"Well, then, make it in company where it's drowned, and not alone," said Dick, grinning at him.
Next morning Paul did sing in company. The friends stayed at a house taken regularly for the period of the Convention by an elderly lady, and charitably filled with missionaries, ordinands, and young clergymen. She called them all her "boys," and they took it in turns to conduct family prayers. Moreover they went with her in a body wherever she went, and, truth to tell, she was rather proud of them. One carried her umbrella, another her Bible, a third her hymn-book, and so on. This year two of them were coloured. Thus went Paul and Dick to the big tent for the first morning's meeting.
It was packed with several thousand people drawn from a large variety of Protestant denominations, and the speakers were a Church of England bishop, a Baptist layman, and a Methodist missionary. An Adventist led in prayer, or at least Paul gathered that he was an Adventist from the intimate information he volunteered in the course of it, as to the details and date of the Second Coming of Christ. The vast congregation adopted many attitudes for prayer, but, chiefly, that of the half-bend; the chairman announced that he trusted the utmost unity and harmony would prevail throughout the several meetings; it was understood that the subject of the Sacraments and such-like controversies was to be avoided; and a motto in red and white burgeoned immense over the platform: "ALL ONE in Christ Jesus."
Throughout the week, Paul followed the usual course of a member of the Convention. He bought a new hymn-book of "The Hymns of Consecration and Faith," and a new Bible, a "Baxter," whose leaves were also neatly cut away in index form to facilitate the finding of the more minor Minor Prophets. He also bought a small text framed in straws for his mother, but, the exultation of the moment which had prompted the purchase having worked off, gave it away next day. He went to Friar's Crag by moonlight, and sang (in company) "There'll be no shadows," and "When the mists have rolled away." On the Sunday he went to outdoor meetings. There was an official Convention open-air, but the market-place was quite full of other open-airs, conducted by people whose ideas were not sufficiently expressed in the central one; and there was also to be seen a somewhat dirty, very ragged and unkempt prophet who had come all the way from the South on foot to denounce modern Christianity in the cause of Humanitarian Deism, and whose rabid sincerity attracted Paul. Finally he went (out of curiosity) to a meeting for men only addressed by a prominent evangelical lady whose subject was "The Personal Devil," and to a series of meetings in which a new baptism of the Spirit was being taught, the idea of the pastor who conducted them being that if one only claimed the promise, one would become full—the emphasis lay there—full of the Holy Spirit. These meetings continued sometimes until midnight and were occasionally noteworthy for the Gift of Tongues. But as there were not found any who could interpret, the authorities, remembering St. Paul, rather cold-shouldered them.
Two days before the friends were to leave, as they were coming from a service in the tent, they ran straight into Edith Thornton. Paul gave a shout of surprise and ran forward eagerly. "You here!" he exclaimed.
She turned, and he saw that her sister Maud was with her.
"Oh, Mr. Kestern," cried the elder girl, "we wondered if we should see you! We heard that you were coming on to Keswick after Port o' Man, but it was only just the other day that we got the chance of coming ourselves."
"But how topping to see you," said Paul, delighted, shaking hands. "I say, do let me introduce my friend. Mr. Hartley; Miss Thornton, Miss Edith Thornton. Where are you staying?"
"At 'The Pines.'"
"I know—the Y.W.C.A. house. When did you arrive?"