in rows on the hard, wooden seats,
and felt again its majesty and its desolation. There was the same
absence of beauty, youth, color, and grace that he had noticed in the
procession. Everywhere worn and weary women in sombre dresses, a
wistful light in their faces, as if they felt dimly the difference
between the lithe and beautiful figure of the girl and their own
stiffened joints and emaciated forms.

The great throng sat silent, listening intently, their eyes fixed upon
the speaker. They were there for a purpose; they were there to find out
why it was that their toil, their sobriety, their self-deprivation,
left them at middle life with distorted and stiffened limbs, gray hair,
and empty hands. They were terribly in earnest, and Bradley felt his
kinship with them. They were his kind.

The music, which set them wild with enthusiasm, was of the simplest and
most stirring sort. That it pleased them so much, showed all too
clearly how barren their lives were of songs and color and light.

* * * * *

The people pressed forward to speak a word to Ida; and Bradley,
yielding to the pressure of the crowd, was carried forward with it. It
stirred him very deeply to see the love and admiration they all felt
for her. On all sides he heard words of affection which came straight
from the heart. Their utter sincerity could not be doubted. He knew he
ought to turn and go away before she saw him, but he could not.

Something in his face attracted a grizzled old farmer, who was moving
along beside him, and he turned with a beaming look.

"How's that for a speech, eh? Did y' ever hear the like of it?"

"No, I never did."

"Ain't she a wonder, now? D' you s'pose there's another woman like her
in the world?"

Bradley shook his head. He was sure of that!

A gaunt old woman, who wore a dark green-check sunbonnet hanging at the
back of her head, put in a word.

"Shows what a woman can do if you give 'er a chance."

"Hello, Sister Slocum, you're always on hand."

"Like a sore thumb, Brother Tobey, an' I don't know of any one got a
bigger interest in downin' the plutes than the farmers' wives--do you?"

It was pathetic, it was unforgettable, to see these people as they
stood beside the rounded, supple, splendid figure of the speaker and
took her strong, smooth hand in their work-scarred, leathery
palms--these women of many children and never-ending work, bent by toil
above the wash-tub