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He was beginning to feel that morbid fascination that sometimes seizes upon those who stand on great heights, an overwhelming impulse to plunge downward. His only salvation was to look up. He would look up to the sky. And what were these words he was beginning to faintly remember? Had not the circuit-rider said in his last sermon that not even a sparrow falls to the ground unmarked of God?
And," continued the young man, with one mighty pull at the knot, "he's got to be a circuit-rider, and I'm going to make one of him. Do you hear that, young man? I'm the man that's setting you free and giving you to your father!" "You can make anything you please out of me," said the prisoner. "Only hurry!"
The quarrel between the two men was becoming hot and bitter. One might have expected nothing better from Jacob Smith, for when a man is drunk, the human element drops like a husk, and only the unreasoning brute is left. But had John Grow forgotten all the good words he had heard to-day from the circuit-rider? Had they melted into thin air during his long ride from the church?
How he was regarded by the mother, Clayton had learned long ago, when, in answer to one of his questions, she had said, with a look at Easter, that " Raines was the likeliest young feller in them mountains "; that "he knew morn'n anybody round thar"; that " he had spent a year in the settlemints, was mighty religious, and would one day be a circuit-rider.
He also reared a son, who contrived somehow to have higher notions than his father. These notions of young Felix Kendrick were confirmed and enlarged by his marriage to the daughter of a Methodist circuit-rider.
There was a halloo at the gate. It was old Squire Middleton and the circuit-rider, and old Joel went toward them with a darkening face. "Why, hello, Chad," the Squire said. "You back again?" He turned to Joel. "Look hyeh, Joel. Thar hain't no use o' your buckin' agin yo' neighbors and harborin' a sheep-killin' dog."
A sudden figure started up with streaming white hair and patriarchal beard. "Will ye deny ez ye hev hed a sign from the heavens, Jubal Kennedy?" the old circuit-rider straitly demanded. "How could ye hev strengthened yer heart fur sech a deed onless the grace o' God prevailed mightily within ye? Inasmuch as ye hev done it unto one o' the least o' these my brethern, ye hev done it unto me."
The old man started from his bed, shaded his eyes, and exclaimed: "Stevie!" The father and son embraced, seeing which the sheriff proved that even sheriffs are human by snatching the circuit-rider in his arms and giving him a mighty hug. The father recovered and lived happily.
Genevieve; and a sorry spectacle was he to Father Olivier when a Protestant circuit-rider pointed him out. The itinerant had come to preach at early candle-lighting to the crowd of sinners which this occasion drew to Kaskaskia. There was a flourishing chapel where this good preacher was esteemed, and his infrequent messages were gladly accepted.
"I didn't know you were such a fool, Jack Carter," interrupted his sweetheart, with a toss of her pretty head; "that settles it!" and she slammed the door in his face. Matters were at such a pass finally that Mr. Skaggs, the circuit-rider, when he came to preach, the third Sunday in the month, at Ebenezer Church, deemed it his duty to remonstrate and pray with Sister Cullum at her own house.
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