himself. "Three soverens was bad."
On the evening of the next day--that day being the Sabbath--the soldier
worshiped in Capel Kingsend; and betwixt the sermon and the benediction,
the preacher delivered this speech: "Very happy am I to see so many
warriors here once more. We sacrificed for them quite a lot, and if they
have any Christianity left in them they will not forget what Capel
Kingsend has done and will repay same with interest. Happier still we
are to welcome Mister Hughes-Jones to the Big Seat. In the valley of the
shadow has Mister Hughes-Jones been. Earnestly we prayed for our dear
religious leader. To-morrow at seven we shall hold a prayer meeting for
his cure. At seven at night. Will everybody remember? On
Monday--to-morrow--at seven at night a prayer meeting for Mister
Hughes-Jones will be held in Capel Kingsend. The duty of every one is to
attend. Will you please say something now, zer?"

Hughes-Jones rose from the arm-chair which is under the pulpit, and
thrust out his bristled chin and rested his palms on the communion
table; and he said not one word.

"Mister Hughes-Jones," the preacher urged.

"I am too full of grace," said Hughes-Jones; he spoke quickly, as one
who is on the verge of tears, and his big nostrils widened and narrowed
as those of one who is short of breath.

"The congregation, zer, expects--"

"Well-well, I've had a glimpse of the better land and with a clear
conscience I could go there, only the Great Father has more for me to do
here. A miracle happened to me. In the thick of my sickness a meetority
dropped outside the bedroom. The mistress fainted slap bang. 'If this is
my summons,' I said, 'I am ready.' A narrow squeak that was. I will now
sit and pray for you one and all."

In the morning Llew went to the One and All and in English--that is the
tongue of the high Welsh--did he address Hughes-Jones.

"I've come to start, zer," he said.

"Why wassn't you in the chapel yezterday?"

"I wass there, zer."

"Ho-ho. For me there are two people in the chapel--me and Him."

"Yez, indeed. Shall I gommence now?"

"Gommence what?"

"My crib what I leave to join up."

"Things have changed. There has been a war on, mister. They are all
smart young ladies here now. And it is not right to sack them and shove
them on the streets."

"But--"

"Don't answer back, or I'll have you chucked from the premizes and
locked up. Much gratitude you show for all I did for the soders."

"Beg pardon, zer."

"We too did our bits at home. Slaved like horses. Me and the two sons.
And they had to do work of national importance. Disgraceful I call it in
a free country."

"I would be much obliged, zer, if you would take me on."

"You left on your own accord, didn't you? I never take back a hand that
leave on their own. Why don't you be patriotic and rejoin and finish up
the Huns?"

Bowed down, the soldier made himself drunk, and the drink enlivened his
dismettled heart; and in the evening he stole into the loft which is
above the Big Seat of Capel Kingsend, purposing to disturb the praying
men with loud curses.

But Llew slept, and while he slept the words of the praying men came
through the ceiling like the pieces of a child's jigsaw puzzle; some
floated sluggishly and fell upon the wall and the roof, and some because
of their little strength did not reach above the floor; and none went
through the roof. Saint David closed his hands on many, and there was no
soundness in them, and they became as though they were nothing. He
formed a bag of the soldier's handkerchief, and he filled it with the
words, but as he drew to the edges they crumbled into less than dust.

He pondered; and he made a sack out of cobwebs, and when the sack could
not contain any more words, he wove a lid of cobwebs over the mouth of
it. Jealous that no mishap should befall his treasure, he mounted a low,
slow-moving cloud, and folding his wings rode up to the Gate of the
Highway.




VIII

JOSEPH'S HOUSE


A woman named Madlen, who lived in Penlan--the crumbling mud walls of
which are in a nook of the narrow lane that rises from the valley of
Bern--was concerned about the future state of her son Joseph. Men who
judged themselves worthy to counsel her gave her such counsels as these:
"Blower bellows for the smith," "Cobblar clox," "Booboo for crows."

Madlen flattered her counselors, though none spoke that which was
pleasing unto her.

"Cobblar clox, ach y fy," she cried to herself. "Wan is the lad bach
with decline. And unbecoming to his Nuncle Essec that he follows low
tasks."

