The Ship of Stars

, and Taffy close behind. The two men were discus

couple of men with tarpaulin and rick-ropes. That'

a big bell rested on the flooring. Its rim was cracked,

e?" the Squire calle

bell," answe

on over to Wheel Gooniver for a tackle and winch. Damme, up t

overhead; "such a cauch o' pilm an' twigs, an'

bish, could just spy a white smock above the beam, and a

ke you help it. I

e so?" said the v

off the ladder

ire!" put in

He turned and brushed his rusty hat with his coat-cuff. Suddenly he faced round again. "Here, Bill Udy," he said to the old labourer who

ut he would not listen to reason. He built his church-a squat Perpendicular building of two aisles, the wider divided into nave and chancel merely by a granite step in the flooring; he saw it consecrated, and returned to his home and died. And the church steadily decayed. He had mixed his mortar with sea-sand. The stonework oozed brine, the plaster fell piece-meal; the blown sand penetrated like water; the foundations sank a foot on the south side, and the whole structure took a list to leeward. The living passed into the hands of the Dean and Chapter of Exeter, and from them, in 1730, to the Moyles. Mr. Raymond's predecessor was a kinsman of theirs by marriage, a pluralist, who li

g-ding-d

its clapper. The heavy bell-rope would be ready next week; but Humility must fi

nd ran scampering. Others, farther away, paused

ding-

held his prayer-book, with a finger between the pages. Glancing down toward th

fy, "Run to the door, and

d after a min

and the little girl with him, and some servan

ody

hear the bell," said Taff

, and God sees

ooked up at his fath

p of some kind. For wha

puzzled the boy; and yet Taffy never felt so near to understanding him as he had then, and did again now. He was shy of his

nd, marched her up to the end of the south aisle. The door of the great pew was shut upon them, and

fter a minute or two Mr. Raymond signed to him to stop and go to his mother, which he did, blushing at the no

s that he hath committed, and doeth that which is la

not help it-that they were all gathered to save this old man's soul, and that everybody knew it and secretly thought it a hopeless case. The notion dogged him all through the service, and for many Su

ach his sermon. He chose his text from Sai

ne and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a

and the winds blew, and beat upon that house

osely. He would listen to a sentence or two,

everlasting foundation of the Church spiritual. . . . Hear what comfortable words our Lord spake to Peter. . . . Our foundation must be faith, which is God's continuing Presence on earth, and which we shall recognise hereafter as God Himself. . . . Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the

neither to right nor to left, with his jaw set like a closed gin. Honoria followed. She had not so mu

gger congregation. Mrs. Venning, who had been carried downstairs for the meal, saw this and asked few questions. Both the women stole g

up to Tredinnis with a note from me. Maybe I will