She "saw no harm in a fiddle," herself, and thought Mr. Leonard
absurdly strict in the matter, though it would not have been well for
the luckless outsider who might have ventured to say as much to her.
She had connived at Felix's visits to old Abel Blair, squaring the
matter with her Presbyterian conscience by some peculiar process
known only to herself.
When Janet heard of the promise which Mr. Leonard had exacted from
Felix she seethed with indignation; and, though she "knew her place"
better than to say anything to Mr. Leonard about it, she made
her disapproval so plainly manifest in her bearing that the stern,
gentle old man found the atmosphere of his hitherto peaceful manse
unpleasantly chill and hostile for a time.
It was the wish of his heart that Felix should be a minister,
as he would have wished his own son to be, had one been born to him.
Mr. Leonard thought rightly that the highest work to which any man
could be called was a life of service to his fellows; but he made
the mistake of supposing the field of service much narrower than it is--
of failing to see that a man may minister to the needs of humanity
in many different but equally effective ways.
Janet hoped that Mr.
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