"I take it 'tis but a manner of speaking, Jim. Religious people get into a way of flinging texts about. Now there's one consolation about texts. If you find one that seems to bear all one way, you've only to look long enough and you'll find another that bears just as plainly the other way. That's why religious people, no matter what sect they belong to, can always find unction for their own souls, and nettles for other folk to sit on." "But your feyther seemed terrible in earnest. I didn't rightly understand all he said. He's a varry difficult man to sit under is yo'r feyther. When I go to Church aw can sleep reight through th' sermon and o'er wakken till th' parson gets to 'And now to God the Father…' But aw n'er closed mi e'en all this forenoon. He seems fair set agen th' Church fo'k. Aw rekkon, now, if onnybody but a Baptist went after your Ruth your father 'ud show him to th' door i' double quick time." "I don't think he'd like it, to be sure," I conceded. Jim looked very crestfallen. "But then, you know, Jim, the fold is always open. Anyone can be dipped after full approval. He might attend regularly at Pole Moor, say for twelve months, and then I daresay he would be received into the company of the elect." "But don't you think your feyther'd smell a rat? Mightn't he tumble to it 'at th' chap were after Ruth?" "Not he, i' faith," I answered with confidence. "A preacher's only too willing to believe that he's the lure. And then, you know, Jim, if I know anything of our Ruth, all the texts in the Bible wouldn't prevent her having the man she'd set her heart on." "Aw'm fain to hear it, Abe. Not that it's onny business o' mine, yo' know. Aw were only axing in a general sort o' way, you know." "Of course," I said, as Jim seemed to look for some comment on this remark. "Of course." "You mean 'at 'oo's booked already?" "I mean nothing of the sort. Why, she's only a chit of a girl yet. 'Twill be time enough for Ruth to be thinking of courting in another ten years' time." "Ten fiddlesticks," quoth Jim, rudely. "How mich younger is she than yersen, I sud like to know." "Oh! that's different," I snapped. "Aw dunnot see it," said Jim; and we arrived at his mother's house in Wrigley Mill Fold as nearly on the verge of a tiff as ever we had been in our long acquaintance. Now I suppose it was because I was not quite easy about my own affairs that I had listened with less than my usual patience to Jim's maunderings. When chapel loosed that morning I had whispered to Ruth that I wanted some private talk with her; and, our simple midday meal concluded, and the pots sided away, she had joined me as I sauntered expectant in the garden. I drew her away from the house, and then I poured into her ears the story of the events that had so strangely broken the even tenor of my life--not omitting the scene at the Wakes, in which Jim had figured so bravely.