ter she added that he was a
book agent. She may have done this as an explanation, for Kilo, and even
Kilo's minister, craved details, or she may have done it to give fair
warning to all concerned. The effect was instantaneous, and the smiles
of welcome faded. The minister shook hands gravely, and the ladies who
had run forward with shoe bags and tidies turned and walked coldly away.

Eliph' Hewlitt smiled.

"Funny how that name makes a man unpopular, ain't it?" he said,
addressing the minister. "But I ain't going to talk books in Kilo. The
landlord down at the hotel told me it was a bad time, so I'm going to
pass it by. Well, I guess we deserve all the blame we get. Some of us do
pester the life out of people--don't know when to stop. Now, when I see
a man don't want my book, or when I see a town ain't ready for it, I
drop books and go off, and leave them alone. I could have stayed down
there at the hotel and bothered the landlord into taking my book. He'd
have too it, because everybody that sees this book, and understands it,
does take it; but I said, 'Why bullyrag the life out of the poor man
when there's a missionary sale going on in town, and he don't want a
book, and I do want to see the sale? I am interested in missions."

"It's a great field," said the minister, with a sigh of relief; for,
as the literary head of Kilo, he was always the first and most strongly
contested goal of the book agents. The subscription list that did not
bear his name at the head bore few others, and he appreciated the self
denial of Eliph' Hewlitt in passing such a good opportunity to talk
business.

"Are you deeply interested in the field?" he inquired graciously.

"Well, you se," said Eliph' Hewlitt, "I was cast away on one of those
desert islands myself once, and I know what those poor heathen must
suffer for lack of churches and civilization, and good books to read. I
can feel for them."

Someone pushed a chair gently against Eliph's legs, in gentle invitation
for him to be seated, and he took the chair, and laid his package across
his knees. Those who had drawn away from him now gathered closer, and
all gazed at him with interest. Miss Sally alone remained at the other
end of the room.

"Well, I never expected to live to see a man that had been shipwrecked,"
said Mrs. Weaver, "let alone shipwrecked on a desert island--an' a book
agent at that!"

Eliph' smiled indulgently.

"I wasn't a book agent in them days," he said; "i