“Well, daddy, I done tried to read her. I set up all one night with Preacher Cuthbertson from over in Owsley, an’ we both read sever’l chapters in them Institutes. Hit was nigh about midnight when we both went to sleep, an’ atter I’d went to sleep he done shuk me by the shoulder an’ woke me up, an’ he says to me, ‘David, David, I’ve been thinkin’ over them Institutes so hard.... I believe they’ve injured my mind’!” The young man broke into a wide-mouthed smile as he made this recountal. But it was a thundercloud of wrath upon the face of his father which greeted such levity. “Ye wasn’t reverent!” he blazed. “Ye was impyous, both of ye. Injure his mind—why, that feller Cuthbertson never had no mind fer to injure. That’s what ails him. The book of John Calvin is one of the greatest books in the world. What’ll folks like ye and Preacher Cuthbertson be up an’ sayin’ next? An’ I’d set ye apart for the ministry, too, allowin’ I could git ye some schoolin’ atter a while, somewhars.” He turned from them both, and stood a little apart, his brows drawn down into a scowling frown. “How come ye come home so soon, Andrew?” asked his mother now. “We wasn’t expectin’ ye back—ye told me ye was a-goin’ over to Leslie to preach a couple days on the head of Hell-fer-Sartin. But ye only left yisterday.” “Hit’s none yore business how I got back so soon,” replied the old man savagely. “I don’t have to account to no one what I do.” He turned about now moodily. In his great hand he still clutched the heavy umbrella which he carried, its whalebone ribs and cotton cover dripping rivulets. A step or two brought him to the opening in the loft floor, where he reached up to place the wet umbrella out of the way. As he did so his hand struck some other object hidden there. He grasped it and drew it down—and stood, his face fairly contorted with surprise and anger. It was his son’s violin which now he clutched in his gnarled and bony hand. As he regarded it the emotion on his face was as much that of horror as aught else. A violin, an instrument of hell, here in his house—his house—a chosen minister of God! “What’s this?” he demanded at length. “Tell me—how come this thing here—in my house!” With one stride now—tearing away all the strings of the instrument with one grasp of his hand as he did so—he flung the offending violin full upon the flames in the fireplace, sweeping from him with an outward thrust of his great arm the tall figure of his son, who impulsively stepped forward to save his cherished instrument. As for the wrinkled old woman, she stood arrested in an attitude as near approaching fear as any she ever had evinced. She knew the fierce temper of both these men. But the young man, the equal in height of his parent, his superior in strength, stayed his own impulse and lowered the clenched hand he had raised. Filial obedience, after all, was strong in his heart