'That's it: they walk hand in hand, and you never know one till you've known the other, just as you never know what health is till you've had to go without it. Do you see what I'm doing here? I'm a charcoal-burner by trade, but by rights I ought to have been a wood-carver. There's few men can do more with a knife and a bit of wood than I can. All them as knows me knows it. That's a cross I'm carving. My daughter's turned religious, and she's a fancy that I should cut her a cross to hang in her room, so that, as she says, she can always think of Christ crucified. To me that's a queer start. I always think of Him as Christ crowned.'
'He is crowned.'
'Of course He is. As I put it, what He done earned Him the V.C. It's with that cross upon His breast I like to think of Him. In what He done I can't see what people see to groan about. It was something to glory in, to be proud of.'
'He was crucified by those to whom He came.'
'There is that. They must have been a silly lot, them Jews. They didn't know what they was doing of.'
'Which man knows what he does, or will let God know, either?'
'It's a sure and certain thing that some of us ain't over and above wise. There do be a good many fools about. I mind that I said to my daughter a good score times: "Don't you have that Jim Bates." But she would. Now he's took himself off and she's took to religion. It's a true fact she didn't know what she was doing of when she had him.'
'Did Jim Bates know what he was doing?'
'I shouldn't be surprised but what he didn't. He never did know much, did Jim. It isn't everyone as can live with my daughter, as he had ought to have known. She's kept house for me these twelve year, so I do know. She always were a contrary piece, she were.'
'The world is full of discords, but He who plays upon it tunes one note after another. In the end it will be all in tune.'