As the judge spoke, the blazing frame fell, the small boys shouted “Oh----h!” in chorus, and the deacon’s heart sank like lead as he turned away. He had lost, say, a hundred and fifty dollars by the fire, and Tom Adams’s misfortune would entail additional loss upon him, for a new man would have to be watched and taught and helped, whereas Tom worked as easily as the wheel of a machine. It was but right that the deacon should regret his losses; for though he was a man of considerable property, a dollar looked very large to him, for the reason that his first dollars had each one represented an enormous amount of labor. But when Lawyer Bottom, who had invested in mill stock only with the hope of profit, approached the deacon, and asked, with more curiosity than malice, “How about temperance now, deacon?” the facial contortions which the deacon offered in reply sent the lawyer away in an ecstasy of unholy glee, which almost eradicated his own sense of loss, and which dispelled for a time such little belief as he had in the transforming power of religion. But what is one man’s poison is another’s food. The lawyer’s question was not entirely disposed of by the deacon’s ungracious reply; it repeated itself time and again to the old man, and at the most inopportune times and places; it came to him behind the counter, and made him give wrong weights and measures, with the balance not always in his favor; it came to him when he was making entries in his day-book, and caused him to forget certain items; at his own dinner-table it suddenly made itself heard, and interfered with his relish of the good viands which he so much enjoyed; it dropped in upon him in his dreams, when he could not be on his guard against his better self, and extracted from his conscience a provoking line of answers which in his waking hours he could not gainsay. For three days this depressing experience continued, and then there occurred, at the regular weekly prayer-meeting of Parson Wedgewell’s church, an episode which for months caused mournful reflections in the minds of such of Parson Wedgewell’s parishioners as were not in the habit of attending prayer-meeting. It was noticed by the faithful that Deacon Jones looked unusually solemn and sensitive as he entered the room, and that he did not, as had been hitherto his habit, start the second hymn. This omission having been made good by some enterprising member, however, the deacon got upon his feet and said: