A conspicuous member of society and a pillar of the Swedenborgian church was Mr. John Preston, a banker and capitalist. With a book of Swedenborgian revelations in one hand and a bundle of tax titles in the other, he would frequently orate to a crowd of unbelievers, from a text drawn from his book, in a manner calculated to quite convert them, were it not that they knew he was only working up a fresh head of steam to enable him to grind the faces of the poor upon whose property he held tax titles. In fact, many people were of the opinion that this man was a dangerous character, in spite of his pretense of piety, his ostentatious charity, and his assumption of the _rôle_ of a professional philanthropist. They insinuated that a man could afford to give largely to an astronomical society, a college, an academy of sciences, and other objects of education, when he had appropriated many thousands of dollars belonging to the school fund to his own use; that he could easily contribute freely to his church, when he used the church property in his own interests and managed the society to suit himself; and that there was no great amount of philanthropy in giving a few hundred dollars to miscellaneous charities, when he made ten times the amount in shaving notes at usurious interest and acquiring land by means only one remove from actual theft; these things were becoming so notorious that a man of less indomitable brass than John Preston would have long since been sent to Coventry, if not to jail; but he revolved on his own center, sublimely indifferent to the attacks of his enemies, for whom, by the way, he used to pray with most fervent unction. His wife was a pleasant, motherly woman, who gave liberally to charitable objects, and who regarded her husband as one of the saints of the earth. There were three children--a young man and two girls. The former gave no promise of either ability, probity, or ambition, and there was about him a noticeable air of deficiency in both mental and moral worth. The girls were commonplace nonentities, with no pretensions to beauty or grace. One of the most prominent citizens of Gloster was a wealthy tanner, named Charles H. Sanders. Having foreseen at an early day the great progress which the city would make in population and importance, he had invested largely in tracts of unimproved land, which he held against all offers to purchase until his real estate was more extended and valuable than that of any other property-owner in the city. Personally he was very thin and angular, with such a sickly look that his death seemed possible any day, though his constitution was of that character which might hold out much longer than that of a more robust type. His wife was a very charming woman, and they had two young daughters, who gave promise of considerable beauty when they should arrive at maturity.