a time at least, her mutineers; and sought to hearten those
of her little crew who wavered, who shrank back appalled as they realized
something of the immensity of the conflict in which her destiny was to be
wrought out.

To carry on the figure, Philip Goodrich might have been deemed her first
officer. He, at least, was not appalled, but grimly conscious of the
greatness of the task to which they had set their hands. The sudden
transformation of conservative St. John's was no more amazing than that
of the son of a family which had never been without influence in the
community. But that influence had always been conservative. And Phil
Goodrich had hitherto taken but a listless interest in the church of his
fathers. Fortune had smiled upon him, trusts had come to him unsought.
He had inherited the family talent for the law, the freedom to practise
when and where he chose. His love of active sport had led him into many
vacations, when he tramped through marsh and thicket after game, and at
five and forty there was not an ounce of superfluous flesh on his hard
body. In spite of his plain speaking, an overwhelming popularity at
college had followed him to his native place, and no organization,
sporting or serious, was formed in the city that the question was not
asked, "What does Goodrich think about it?"

His whole-souled enlistment in the cause of what was regarded as radical
religion became, therefore, the subject of amazed comment in the many
clubs he now neglected. The "squabble" in St. John's, as it was
generally referred to, had been aired in the press, but such was the
magic in a name made without conscious effort that Phil Goodrich's
participation in the struggle had a palpably disarming effect: and there
were not a few men who commonly spent their Sunday mornings behind
plate-glass windows, surrounded by newspapers, as well as some in the
athletic club (whose contests Mr. Goodrich sometimes refereed) who went
to St. John's out of curiosity and who waited, afterwards, for an
interview with Phil or the rector. The remark of one of these was typical
of others. He had never taken much stock in religion, but if Goodrich
went in for it he thought he'd go and look it over.

Scarcely a day passed that Phil did not drop in at the parish house....
And he set himself, with all the vigour of an unsquandered manhood, to
help Hodder to solve the multitude of new problems by which they were
beset.

A free church was a magnif