to please you and make you happy; but Jesus says that that is just the same as doing it for him."

Julia's next question was very searching:

"But, Ester, I thought you had been a member of the church a good many years. Sadie said so. Didn't you ever try to do things for Jesus before?"

A burning blush of genuine shame mantled Ester's face, but she answered quickly:

"No; I don't think I ever really did."

Julia eyed her for a moment with a look of grave wonderment, then suddenly stood on tiptoe to return the kiss, as she said:

"Well, I think it is nice, anyway. If Jesus likes to have you be so kind and take so much trouble for me, why then he must love me, and I mean to thank him this very night when I say my prayers."

And as Ester rested for a moment in the arm-chair on the piazza, and watched her little brother and sister move briskly off, she hummed again those two lines that had been making unconscious music in her heart all day:

"Content to fill a little space If Thou be glorified."



CHAPTER XXIII.

CROSSES.

The large church was very full; there seemed not to be another space for a human being. People who were not much given to frequenting the house of God on a week-day evening, had certainly been drawn thither at this time. Sadie Ried sat beside Ester in their mother's pew, and Harry Arnett, with a sober look on his boyish face, sat bolt upright in the end of the pew, while even Dr. Douglass leaned forward with graceful nonchalance from the seat behind them, and now and then addressed a word to Sadie.

These people had been listening to such a sermon as is very seldom heard—that blessed man of God whose name is dear to hundreds and thousands of people, whose hair is whitened with the frosts of many a year spent in the Master's service, whose voice and brain and heart are yet strong, and powerful, and "mighty through God," the Rev. Mr. Parker, had been speaking to them, and his theme had been the soul, and his text had been: "What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?"

I hope I am writing for many who have had the honor of hearing that appeal fresh from the great brain and greater heart of Mr. Parker. Such will understand the spell under which his congregation sat even after the prayer and hymn had died into silence. Now the gray-haired veteran stood bending over the pulpit, waiting for the Christian witnesses to the truth of his solemn messages; and for that he seemed likely to wait. A few earnest men, veterans too in the cause, gave in their testimony—and then occurred one of those miserable, disheartening, disgraceful pauses which are met with nowhere on earth among a company of intelligent men and women, with liberty given them to talk, save in a prayer-meeting! Still silence, and still the aged servant stood with one arm resting on the Bible, and looked down almost beseechingly upon that crowd of dumb Christians.

"Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord," he repeated, in earnest, pleading tones.

Miserable witnesses they! Was not the Lord ashamed of them all, I wonder? Something like this flitted through Ester's brain as she looked around upon that faithless company, and noted here and there one who certainly ought to "take up his cross." Then some slight idea of the folly of that expression struck her. What a fearful cross it was, to be sure! What a strange idea to use the same word in describing it that was used for that blood-stained, nail-pierced cross on Calvary. Then a thought, very startling in its significance, came to her. Was that cross borne only for men? were they the only ones who had a thank-offering because of Calvary? Surely her Savior hung there, and bled, and groaned, and died for HER. Why should not she say, "By his stripes I am healed?" What if she should? What would people think? No, not that either. What would Jesus think? that, after all, was the important question. Did she really believe that if she should say in the hearing of that assembled company, "I love Jesus," that Jesus, looking down upon her, and hearing how her timid voice broke the dishonoring silence, would be displeased, would set it down among the long list of "ought not to have" dones? She tried to imagine herself speaking to him in her closet after this manner: "Dear Savior, I confess with shame that I have brought reproach upon thy name this day, for I said, in the presence of a great company of witnesses, that I loved thee!" In defiance of her education and former belief upon this subject, Ester was obliged to confess, then and there, that all this was extremely ridiculous. "Oh, well," said Satan, "it's not exactly wrong, of course; but then it isn't very modest or ladylike; and, besides, it is unnecessary. There are plenty of men to do the talking." "But," said common sense, "I don't see why it's a bit more unladylike than the ladies' colloquy at the lyceum was last evening. There were more people present than are here tonight; and as for the men, they are perfectly mum. There seems to be plenty of opportunity for somebody." "Well," said Satan, "it isn't customary at least, and people will think strangely of you. Doubtless it would do more harm than good."

This most potent argument, "People will think strangely of you," smothered common sense at once, as it is apt to do, and Ester raised her head from the bowed position which it had occupied during this whirl of thought, and considered the question settled. Some one began to sing, and of all the words that could have been chosen, came the most unfortunate ones for this decision:

"On my head he poured his blessing, Long time ago; Now he calls me to confess him Before I go. My past life, all vile and hateful, He saved from sin; I should be the most ungrateful Not to own him. Death and hell he bade defiance, Bore cross and pain; Shame my tongue this guilty silence, And speak his name."

