The congregation broke up, and old William Dent said to
one of his cronies, "Watty was grand this afternoon. Ay, they may talk
about the fine preachers with the Greek and the Latin, but I want to
hear a man like that." Musgrave and Hob's Tommy walked back over the
moor in the twilight after the second service, and the giant spoke not a
word all the way until they reached the bridge that crossed the little
river. The dying twilight made the sluggish water like silver, and the
trees were just beginning to moan with the evening wind. Tommy stood in
the middle of the bridge, and looked--looked into the dark depths of the
water, and then let his eye trace the silver path of the river where it
vanished in the soft purple tints of the wood. He said, "If I was to
drop over here now, Mr. Musgrave, do you think God would take me?" And
Musgrave said--

"Don't talk nonsense, Thomas; come along with me. When God wants to take
you, He will take you; but you must not be trying to put your opinions
in place of God's. Turn back, my man, and look at the Point there where
the Cobbler's Stone stands. Now forget that you are looking at the calm
stream, and think what you would feel like one dark night, with a
northerly gale, if you had to fight your way round the Cobbler, and
expected the sea to double over your boat every minute. You are not in
danger now, and your business is to worship. Try to think, my lad, what
you would feel if you expected that every sea would be the last one. Now
come away, and talk no more nonsense to-night."

So Hob's Tommy did not go trouting on that Sunday evening.

The next day, when he woke up, he had a sense of strangeness, and it
suddenly flashed upon him that he ought to pray. He did not exactly know
how to begin, but he managed to produce a curious imitation of the
prayer he had heard Musgrave deliver the day before. He then put on his
sea-boots and sou'-wester, and strolled into the kitchen. When his
mother heard his foot in the passage, she trembled a little, because Tom
was not over civil as a rule. To her utter astonishment, the ruffian
whom she loved said, "Good morning, mother. Is the coffee ready?" He
then stepped up to her, and placed his arm round her shoulders. He had
never kissed anybody in his life; so that form of endearment did not
occur to him; but he bent his bearded face, and laid his cheek clumsily
against his mother's. The draggled woman was so startled that she was
unable to form any