night over that same "accountability of the heathen."

"It's too bad the Simpsons have moved away," said Candace. "It's
so seldom you can find a real big wicked family like that to
save, with only Clara Belle and Susan good in it."

"And numbers count for so much," continued Alice. "My grandmother
says if missionaries can't convert about so many in a year the
Board advises them to come back to America and take up some other
work."

"I know," Rebecca corroborated; "and it's the same with
revivalists. At the Centennial picnic at North Riverboro, a
revivalist sat opposite to Mr. Ladd and Aunt Jane and me, and he
was telling about his wonderful success in Bangor last winter.
He'd converted a hundred and thirty in a month, he said, or about
four and a third a day. I had just finished fractions, so I asked
Mr. Ladd how the third of a man could be converted. He laughed
and said it was just the other way; that the man was a third
converted. Then he explained that if you were trying to convince
a person of his sin on a Monday, and couldn't quite finish by
sundown, perhaps you wouldn't want to sit up all night with him,
and perhaps he wouldn't want you to; so you'd begin again on
Tuesday, and you couldn't say just which day he was converted,
because it would be two thirds on Monday and one third on
Tuesday."

"Mr. Ladd is always making fun, and the Board couldn't expect any
great things of us girls, new beginners," suggested Emma Jane,
who was being constantly warned against tautology by her teacher.