armed girl's getting hurt in the
roller. I used to believe everything I heard the evangelist say, but I
don't think no more that religion is what it's cracked up to be." A few
moments later she asked if I was a Protestant, too, and receiving an
affirmative, proceeded to express herself on the superior merits of that
form of faith as compared with the Catholic, against which she had all
the narrow-minded ignorance and superstition which, strange to say, only
too often characterize the better element of the class to which she
belonged. This girl's unreasonable prejudice against something of which
she knew not the first thing presented a paradox universal in her world.
The Catholic Church as an institution was her enemy, and the enemy of
all Protestants. "If they could kill you, and not be found out by the
law, they'd do it just as quick as wink, because the priest would bail
them out of hell for a dollar and a quarter." And yet, when it came to
the concrete and personal, she had to admit that all the Catholics she
had ever known were "just about as good as Protestants."

This religious discussion was carried on in a low voice, with many
side-glances toward the Catholic side of the table, as if danger
threatened were they to hear a word of it. I knew, however, that there
was nothing to fear from that quarter. There was only one religious
conscience there, and that belonged to the one-eyed girl herself. From
innumerable other instances I had met with before I had come to this
generalization: that bigotry and bitter prejudices in matters of faith,
deplorable as they at first seem to be, mark a distinct step in the
social evolution and moral development of the ignorant and degraded.
Nobody else at that table was far enough along to worry herself with
principles of faith.

"I think the Salvation Army's a kind of good religion," she continued;
"only they--" but I heard no more; we were interrupted by a flurry of
interest in the front, which spread quickly to our region, as a portly
man in an automobile coat and Panama hat made his way by the
mangle-machines and the tables. The foreman, diffident and uncertain,
was walking by his side; and from the peremptory and numerous
instructions he was receiving, it became patent that his companion was
the "boss." Everybody looked hastily, stealthily, at the Queen, who hid
her pleasure under a very transparent veil of dissembling, as she helped
us unload a truck. Never before had I heard