wonder Mr. Abel
didn't interfere." "That there poem o' Mrs. Abel's was a'most too much
for me. But to think o' _him_ gettin' up like that! It must be Satan
that's got into him." "It's a awful thing to 'ave a man like that livin'
in the next cottage to your own. I'll be frightened out o' my wits when
my master's not at 'ome." "They ought to _do_ something to 'im--I've
said so many a time."

And then the voice of Snarley's wife as she chafed her husband's hands:
"No, sir, don't you believe 'em when they say he's drunk. He's only had
two glasses of cider and half a glass o' beer. You can see the other
half in his glass now. I counted 'em myself. And it takes quarts to make
'im tipsy. It's a sort of trance, sir, as he's had. I've knowed him like
this two or three times before. He was _just_ like it after he'd been to
hear Sir Robert Ball on the stars, sir--worse, if anythin'. He's gettin'
better now; but I'm afraid he'll be terrible upset."

Snarley had opened his eyes, and was looking vacantly and sleepily round
him. "I'll go home," was all he said. He got up and walked rather
shakily, but without assistance, out of the barn.

A few minutes later Mrs. Abel came up to me. "We were fools five months
ago," she said; "but what are we now?"

"Criminals, most likely," I replied.

"And if you do it again, you'll be murderers," said Mr. Abel, in a tone
of severity.

A MIRACLE

I

In early life Chandrapal had been engaged in the practice of the law,
and had held a position of some honour under the Crown. But as the years
wore on the ties which bound him to the world of sense were severed one
by one, and he was now released. By the study of the Vedanta, by ascetic
discipline, and by the daily practice of meditation undertaken at
regular hours, he had attained the Great Peace; and those who knew the
signs of such attainment reverenced him as a holy man. His influence was
great, his fidelity was unquestioned, and his fame as a teacher and sage
had been carried far beyond his native land.

Chandrapal was versed in the lore of the West. He had studied the
history, the politics, the literature and philosophy of the great
nations, and could quote their poets and their sages with copiousness
and aptitude. He had written a commentary on _Faust_. He also read, and
sometimes expounded, the New Testament; and he held the Christian Gospel
in high esteem.

Among the philosophers of the West it was Spinoza to whom he gave th