This at once renewed the struggle, but in a different form. She no longer said, "Ought I?" but, "Can I?" Still the spell of silence seemed unbroken save by here and there a voice, and still Ester parleyed with her conscience, getting as far now as to say: "When Mr. Jones sits down, if there is another silence, I will try to say something"—not quite meaning, though, to do any such thing, and proving her word false by sitting very still after Mr. Jones sat down, though there was plenty of silence. Then when Mr. Smith said a few words, Ester whispered the same assurance to herself, with exactly the same result. The something decided for which she had been longing, the opportunity to show the world just where she stood, had come at last, and this was the way in which she was meeting it. At last she knew by the heavy thuds which her heart began to give, that the question was decided, that the very moment Deacon Graves sat down she would rise; whether she would say any thing or not would depend upon whether God gave her any thing to say—but at least she could stand up for Jesus. But Mr. Parker's voice followed Deacon Graves'; and this was what he said:

"Am I to understand by your silence that there is not a Christian man or woman in all this company who has an unconverted friend whom he or she would like to have us pray for?"

Then the watching Angel of the Covenant came to the help of this trembling, struggling Ester, and there entered into her heart such a sudden and overwhelming sense of longing for Sadie's conversion, that all thought of what she would say, and how she would say it, and what people would think, passed utterly out of her mind; and rising suddenly, she spoke, in clear and wonderfully earnest tones:

"Will you pray for a dear, dear friend?"

God sometimes uses very humble means with which to break the spell of silence which Satan so often weaves around Christians; it was as if they had all suddenly awakened to a sense of their privileges.

Dr. Van Anden said, in a voice which quivered with feeling: "I have a brother in the profession for whom I ask your prayers that he may become acquainted with the great Physician."

Request followed request for husbands and wives, mothers and fathers, and children. Even timid, meek-faced, low-voiced Mrs. Ried murmured a request for her children who were out of Christ. And when at last Harry Arnett suddenly lifted his handsome boyish head from its bowed position, and said in tones which conveyed the sense of a decision, "Pray for me" the last film of worldliness vanished; and there are those living to-day who have reason never to forget that meeting.

"Is it your private opinion that our good doctor got up a streak of disinterested enthusiasm over my unworthy self this evening?" This question Dr. Douglass asked of Sadie as they lingered on the piazza in the moonlight.

Sadie laughed gleefully. "I am sure I don't know. I'm prepared for any thing strange that can possibly happen. Mother and Ester between them have turned the world upside down for me to-night. In case you are the happy man, I hope you are grateful?"

"Extremely! Should be more so perhaps if people would be just to me in private, and not so alarmingly generous in public."

"How bitter you are against Dr. Van Anden," Sadie said, watching the lowering brow and sarcastic curve of the lip, with curious eyes. "How much I should like to know precisely what is the trouble between you!"

Dr. Douglass instantly recovered his suavity. "Do I appear bitter? I beg your pardon for exhibiting so ungentlemanly a phase of human nature; yet hypocrisy does move me to—" And then occurred one of those sudden periods with which Dr. Douglass always seemed to stop himself when any thing not quite courteous was being said. "Just forget that last sentence," he added. "It was unwise and unkind; the trouble between us is not worthy of a thought of yours. I wish I could forget it. I believe I could if he would allow me."

At this particular moment the subject of the above conversation appeared in the door. Sadie gave a slight start; the thought that Dr. Van Anden had heard the talk was not pleasant. She need not have feared, he had just come from his room, and from his knees.

He spoke abruptly and with a touch of nervousness: "Dr. Douglass, may I have a few words with you in private?"

Dr. Douglass' "Certainly, if Miss Sadie will excuse us," was both prompt and courteous apparently, though the tone said almost as plainly as words could have done, "To what can I be indebted for this honor?"

Dr. Van Anden led the way into the brightly lighted vacant parlor; and there Dr. Douglass stationed himself directly under the gas light, where he could command a full view of the pale, somewhat anxious face of his companion, and waited with that indescribable air made up of nonchalance and insolence. Dr. Van Anden dashed into his subject:

"Dr. Douglass, ten years ago you did what you could to injure me. I thought then purposely, I think now that perhaps you were sincere. Be that as it may, I used language to you then, which I, as a Christian man, ought never to have used. I have repented it long ago, but in my blindness I have never seen that I ought to apologize to you for it until this evening. God has shown me my duty. Dr. Douglass, I ask your pardon for the angry words I spoke to you that day."

The gentleman addressed kept his full bright eyes fixed on Dr. Van Anden, and answered him in the quietest and at the same time iciest of tones:

"You are certainly very kind, now that your anger has had time to cool during these ten years, to accord to me the merit of being possibly sincere. Now I was more Christian in my conclusions; I set you down as an honest blunderer. That I have had occasion since to change my opinion is nothing to the purpose but it would be pleasanter for both of us if apologies could restore our friend, Mrs. Lyons to life."

During this response Dr. Van Anden's face was a study. It had passed in quick succession through so many shades of feeling, anxiety, anger, disgust, and finally surprise, and apparently a dawning sense of a new development, for he made the apparently irrelevant reply:

"Do you think I administered that chloroform?"

