"One o'clock," observed President Lottson, and the session closed.
"Now wasn't that just like Alleman?" asked Squire Woodhouse of Mr. Jodderel. "Beautiful idea—perfectly heavenly; but nothing in it that a man can take hold of without running the risk of losing some of his property. He'd better not talk that way before the city booksellers, if he don't want to have to pay cash for every bill of books he buys."
And Captain Maile walked out singing to himself, but in a tone loud enough to be offensive, the old song beginning,
"Whip the devil around the stump."
CHAPTER VI. BUILDER STOTT SAVES THE FAITH.
The Scripture Club proceeded promptly to work on the ensuing Sunday. Too many men had brought to the previous meeting ideas which they could not find time to express; so on the second Sunday in which the nature and reward of the meek were considered, the members who had not expressed their views, with several who had, made haste to occupy front seats, so as to be sure of opportunities to speak.
Among these was Squire Woodhouse. He had several times ruined the regularity of the proceedings of other meetings, but still he was unsatisfied. He had not expressed his own views in full, partly because he had not been asked to do so, but principally because he had had no settled views to express. Now, however, the case was different. He had leisurely pondered over everything that he had heard in the class, he had admired each original idea with the true American heartiness toward new notions, he had endeavored to reconcile them with his unformulated but still very positive preconceived religious opinions, and his honesty had finally triumphed over his theology and his sophistry. When he came to church, therefore, he neglected his own pew and took the front seat and the extreme right end thereof, so when Deacon Bates opened the exercises of the class immediately after service, it was impossible not to call upon Squire Woodhouse first of all. The Squire cleared his throat, waved his head about in a dissatisfied manner, and finally said:
"This thing of being meek grows pretty big when you think about it for a little while, and the worst of it is that everything else in the chapter is only a chip out of the same block. All of it—being meek and everything else—seems to come in the end to just this: you mustn't be like folks in general, particularly like business men. I confess that I don't know exactly how to do it all, but it seems to me it must be done by any one who believes that Jesus Christ had the right to say all that he did. I don't know how to be meek about the way I was swindled—treated, I mean—by the insurance companies when my barn burned down——"