and sat tranquilly until midnight over the pages of
the book with which he had prudently provided himself.

"Hope you slept well last night," said the old Deacon, when Mr. Clement
came down to breakfast the next morning.

"Very well, thank you,--that is, after I got to bed. But I sat up pretty
late reading my favorite Scott. I am apt to forget how the hours pass
when I have one of his books in my hand."

The worthy Deacon looked at Mr. Clement with a sudden accession of
interest.

"You couldn't find better reading, young man. Scott is _my_ favorite
author. A great man. I have got his likeness in a gilt frame hanging up
in the other room. I have read him all through three times."

The young man's countenance brightened. He had not expected to find so
much taste for elegant literature in an old village deacon.

"What are your favorites among his writings, Deacon? I suppose you have
your particular likings, as the rest of us have."

The Deacon was flattered by the question. "Well," he answered, "I can
hardly tell you. I like pretty much everything Scott ever wrote.
Sometimes I think it is one thing, and sometimes another. Great on
Paul's Epistles,--don't you think so?"

The honest fact was, that Clement remembered very little about "Paul's
Letters to his Kinsfolk,"--a book of Sir Walter's less famous than many
of his others; but he signified his polite assent to the Deacon's
statement, rather wondering at his choice of a favorite, and smiling at
his queer way of talking about the Letters as Epistles.

"I am afraid Scott is not so much read now-a-days as he once was, and as
he ought to be," said Mr. Clement. "Such character, such nature and so
much grace--"

"That's it,--that's it, young man," the Deacon broke in,--"Natur' and
Grace,--Natur' and Grace. Nobody ever knew better what those two words
meant than Scott did, and I'm very glad to see you've chosen such good
wholesome reading. You can't set up too late, young man, to read Scott.
If I had twenty children, they should all begin reading Scott as soon as
they were old enough to spell 'sin,'--and that's the first word my
little ones learned, next to 'pa' and 'ma.' Nothing like beginning the
lessons of life in good season."

"What a grim old satirist!" Clement said to himself. "I wonder if the
old man reads other novelists.--Do tell me, Deacon, if you have read
Thackeray's last story?"

"Thackery's story? Published by the American Tract Society?"

"Not exa