ou must have made
quite a little speech."

"Well this is the land of religious freedom, isn't it? That's what
you came here for, didn't you?" She sat up to deliver this remark--a
movement which enabled Kennicott to win back seven-eighths of the bed
covering.

"Now look here Prissie--I'm not narrow like some of these pilgrims who
came over with us. But I won't have my wife intimating that a Roman
Catholic or a Quaker should be allowed to spread his heresies broadcast
in this country. It's all right for you and me to know something about
those things, but we must protect our children and those who have not
had our advantages. The only way to meet this evil is to stamp it
out, quick, before it can get a start. And it's just such so-called
broadminded thinkers as you that encourage these heretics. You'll be
criticizing the Bible next, I suppose."

Thus in early times did the pious Right Thinkers save the land from
Hellfire and Damnation; thus the great-grandfathers of middle-western
congressmen; thus the ancestors of platitudinous editorial writers,
Sitters on Committees, and tin-horn prohibitionists.

Kennicott got up to cool his wrath and indignation with a drink of
water. He stumbled over a chair, reached for the jug, took a drink, set
the jug down, stumbled over the same chair, and crawled back into bed.
His expedition cost him the loss of all bed covering; he gave up the
fight.

"Aside from dragging my own private views over the coals of your
righteousness, did you and your friends find anything equally pleasant
and self-satisfying to discuss this evening?"

"Eh--what's that? Why, yes, we did. We decided to refuse permission for
one of these traveling medicine shows to operate in Plymouth."

"Medicine shows?"

"Yes--you know--like a fair in England. This one claims to come from
down south somewhere. 'Smart Set Medicine Show' it's called, run by
a fellow named Mencken. Sells cheap whisky to the Indians--makes them
crazy, they say. He's another one of your radical friends we don't want
around."

"Yes, he might cut in on your own trading with the Indians."

"Oh, for heaven's sake, Prissie--hire a hall."

Silence. He began to snore.

She lay there, sleepless and open-eyed. The clock struck eleven.

"Why can't I get to sleep?"

("Did Will put the cat out?")

"I wonder what this medicine show is like?"

"What is the matter with these people?"

("Or is it me?")

She reached down, pulled the blankets f