Moreover, people, look you at John Lewis. Study his marble gravestone in
the burial ground of Capel Sion: "His name is John Newton-Lewis; Paris
House, London, his address. From his big shop in Putney, Home they
brought him by railway." Genteel are shops for boys who are consumptive.
Always dry are their coats and feet, and they have white cuffs on their
wrists and chains on their waistcoats. Not blight nor disease nor frost
can ruin their sellings. And every minute their fingers grabble in the
purses of nobles.

So Madlen thought, and having acted in accordance with her design, she
took her son to the other side of Avon Bern, that is to Capel Mount
Moriah, over which Essec her husband's brother lorded; and him she
addressed decorously, as one does address a ruler of the capel.

"Your help I seek," she said.

"Poor is the reward of the Big Preacher's son in this part," Essec
announced. "A lot of atheists they are."

"Not pleading I have not the rent am I," said Madlen. "How if I
prentice Joseph to a shop draper. Has he any odds?"

"Proper that you seek," replied Essec. "Seekers we all are. Sit you. No
room there is for Joseph now I am selling Penlan."

"Like that is the plan of your head?" Madlen murmured, concealing her
dread.

"Seven of pounds of rent is small. Sell at eighty I must."

"Wait for Joseph to prosper. Buy then he will. Buy for your mam you
will, Joseph?"

"Sorry I cannot change my think," Essec declared.

"Hard is my lot; no male have I to ease my burden."

"A weighty responsibility my brother put on me," said Essec. "'Dying
with old decline I am,' the brother mouthed. 'Fruitful is the soil.
Watch Madlen keeps her fruitful.' But I am generous. Eight shall be the
rent. Are you not the wife of my flesh?"

After she had wiped away her tears, "Be kind," said Madlen, "and wisdom
it to Joseph."

"The last evening in the seiet I commanded the congregation to give the
Big Man's photograph a larger hire," said Essec. "A few of my proverbs I
will now spout." He spat his spittle and bundling his beard blew the
residue of his nose therein; and he chanted: "Remember Essec Pugh, whose
right foot is tied into a club knot. Here's the club to kick sinners as
my perished brother tried to kick the Bad Satan from the inside of his
female Madlen with his club of his baston. Some preachers search over
the Word. Some preachers search in the Word. But search under the Word
does preacher Capel Moriah. What's the light I find? A stutterer was
Moses. As the middle of a butter cask were the knees of Paul. A splotch
like a red cabbage leaf was on the cheek of Solomon. By the signs shall
the saints be known. 'Preacher Club Foot, come forward to tell about
Moriah,' the Big Man will say. Mean scamps, remember Essec Pugh, for I
shall remember you the Day of Rising."

It came to be that on a morning in the last month of his thirteenth year
Joseph was bidden to stand at the side of the cow which Madlen was
milking and to give an ear to these commandments: "The serpent is in the
bottom of the glass. The hand on the tavern window is the hand of Satan.
On the Sabbath eve get one penny for two ha'pennies for the plate
collection. Put money in the handkerchief corner. Say to persons you are
a nephew of Respected Essec Pugh and you will have credit. Pick the
white sixpence from the floor and give her to the mishtir; she will have
fallen from his pocket trowis."

Then Joseph turned, and carrying his yellow tin box, he climbed into the
craggy moorland path which takes you to the tramping road. By the pump
of Tavarn Ffos he rested until Shim Carrier came thereby; and while
Shim's horse drank of barley water, Joseph stepped into the wagon; and
at the end of the passage Shim showed him the business of getting a
ticket and that of going into and coming down from a railway carriage.

In that manner did Joseph go to the drapery shop of Rees Jones in
Carmarthen; and at the beginning he was instructed in the keeping and
the selling of such wares as reels of cotton, needles, pins, bootlaces,
mending wool, buttons, and such like--all those things which together
are known as haberdashery. He marked how this and that were done, and in
what sort to fashion his visage and frame his phrases to this or that
woman. His oncoming was rapid. He could measure, cut, and wrap in a
parcel twelve yards of brown or white calico quicker than any one in the
shop, and he understood by rote the folds of linen tablecloths and
bedsheets; and in the town this was said of him: "Shopmen quite
ordinary can sell what a customer wants; Pugh Rees Jones can sell what
nobody wants."

