"That's good. I own up I like to hear you say it. And I am glad there
are some things I do like about this new place of mine. Because--well,
because there's likely to be others that I shan't like at all."

On Friday evening the minister conducted his first prayer meeting.
Before it, and afterwards, he heard a good deal concerning the
Come-Outers. He learned that Captain Eben Hammond had preached against
him in the chapel on Sunday. Most of his own parishioners seemed to
think it a good joke.

"Stir 'em up, Mr. Ellery," counseled Lavinia Pepper. "Stir 'em up! Don't
be afraid to answer em from the pulpit and set 'em where they belong.
Ignorant, bigoted things!"

Others gave similar counsel. The result was that the young man became
still more interested in these people who seemed to hate him and all he
stood for so profoundly. He wished he might hear their side of the case
and judge it for himself. It may as well be acknowledged now that John
Ellery had a habit of wishing to judge for himself. This is not always a
politic habit in a country minister.

The sun of the following Thursday morning rose behind a curtain of fog
as dense as that of the day upon which Ellery arrived. A flat calm in
the forenoon, the wind changed about three o'clock and, beginning with
a sharp and sudden squall from the northwest, blew hard and steady. Yet
the fog still cloaked everything and refused to be blown away.

"There's rain astern," observed Captain Zeb, with the air of authority
which belongs to seafaring men when speaking of the weather. "We'll get
a hard, driving rain afore mornin', you see. Then, if she still holds