Now, I must say that the interior of an American church, with its lines of benches, its galleries, and its platform, does not inspire in one such religious feelings as the interior of a European Catholic church. In many American towns, the church is let for meetings, concerts, exhibitions, bazaars, etc., and so far as you can see, there is nothing to distinguish it from an ordinary lecture hall. Yet it is a church, and both lecturer and audience feel it. [Illustration] CHAPTER XIV. MARCUS AURELIUS IN AMERICA--CHAIRMEN I HAVE HAD--AMERICAN, ENGLISH, AND SCOTCH CHAIRMEN--ONE WHO HAD BEEN TO BOULOGNE--TALKATIVE AND SILENT CHAIRMEN--A TRYING OCCASION--THE LORD IS ASKED TO ALLOW THE AUDIENCE TO SEE MY POINTS. _New York, January 22._ There are indeed very few Americans who have not either tact or a sense of humor. They make the best of chairmen. They know that the audience have not come to hear them, and that all that is required of them is to introduce the lecturer in very few words, and to give him a good start. Who is the lecturer that would not appreciate, nay, love, such a chairman as Dr. R. S. MacArthur, who introduced me yesterday to a New York audience in the following manner? "Ladies and Gentlemen," said he, "the story goes that, last summer, a party of Americans staying in Rome paid a visit to the famous Spithöver's bookshop in the Piazza di Spagna. Now Spithöver is the most learned of bibliophiles. You must go thither if you need artistic and archæological works of the profoundest research and erudition. But one of the ladies in this tourists' party only wanted the lively travels in America of Max O'Rell, and she asked for the book at Spithöver's. There came in a deep guttural voice--an Anglo-German voice--from a spectacled clerk behind a desk, to this purport: 'Marcus Aurelius vos neffer in te Unided Shtaates!' But, ladies and gentlemen, he is now, and here he is." With such an introduction, I was immediately in touch with my audience. What a change after English chairmen! A few days before lecturing in any English town, under the auspices of a Literary Society or Mechanics' Institute, the lecturer generally receives from the secretary a letter running somewhat as follow: DEAR SIR: I have much pleasure in informing you that our Mr. Blank, one of our vice-presidents and a well-known resident here, will take the chair at your lecture. Translated into plain English, this reads: My poor fellow, I am much grieved to have to inform you that a chairman will be inflicted upon you on the occasion of your lecture before the members of our Society.