The first year passed happily, and the second year; and in the third
Joseph was stirred to go forward.

"What use to stop here all the life?" he asked himself. "Better to go
off."

He put his belongings in his box and went to Swansea.

"Very busy emporium I am in," were the words he sent to Madlen. "And the
wage is twenty pounds."

Madlen rejoiced at her labor and sang: "Ten acres of land, and a
cow-house with three stalls and a stall for the new calf, and a pigsty,
and a house for my bones and a barn for my hay and straw, and a loft for
my hens: why should men pray for more?" She ambled to Moriah, diverting
passers-by with boastful tales of Joseph, and loosened her imaginings to
the Respected.

"Pounds without number he is earning," she cried. "Rich he'll be.
Swells are youths shop."

"Gifts from the tip of my tongue fell on him," said Essec. "Religious
were my gifts."

"Iss, indeed, the brother of the male husband."

"Now you can afford nine of pounds for the place. Rich he is and richer
he will be. Pounds without number he has."

Madlen made a record of Essec's scheme for Joseph; and she said also:
"Proud I'll be to shout that my son bach bought Penlan."

"Setting aside money am I," Joseph speedily answered.

Again ambition aroused him. "Footling is he that is content with
Zwanssee. Next half-holiday skurshon I'll crib in Cardiff."

Joseph gained his desire, and the chronicle of his doings he sent to his
mother. "Twenty-five, living-in, and spiffs on remnants are the wages,"
he said. "In the flannelette department I am and I have not been fined
once. Lot of English I hear, and we call ladies madam that the wedded
nor the unwedded are insulted. Boys harmless are the eight that sleep by
me. Examine Nuncle of the price of Penlan."

"I will wag my tongue craftily and slowly," Madlen vowed as she crossed
her brother-in-law's threshold.

"I Shire Pembroke land is cheap," she said darkly.

"Look you for a farm there," said Essec. "Pelted with offers am I for
Penlan. Ninety I shall have. Poverty makes me sell very soon."

"As he says."

"Pretty tight is Joseph not to buy her. No care has he for his mam."

"Stiffish are affairs with him, poor dab."

Madlen reported to Joseph that which Essec had said, and she added:
"Awful to leave the land of your father. And auction the cows. Even the
red cow that is a champion for milk. Where shall I go? The House of the
Poor. Horrid that your mam must go to the House of the Poor."

Joseph sat on his bed, writing: "Taken ten pounds from the post I have
which leaves three shillings. Give Nuncle the ten as earnest of my
intention."

Nine years after that day on which he had gone to Carmarthen Joseph said
in his heart: "London shops for experience"; and he caused a frock coat
to be sewn together, and he bought a silk hat and an umbrella, and at
the spring cribbing he walked into a shop in the West End of London,
asking: "Can I see the engager, pleaze?" The engager came to him and
Joseph spoke out: "I have all-round experience. Flannelettes three years
in Niclass, Cardiff, and left on my own accord. Kept the colored dresses
in Tomos, Zwanssee. And served through. Apprentized in Reez Jones
Carmarthen for three years. Refs egzellent. Good ztok-keeper and
appearance."

"Start at nine o'clock Monday morning," the engager replied. "Thirty
pounds a year and spiffs; to live in. You'll be in the laces."

"Fashionable this shop is," Joseph wrote to Madlen, "and I have to be
smart and wear a coat like the preachers, and mustn't take more than
three zwap lines per day or you have the sack. Two white shirts per
week; and the dresses of the showroom young ladies are a treat. Five
pounds enclosed for Nuncle."

"Believe your mam," Madlen answered: "don't throw gravel at the windows
of the old English unless they have the fortunes."

In his zeal for his mother's welfare Joseph was heedless of himself,
eating little of the poor food that was served him, clothing his body
niggardly, and seldom frequenting public bath-houses; his mind spanned
his purpose, choosing the fields he would join to Penlan, counting the
number of cattle that would graze on the land, planning the slate-tiled
house which he would set up.

"Twenty pounds more must I have," he moaned, "for the blaguard Nuncle."