Dr. Douglass' coolness forsook him for a moment "Who did?" he queried, with flashing eyes.

"Dr. Gilbert."

"Dr. Gilbert?"

"Yes, sir."

"How does it happen that I never knew it?"

"I am sure I do not know." Dr. Van Anden passed his hand across his eyes, and spoke in sadness and weariness. "I had no conception that you were not aware of it until this moment. It explains in part what was strangely mysterious to me; but even in that case, it would have been, as you said, a blunder, not a criminal act However, we can not undo that past. I desire, above all other things, to set myself right in your eyes as a Christian man. I think I may have been a stumbling-block to you. God only knows how bitter is the thought I have done wrong; I should have acknowledged it years ago. I can only do it now. Again I ask you. Dr. Douglass, will you pardon those bitterly spoken words of mine?"

Dr. Douglass bowed stiffly, with an increase of hauteur visible in every line of his face.

"Give yourself no uneasiness on that score, Dr. Van Anden, nor on any other, I beg you, so far as I am concerned. My opinion of Christianity is peculiar perhaps, but has not altered of late; nor is it likely to do so. Of course, every gentleman is bound to accept the apology of another, however tardily it may be offered. Shall I bid you good-evening, sir?"

And with a very low, very dignified bow, Dr. Douglass went back to the piazza and Sadie. And groaning in spirit over the tardiness of his effort, Dr. Van Anden returned to his room, and prayed that he might renew his zeal and his longing for the conversion of that man's soul.

"Have you been receiving a little fraternal advice?" queried Sadie, her mischievous eyes dancing with fun over the supposed discomfiture of one of the two gentlemen, she cared very little which.

"Not at all. On the contrary, I have been giving a little of that mixture in a rather unpalatable form, I fear. I haven't a very high opinion of the world, Miss Sadie."

"Including yourself, do you mean?" was Sadie's demure reply.

Dr. Douglass looked the least bit annoyed; then he laughed, and answered with quiet grace:

"Yes, including even such an important individual as myself. However, I have one merit which I consider very rare—sincerity."

Sadie's face assumed a half puzzled, half amused expression, as she tried by the moonlight to give a searching look at the handsome form leaning against the pillar opposite her.

"I wonder if you are as sincere as you pretend to be?" was her next complimentary sentence. "And also I wonder if the rest of the world are as unlimited a set of humbugs as you suppose? How do you fancy you happened to escape getting mixed up with the general humbugism of the world? This Mr. Parker, now, talks as though he felt it and meant it."

"He is a first-class fanatic of the most outrageous sort. There ought to be a law forbidding such ranters to hold forth, on pain of imprisonment for life."

"Dr. Douglass," said Sadie, speaking with grave dignity, "I would rather not hear you speak of that old gentleman in such a manner. He may be a fanatic and a ranter, but I believe he means it, and I can't help respecting him more than any cold-blooded moralist that I ever met. Besides, I can not forget that my honored father was among the despised class of whom you speak so scornfully."

"My dear friend," and Dr. Douglass' tone was as gentle as her mother's could have been, "forgive me if I have pained you; it was not intentional. I do not know what I have been saying—some unkind things perhaps, and that is always ungentlemanly; but I have been greatly disturbed this evening, and that must be my apology. Pardon me for detaining you so long in the evening air. May I advise you, professionally, to go in immediately?"

"May I advise you unselfishly to get into a better humor with the world in general, and Dr. Van Anden in particular, before you undertake to talk with a lady again?" Sadie answered in her usual tones of raillery; all her dignity had departed. "Meantime, if you would like to have unmolested possession of this piazza to assist you in tramping off your evil spirit, you shall be indulged. I'm going to the west side. The evening air and I are excellent friends." And with a mocking laugh and bow Sadie departed.

"I wonder," she soliloquized, returning to gravity the moment she was alone, "I wonder what that man has been saying to him now? How unhappy these two gentlemen make themselves. It would be a consolation to know right from wrong. I just wish I believed in everybody as I used to. The idea of this gray-headed minister being a hypocrite! that's absurd. But then the idea of Dr. Van Anden being what he is! Well, it's a queer world. I believe I'll go to bed."



CHAPTER XXIV.

GOD'S WAY.

Be it understood that Dr. Douglass was very much astonished, and not a little disgusted with himself. As he marched defiantly up and down the long piazza he tried to analyze his state of mind. He had always supposed himself to be a man possessed of keen powers of discernment, and yet withal exercising considerable charity toward his erring fellow-men, willing to overlook faults and mistakes, priding himself not a little on the kind and gentlemanly way in which he could meet ruffled human nature of any sort. In fact, he dwelt on a sort of pedestal, from the hight of which he looked calmly and excusingly down on weaker mortals. This, until to-night: now he realized, in a confused, blundering sort of way, that his pedestal had crumbled, or that he had tumbled from its hight, or at least that something new and strange had happened. For instance, what had become of his powers of discernment? Here was this miserable doctor, who had been one of the thorns of his life, whom he had looked down upon as a canting hypocrite. Was he, after all, mistaken? The explanation of to-night looked like it; he had been deceived in that matter which had years ago come between them; he could see it very plainly now. In spite of himself, the doctor's earnest, manly apology would come back and repeat itself to his brain, and demand admiration.

