ientiously and skillfully performed, were very
pessimistic as to any satisfactory result ever being achieved.

"The angle of the roof--what they call the 'pitch'--they say that that's
always been wrong," announced the secretary of the Dorcas in a business
session.

"Is it that kind of pitch that the Bible says you can't touch without
being defiled? If not, I vote that we unshingle the roof and alter the
pitch!" This proposal came from a sister named Maria Sharp, who had
valiantly offered the year before to move the smoky chimney with her own
hands, if the "menfolks" would n't.

But though the incendiary suggestion of altering the pitch was received
with applause at the moment, subsequent study of the situation proved
that such a proceeding was entirely beyond the modest means of the
society. Then there arose an ingenious and militant carpenter in
a neighboring village, who asserted that he would shingle the
meeting-house roof for such and such a sum, and agree to drink every
drop of water that would leak in afterward. This was felt by all parties
to be a promise attended by extraordinary risks, but it was accepted
nevertheless, Miss Lobelia Brewster remarking that the rash carpenter,
being already married, could not marry a Dorcas anyway, and even if he
died, he was not a resident of Edgewood, and therefore could be more
easily spared, and that it would be rather exciting, just for a change,
to see a man drink himself to death with rain-water. The expected
tragedy never occurred, however, and the inspired shingler fulfilled
his promise to the letter, so that before many months the Dorcas
Society proceeded, with incredible exertion, to earn more money, and the
interior of the church was neatly painted and made as fresh as a rose.
With no smoke, no rain, no snow nor melting ice to defile it, the good
old landmark that had been pointing its finger Heavenward for over a
century would now be clean and fragrant for years to come, and the weary
sisters leaned back in their respective rocking-chairs and drew deep
breaths of satisfaction.

These breaths continued to be drawn throughout an unusually arduous
haying season; until, in fact, a visitor from a neighboring city was
heard to remark that the Tory Hill Meeting-House would be one of the
best preserved and pleasantest churches in the whole State of Maine, if
only it were suitably carpeted.

This thought had secretly occurred to many a Dorcas in her hours
of pie-making,