Every day thereafter he stole a little money from his employers and
every night he made peace with God: "Only twenty-five is the wage, and
spiffs don't count because of the fines. Don't you let me be found out,
Big Man bach. Will you strike mam into her grave? And disgrace Respected
Essec Pugh Capel Moriah?"

He did not abate his energies howsoever hard his disease was wasting and
destroying him. The men who lodged in his bedroom grew angry with him.
"How can we sleep with your dam coughing?" they cried. "Why don't you
invest in a second-hand coffin?"

Feared that the women whom he served would complain that the poison of
his sickness was tainting them and that he would be sent away, Joseph
increased his pilferings; where he had stolen a shilling he now stole
two shillings; and when he got five pounds above the sum he needed, he
heaved a deep sigh and said: "Thank you for your favor, God bach. I will
now go home to heal myself."

Madlen took the money to Essec, coming back heavy with grief.

"Hoo-hoo," she whined, "the ninety has bought only the land. Selling the
houses is Essec."

"Wrong there is," said Joseph. "Probe deeply we must."

From their puzzlings Madlen said: "What will you do?"

"Go and charge swindler Moriah."

"Meddle not with him. Strong he is with the Lord."

"Teach him will I to pocket my honest wealth."

Because of his weakness, Joseph did not go to Moriah; to-day he said: "I
will to-morrow," and to-morrow he said: "Certain enough I'll go
to-morrow."

In the twilight of an afternoon he and Madlen sat down, gazing about,
and speaking scantily; and the same thought was with each of them, and
this was the thought: "A tearful prayer will remove the Big Man from His
judgment, but nothing will remove Essec from his purpose."

"Mam fach," said Joseph, "how will things be with you?"

"Sorrow not, soul nice," Madlen entreated her son. "Couple of weeks very
short have I to live."

"As an hour is my space. Who will stand up for you?"

"Hish, now. Hish-hish, my little heart."

Madlen sighed; and at the door she made a great clatter, and the sound
of the clatter was less than the sound of her wailing.

"Mam! Mam!" Joseph shouted. "Don't you scream. Hap you will soften
Nuncle's heart if you say to him that my funeral is close."

Madlen put a mourning gown over her petticoats and a mourning bodice
over her shawls, and she tarried in a field as long as it would take her
to have traveled to Moriah; and in the heat of the sun she returned,
laughing.

"Mistake, mistake," she cried. "The houses are ours. No undertanding was
in me. Cross was your Nuncle. 'Terrible if Joseph is bad with me,' he
said. Man religious and tidy is Essec." Then she prayed that Joseph
would die before her fault was found out.

Joseph did not know what to do for his joy. "Well-well, there's better I
am already," he said. He walked over the land and coveted the land of
his neighbors. "Dwell here for ever I shall," he cried to Madlen. "A
grand house I'll build--almost as grand as the houses of preachers."

In the fifth night he died, and before she began to weep, Madlen lifted
her voice: "There's silly, dear people, to covet houses! Only a smallish
bit of house we want."




IX

LIKE BROTHERS


Silas Bowen hated his brother John, but when he heard of John's
sickness, he reasoned: "Blackish has been his dealings. And trickish.
Sly also. Odd will affairs seem if I don't go to him at once."

At the proper hour he closed the door of his shop. Then he washed his
face, and put beeswax on the dwindling points of his mustache, and he
came out of Barnes into Thornton East; into High Road, where is his
brother's shop.

"That is you," said John to him.

"How was you, man?" Silas asked. "Talk the name of the old malady."

"Say what you have to say in English," John answered in a little voice.
"It is easier and classier."

That which was spoken was rendered into English; and John replied: "I am
pleazed to see you. Take the bowler off your head and don't put her on
the harimonium. The zweat will mark the wood."

"The love of brothers push me here," said Silas. "It is past
understanding. As boyss we learn the same pray-yer. And we talked the
same temperance dialogue in Capel Zion. I was always the temperance one.
And quite a champion reziter. The way is round and about, boy bach, from
Zion to the grave."

"Don't speak like that," pleaded John. "I caught a cold going to the
City to get ztok. I will be healthy by the beginning of the week."

"Be it so. Yet I am full of your trouble. Sick you are and how's trade?"