Now Dr. Douglass was honestly amazed at himself, because he was not pleased with this state of things. Why was he not glad to discover that Dr. Van Anden was more of a man than he had ever supposed? This would certainly be in keeping with the character of the courteous, unprejudiced gentleman that he had hitherto considered himself to be; but there was no avoiding the fact that the very thought of Dr. Van Anden was exasperating, more so this evening than ever before. And the more his judgment became convinced that he had blundered, the more vexed did he become.

"Confound everybody!" he exclaimed at length, in utter disgust. "What on earth do I care for the contemptible puppy, that I should waste thought on him. What possessed the fellow to come whining around me to-night, and set me in a whirl of disagreeable thought? I ought to have knocked him down for his insufferable impudence in dragging me out publicly in that meeting." This he said aloud; but something made answer down in his heart: "Oh, it's very silly of you to talk in this way. You know perfectly well that Dr. Van Anden is not a contemptible puppy at all. He is a thoroughly educated, talented physician, a formidable rival, and you know it; and he didn't whine in the least this evening; he made a very manly apology for what was not so very bad after all, and you more than half suspect yourself of admiring him."

"Fiddlesticks!" said Dr. Douglass aloud to all this information, and went off to his room in high dudgeon.

The next two days seemed to be very busy ones to one member of the Ried family. Dr. Douglass sometimes appeared at meal time and sometimes not, but the parlor and the piazza were quite deserted, and even his own room saw little of him. Sadie, when she chanced by accident to meet him on the stairs, stopped to inquire if the village was given over to small-pox, or any other dire disease which required his constant attention; and he answered her in tones short and sharp enough to have been Dr. Van Anden himself:

"It is given over to madness," and moved rapidly on.

This encounter served to send him on a long tramp into the woods that very afternoon. In truth, Dr. Douglass was overwhelmed with astonishment at himself. Two such days and nights as the last had been he hoped never to see again. It was as if all his pet theories had deserted him at a moment's warning, and the very spirit of darkness taken up his abode in their place. Go whither he would, do what he would, he was haunted by these new, strange thoughts. Sometimes he actually feared that he, at least, was losing his mind, whether the rest of the world were or not. Being an utter unbeliever in the power of prayer, knowing indeed nothing at all about it, he would have scoffed at the idea that Dr. Van Anden's impassioned, oft-repeated petitions had aught to do with him at this time. Had he known that at the very time in which he was marching through the dreary woods, kicking the red and yellow leaves from his path in sullen gloom, Ester in her little clothes-press, on her knees, was pleading with God for his soul, and that through him Sadie might be reached, I presume he would have laughed. The result of this long communion with himself was as follows: That he had overworked and underslept, that his nervous system was disordered, that in the meantime he had been fool enough to attend that abominable sensation meeting, and the man actually had wonderful power over the common mind, and used his eloquence in a way that was quite calculated to confuse a not perfectly balanced brain. It was no wonder, then, in his state of bodily disorder, that the sympathetic mind should take the alarm. So much for the disease, now for the remedy. He would study less, at least he would stop reading half the night away; he would begin to practice some of his own preaching, and learn to be more systematic, more careful of this wonderful body, which could cause so much suffering; he would ride fast and long; above all, he would keep away from that church and that man, with his fanciful pictures and skillfully woven words.

Having determined his plan of action he felt better. There was no sense, he told himself, in yielding to the sickly sentimentalism which had bewitched him for the past few days; he was ashamed of it, and would have no more of it. He was master of his own mind, he guessed, always had been, and always would be. And he started on his homeward walk with a good deal of alacrity, and much of his usual composure settling on his face.

Oh, would the gracious Spirit which had been struggling with him leave him indeed to himself? "O God," pleaded Ester, "give me this one soul in answer to my prayer. For the sake of Sadie, bring this strong pillar obstructing her way to thyself. For the sake of Jesus, who died for them both, bring them both to yield to him."

