comfortable kind of thing to believe in when thar's only one Justice of
the Peace an' he bed-ridden since Christmas. When you ax me to pin my
faith on any p'int, be it for this world or the next, my first question
consarnin' it is whether that particular p'int happens to be pleasant.
'Tis that little small argyment of mine that has confounded Mr. Mullen
more than once, when he meets me on equal ground outside the pulpit.
'Mebbe 'tis an' mebbe 'tisn't,' as I remarked sociably to him about the
matter of eternal damnation, 'but you can't deny, can you, suh, bein'
outside the pulpit an' bound to speak the truth like the rest of us,
that you sleep a long sight easier in yo' bed when you say to yo'self
that mebbe 'tisn't?'"

"You see pa's old, an' he won't harbour any belief at his time of
life that don't let him rest comfortable," remarked young Adam, in an
apologetic aside. "It's that weakness of his that keeps him from bein' a
thorough goin' good Christian."

"That strange young clergyman has stirred us all up about the
doctrines," said Solomon Hatch. "He's opened Old Church agin, an' he
works terrible hard to make us feel that we'd rather be sprinkled on the
head than go under all over. A nice-mannered man he is, with a pretty
face, an' some folks hold it to be a pity that we can't change our ideas
about baptism and become Episcopals in our hearts, jest to oblige him.
The women have, mostly, bein' an accommodatin' sex in the main, with the
exception of Mrs. Mallory, the blacksmith's mother, who declars she'd
rather give up eternal damnation any day than immersion."

"I ain't goin' so fur as that," rejoined old Adam, "an' mo'over, when
it comes to the p'int, I've never found any uncommon comfort in either
conviction in time of trouble. I go to Mr. Mullen's church regular every