"A dashing, masculine, head-punching spirit might have saved him with all his ballast, but he didn't have it. The Reverend Robert was a good fellow to everybody--a fairly sound-hearted, decent, handsome fellow, but not a man. To be that, one has to know things at first hand--especially work and trouble. He was a second-hand, school-made thinker. His doctrines came out of the books, but his conduct was mildly modern. He danced and smoked a little, and played bridge and golf, and made his visits in a handsome motor-car. "Marie liked the young man, and she and her mother rode and tramped about with him almost every day of that summer. Deacon Joe showed signs of faintness when he spoke of him. "One day I went up to the Benson homestead and found the old man sitting on his piazza alone. "'Where's Marie?' I asked. "'Off knocking around with the minister,' said Deacon Joe, in a voice frail with contempt. "'She might be in worse company,' I suggested. "'Maybe,' he snapped. "'What's the matter with the minister?' "'Nothing,' said the old man, with a chuckle. 'He's a complete gentleman, complete! So plaguy beautiful that he's a kind of a girl's plaything. He couldn't milk a cow or dig a hill o' potatoes. Acts kind o' faint an' sickly to me.' "The Deacon thoughtfully stirred the roots of his beard with the fingers of his right hand, and went on with a squint and a feeble tone which he seemed to think best suited to his subject. "'Talks so low you can hardly hear him. I have to set with my hand to my ear every Sunday to make out what he's sayin', an' he prays as if he had the lung fever. Talks o' hell as though it was a quart o' cold molasses. That's one reason we ain't no respect for it in this community. Ay--'es! That's the reason.' "He squinted his face thoughtfully and resumed with more energy. "'I like to hear a man get up on his hind legs and holler as they used to--by gravy! Ye can't scare anybody by whispers. Damn it, sir, what we need is an old-fashioned revival.' "The Deacon halted to take a chew of tobacco, and went on, with a sorrowful calmness: "'Now this young feller don't want to give no credit to God--not a bit--no, sir! Science has done everything. I've noticed it time an' ag'in. T'other Sunday he said that an angel spoke to Moses, an' the Bible says, as plain as A B C, that God spoke to him. How can he expect that God is going to bless his ministry, an' he never givin' Him any credit?' "'It's rather bad politics, anyhow,' I said.