Against the obnoxious local preacher before mentioned, Sister and I had a special grievance: While standing one day on the creek bridge, when he and some boys were below, fishing, we had heard him say an obscene word as a fish got off his hook. Indignant to our finger tips, we walked on, harbouring this in righteous wrath. And shortly after that, when he was assisting the pastor at Communion, Sister and I tacitly agreed to stay away from the altar rather than be ministered unto by him. Noting our failure to commune, and meeting us on the street later, he questioned us. Kate took the initiative but we were both terrible in our wrath. We told him we did not care to take the bread and wine from one who talked as he did on week-days. Astonished, he inquired what we meant; concerned and uncomfortable, he seemed divided between wanting to know and dreading to hear. Kate said she would not repeat such talk, but that she heard it herself on the creek bridge when he was fishing. He looked very cheap. Having reproved this whited sepulchre, the offended misses went disdainfully on their way. I suppose that was the least of his sins. I fancy he felt relieved that it was nothing worse we knew about him. Later his conduct became notorious, but he never had more inflexible accusers than those stern maidens who upbraided him that Sunday. Another Communion service, probably before this, stands out vividly. It was when I was having doubts and waverings about acceptance as a child of God, when, in Methodist parlance, I was “falling from grace.” That day, sitting through the service, seeing altar-full after altar-full kneel, commune, rise, and “go in peace,” I had said to myself, “I will not go.” Steeling my heart, I sat upright, conscious of Mother’s questioning glances, but apparently unmoved. After the congregation had communed, the choir-members went to the altar-rail, and as the sparse gathering knelt there, and the last notes of the hymn died away, instead of immediately passing the bread and wine, the minister and the young evangelist paused to see if others would come. Although the evangelist made a moving appeal, still was I determined not to go and, anyhow, having waited so long, I was too embarrassed to go. The choir communed and left the altar. It was the last chance. No, the evangelist still stood there, and in a few earnest words besought any who were hanging back to come. I knew he meant me, still I tried to withstand. In conclusion he said, “While the choir is singing the next hymn, I know God will soften your heart and you will come”: “Just as I am, without one plea, But that thy blood was shed for me, And that thou bidd’st me come to thee, Oh, Lamb of God, I come, I come!”