"Seton's kirk," as it was called in the district, was a dignified building, finely proportioned, and plain to austerity. Once it had been the fashionable church in a good district. Old members still liked to tell of its glorious days, when "braw folk" came in their carriages and rustled into their cushioned pews, and the congregation was so large that people sat on the pulpit steps. These days were long past. No one sat on the pulpit steps to hear James Seton preach, there was room and to spare in the pews. Indeed, "Seton's kirk" was now something of a forlorn hope in a neighbourhood almost entirely given over to Jews and Roman Catholics. A dreary and disheartening sphere to work in, one would have thought, but neither Mr. Seton nor his flock were dreary or disheartened. For some reason, it was a church that seemed difficult to leave. Members "flitted" to the suburbs and went for a Sabbath or two to a suburban church, then they appeared again in "Seton's kirk," remarking that the other seemed "awful unhomely somehow." Mr. Seton would not have exchanged his congregation for any in the land. It was so full of character, he said; his old men dreamed dreams, his young men saw visions. That they had very little money troubled him not at all. Money was not one of the things that mattered to James Seton. Arthur Townshend sat beside Elizabeth in the Manse seat. Elizabeth had pushed a Bible and Hymnary in his direction and, never having taken part in a Presbyterian service, he awaited further developments with interest, keeping an eye the while on Billy, who had tied a bent pin to a string and was only waiting for the first prayer to angle in the next pew. As the clock struck eleven the beadle carried the big Bible up to the pulpit, and descending, stood at the foot of the stairs until the minister had passed up. Behind came the precentor, distributing before he sat down slips with the psalms and hymns of the morning service, round the choir. Mr. Seton entered the pulpit. A hush fell over the church. "Let us pray," he said. A stranger hearing James Seton pray was always struck by two things--the beauty of his voice, or rather the curious arresting quality of it which gave an extraordinary value to every word he said, and the stateliness of his language. There was no complacent camaraderie in his attitude towards his Maker. It is true he spoke confidently as to a Father, but he never forgot that he was in the presence of the King of kings.