der--men and women in
tattered garments, and many of them with debauched looks. A tall thin
man stood on the stage or platform. The singing ceased, and he
advanced.

"Bah!" whispered Aspel, "it's a prayer-meeting. Let's be off."

"Stay," returned Bones. "I know the feller. He comes about our court
sometimes. Let's hear what he's got to say."

"Friends," said Mr Sterling, the city missionary, for it was he, "I
hold in my hand the Word of God. There are messages in this Word--this
Bible--for every man and woman in this room. I shall deliver only two
of these messages to-night. If any of you want more of 'em you may come
back to-morrow. Only two to-night. The first is, `Though your sins be
as scarlet they shall be as white as snow, though they be red like
crimson they shall be as wool.' The other is, `It is God who giveth us
the victory.'"

Bones started and looked at his companion. It seemed as if the
missionary had caught up and echoed the parting words of the colporteur.

Mr Sterling had a keen, earnest look, and a naturally eloquent as well
as persuasive tongue. Though comparatively uneducated, he was deeply
read in the Book which it was his life's work to expound, and an
undercurrent of intense feeling seemed to carry him along--and his
hearers along with him--as he spoke. He did not shout or gesticulate:
that made him all the more impressive. He did not speak of himself or
his own feelings: that enabled his hearers to give undistracted
attention to the message he had to deliver. He did not energise. On
the contrary, it seemed as if he had some difficulty in restraining the
superabundant energy that burned within him; and as people usually stand
more or less in awe of that which they do not fully understand, they
gave him credit, perhaps, for more power than he really possessed. At
all events, not a sound was heard, save now and then a suppressed sob,
as he preached Christ crucified to guilty sinners, and urged home the
two "messages" with all the force of unstudied language, but
well-considered and aptly put illustration and anecdote.

At one part of his discourse he spoke, with bated breath, of the
unrepentant sinner's awful danger, comparing it to the condition of a
little child who should stand in a blazing house, with escape by the
staircase cut off, and no one to deliver--a simile which brought
instantly to Bones's mind his little Tottie and the fire, and the rescue
by the man he had re