The Argosy — page 270: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

251 “BESIDE ALL WATERS.” Twas a summer Sunday afternoon, and through the western window of the old grey village church the slanting sunbeams poured a flood of many-coloured light upon the worn stone pavement. The noble army of Martyrs, the goodly fellowship of the Prophets, stood out in all their glory of crimson and gold; and from the ‘Apostles’ window an amber ray from the robe of St. John the Divine fell full upon the children in the wide old rectory pew, touching each litt’e head as with an aureole. The church was unusually full, for the tidings that a stranger was to preach that afternoon had brought out many who would otherwise have found the August sun a sufficient excuse for taking things quietly at home. They were a good, honest, steady-going set of people, and devoted to their own Rector, who had been with them many years ; but with the thermometer at 90 degrees in the shade it is hardly surprising that it took that very great novelty, a stranger, to draw them once more from the distant parts of the village when the bell rang for afternoon service. A stranger “‘ parson” was a rare phenomenon in a little obscure hamlet buried away in the heart of the country. Moreover, this par- ticular parson was a man whose fame had penetrated even into this remote old-world village; a man who was noted as one of those zealous and self-denying workers whose lives are spent in a hand-to- hand conflict with evil in some of the many “dark places” of the great far-off metropolis. He was taking a brief and hardly-earned holiday, walking through the green lanes and country villages, resting and refreshing heart and brain, sick and tired with the noise and strife of London. He had stayed the night before at the little inn, and while wandering about in the meadows had come upon the Rector _ returning from a sick call, and had fallen into friendly chat which - | ended in an offer to help on the morrow, and to preach for him in the afternoon. * But,” expostulated the Rector, looking at his companion’s worn face, graven with lines not of age, but of hard work and care, “I thought you were taking a holiday! ” The other laughed as he answered: “It will not hurt me. I have _ been too long in harness to be ever quite happy out of it. I have taken a fancy to this place; perhaps I shall never see it again; and I have a feeling I should like to say a word to your people, if you will let me.” So he had his way, and as he went up the pulpit stairs quite a crowd of faces were lifted towards him. Only in the rectory pew one little head remained bent until the first sound of his voice. CORINELOO© SS) (©) im