"A Christian! A Christian! Advise me as a _Christian_ to not ring the
Sabbath bells!"

I see the idee skairt him. He wuz fairly pale with surprise and borrow.
And I told him agin', puttin' in all the perticilers it needed to make
the story straight and good, how Ralph S. Robinson had labored for
the good of others, and how his strength had gin out, and he wuz now
a-layin' at the very pint of death, and how his girl and his sister wuz
a-breakin' their hearts over him, and how we had some hopes of savin'
his life if he could get some sleep, that the doctors said his life
depended on it, and agin I begged him to do what we asked.

But the Deacon had begin to get over bein' skairt, and he looked firm as
anybody ever could, as he sez: "The bells never hurt anybody, I know,
for here I have lived right by the side of 'em for 20 years. Do I look
broke down and weak?" sez he.

"No," sez I, honestly. "No more than a grannit monument, or a steel
trap."

"Wall," sez he, "what don't hurt me won't hurt nobody else."

"But," sez I, "folks are made up different." Sez I, "The Bible sez so,
and what might not hurt you, might be the ruin of somebody else. Wuz you
ever nervous?" sez I.

"Never," sez he. And he added firmly, "I don't believe in nerves. I
never did. There hain't no use in 'm."