ed in a
frightened whine.

The tall youth staggered to his feet. "If you don't hold your mouths
I'll turn you all out o' here, the whole lot of you," he cried with many
oaths. "G'wan, minister... don't let 'em faze you...."

"Now is Christ risen from the dead and become the first-fruits of them
that slept.... Behold, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but
we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at
the last trump.... For this corruptible must put on incorruption and this
mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruption shall have put
on incorruption, and when this mortal shall have put on immortality,
then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is
swallowed up in Victory...."

One by one the mighty words fell on Charity's bowed head, soothing
the horror, subduing the tumult, mastering her as they mastered the
drink-dazed creatures at her back. Mr. Miles read to the last word, and
then closed the book.

"Is the grave ready?" he asked.

Liff Hyatt, who had come in while he was reading, nodded a "Yes," and
pushed forward to the side of the mattress. The young man on the bench
who seemed to assert some sort of right of kinship with the dead woman,
got to his feet again, and the proprietor of the stove joined him.
Between them they raised up the mattress; but their movements were
unsteady, and the coat slipped to the floor, revealing the poor body in
its helpless misery. Charity, picking up the coat, covered her mother
once more. Liff had brought a lantern, and the old woman who had already
spoken took it up, and opened the door to let the little procession
pass out. The wind had dropped, and the night was very dark and bitterly
cold. The old woman walked ahead, the lantern shaking in her hand and
spreading out before her a pale patch of dead grass and coarse-leaved
weeds enclosed in an immensity of blackness.

Mr. Miles took Charity by the arm, and side by side they walked behind
the mattress. At length the old woman with the lantern stopped, and
Charity saw the light fall on the stooping shoulders of the bearers and
on a ridge of upheaved earth over which they were bending. Mr. Miles
released her arm and approached the hollow on the other side of the
ridge; and while the men stooped down, lowering the mattress into the
grave, he began to speak again.

"Man that is born of woman hath but a short time to live and is full
of misery.... He cometh up and is