t any malice nor
dishonesty in him; but it was terrible that a man with an immortal soul
should live so nearly the life of the brute beasts that have no
understanding, and should never wake to the sense of God or of eternity.

He was not a man of many words, and nothing passed for a long time but
shouts of hoy, and whoa, and the like, to the horse. Paul went heavily
on, scarce knowing what he was about; there was a stunned jaded feel
about him, as if he were hunted and driven about, a mere outcast,
despised by every one, even by the Kings, whose kindness had been his
only ray of brightness. Not that his senses or spirits were alive enough
even to be conscious of pain or vexation; it was only a dull dreary
heedlessness what became of him next; and, quick clever boy as he had
been in the Union, he did not seem to have a bit more sense, thought, or
feeling, than John Farden.

John Farden was the first to break the silence: 'I wouldn't bide,' said
he.

Paul looked up, and muttered, 'I have nowhere to go.'

'Farmer uses thee shameful,' repeated John. 'Why don't thee cut?'

Paul saw the smoke of Mrs. King's chimney. That had always seemed like a
friend to him, but it came across him that they too thought him a runaway
from prison, and he felt as if his only bond of fellowship was gone. But
there was something else, too; and he made answer, 'I'll bide for the
Confirmation.'

'Eh?' said John, 'what good'll that do ye?'

'Help me to be a good lad,' said Paul, who knew John Farden would not
enter into any other explanation.

'Why, what'll they do to ye?'

'The Bishop will put his hand on me and bless me,' said Paul; and as he
said the words there was hope and refreshment coming back. He was a
child of God, if no other owned him.

'Whoy,' said Farden, much as he might have spoken to his horse, 'rum sort
of a head thou'st got! Thee'll never go up to Bishop such a guy!'

'Can't help it,' said Paul rather sullenly; 'it ain't the clothes that
God looks at.'

John scanned him all over, with his face looking more foolish than ever
in the puzzle he felt.

'Well,' he said, 'and what wilt get by it?'

'God's grace to do right, I hope,' said Paul; then he added, out of his
sad heart, 'It's bad enough here, to be sure. It would be a bad look-out
if one hoped for nothing afterwards.'

Somehow John's mind didn't take in the notion of afterwards, and he did
not go on talking to Paul. Perhaps there was a dread in his