ead man, and it was generally
admitted that he "would have a time of it" in administering upon the
estate.

At last the word was whispered about that the Elder was coming. Word was
sent to the smoke-house and to the haystack to call the stragglers in.
They came slowly, and finding the rooms all filled considered themselves
absolved from a disagreeable duty, and went back to the sunny side of
the haystack, where they smoked their pipes in ruminative enjoyment.

The Elder, upon entering, took his place beside the coffin, the foot of
which he used for a pulpit on which to lay his Bible and his hymn-book.
A noise of whispering, rustling, scraping of feet arose as some old men
crowded in among the women, and then the room became silent.

The Elder took his seat and glanced round upon them all with solemn
unrecognizing severity, while the mourners came down the creaking pine
stairway in proper order of procedure.

Everybody noticed the luxury of new dresses on the nieces and the new
suits on the children. Everybody knew the feeling which led to these
extravagances. Death, after all, was a majestic visitor, and money was
not to stand in the way of a decent showing. Some of the girls smiled
slyly at Isaac's gloves, which were too small and would go only halfway
on, a fact he tried to conceal by keeping his hands folded. Each boy was
provided with a large new stiff cotton handkerchief, which occupied
immense space in outside pockets, crumpled as they were into a rustling
ball with cruel salient angles like a Chinese puzzle.

The Elder had attended two funerals that week, and like a jaded actor
came lamely to his work. His prayer was not entirely satisfactory to the
older people, they had expected a "little more power."

He was a thin-faced man, with weak brown eyes and a mouth like a gopher,
that is, with very prominent upper teeth. His black coat was worn and
shiny, and hung limply, as if at some other period he had been fatter,
or as if it had belonged to some other man.

The choir with instinctive skill had selected a wailing hymn, only
slightly higher in development than the chant of the Indians, sweet,
plaintive at times, barbaric in its moving cadences. They sang it well,
in meditative march, looking out of the windows during its interminable
length.

Then the Elder read some passages of the Scripture in his "funeral
voice," which was entirely different from his "marriage voice" and his
"Sunday voice." It had deep