t moment I was fully resolved neither should be, as soon as I
got into a situation to control the matter.

"In that I agree with you entirely, my child," resumed the clergyman;
"and were it not for this movement connected with the rents, and the
false principles that have been so boldly announced of late years, I
might have taken on myself the authority, as rector, to remove the
hatchments. Even according to the laws connected with the use of such
things, they should have been taken away a generation or two back. As to
the pew, it is a different matter. It is private property; was
constructed with the church, which was built itself by the joint
liberality of the Littlepages and mother Trinity; and it would be a most
ungracious act to undertake to destroy it under such circumstances, and
more especially in the absence of its owner."

"You agree, however, that it ought not to be there?" asked Seneca, with
exultation.

"I wish with all my heart it were not. I dislike every thing like
worldly distinction in the house of God; and heraldic emblems, in
particular, seem to me very much out of place where the cross is seen to
be in its proper place."

"Wa-all, now, Mr. Warren, I can't say I much fancy crosses about
churches either. What's the use in raising vain distinctions of any
sort. A church is but a house, after all, and ought so to be regarded."

"True," said Mary, firmly; "but the house of God."

"Yes, yes, we all know, Miss Mary, that you Episcopalians look more at
outward things, and more respect outward things, than most of the other
denominations of the country."

"Do you call leases 'outward things,' Mr. Newcome?" asked Mary, archly;
"and contracts, and bargains, and promises, and the rights of property,
and the obligation to 'do as you would be done by?'"

"Law! good folks," cried Opportunity, who had been all this time
tumbling over the trinkets, "I wish it was 'down with the rent' for
ever, with all my heart; and that not another word might ever be said on
the subject. Here is one of the prettiest pencils, Mary, I ever did see;
and its price is only four dollars. I wish, Sen, you'd let the rent
alone, and make me a present of this very pencil."

As this was an act of which Seneca had not the least intention of being
guilty, he merely shifted his hat from one side of his head to the
other, began to whistle, and then he coolly left the room. My uncle Ro
profited by the occasion to beg Miss Opportunity wou