Dr. Douglass paused at the place where two roads forked and mused, and the subject of his musing was no more important than this: Should he go home by the river path or through the village? The river path was the longer, and it was growing late, nearly tea time; but if he took the main road he would pass his office, where he was supposed to be, as well as several houses where he ought to have been, besides meeting probably several people whom he would rather not see just at present. On the whole, he decided to take the river road, and walked briskly along, quite in harmony with himself once more, and enjoying the autumn beauty spread around him. A little white speck attracted his attention; he almost stopped to examine into it, then smiled at his curiosity, and moved on. "A bit of waste paper probably," he said to himself. "Yet what a curious shape it was as if it had been carefully folded and hidden under that stone. Suppose I see what it is? Who knows but I shall find a fortune hidden in it?" He turned back a step or two, and stooped for the little white speck. One corner of it was nestled under a stone. It was a ragged, rumpled, muddy fragment of a letter, or an essay, which rain and wind and water had done their best to annihilate, and finally, seeming to become weary of their plaything, had tossed it contemptuously on the shore, and a pitying stone had rolled down and covered and preserved a tiny corner. Dr. Douglass eyed it curiously, trying to decipher the mud-stained lines, and being in a dreamy mood wondered meanwhile what young, fair hand had penned the words, and what of joy or sadness filled them. Scarcely a word was readable, at least nothing that would gratify his curiosity, until he turned the bit of leaf, and the first line, which the stone had hidden, shone out distinctly: "Sometimes I can not help asking myself why I was made—." Here the corner was torn off, and whether that was the end of the original sentence or not, it was the end to him. God sometimes uses very simple means with which to confound the wisdom of this world. Such a sudden and extraordinary revulsion of feeling as swept over Dr. Douglass he had never dreamed of before. He did not stop to question the strangeness of his state of mind, nor why that bit of soiled, torn paper should possess so fearful a power over him. He did not even realize at the moment that it was connected with this bewilderment, he only knew that the foundation upon which he had been building for years seemed suddenly to have been torn from under him by invisible hands, and left his feet sinking slowly down on nothing; and his inmost soul took suddenly up that solemn question with which he had never before troubled his logical brain: "I can not help asking myself why I was made?" There was only one other readable word on that paper, turn it whichever way he would, and that word was "God;" and he started and shivered when his eye met this, as if some awful voice had spoken it to his ear.

"What unaccountable witchcraft has taken possession of me?" he muttered, at length. And turning suddenly he sat himself down on an old decaying log by the river side, and gave himself up to real, honest, solemn thought.

"Where is Dr. Douglass?" queried Julia, appearing at the dining-room door just at tea time. "There is a boy at the door says they want him at Judge Beldon's this very instant."

"He's nowhere" answered Sadie solemnly, pausing in the work of arranging cups and saucers. "It's my private opinion that he has been and gone and hung himself. He passed the window about one o'clock, looking precisely as I should suppose a man would who was about to commit that interesting act, since which time I've answered the bell seventeen times to give the same melancholy story of his whereabouts."

"My!" exclaimed the literal Julia, hurrying back to the boy at the door. She comprehended her sister sufficiently to have no faith in the hanging statement, but honestly believed in the seventeen sick people who were waiting for the doctor.

The church was very full again that evening. Sadie had at first declared herself utterly unequal to another meeting that week, but had finally allowed herself to be persuaded into going; and had nearly been the cause of poor Julia's disgrace because of the astonished look which she assumed as Dr. Douglass came down the aisle, with his usual quiet composure of manner, and took the seat directly in front of them. The sermon was concluded. The text: "See I have set before thee this day life and good, death and evil," had been dwelt upon in such a manner that it seemed to some as if the aged servant of God had verily been shown a glimpse of the two unseen worlds waiting for every soul, and was painting from actual memory the picture for them to look upon. That most solemn of all solemn hymns had just been sung:

"There is a time, we know not when A point, we know not where, That marks the destiny of men 'Twixt glory and despair.

"There is a line, by us unseen, That crosses every path, The hidden boundary between God's mercy and his wrath."

Silence had but fairly settled on the waiting congregation when a strong, firm voice broke in upon it, and the speaker said:

"I believe in my soul that I have met that point and crossed that line this day. I surely met God's mercy and his wrath, face to face, and struggled in their power. Your hymn says, 'To cross that boundary is to die;' but I thank God that there are two sides to it. I feel that I have been standing on the very line, that my feet had well-nigh slipped. To-night I step over on to mercy's side. Reckon me henceforth among those who have chosen life."

"Amen," said the veteran minister, with radiant face.

"Thank God," said the earnest pastor, with quivering lip.

Two heads were suddenly bowed in the silent ecstasy of prayer—they were Ester's and Dr. Van Anden's. As for Sadie, she sat straight and still as if petrified with amazement, as she well-nigh felt herself to be, for the strong, firm voice belonged to Dr. Douglass!

An hour later Dr. Van Anden was pacing up and down the long parlor, with quick, excited steps, waiting for he hardly knew what, when a shadow fell between him and the gaslight. He glanced up suddenly, and his eyes met Dr. Douglass, who had placed himself in precisely the same position in which he had stood when they had met there before. Dr. Van Anden started forward, and the two gentlemen clasped hands as they had never in their lives done before. Dr. Douglass broke the beautiful silence first with earnestly spoken words:

"Doctor, will you forgive all the past?"

And Dr. Van Anden answered: "Oh, my brother in Christ!"

