paints it up to look like a
heaven of peace and purity and sanctified spirits. Snowfall like this
would of made Lot turn the angel out-of-doors and say that the old home
was good enough for him. Gomorrah would of looked like a Puritan
village--though I'll bet my last dollar that there was a lot, and a
WHOLE lot, that's never been told about Puritan villages. A lot that--"

"WHAT never was?" interrupted Mr. Peter Bradbury, whose granddaughter
had lately announced her discovery that the Bradburys were descended
from Miles Standish. "What wasn't told about Puritan villages?"

"Can't you wait?" Mr. Arp's accents were those of pain. "Haven't I got
ANY right to present my side of the case? Ain't we restrained enough
to allow of free speech here? How can we ever git anywhere in an
argument like this, unless we let one man talk at a time? How--"

"Go on with your statement," said Uncle Joe Davey, impatiently.

Mr. Arp's grievance was increased. "Now listen to YOU! How many more
interruptions are comin'? I'll listen to the other side, but I've got
to state mine first, haven't I? If I don't make my point clear, what's
the use of the argument? Argumentation is only the comparison of two
sides of a question, and you have to see what the first side IS before
you can compare it with the other one, don't you? Are you all agreed
to that?"

"Yes, yes," said the Colonel. "Go ahead. We won't interrupt until
you're through."

"Very well," resumed Mr. Arp, with a fleeting expression of
satisfaction, "as I said before, I wish to--as I said--" He paused, in
some confusion. "As I said, argumentation is--that is, I say--" He
stopped again, utterly at sea, having talked himself so far out of his
course that he was unable to recall either his sailing port or his
destination. Finally he said, feebly, to save the confession, "Well,
go on with your side of it."

This generosity was for a moment disconcerting; however, the quietest
of the party took up the opposition--Roger Tabor, a very thin, old man
with a clean-shaven face, almost as white as his hair, and melancholy,
gentle, gray eyes, very unlike those of his brother Jonas, which were
dark and sharp and button-bright. (It was to Roger's son that Jonas
had so magnificently sold the hardware business.) Roger was known in
Canaan as "the artist"; there had never been another of his profession
in the place, and the town knew not the word "painter," except in
application to