"We have the Rev. Mr. Ringfield of St. Ignace with us this afternoon, and I have no doubt that he is already as anxious as the rest of you for a share of the good things we see here before us, so I am going to ask him to say—ah—Grace, then we can fall to. Mr. Ringfield, will you be kind enough to ask the blessing?"
There was a pause, not because Ringfield was unready on these occasions nor because of any fear lest his special kind of intercessory gastronomic prayer might fail to carry conviction with it, but on account of the intrusion of two belated arrivals down by the door. He could not distinguish very clearly, but there seemed to be some one either invalided or very young in a basket-chair, wheeled in by a young woman of twenty-two or twenty-three, who entering brusquely, on a run, and laughing, was silenced, and the chair and its occupant pushed back against the wall. This slight but untimely interruption over, Ringfield gazed solemnly around—it was already growing a little dim in the barn—and spoke as follows, with head thrown back, and closed eyes:—
"O Lord, the giver of all good things, who sendest seed-time and harvest, rain and sun on the fruits of the earth and crownest the year with fatness, look down on us at this time and bless us." At this point the Anglicans present sat down under the impression that the "grace" was over. They rose again in confusion as Ringfield continued:—
"We thank Thee for these, Thy temporal blessings vouchsafed unto us as a people. We have Thy pledge in the book of Thy Holy Word, that while the earth remaineth, seed-time and harvest shall not fail. We thank Thee for the fields white with harvest. We thank Thee for our great and beautiful country; for its beneficent laws, its opportunities, its great and unequalled privileges, and we pray for our rulers, for all in authority, for all engaged in the ministry of whatever denomination, for the Queen and the Royal Family. We pray for him whose duty it is to go in and out before this assembly; grant him wisdom and spiritual strength; bless also the partner of his life work, and may their united labours prevail and resound to Thy glory and the honour of Thy name, and while we remember at this time to thank Thee with full hearts for these temporal gifts, let us be swift to remember also Thy choicer, greater, holier gift of Free Salvation; Mercy, Pardon, Peace, and glorious relief from sin and its thraldom—these may be ours for the asking. O Lord, if any sinner lurk among us, if any poor sinner be at this board to-night, search him, O Lord, and purge his mortal body, try it with Thy true refiner's fire. As our snows are pure, so let us be pure. As our waters are deep yet clear, let our minds be clear of evil, and rid of all offence; and for all who by reason of sin, or pain, or sickness, or any other infirmity either of body or of mind cannot be with us at this time, we pray that Thou wilt comfort, uplift, forgive and relieve them. All—for Christ's sake—Amen."
CHAPTER XI
"ANGEEL!"
"Like a sheep enthralled
'Mid thorns and brambles."
On the conclusion of this address, which was Ringfield's idea of a "grace" and which was modelled on the Methodist formula customary on such occasions, the people, whose appetites had been held over-long in check, took their seats with expressions of relief and in some cases with audible grunts and whispers of annoyance. The truth was, Ringfield had exhibited a want of tact in expatiating in an eloquent prayer on things better left alone, from the village point of view. It was bad enough to occupy so much time when already it was darkening and soon the lamps would have to be lighted; it was bad enough to pray in public for the rector and his wife; it was entirely inexcusable to hint at the presence of a sinner in their midst, at the very board now covered with the home-made dainties cooked and sent in by the ladies of Hawthorne. In itself perhaps the prayer, though trite and redundant (Ringfield was not in his best vein, no longer single-minded), was eloquent and pointed, and the reference to the snows and rivers of the country extremely poetic and suggestive, yet it was not in accordance with the best taste, although prompted by the best feeling. The rector and his wife, ignoring their own sentiments, made haste to smooth away the little difficulty that had thus unexpectedly arisen, and in a few minutes all was in a pleasant clatter and babble with the pouring of tea, cutting of huge three-decker cakes, and passing of large, solid plates holding pyramids of equally large and solid sandwiches. Ringfield, devoting himself to the English visitors and the person in black silk, who was the widow of a deceased lumber king correctly reputed to have left an enormous fortune, was by the nature of things the last to perceive that he had wounded the delicate sensibilities of the company, and therefore he made a good meal, unconscious of the comments lower down his table and also around the rector.
"It's always the way with them Methodists," said one speaker in a careful undertone, a venerable body of fifty or so, with four teeth left in his head, bent, bald and wrinkled. "They pride themselves on what they call 'extem-pore' speaking." He gave the word only three syllables of course. "Why, it's mostly out of the Prayer Book anyway! He said 'any other infirmity,' did you notice? And we say, 'any other adversity,' don't we? Well, where's the difference?"
"The tairms are not precisely in the nature of synonyms," remarked the schoolmaster, a Scotchman of sandy and freckled appearance, who was cutting a sandwich into small pieces with his penknife and then frugally conveying them to his mouth with the aid of the same useful implement. "But in a sairtain sense ye can call them synonyms."