"Very brisk. I am opening a shop in Richmond again," John said.

"You're learning me something. Don't you think too much of that shop;
Death is near and set your mind on the crossing."

John's lame daughter Ann halted into the room, and stepped up to the
bed.

"Stand by the door for one minit, Silas," John cried. "I am having my
chat confidential."

From a book Ann recited the business of that day; naming each article
that had been sold, and the cost and the profit thereof.

"How's that with last year?" her father commanded.

"Two-fifteen below."

"Fool!" John whispered. "You are a cow, with your gamey leg. You're
ruining the place."

Ann closed the book and put her fountain pen in the leather case which
was pinned to her blouse, and she spoke this greeting: "How are you,
Nuncle Silas. It's long since I've seen you." She thrust out her arched
teeth in a smile. "Good-night, now. You must call and see our Richmond
establishment."

"Silas," said John, "empty a dose of the medecyne in a cup for me."

"There's little comfort in medecyne," Silas observed. "Not much use is
the stuff if the Lord is calling you home. Calling you home. Shall I
read you a piece from the Beybile of the Welsh? It is a great pity you
have forgot the language of your mother."

"I did not hear you," said John. "Don't you trouble to say it over." He
drank the medicine. "Unfortunate was the row about the Mermaid Agency. I
was sorry to take it away from you, but if I hadn't some one else would.
We kept it in the family, Silas."

"I have prayed a lot," said Silas to his brother, "that me and you are
brought together before the day of the death. Nothing can break us from
being brothers."

"You are very doleful. I shall shift this little cold."

"Yes-yes, you will. I would be glad to follow your coffin to Wales and
look into the guard's van at stations where the train stop, but the
fare is big and the shop is without a assistant. Weep until I am sore
all over I shall in Capel Shirland Road. When did the doctor give you
up?"

"He's a donkey. He doesn't know nothing. Here he is once per day and
charging for it. And he only brings his repairs to me."

"The largest charge will be to take you to your blessed home," said
Silas. "The railway need a lot of money for to carry a corpse. I feel
quite sorrowful. In Heaven you'll remember that I was at your deathbed."

John did not answer.

"Well-well," said Silas, whispering loudly, "making his peace with the
Big Man he is"; and he went away, moaning a funereal hymn tune.

John thought over his plight and was distressed, and he spoke to God in
Welsh: "Not fitting that you leave the daughter fach alone. Short in
her leg you made her. There's a set-back. Her mother perished; and did I
complain? An orphan will the pitiful wench be. Who will care for the
shop? And the repairing workman? Steal the leather he will. A fuss will
be about shop Richmond. Paid have I the rent for one year in advance.
Serious will the loss be. Be not of two thinks. Send Lisha to breathe
breathings into my inside--in the belly where the heart is. Forgive me
that I go to the Capel English. Go there I do for the trade. Generous am
I in the collections. Ask the preacher. Take some one else to sit in my
chair in the Palace. Amen. Amen and amen." In his misery he sobbed, and
he would not speak to Ann nor heed her questionings. At the cold of dawn
he thought that Death was creeping down to him, and he screamed: "Allow
me to live for a year--two years--and a grand communion set will I give
to the Welsh capel in Shirland Road. Individual cups. Silver-plated,
Sheffield make. Ann shall send quickly for the price-list."

His fear was such that he would not suffer his beard to be combed, nor
have his face covered by a bedsheet; and he would not stretch himself or
turn his face upwards: in such a manner dead men lie.

Again came Silas to provoke his brother to his death.

"Richmond shops are letting like anything," he said.

"The place is coming on," replied John. "I was lucky to get one in
King's Row. She is cheap too."

"What are you talking about? There's a new boot shop in King's Row
already. Next door to the jeweler."

"You are mistook. I have taken her."

"Well, then, you are cheated. Get up at once and make a case. Wear an
overcoat and ride in the bus."

But John bade Ann go to Richmond and to say this and that to the owner
of the house. Ann went and the house was empty.

A third time Silas came out of Barnes, bringing with him gifts. These
are the gifts that he offered his brother John: a tin of lobster, a tin
of sardines, a tin of salmon, and a tin of herrings; and through each
tin, in an unlikely place, he had driven the point of a gimlet.

"Eat these," he said, "and good they will do you."

"Much obliged," replied John. "I'll try a herring with bread and butter
and vinegar to supper. Very much obliged. It was not my blame that we
quarreled. Others had his eye on the agency."

"Tish, I did not want the old Mermaid. You keep her. I got the sole
agency for the Gwendoline."

"How is Gwendolines going?"

"More than I can do to keep ztok of her. Four dozen gents' laces and
three dozen ladies' ditto on the twenty-fifth, and soon I order another
four dozen ladies' buttons."

John called Ann and to her he said: "How is Mermaid ztok?"

"We are almost out of nine gents and four ladies," answered Ann.

"Write Nuncle Silas the order and he'll drop her in the Zity. Pay your
fare one way will I, Silas."

Silas fled the next day into the Mermaid warehouse and sought out the
manager. "My brother J. Owen and Co. Thornton East has sold his last
pair of Mermaids," he said.

He brought trouble into his eyes and made his voice to quiver as he told
how that John was dying and how that the shop was his brother's legacy
to him. "Send you the goods for this order to my shop in Barnes," he
added. "And all future orders. That will be my headquarters."

He did not go to John's house any more; and although John ate of the
lobster, the herrings, and the sardines and was sick, he did not die. A
week expired and a sound reached him that Silas was selling Mermaid
boots; and he enjoined Ann to test the truth of that sound.

"It's sure enough, dad," Ann said.

John's fury tingled. He put on him his clothes and seized a stick, and
by the strength of his passion he moved into Barnes; and he pitched
himself at the entering in of the shop, and he saw that Ann's speech was
right. He came back; and he did not eat or drink or rest until he had
removed all that was in his window and had placed therein no other boots
than the Mermaids; and on each pair he put a ticket which was truly
marked: "Half cost price." On his door he put this notice: "This FIRM
has no Connection with the shop in Barnes"; and this notice could be
seen and read whether the door was open or shut.

After a period people returned to him, demanding: "I want a pair of
Mermaids, please"; and inasmuch as he had no more to sell, they who had
dealt with him went to the shop of his brother.




X

A WIDOW WOMAN


The Respected Davydd Bern-Davydd spoke in this sort to the people who
were assembled at the Meeting for Prayer: "Well-well, know you all the
order of the service. Grand prayers pray last. Boys ordinary pray
middle, and bad prayers pray first. Boys bach just beginning also come
first. Now, then, after I've read a bit from the Book of Speeches and
you've sung the hymn I call out, Josi Mali will report."

Bern-Davydd ceased his reading, and while the congregation sang, Josi
placed his arms on the sill which is in front of pews and laid his head
thereon.

"Josi Mali, man, come to the Big Seat and mouth what you think," said
Bern-Davydd.

Josi's mother Mali touched her son, whispering this counsel: "Put to
shame the last prayer, indeed now, Josi."

By and by Josi lifted his head and stood on his feet. This is what he
said: "Asking was I if I was religious enough to spout in the company of
the Respected."

"Out of the necks of young youths we hear pieces that are very
sensible," said Bern-Davydd. "Come you, Josi Mali, to the saintly Big
Seat."

As Josi moved out of his pew, his thick lips fallen apart and his high
cheek bones scarlet, his mother said: "Keep your eyes clapped very
close, or hap the prayers will shout that you spoke from a hidden book
like an old parson."

So Josi, who in the fields and on his bed had exercised prayer in the
manner that one exercises singing, uttered his first petition in Capel
Sion. He told the Big Man to pardon the weakness of his words, because
the trousers of manhood had not been long upon him; he named those who
entered the Tavern and those who ate bread which had been swollen by
barm; he congratulated God that Bern-Davydd ruled over Sion.

At what time he was done, Bern-Davydd cried out: "Amen. Solemn, dear me,
amen. Piece quite tidy of prayer"; and the men of the Big Seat cried:
"Piece quite tidy of prayer."

The quality of Josi's prayers gave much pleasure in Sion, and it was
noised abroad even in Morfa, from whence a man journeyed, saying: "Break
your hire with your master and be a servant in my farm. Wanting a prayer