as large contributors, as guaranteed saints, had all year been nagging them.
Here were these fine young men going into the ministry, said Brother Tusker. Well, it was up to them to help. Brother Gantry and Brother Fislinger were leaping with the joy of sacrifice and learning. Then let the churches give 'em a chance, and not make 'em spend all the time hot-footing it around, as some older preachers had to do, raising their own salaries! Let folks quit criticizing; let 'em appreciate godly lives and the quickening word once in a while, instead of ham-ham-hammering their preachers all day long!
And certain of the parties who criticized the preachers' wives for idleness—funny the way some of them seemed to have so much time to gad around and notice things and spread scandal! T'wa'n't only the menfolks that the Savior was thinking of when he talked about them that were without sin being the only folks that were qualified to heave any rocks!
The other preachers leaned back in their chairs and tried to look casual, and hoped that Brother Tusker was going to bear down even a lee-tle heavier on that matter of raising salaries.
In his sermon and the concluding ordination prayer Brother Knoblaugh (of Barkinsville) summed up, for the benefit of Elmer Gantry, Eddie Fislinger, and God, the history of the Baptists, the importance of missions, and the perils of not reading the Bible before breakfast daily.
Through this long prayer, the visiting pastors stood with their hands on the heads of Elmer and Eddie.
There was a grotesque hitch at first. Most of the ministers were little men who could no more than reach up to Elmer's head. They stood strained and awkward and unecclesiastical, these shabby good men, before the restless audience. There was a giggle. Elmer had a dramatic flash. He knelt abruptly, and Eddie, peering and awkward, followed him.
In the powdery gray dust Elmer knelt, ignoring it. On his head were the worn hands of three veteran preachers, and suddenly he was humble, for a moment he was veritably being ordained to the priestly service of God.
He had been only impatient till this instant. In the chapels at Mizpah and Terwillinger he had heard too many famous visiting pulpiteers to be impressed by the rustic eloquence of
