"That's so: we've heerd some preachers in our day. He must toe the mark. He may be all right at college, but he's in a pulpit now that has held preachers fur shore. A pebble's all right among pebbles, but it looks mighty small 'longside o' boulders. He's preachin' before people now. Why, Brother Simpson himself never would 'a' got a special dispensation to hold the church all these years, ef it had n't been fur the people backin' him up an' Conference was afraid they'd leave the connection."
"Well, ef this boy is anything, Lord only knows where he gets it, fur everybody knows—"
"'Sh!"
The buzz which had attended the young speaker's entrance subsided as Mr. Simpson rose and gave out the hymn. That finished, he ran his eyes over the front seats of the assembly and then said, "Brother Hastings, lead us in prayer."
The old man paused for an instant as if surprised, and then got slowly to his knees. It was a strange selection, but we have seen that this particular parson was capable of doing strange things. In the course of a supplication of some fifteen minutes' dura-
