“On the job,” laughed one of the company.
“For good and all,” Higgins agreed. “It’s funny about life,” he added, gravely. “I’m a great big wilful fellow, naturally evil, I suppose; but it seems to me that all my lifelong the Lord has just led me by the hand as if I were nothing but a little child. And I didn’t know what was happening to me! Now isn’t that funny? Isn’t the whole thing funny?”
XI
FIST-PLAY
It used sometimes to be difficult for Higgins to get a hearing in the camps; this was before he had fought and preached his way completely into the trust of the lumber-jacks. There was always a warm welcome for him in the bunk-houses, to be sure, and for the most part a large eagerness for the distraction of his discourses after supper; but here and there in the beginning he encountered an obstreperous fellow (and does to this day) who interrupted for the fun of the thing. It is related that upon one occasion a big Frenchman began to grind his axe of a Sunday evening precisely as Higgins began to preach.
“Some of the boys here,” Higgins drawled, “want to hear me preach, and if the boys would just grind their axes some other time I’d be much obliged.”
The grinding continued.
“I say,” Higgins proceeded, his voice rising a little, “that a good many of the boys have asked me to preach a little sermon to them; but I can’t preach while one of the boys grinds his axe.”
No impression was made.
“Now, boys,” Higgins went on, “most of you want to hear me preach, and I’m going to preach, all right; but I cant preach if anybody grinds an axe.”