work was equally innocent of paint as the outside.

On the arrival of Mr. Armstrong with his companions, they found the
room only partly occupied, nor had the exercises commenced. According
to a custom which would have struck a stranger as singular, but which,
doubtless, was founded in a knowledge of the nature of young men and
young women, the males were seated on one side of the passage, and
the females on the other. The separation, as might be expected, only
partly answered the purpose, being unable to arrest the glances
which, with quite as much of earth as of heaven in them, crossed the
intervening space. These, however, were stolen, and managed in such a
quiet way as not materially to affect the devotions of the elders.
In compliance with an usage, a breach of which would have violated
propriety, Faith, withdrawing her arm from her father's, glided into
a seat among her own sex on the right, while Mr. Armstrong and Holden
sought places on the left.

The appearance of the Solitary entering the little place of worship,
striding up the passage with his usual air of dignity and composure,
and taking a seat among the principal members of the church,
occasioned great surprise. Although differing little, probably, in
religious sentiments (except in one point) from those around him, he
had never united with them in religious worship. He was, therefore,
notwithstanding his frequent allusions to the Scriptures, considered
generally more in the light of a heathen than of a Christian man, and
the apparition of Plato or Socrates would hardly have excited more
observation. Many, in consequence, were the looks bent on him by those
present, and those who afterwards came in.

But of them, or of any sensation caused by his presence, he seemed
utterly unconscious. With arms folded and head drooped upon his chest,
he shut his eyes and abandoned himself to meditation.

"Massy on us," whispered Miss Green, the mantua-maker, to her next
neighbor, Miss Thompson, the tailoress, "if here ain't old Holden. I
wonder what fetches him here."

"And did you see!" said Miss Thompson, whispering in like manner, "he
came in with the Armstrongs. I always did admire what they could see
in him to like."

"I guess," said Miss Green, "he feels kind o' awkward. Look how
he's folded his arms. It's so long since he's been to meeting or
conference, if he was ever in such a place before; he don't know how
to behave."

"There's no sort o' set about h