"Oh, nonsense, Mrs. Prency!" said the cobbler, dropping the shoe and looking up incredulously. "He's got a thousand times as much head-piece as I have, an' if he can't learn what he wants to from other people there ain't the slightest likelihood of my ever learnin' him anythin'."
"Sam," said Mrs. Prency, earnestly, "in the book that you have been reading so industriously, from which you have learned so much, and from which I hope you will continue to learn a great deal, don't you remember something that is said about the Lord having selected the feeble ones of this world to confound the wise?"
Sam looked down meditatively at the dropped shoe, and replied in a moment,—
"Well, now you speak of it, ma'am, I think I do."
"You certainly will believe that as much as everything else you have read there?"
"Why, of course; I'll have to."
"Very well, then; apply it to yourself, and try to be patient the next time that young man comes to annoy you."
Sam rested his elbows on his knees and dropped the shoe again for a moment, and at last, resuming his work, said,—
"Well, I'll take your word for it, ma'am: you know a good deal more about such things than I do."
Gradually the cobbler's face began to contract. His needle and thread moved more and more rapidly through the buttons and the leather. At last he laid the shoe aside with an air of desperation, looked up defiantly, and said,—