talk. Says
Isaac, 'Oh, nothing particular; only, can they pray-down fire from
heaven on an altar? It ain't much, maybe, your majesty, only can they do
it? That's the idea.' So the king was a good deal disturbed, and he went
to the prophets of Baal, and they said, pretty airy, that if he had
an altar ready, they were ready; and they intimated he better get it
insured, too.

"So next morning all the children of Israel and their parents and the
other people gathered themselves together. Well, here was that great
crowd of prophets of Baal packed together on one side, and Isaac walking
up and down all alone on the other, putting up his job. When time was
called, Isaac let on to be comfortable and indifferent; told the other
team to take the first innings. So they went at it, the whole four
hundred and fifty, praying around the altar, very hopeful, and doing
their level best. They prayed an hour--two hours--three hours--and so
on, plumb till noon. It wa'n't any use; they hadn't took a trick. Of
course they felt kind of ashamed before all those people, and well they
might. Now, what would a magnanimous man do? Keep still, wouldn't he? Of
course. What did Isaac do? He graveled the prophets of Baal every way
he could think of. Says he, 'You don't speak up loud enough; your god's
asleep, like enough, or maybe he's taking a walk; you want to holler,
you know'--or words to that effect; I don't recollect the exact
language. Mind, I don't apologize for Isaac; he had his faults.

"Well, the prophets of Baal prayed along the best they knew how all the
afternoon, and never raised, a spark. At last, about sundown, they were
all tuckered out, and they owned up and quit.

"What does Isaac do now? He steps up and says to some friends of
his there, 'Pour four barrels of water on the altar!' Everybody was
astonished; for the other side had prayed at it dry, you know, and got
whitewashed. They poured it on. Says he, 'Heave on four more barrels.'
Then he says, 'Heave on four more.' Twelve barrels, you see, altogether.
The water ran all over the altar, and all down the sides, and filled up
a trench around it that would hold a couple of hogsheads-'measures,' it
says; I reckon it means about a hogshead. Some of the people were going
to put on their things and go, for they allowed he was crazy. They
didn't know Isaac. Isaac knelt down and began to pray; he strung along,
and strung along, about the heathen in distant lands, and about the
sister c