ourth-class Methodist effort," thought
the listener in the Lossing pew, stroking his fair mustache, "with
Episcopal decorations! That man used to be a Methodist minister, and
he was brought into the fold by a high-churchman. Poor fellow, the
Methodist church polity has a place for such fellows as he; but he is a
stray sheep with us. He doesn't half catch on to the motions; yet I'll
warrant he is proud of that sermon, and his wife thinks it one of the
great efforts of the century." Here Harry took a short rest from the
sermon, to contemplate the amazing moral phenomenon: how robust can be a
wife's faith in a commonplace husband!

"Now, this man," reflected Harry, growing interested in his own fancies,
"this man never can have LIVED! He doesn't know what it is to suffer, he
has only vegetated! Doubtless, in a prosaic way, he loves his wife
and children; but can a fellow who talks like him have any delicate
sympathies or any romance about him? He looks honest; I think he is a
right good fellow and works like a soldier; but to be so stupid as he
is, ought to HURT!"

Harry felt a whimsical moving of sympathy towards the preacher. He
wondered why he continually made gestures with the left arm, never with
his right.

"It gives a one-sided effect to his eloquence," said he. But he thought
that he understood when an unguarded movement revealed a rent which had
been a mended place in the surplice.

"Poor fellow," said Harry. He recalled how, as a boy, he had gone to a
fancy-dress ball in Continental smallclothes, so small that he had been
strictly cautioned by his mother and sisters not to bow except with the
greatest care, lest he rend his magnificence and reveal that it was too
tight to allow an inch of underclothing. The stockings, in particular,
had been short, and his sister had providently sewed them on to the
knee-breeches, and to guard against accidents still further, had pinned
as well as sewed, the pins causing Harry much anguish.

"Poor fellow!" said Harry again, "I wonder is HE pinned somewhere? I
feel like giving him a lift; he is so prosy it isn't likely anyone else
will feel moved to help."

Thus it came about that when the dean announced that the alms this day
would be given to the parish of our friend who had just addressed us;
and the plate paused before the Lossing pew, Harry slipped his hand into
his waistcoat pocket after those two five-dollar notes.

I should explain that Harry being a naturally left