dilapidated maps at angles suggesting the interior of a ship's cabin
during a storm, or a party of revellers, returning homeward, after
the night before, gravely hilarious. Behind the platform a blackboard,
cracked into irregular spaces, preserved the mental processes of the
pupils during their working hours, and in sharp contrast to these the
terribly depressing perfection of the teacher's exemplar in penmanship,
which reminded the self-complacent slacker that "Eternal vigilance is
the price of freedom."

It was an evangelistic meeting. Behind the table, his face illumined by
the lamp thereon, stood a man turning over the leaves of a hymn book.
His aspect suggested a soul, gentle, mild and somewhat abstracted from
its material environment. The lofty forehead gave promise of an idealism
capable of high courage, indeed of sacrifice--a promise, however, belied
somewhat by an irresolute chin partly hidden by a straggling beard. But
the face was sincere and tenderly human. At his side upon the platform
sat his wife behind a little portable organ, her face equally gentle,
sincere and irresolute.

The assembly--with the extraordinary patience that characterises public
assemblies--waited for the opening of the meeting, following with
attentive eyes the vague and trifling movements of the man at the table.
Occasionally there was a rumble of deep voices in conversation, and
in the dark corners subdued laughter--while on the front benches the
animated and giggling whispering of three little girls tended to relieve
the hour from an almost superhuman gravity.

At length with a sudden acquisition of resolution the evangelist glanced
at his watch, rose, and catching up a bundle of hymn books from the
table thrust them with unnecessary energy into the hands of a boy who