and you know it, Josiah Allen. And he was kep in the church, the meen old creeter. And Miss Henn is a widder and poor."

   "Yes," sez Josiah, calmly, "she hain't been able to help the meetin' house much, and Brother Widrig contributes largely."

   Sez I, in a fearful meanin' axent, "I hearn he did at the time he wuz up—I hearn he contributed

    lots

   to the male brethren who was a-judgin' him—but," sez I, "do you spoze, Josiah Allen, that if wimmen wuz allowed their way in the matter, that that man would be allowed to stay in the meetin' house, and keep on a-makin' and a-sellin' the poisen that is sendin' men to ruin all round him—

   "Makin' his hard cider by the barell and hogset and fixin' it some way so it will make a far worse drunk than whiskey, and then supplyin' every low saloon fur and near with it, and peddlin' it out to every man and boy that wants it.

   "And boys think they can drink cider without doin' any harm—so he jest entices 'em down into the road to ruin—doin' as much agin harm as a whiskey seller.

   "And mothers have to set still and see it go on. It is men that are always appinted to deal with sinners, male or female. Men are judged by their peers, but wimmen never are.

   "I wonder if that is just? I wonder how Deacon Widrig would have liked it to have had Miss Henn set on him? He wuz dretful excited, so I hearn, about Metilda's case—thought it wuz highly incumbient on the meetin' house to have her made a example of, so's to try to abolish such wicked doin's as snickerin' out in meetin'.

   "I wonder how he would have liked it to have had Charley Lanfear's mother set on him? She is a Sister in the meetin' house and Charley is a ruined boy—and Deacon Widrig is jest as much the cause of his ruin— jest as guilty of murderin' all that wuz sweet and lovely in him es if he had fed arsenic to him with a teaspoon."

   Sez I, "In that very meetin' house to Loontown, there are mothers who have to set and take the bread and wine tokens of the blood and body of their crucified Redeemer from a man's hands that they know are red with the blood of their own sons. Fur redder than human blood and deeper-stained with the ruin of their immortal souls.

   "What thoughts does these mothers keep on a-thinkin' as they set there 

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