Page:Malabari, Behramji M. - Gujarat and the Gujaratis (1882).djvu/37

The deceased was a most successful preacher of the Gospel. He hated all underhand and dubious means; and rather than fire up the imagination of his audience by the glitter of false hopes and impossible promises, he preferred to reach their conscience by making Christianity a necessity of man's fallen nature. His Christianity was of a peculiar character, like himself, pleasant, practical, and conciliatory. Wherever he could, he cheerfully fell in with the views of his opponent; where he could not, he would not mind pulling Satan himself by the beard, keeping himself and the adversary all the while in the best of humours. An anecdote is current in Gujarát of how the good old man would sally forth of a Sabbath morning, enter an unknown village, preach against the stone-gods, be set upon by the mob, and incarcerated for his audacity: how he would hold forth from his prison—now in muscular Hindustáni, reminding the populace of their unlawful conduct and its consequences; now in suasive Gujaráti, laughing at their despicable mode of warfare; and then suddenly asking for a drink of water, and directly going off to take his forty winks; falling to the recital of some quaint but touching prayer on awaking; till at last he