"Now, _Aubrey_ and _Lettice_," saith she, "both of you, fall a-catechising me in the stead of _Nell_. The maid hath no list to wed with _Nym Lewthwaite_, and hath told me so much aforetime. Leave her be, and send him away the other side of _Jericho_, where he belongs, and let him, an' he list, fetch back a _Syrian_ maiden with a horn o'er her forehead and a ring of her nose." "Wherefore didst thou not tell us so much, _Nell_, my lass?" saith _Father_ right kindlily, laying of his hand on my shoulder. But in the stead of answering him thankfully, as a dutiful daughter should, what did I but burst forth o' crying, as though he had been angered with me: yea, nor might I stop the same, but went on, truly I knew not wherefore, till _Mother_ came up and put her arms around me, and hushed me as she wont to do when I was a little child. "The poor child is o'erwrought," quoth she, tenderly. "Let us leave her be, _Aubrey_, till she calms down.--There, come to me and have it out, my _Nelly_, and none shall trouble thee, trust me." Lack-a-daisy! I sobbed all the harder for a season, but in time I calmed down, as _Mother_ says, and when so were, I prayed her of pardon for that I could be so foolish. "Nay, my lass," saith she, "we be made of body and soul, and either comes uppermost at times. 'Tis no good trying to live with one, which so it be." "Ah, the old monks made that blunder," saith _Father_, "and thought they could live with souls only, or well-nigh so. And there be scores of other that essay to live with nought but bodies. A man that starves his body is ill off, but a man that starves his soul is yet worser. No is it thus, _Mynheer_?" Mynheer van _Stuyvesant_ had come in while _Father_ was a-speaking. "Ah!" saith he, "there be in my country certain called _Mennonites_, that do starve their natures of yonder fashion." "Which half of them,--body or soul?" saith _Father_. "Nay, I would say both two," he makes answer. "They run right to the further end of every matter. Because they read in their Bibles that `in the multitude of words there wanteth not sin,' therefore they do forbid all speech that is not of very necessity,--even a word more than needful is sin in their eyes. If you shall say, `Sit you down in that chair to your comfort,' there are eight words more than you need. You see?-- there are eight sins. `Sit' were enough. So, one mouthful more bread than you need--no, no!--that is a sin. One drop of syrup to your bread--not at all! You could eat your bread without syrup. All that is joyous, all that is comfortable, all that you like to do--all so many sins. Those are the _Mennonites_." "What sinful men they must be!" saith _Father_. "Good lack, Master _Stuyvesant_, but think you all those folks tarried in _Holland_?" saith Aunt _Joyce_. "Marry, I could count you a round dozen I have met in this country. And they _be_ trying, I warrant you. My fingers have itched to shake them ere now."