As for Ester, she prayed, in her clothes-press, thankfully for Dr. Douglass, more hopefully for Sadie, and knew not that a corner of the poor little letter which had slipped from Julia's hand and floated down the stream one summer morning, thereby causing her such a miserable, miserable day, was lying at that moment in Dr. Douglass' note-book, counted as the most precious of all his precious bits of paper. Verily "His ways are not as our ways."



CHAPTER XXV.

SADIE SURROUNDED.

"Oh," said Sadie, with a merry toss of her brown curls, "don't waste any more precious breath over me, I beg. I'm an unfortunate case, not worth struggling for. Just let me have a few hours of peace once more. If you'll promise not to say 'meeting' again to me, I'll promise not to laugh at you once after this long drawn-out spasm of goodness has quieted, and you have each descended to your usual level once more."

"Sadie," said Ester, in a low, shocked tone, "do you think we are all hypocrites, and mean not a bit of this?"

"By no means, my dear sister of charity, at least not all of you. I'm a firm believer in diseases of all sorts. This is one of the violent kind of highly contagious diseases; they must run their course, you know. I have not lived in the house with two learned physicians all this time without learning that fact, but I consider this very nearly at its height, and live in hourly expectation of the 'turn.' But, my dear, I don't think you need worry about me in the least. I don't believe I'm a fit subject for such trouble. You know I never took whooping-cough nor measles, though I have been exposed a great many times."

To this Ester only replied by a low, tremulous, "Don't, Sadie, please."

Sadie turned a pair of mirthful eyes upon her for a moment, and noting with wonder the pale, anxious face and quivering lip of her sister, seemed suddenly sobered.

"Ester," she said quietly, "I don't think you are 'playing good;' I don't positively. I believe you are thoroughly in earnest, but I think you have been through some very severe scenes of late, sickness and watching, and death, and your nerves are completely unstrung. I don't wonder at your state of feeling, but you will get over it in a little while, and be yourself again."

"Oh," said Ester, tremulously, "I pray God I may never be myself again; not the old self that you mean."

"You will," Sadie answered, with roguish positiveness. "Things will go cross-wise, the fire won't burn, and the kettle won't boil, and the milk-pitcher will tip over, and all sorts of mischievous things will go on happening after a little bit, just as usual, and you will feel like having a general smash up of every thing in spite of all these meetings."

Ester sighed heavily. The old difficulty again—things would not be undone. The weeds which she had been carelessly sowing during all these past years had taken deep root, and would not give place. After a moment's silence she spoke again.

"Sadie, answer me just one question. What do you think of Dr. Douglass?"

Sadie's face darkened ominously. "Never mind what I think of him," she answered in short, sharp tones, and abruptly left the room.

What she did think of him was this: That he had become that which he had affected to consider the most despicable thing on earth—a hypocrite. Remember, she had no personal knowledge of the power of the Spirit of God over a human soul. She had no conception of how so mighty a change could be wrought in the space of a few hours, so her only solution of the mystery was that to serve some end which he had in view Dr. Douglass had chosen to assume a new character.

Later, on that same day, Sadie encountered Dr. Douglass, rather, she went to the side piazza equipped for a walk, and he came eagerly from the west end to speak with her.

"Miss Sadie, I have been watching for you. I have a few words that are burning to be said."

"Proceed," said Sadie, standing with demurely folded hands, and a mock gravity in her roguish eyes.

"I want to do justice at this late day to Dr. Van Anden. I misjudged him, wronged him, perhaps prejudiced you against him. I want to undo my work."

"Some things can be done more easily than they can be undone," was Sadie's grave and dignified reply. "You certainly have done your best to prejudice me against Dr. Van Anden not only, but against all other persons who hold his peculiar views, and you have succeeded splendidly. I congratulate you."

That look of absolute pain which she had seen once or twice on this man's face, swept over it now as he answered her.

"I know—I have been blind and stupid, wicked any thing you will. Most bitterly do I regret it now; most eager am I to make reparation."

Sadie's only answer was: "What a capital actor you would make, Dr. Douglass. Are you sure you have not mistaken your vocation?"

"I know what you think of me." This with an almost quivering lip, and a voice strangely humble and as unlike as possible to any which she had ever heard from Dr. Douglass before. "You think I am playing a part. Though what my motive could be I can not imagine, can you? But I do solemnly assure you that if ever I was sincere in any thing in all my life I am now concerning this matter."

"There is a most unfortunate 'if' in the way, Doctor. You see, the trouble is, I have very serious doubts as to whether you ever were sincere in any thing in your life. As to motives, a first-class anybody likes to try his power. You will observe that 'I have a very poor opinion of the world.'"

