hear his voice once a week would be
reason enough for building churches and pulpits. The Master stopped all
at once, and after about half a minute laughed his pleasant laugh.

What is it?--I asked him.

I was thinking of the great coach and team that is carrying us fast
enough, I don't know but too fast, somewhere or other. The D. D.'s used
to be the leaders, but now they are the wheel-horses. It's pretty hard
to tell how much they pull, but we know they can hold back like the----

--When we're going down hill,--I said, as neatly as if I had been a
High-Church curate trained to snap at the last word of the response, so
that you couldn't wedge in the tail of a comma between the end of the
congregation's closing syllable and the beginning of the next petition.
They do it well, but it always spoils my devotion. To save my life, I
can't help watching them, as I watch to see a duck dive at the flash of a
gun, and that is not what I go to church for. It is a juggler's trick,
and there is no more religion in it than in catching a ball on the fly.

I was looking at our Scheherezade the other day, and thinking what a pity
it was that she had never had fair play in the world. I wish I knew more
of her history. There is one way of learning it,--making love to her. I
wonder whether she would let me and like it. It is an absurd thing, and
I ought not to confess, but I tell you and you only, Beloved, my heart
gave a perceptible jump when it heard the whisper of that possibility
overhead! Every day has its ebb and flow, but such a thought as that is
like one of those tidal waves they talk about, that rolls in like a great
wall and overtops and drowns out all your landmarks, and you, too, if you
don't mind what you are about and stand ready to run or climb or swim.
Not quite so bad as that, though, this time. I take an interest in our
Scheherezade. I am glad she did n't smile on the pipe and the
Bohemian-looking fellow that finds the best part of his life in sucking
at it. A fine thing, isn't it; for a young woman to marry a man who will
hold her

"Something better than his dog, a little dearer than his horse,"

but not quite so good as his meerschaum? It is n't for me to throw
stones, though, who have been a Nicotian a good deal more than half my
days. Cigar-stump out now, and consequently have become very bitter on
more persevering sinners. I say I take an interest in our Scheherezade,
but I rather think it is