"Oh, Hillard--Hillard," he said, "say all that over agin about the
clouds an' the thunder of passion--say all the last part over
agin--it sounds so good!"

The congregation thronged around him and shook his hand. They gave
him the flowers they had brought; they told him how much they thought
of him, how sorry they would be to see him dead, how they had always
intended to come to see him, but had been so busy, and to cheer up
that he wasn't dead yet.

"No"--said Uncle Dave, weeping--"no, an' now since I see how much you
all keer fur me I don't b'lieve--I--I wanter die at all."

CHAPTER XXI

JACK AND THE LITTLE ONES

No one would ever have supposed that the big blacksmith at the
village was Jack Bracken. All the week he worked at his trade--so
full of his new life that it shone continually in his face--his face
strong and stern, but kindly. With his leathern apron on, his sleeves
rolled up, his hairy breast bare and shining in the open collar,
physically he looked more like an ancient Roman than a man of to-day.

His greatest pleasure was to entice little children to his shop,
talking to them as he worked. To get them to come, he began by
keeping a sack of ginger snaps in his pockets. And the villagers used
to smile at the sight of the little ones around him, especially after
sunset when his work was finished. Often a half dozen children would
be in his lap or on his knees at once, and the picture was so
beautiful that people would stop and look, and wonder what the big
strong man saw in all those noisy children to love.

They did not know that this man had spent his life a hunted thing;
that the strong instinct of home and children had been smothered in
him, that his own little boy had been taken, and that to him every
child was a saint.

But they soon learned that the great kind-hearted, simple man was a
tiger when aroused. A small child from the mill, sickly and timid,
was among those who stopped one morning to get one of his cakes.

Not knowing it was a mill child on its way to work, Jack detained it
in all the kindness of his heart, and the little thing was not in a
hurry to go. Indeed, it forgot all about the mill until its father
happened along an hour after it should have been at work. His name
was Joe Hopper, a ne'er-do-well whose children, by working at the
mill, supported him in idleness.

Catching the child, he berated it and boxed its ears soundly. Jack
was at work, but turning, and s