there seems the intention to impart a moral in the refusal of Providence
to temper warm weather to the full-bodied.

Old Tom Martin expressed a strong consciousness of such intention when he
observed to the shocked Miss Selina, as Mr. Bill Snoddy, the stoutest
citizen of the county, waddled abnormally up the aisle: "The Almighty must
be gittin" a heap of fun out of Bill Snoddy to-night."

"Oh, Mr. Martin!" exclaimed Miss Tibbs, fluttering at his irreverence.

"Why, you would yourself. Miss Seliny," returned old Tom. Mr. Martin
always spoke in one key, never altering the pitch of his high, dry,
unctuous drawl, though, when his purpose was more than ordinarily
humorous, his voice assumed a shade of melancholy. Now and then he
meditatively passed his fingers through his gray beard, which followed the
line of his jaw, leaving his upper lip and most of his chin smooth-shaven.
"Did you ever reason out why folks laugh so much at fat people?" he
continued. "No, ma'am. Neither'd anybody else."

"Why is it, Mr. Martin?" asked Miss Selina.

"It's like the Creator's sayin', 'Let there be light.' He says, 'Let
ladies be lovely--'" (Miss Tibbs bowed)--"and 'Let men-folks be honest--
sometimes;' and, 'Let fat people be held up to ridicule till they fall
off.' You can't tell why it is; it was jest ordained that-a-way."

The room was so crowded that the juvenile portion of the assemblage was
ensconced in the windows. Strange to say, the youth of Plattville were not
present under protest, as their fellows of a metropolis would have been,
lectures being well understood by the young of great cities to have