556 READINGS IN RURAL ECONOMICS 



affliction becomes doubly great when the town girl's brother or 

 "feller" comes out to take her home. Then he longs for a cyclone 

 or a fire to bring out his hidden excellences some emergency 

 that might show that he could do things which "that dude" 

 could n't. 



Another contrast, but of a different sort, occurs when the 

 preacher stops in at supper time and stays all night. The hired 

 man feels a sort of contempt for " that fine-haired feller with such 

 a stand-in with the women folks," especially when he sees that he 

 doesn't half know how to unhitch his horse. But with his con- 

 tempt comes a feeling of dread, dread of that awful time just 

 before going to bed, when the preacher is to have his innings. 

 During the whole evening there is a cloud over the family. No 

 one ventures even a whispered joke in the corner, and the talk 

 invariably takes an uninteresting turn. Finally comes the expected 

 hitch in the conversation, the head of the family coughs, clears 

 his throat twice, then comes out with the inevitable, " Brother X, 

 will you read ? " The hired man scarcely hears the voice of the 

 minister, he thinks only of the crisis to come at the reading's end. 

 Will he be expected to kneel, or, being a hired man, will just 

 bowing the head a little suffice ? Finally the minister's voice 

 ceases, and the women of the family follow the visitor's example 

 and kneel, squarely facing their chairs, while the men assume 

 various awkward compromises between inclination and duty. The 

 hired man hesitates an instant, then, yielding to the power of 

 example, lets one knee slip down from his chair to the floor, and 

 thus painfully waits until the blessing of Heaven, having been 

 invoked by the speaker on the nation, the state, this particular 

 farm, the family in general, and each member of it in particular, 

 is finally directed to " the servant within thy house and his well- 

 being," and the welcome "amen" releases this functionary from 

 his cramped position. The preacher makes some commonplace 

 remark to unlimber the minds of the family, a remark which 

 somehow suggests to the hired man, as he bolts thankfully to his 

 bedroom, the satisfaction of a surgeon after a successful operation. 

 I wonder if this ceremony was followed by the preacher of twenty 

 years ago in response to a feeling of duty, merely, or whether he 



