[G] Hebrews ix. 22.
[H] Acts iv. 12.
[I] 1 John ii. 7.
XXI.
An Old Letter.
"Well, Bell, my dear," said the carpenter, as his wife returned from afternoon service, "tell me what you've heard to-day, and I'll tell you what I've heard."
"Mr. Leyton preached as usual," replied Mrs. Stone, as she unloosed the red strings of her bonnet. "I think he's getting less shy, and more earnest. His text was, 'If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.'"
"Why, that would ha' done for the text of the sermon I've had all to myself," said Ben Stone.
"Sermon,—what do you mean?" asked his wife, pausing in the act of taking off her shawl.
"There's Ned Franks been here, and—talk of earnestness—he's earnest with a vengeance! There was nothing would content him but that I should own myself to be a downright, miserable sinner; and he threw out something more than a hint, that I'm like to come to the same end as those who wouldn't go into the ark, and so were drowned in the flood."