wind brings it word from heaven, save some venerable few who
rose erect (as was their fathers' way), standing like sentinel oaks amid
lesser trees, they also bending with an obeisance prompted from within.
It seemed not hard to lead these earnest hearts in prayer--they seemed
the rather to lead my soul as by a more familiar path; or, to state the
truth more utterly, their devoutness seemed to bear me on, as the deep
ocean bears itself and its every burden towards the shore.

This intensity of worship pervaded its every act. They joined in the
reading of the Word as those who must both hear and see it for
themselves, their books opening and closing in unison with the larger
one which decked their pulpit like a crown.

Even when the collection was taken up they maintained their loftiness of
poise. It had been often told me that Scotch folk contribute to an
offering with the same heroism wherewith their ancestors opened their
unshrinking veins, doling forth their money, like their blood, with a
martyr's air. But although I remarked that some Scottish eyes followed
their departing coins with glances of parental tenderness, there was yet
a solemn stateliness about the operation which greatly won me, even
those who dedicated the homeliest copper doing it unabashedly, as if to
the Lord, and not unto men.

We closed with the penitential psalm which Mr. Blake had asked, and its
great words seemed charged with the strong reality of men who believed
in sin with the same old-fashioned earnestness as marked their faith in
God, the two answering the one to the other as deep calleth unto deep,
eternally harmonious as they are.

The congregation swayed slowly down the aisle, Scottishly cold and
still, like the processional of the ice in the spring-time. They
reminded me of noble bergs drifting through the Straits of Belle Isle.
It was a Presbyterian flood, and every man a floe. But I suspected
mightily that they were nevertheless the product of the spring, and
somehow felt that they dwelt near the confines of the summer. The fire
which warmed their hearts had touched my own, and in that very moment
wherein they turned their backs upon me, I pursued them with
surrendering tenderness, and coveted for my own the rugged faithfulness
which hath now enriched these many golden years.

One or two turned to glance at me, but when their gaze met mine they
despatched their eyes on some impartial quest, as if caressing their
noble church or