ave little more to say, except, that what is generally the
experience of your countrymen will probably be yours in Merleville. You
have some disappointing discoveries to make among us, you who are an
earnest man and a thinker."

"I think a want of earnestness can hardly be called a sin of your
countrymen," said the minister.

"Earnestness!" said Mr Greenleaf. "No, we are earnest enough here in
Merleville. But the most of even the good men among us seem earnest,
only in the pursuit of that, in comparison to which my political
aspirations seem lofty and praiseworthy. It is wealth they seek. Not
that wealth which will result in magnificent expenditure, and which, in
a certain sense, may have a charm for even high-minded men, but
money-making in its meanest form--the scraping together of copper coins
for their own sakes. At least one might think so, for any good they
ever seem to get of it."

"You are severe," said the minister, quietly.

"Not too severe. This seems to be the aim of all of us, whether we are
willing to acknowledge it or not. And such a grovelling end will
naturally make a man unscrupulous as to the means to attain it. There
are not many men among us here--I don't know more than two or three--who
would not be surprised if you told them, being out of the pulpit, that
they had not a perfect right to make the very most out of their
friends--even by shaving closely in matters of business."

"And yet you say their standard is a high one?"

"High or not, the religious people among us don't seem to doubt their
own Christianity on account of these things. And what is more, they
don't seem to lose faith in each other. But how it will all seem to you
is another matter."

"How does it seem to you?"

"Oh, I am but a spectator. Being not one of the initiated, I am not
supposed to understand the change they profess to have undergone; and
so, instead of being in doubt about particular cases, I am disposed to
think little of the whole matter. With you it is different."

"Yes, with me it is indeed different," said the minister, gravely--so
gravely, that Mr Greenleaf almost regretted having spoken so freely,
and when he spoke again it was to change the subject.

"It must have required a great wrench to break away from your people and
country and old associations," said he, in a little. Mr Elliott
started,--

"No, the wrench came before. It would have cost me more to stay and
grow old in my own lan