religion was strong as instinct
in him, and he could neither be enticed nor driven from the faith which
his father had died for. The odium of this stubbornness was shared in a
great measure by the child's protectors, insomuch that Tobias and
Dorothy very shortly began to experience a most bitter species of
persecution, in the cold regards of many a friend whom they had valued.
The common people manifested their opinions more openly. Pearson was a
man of some consideration, being a representative to the General Court,
and an approved lieutenant in the trainbands; yet within a week after
his adoption of Ilbrahim, he had been both hissed and hooted. Once,
also, when walking through a solitary piece of woods, he heard a loud
voice from some invisible speaker; and it cried, "What shall be done to
the backslider? Lo! the scourge is knotted for him, even the whip of
nine cords, and every cord three knots!" These insults irritated
Pearson's temper for the moment; they entered also into his heart, and
became imperceptible but powerful workers toward an end which his most
secret thought had not yet whispered.

* * * * *

On the second Sabbath after Ilbrahim became a member of their family,
Pearson and his wife deemed it proper that he should appear with them at
public worship. They had anticipated some opposition to this measure
from the boy, but he prepared himself in silence, and at the appointed
hour was clad in the new mourning suit which Dorothy had wrought for
him. As the parish was then, and during many subsequent years,
unprovided with a bell, the signal for the commencement of religious
exercises was the beat of a drum. At the first sound of that martial
call to the place of holy and quiet thoughts, Tobias and Dorothy set
forth, each holding a hand of little Ilbrahim, like two parents linked
together by the infant of their love. On their path through the leafless
woods, they were overtaken by many persons of their acquaintance, all of
whom avoided them, and passed by on the other side; but a severer trial
awaited their constancy when they had descended the hill, and drew near
the pine-built and undecorated house of prayer. Around the door, from
which the drummer still sent forth his thundering summons, was drawn up
a formidable phalanx, including several of the oldest members of the
congregation, many of the middle aged, and nearly all the younger males.
Pearson found it difficult to sust