ward a similar smash-up. You'll both be proletarians
before you're done with it."

The conversation turned upon the Bishop, and we got Ernest to explain
what he had been doing with him.

"He is soul-sick from the journey through hell I have given him. I took
him through the homes of a few of our factory workers. I showed him the
human wrecks cast aside by the industrial machine, and he listened to
their life stories. I took him through the slums of San Francisco, and
in drunkenness, prostitution, and criminality he learned a deeper cause
than innate depravity. He is very sick, and, worse than that, he has got
out of hand. He is too ethical. He has been too severely touched. And,
as usual, he is unpractical. He is up in the air with all kinds of
ethical delusions and plans for mission work among the cultured. He
feels it is his bounden duty to resurrect the ancient spirit of the
Church and to deliver its message to the masters. He is overwrought.
Sooner or later he is going to break out, and then there's going to be
a smash-up. What form it will take I can't even guess. He is a pure,
exalted soul, but he is so unpractical. He's beyond me. I can't keep
his feet on the earth. And through the air he is rushing on to his
Gethsemane. And after this his crucifixion. Such high souls are made for
crucifixion."

"And you?" I asked; and beneath my smile was the seriousness of the
anxiety of love.

"Not I," he laughed back. "I may be executed, or assassinated, but I
shall never be crucified. I am planted too solidly and stolidly upon the
earth."

"But why should you bring about the crucifixion of the Bishop?" I asked.
"You will not deny that you are the cause of it."

"Why should I leave one comfortable soul in comfort when there are
millions in travail and misery?" he demanded back.

"Then why did you advise father to accept the vacation?"

"Because I am not a pure, exalted soul," was the answer. "Because I am
solid and stolid and selfish. Because I love you and, like Ruth of
old, thy people are my people. As for the Bishop, he has no daughter.
Besides, no matter how small the good, nevertheless his little
inadequate wail will be productive of some good in the revolution, and
every little bit counts."

I could not agree with Ernest. I knew well the noble nature of
Bishop Morehouse, and I could not conceive that his voice raised for
righteousness would be no more than a little inadequate wail. But I did
not yet have the