Paula, glad to escape for a moment, ran for her Bible, which was always beside her in our little bedroom. As she crossed the threshold, Teresa entered to carry away the dishes. "What now? What's the matter?" said the old servant as she looked at Paula's tearful face. "What on earth have you been crying about, poor child?" My father answered for her. "She's been guilty of most incredible impertinence." "That's strange," said the old servant. "That's not a bit like her, with her happy, humble ways with all of us." "That may be," said my father, "but it's just as I feared. She's got all the ideas of her father's family. She talks of nothing but God and the Bible and of her religion, and that's insupportable in this house." "Oh, do go slow, sir," Teresa implored. "She's a mere child yet." "Yes, but she must obey." Teresa contented herself with a shrug of her shoulders, for she saw that my father was not going to yield. And now Paula had returned with her Bible in hand. "And now," said my father, after a moment of silence, "let us see those words. Have you found them yet?" Paula had paused, her hand turning over the pages of her Bible rapidly. "No, uncle, not yet, but I will find them soon." Again there was silence. Teresa had returned to the kitchen, the door closing with a bang to demonstrate her displeasure. Nothing could be heard but the tick-tack of the clock, and the sound of the turning pages, as Paula, in spite of her tears, looked for the desired words. "Here it is," she said at last, smiling in spite of her emotion. "See, uncle, here you are, at the fifth chapter of Acts, verse 29." "'We ought to obey God, rather than men!'" murmured my father two or three times, as he read the words of Holy Writ, while Paula looked at him with confident eyes, even though a few tears still lingered. "Let us see, now, something of the context," he added. "Oh, yes, here it is," and he commenced to read aloud, "'And the high priest asked them saying, Did not we straitly command you that ye should not teach in this name? and, behold, ye have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this man's blood upon us. Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, _We ought to obey God rather than men_.'" Teresa, who had forgotten the tablecloth, came to get it, and smiled as she saw that happiness had again returned to Paula's countenance; for nothing pleased the good woman more than to find everybody in the house happy. My father leaving certain directions relative to Catalina whom he had found very weak that morning, gathered up his papers, also the Bible, and started to go out. "Uncle," Paula reminded him timidly, "you've made a mistake. You are carrying my Bible away with your papers." "Yes, that is true, but I've made no mistake. I'm keeping your Bible now." "And you will return it to me tonight, uncle?" "And why tonight?" "To read it, uncle, as I always do, every night."