“Come, George,” said the good Deacon, in an appealing tone, “remember the apostle says, ‘Suffer the word of exhortation.’”
“’Xcuse me, Deac’n, but one sufferin’ at a time; I ain’t through sufferin’ at bein’ beaten down yet. How about deac’ns not being ‘given to filthy lucre?’”
The good Deacon was pained, and he was almost out of patience with the apostle for writing things which came so handy to the lips of the unregenerate. He commenced an industrious search for a text which should completely annihilate the impious carpenter, when that individual interrupted him with:
“Out with it, Deac’n—ye had a meetin’ las’ night to see what was to be done with the impenitent. I was there—that is, I sot on a stool jest outside the door, an’ I heerd all ’twas said. Ye didn’t agree on nothin’—mebbe ye’v fixed it up sence. Any how, ye’v sot me down fur one of the impenitent, an’ yer goin’ fur me. Well——”
“Go on nailin’,” interrupted the economical Deacon, a little testily; “the noise don’t disturb me; I can hear ye.”
“Well, what way am I so much wickeder ’n you be—you an’ t’other folks at the meetin’-house?” asked Hay.
“George, I never saw ye in God’s house in my life,” replied the Deacon.
“Well, s’pose ye hevn’t—is God so small He can’t be nowheres ‘xcept in your little meetin’-house? How about His seein’ folks in their closets?”
“George,” said the Deacon, “ef yer a prayin’ man, why don’t ye jine yerself unto the Lord’s people?”
“Why? ’Cos the Lord’s people, as you call ’em, don’t want me. S’pose I was to come to the meetin’-house in these clothes—the only ones I’ve got—d’ye s’pose any of the Lord’s people ’d open a pew-door to me? An’ s’pose my wife an’ children, dressed no better ’n I be, but as good ’s I can afford, was with me, how d’ye s’pose I’d feel?”