IN THE FIGHTING-LINE 



There was a moment of hot lull in the debate. 

 We had delivered ourselves of the particular argu- 

 ment that a week of canvassing had proved to be the 

 most telling, and our pulses throbbed with our own 

 eloquence. The stalwart old farmer, who had sat 

 silent in the corner, stirred in his chair, and said, 

 " Wot I says is, 'e that believeth and is baptised, 

 shall be saved, and 'e that believeth not " 



He did not flinch from the conclusion, and neither 

 then nor since have we been able to discover any 

 connection between what he said and the subject 

 under discussion. He wielded the tremendous text 

 as easily as one of his own pitchforks, and his wife 

 groaned, with a perfunctory religious ardour. By an 

 inner current of sympathy we knew that she yearned 

 for our departure in order that she might clear away 

 the tea-things that stood on the table ; but the heart 

 of the canvasser must be steeled against such 

 perceptions. 



Over against us sat the farmer's son, a clerk-like 

 and self-satisfied youth in blue serge and spectacles; 

 on the plate in front of him were the bacon-parings 

 of his evening meal, out of his mouth proceeded 

 bigotry, ignorance, and the Gospel. The room was 

 perfectly clean, and the boarded floor had a bit of 

 carpet on it ; the farmer's wife had, among other 

 things, taught her men to wipe their feet, and purity 

 of political motive seemed inseparable from such white- 

 washed walls. The very growth of the roses outside 



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