A general groan arose.
"Yes, yes," said the Sheriff. "Everything has voted that could stand on its hind legs, and the hogs are too many for us. It's a bad beat—bad beat."
That night when little Dolly came in to family prayers, she looked around wondering. Her father and mother looked stricken and overcome. There was the sort of heaviness in the air that even a child can feel when deep emotions are aroused. The boys, who knew only in a general way that their father's side had been beaten, looked a little scared at his dejected face.
"Father, what makes you feel so bad?" said Will, with that surprised wonder with which children approach emotions they cannot understand.
"I feel for the Church of God, my child," he said, and then he sung for the evening psalm:
I love thy kingdom, Lord,
The house of thine abode;
The Church our dear Redeemer saved
With his own precious blood.
For her my tears shall fall,