The Rising of the Tide: The Story of SabinsportTarbell, Ida M. (Ida Minerva)
General
The Rising of the Tide: The Story of Sabinsport
Tarbell, Ida M. (Ida Minerva)
World War, 1914-1918 -- Fiction
The air was thick with disapproval that day in Sabinsport of the Rev.
Richard Ingraham; and suspicion gathered and gathered as the day went
on. Could it be that they had been mistaken, that he really was at
heart a pacifist?
The day was to come--and it was not far distant--when all these
indignant patriots were to do their best to make amends for their
resentment.
Under the great burst of joyous relief which the news of the signing of
the armistice caused in Sabinsport, her anger at Dick began to soften.
As the days went on and they actually saw at least the spirit of his
dream coming true--their own boys crossing into the enemy's country in
orderly fashion, going about the enemy's streets in self-control, even
holding the enemy's children on their knees and joining in their
Christmas trees and Christmas carols--a kind of wonder seized them. It
was a prophecy they had listened to. Even Miss Sarah Kenton was one day
to come to Dick and express her appreciation of his sermon, as frankly
as she had just expressed her disapproval.
But all that was for a later day. There is no question at all but that,
at the moment, Richard Ingraham had deeply outraged Sabinsport spirit
of righteous indignation against the Germans which he had done more
than any other man to awaken.
He went back to his study in the rectory after his interview with Miss
Sarah and sat for a long time, considering what he had done. "Good
Lord!" he said, "I certainly have put my foot in it. They really think
I am a pacifist," and he threw back his head and laughed aloud. But it
was a rueful laugh. Disapproval was a new experience for the young man.
He had had nothing but affectionate approval from the day that
Sabinsport first made his acquaintance. He could not remember a time in
all these years of speaking to them that his sermons had not met with
kindly appreciation, and now? Why, they had walked out of that church
as if they thought him a German spy.
And yet, underneath his chagrin, there was a certain exaltation. "She
has a mind of her own, Sabinsport, and she is not afraid to show it.
You can trust her to take care of her own, even against her own. But
what a climb I will have to get back!" And then quickly the thought
came, "I wonder if Nancy will feel as they do?" That gave him a cold
heart, almost a physical sickness. He could bear everything but to have
Nancy look at him as the people had when he first came out of his
rhapsody and realized their faces.
He put it through bravely. At the evening service there was the
smallest number of people that he ever remembered to have seen, but he
talked exactly as he had planned.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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