“And in fasting, too, I dare say,” she added, with a little smile. “And why not?” he asked. “Pardon me,” she said; “I don't pretend to know what you need. I need to eat, though Heaven knows it's hard enough to keep up an appetite down here. But it is physical endurance you need for the work here. Do you think fasting strengthens you to go through your work night and day?” “I know I couldn't do it on my own strength.” And Dr. Leigh recalled times when she had seen him officiating in the chapel apparently sustained by nothing but zeal and pure spirit, and wondered that he did not faint and fall. And faint and fall he did, she was sure, when the service was over. “Well, it may be necessary to you, but not as an example to these people. I see enough involuntary fasting.” “We look at these people from different points of view, I fear.” And after a moment he said: “But, doctor, I wanted to ask you about Gretchen. You see her?” “Occasionally. She works too many hours, but she seems to be getting on very well, and brings her mother all she earns.” “Do you think she is able to stand alone?” Dr. Leigh winced a little at this searching question, for no one knew better than she the vulgarizing influence of street life and chance associations upon a young girl, and the temptations. She was even forced to admit the value in the way of restraint, as a sort of police force, of the church and priestly influence, especially upon girls at the susceptible age. But she knew that Father Damon meant something more than this, and so she answered: “But people have got to stand alone. She might as well begin.” “But she is so young.” “Yes, I know. She is in the way of temptation, but so long as she works industriously, and loves her mother, and feels the obligation, which the poor very easily feel, of doing her share for the family, she is not in so much moral danger as other girls of her age who lead idle and self-indulgent lives. The working-girls of the city learn to protect themselves.” “And you think this is enough, without any sort of religion--that this East Side can go on without any spiritual life?” Ruth Leigh made a gesture of impatience. In view of the actual struggle for existence she saw around her, this talk seemed like cant. And she said: “I don't know that anything can go on. Let me ask you a question, Father Damon. Do you think there is any more spirituality, any more of the essentials of what you call Christianity, in the society of the other side than there is on the East Side?” “It is a deep question, this of spirituality,” replied Father Damon, who was in the depths of his proselyting action a democrat and in sympathy with the people, and rated quite at its full value the conventional fashion in religion. “I shouldn't like to judge, but there is a great body of Christian men and women in this city who are doing noble work.”