The Doctor did not notice the quotation of his favorite expression, but answered with a touch of his accustomed dignity:

"I may have deserved this treatment at your hands, Miss Sadie. Doubtless I have, although I am not conscious of ever having said to you any thing which I did not think I meant. I have been a fool. I am willing—yes, and anxious to own it. But there are surely some among your acquaintances whom you can trust if you can not me. I—"

Sadie interrupted him. "For instance, that 'first-class fanatic of the most objectionable stamp,' the man who Dr. Douglass thought, not three days ago, ought to be bound by law to keep the peace. I suppose you would have me unhesitatingly receive every word he says?"

Dr. Douglass' face brightened instantly, and he spoke eagerly:

"I remember those words, Miss Sadie, and just how honestly I spoke them, and just how bitterly I felt when I spoke them, and I have no more sure proof that this thing is of God than I have in noting the wonderful change which has come over my feelings in regard to that blessed man. I pray God that he may be permitted to speak to your soul with the tremendous power that he has to mine. Oh, Sadie, I have led you astray, may I not help you back?"

"I am not a weather-vane, Dr. Douglass, to be whirled about by every wind of expediency; besides I am familiar with one verse in the Bible, of which you seem never to have heard: Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. You have sowed well and faithfully; be content with your harvest."

I do not know what the pale, grave lips would have answered to this mocking spirit, for at that moment Dr. Van Anden and the black ponies whizzed around the corner, and halted before the gate.

"Sadie," said the doctor, "are you in the mood for a ride? I have five miles to drive."

"Dr. Van Anden," answered Sadie, promptly, "the last time you and I took a ride together we quarreled."

"Precisely," said the Doctor, bowing low. "Let us take another now and make up."

"Very well," was the gleeful answer which he received, and in another minute they were off.

For the first mile or two he kept a tight rein, and let the ponies skim over the ground in the liveliest fashion, during which time very little talking was done. After that he slackened his speed, and leaning back in the carriage addressed himself to Sadie:

"Now we are ready to make up."

"How shall we commence?" asked Sadie, gravely.

"Who quarreled?" answered the Doctor, sententiously.

"Well," said Sadie, "I understand what you are waiting for. You think I was very rude and unladylike in my replies to you during that last interesting ride we took. You think I jumped at unwarrantable conclusions, and used some unnecessarily sharp words. I think so myself, and if it will be of any service to you to know it, I don't mind telling you in the least."

"That is a very excellent beginning," answered the Doctor, heartily. "I think we shall have no difficulty in getting the matter all settled Now, for my part, it won't sound as well as yours, because however blunderingly I may have said what I did, I said it honestly, in good faith, and with a good and pure motive. But I am glad to be able to say in equal honesty that I believe I was over-cautious, that Dr. Douglass was never so little worthy of regard as I supposed him to be, and that nothing could have more rejoiced my heart than the noble stand which he has so recently taken. Indeed his conduct has been so noble that I feel honored by his acquaintance."

He was interrupted by a mischievous laugh.

"A mutual admiration society," said Sadie, in her most mocking tone. "Did you and Dr. Douglass have a private rehearsal? You interrupted him in a similar rhapsody over your perfections."

Instead of seeming annoyed, Dr. Van Anden's face glowed with pleasure.

"Did he explain to you our misunderstanding?" he asked, eagerly. "That was very noble in him."

"Of course. He is the soul of nobility—a villain yesterday and a saint to-day. I don't understand such marvelously rapid changes, Doctor."

"I know you don't," the Doctor answered quietly. "Although you have exaggerated both terms, yet there is a great and marvelous change, which must be experienced to be understood. Will you never seek it for yourself, Sadie?"

"I presume I never shall, as I very much doubt the existence of any such phenomenon."

The Doctor appeared neither shocked nor surprised, but favored her with a cool and quiet reply:

"Oh, no, you don't doubt it in the least. Don't try to make yourself out that foolish and unreasonable creature—an unbeliever in what is as clear to a thinking mind as is the sun at noonday. You and I have no need to enter into an argument concerning this matter. You have seen some unwise and inconsistent acts in many who are called by the name of Christian. You imagine that they have staggered your belief in the verity of the thing itself. Yet it is not so. You had a dear father who lived and died in the faith, and you no more doubt the fact that he is in heaven to-day, brought there by the power of the Savior in whom he trusted, than you doubt your own existence at this moment."

Sadie sat silenced and grave; she was very rarely either, perhaps. Dr. Van Anden was the one person who could have thus subdued her, but in her inmost heart she felt his words to be true; that dear, dear father, whose weary suffering life had been one long evidence to the truth of the religion which he professed—yes, it was so, she no more doubted that he was at this moment in that blessed heaven toward which his hopes had so constantly tended, than she doubted the shining of that day's sun—so he, being dead, yet spoke to her. Besides, her keen judgment had, of late, settled back upon the belief that Dr. Van Anden lived a life that would bear watching—a true, earnest, manly life; also, that he was a man not likely to be deceived. So, sitting back there in the carriage, and appearing to look at nothing, and be interested in nothing, she allowed herself to take in again the firm conviction that whatever most lives were, there was always that father—safe, safe in the Christian's heaven—and there were besides some few, a very few, she thought; but there were some still living, whom she knew, yes, actually knew, were fitting for that same far-away, safe place. No, Sadie had stood upon the brink, was standing there still, indeed; but reason and the long-buried father still kept her from toppling over into the chasm of settled unbelief. "Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors; and their works do follow them."

But something must be said. Sadie was not going to sit there and allow Dr. Van Anden to imagine that she was utterly quieted and conquered; she would rather quarrel with him than have that. He had espoused Dr. Douglass' cause so emphatically, let him argue for him now; there was nothing like a good sharp argument to destroy the effect of unpleasant personal questions—so she blazed into sudden indignation:

"I think Dr. Douglass is a hypocrite!"

Nothing could have been more composed than the tone in which she was answered:

"Very well. What then?"

This question was difficult to answer, and Sadie remaining silent, her companion continued:

"Mr. Smith is a drunkard; therefore I will be a thief. Is that Miss Sadie Ried's logic?"

"I don't see the point."

"Don't you? Wasn't that exclamation concerning Dr. Douglass a bit of hiding behind the supposed sin of another—a sort of a reason why you were not a Christian, because somebody else pretended to be? Is that sound logic, Sadie? When your next neighbor in class peeps in her book, and thereby disgraces herself, and becomes a hypocrite, do you straightway declare that you will study no more? You see it is fashionable, in talking of this matter of religion, to drag out the shortcomings and inconsistencies of others, and try to make of them a garment to covet our own sins; but it is very senseless, after all, and you will observe is never done in the discussion of any other question."

Clearly, Sadie must talk in a common-sense way with this straightforward man, if she talked at all. Her resolution was suddenly taken, to say for once just what she meant; and a very grave and thoughtful pair of eyes were raised to meet the doctor's when next she spoke.

"I think of these things sometimes, doctor, and though a great deal of it seems to be humbug, it is as you say—I know some are sincere, and I know there is a right way. I have been more than half tempted many times during the last few weeks to discover for myself the secret of power, but I am deterred by certain considerations, which you would, doubtless, think very absurd, but which, joined with the inspiration which I receive from the ridiculous inconsistencies of others, have been sufficient to deter me hitherto."

"Would you mind telling me some of the considerations?"

And the moment Sadie began to talk honestly, the doctor's tones lost their half-indifferent coolness, and expressed a kind and thoughtful interest.

"No," she said, hesitatingly. "I don't know that I need, but you will not understand them; for instance, if I were a Christian I should have to give up one of my favorite amusements—almost a passion, you know, dancing is with me, and I am not ready to yield it."

"Why should you feel obliged to do so if you were a Christian?"

Sadie gave him the benefit of a very searching look. "Don't you think I would be?" she queried, after a moment's silence.

"I haven't said what I thought on that subject, but I feel sure that it is not the question for you to decide at present; first settle the all-important one of your personal acceptation of Christ, and then it will be time to decide the other matter, for or against, as your conscience may dictate."

"Oh, but," said Sadie, positively, "I know very well what my conscience would dictate, and I am not ready for it."

"Isn't dancing an innocent amusement?"

"For me yes, but not for a Christian."

"Does the Bible lay down one code of laws for you and another for Christians?"

"I think so—it says, 'Be not conformed to the world.'"

"Granted; but does it anywhere say to those who are of the world, 'You have a right to do just what you like; that direction does not apply to you at all, it is all intended for those poor Christians?'"

"Dr. Van Anden," said Sadie with dignity, "don't you think there should be a difference between Christians and those who are not?"

"Undoubtedly I do. Do you think that every person ought or ought not to be a Christian?"

Sadie was silent, and a little indignant. After a moment she spoke again, this time with a touch of hauteur:

"I think you understand what I mean, Doctor, though you would not admit it for the world. I don't suppose I feel very deeply on the subject, else I would not advance so trivial an excuse; but this is honestly my state of mind. Whenever I think about the matter at all, this thing comes up for consideration. I think it would be very foolish for me to argue against dancing, for I don't know much about the arguments, and care less. I know only this much, that there is a very distinctly defined inconsistency between a profession of religion and dancing, visible very generally to the eyes of those who make no profession; the other class don't seem so able to see it; but there exists very generally among us worldlings a disposition to laugh a little over dancing Christians. Whether this is a well-founded inconsistency, or only a foolish prejudice on our part, I have never taken the trouble to try to determine, and it would make little material difference which it was—it is enough for me that such is the case; and it makes it very plain to me that if I were an honest professor of that religion which leads one of its teachers to say, 'He will eat no meat while the world stands if it makes his brother to offend,' I should be obliged to give up my dancing. But since I am not one of that class, and thus have no such influence, I can see no possible harm in my favorite amusement, and am not ready to give it up; and that is what I mean by its being innocent for me, and not innocent for professing Christians."