Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1891-06-26
HOW THE CHURCH WAS BUILT
At KEHOES BAR.

Dut WHICH, udlt llOl Dt lllCls
There were two hundred women at Ke-
hoes Bar-and such women!-of them the
least said, soonest forgiven
In usual communities the better half
looks askance at the worse, fears shoulders
and condemns.
But things were different at Kehoe's.
The rough, bluff and tough little Sodom
never had better half, but brawled and
cursed within itself, and grubbed and
fought the gritty sands without year after
year, in all the pristine wickedness of its
baCheorhOod of vice.
There was no church at Kehoe's Bar
Nomeeting- house but "Purselrs chapel
-mning-town sarcasm, that-Purselr 5,
where none but heather gods might claim
their devotees drunken Bacchus, tinseled
Venus, and a blear-eyed god of war, to
end the drunken orgies of the waning
night and add one more sunken spot to the
struggling row on the hill beyond the bar
And there was no church at kehOe's.
A tall, spare man, with deeply earnest
eyes and long black coat had once stern
" denounced the sins of the kehOites,
right under their sharp or ruby noses, as
the case might be, and in their wOltish
faces had warned the yelling citizens of
the wrath to come, and to flee while yet
there was time.
Punishment condign had no fears for
them. They tlOuted him and secuted him.
They laughed the gray-haired man to scOrn,
and drove him from the town with curses.
The vigilance committee cut off the
tails of his long black coat, daubed him
with mud, and warned him with worse.
Bewildered and bruised, he went away.
Bacchus, Venus and Mars resumed their
mutual sway, and Kehoe's was its stray
Cling, wolfsh self once more.
Yet here again 1.-THE diggins' were in an
uproar and dumfounded with sheer amaze.
Another gospel sharp had dared show
himself at Kehoes.
And, what was more and 'tarnally wuss,
between the pines, by Purselrs, Tapped
and tautened broad, white sheet announc-
ing in bold capitals religious service there
that evening.
They all came down to see the fun. Tall
stumpy, fat and hungry. Grim in their
likeness to the wilderness from which they
tore their livelihood Fearless and con-
temptuous alike of God, or man, or devil
A swearing, roaring mob, stained with clay,
tobacco, rum and sin-the last thicker and
more palpable than all the rest.
Across the stumps was nailed plank,
and upon this whip-sawed platform before
them stood the gospel sharp young
slender, steady-eyed, his yellow hair thrown
carelessly back.
A short blue coat and flannel shirt, a
belt and faded trOusers-a disappearing
growl showed how unwillingly the crowd
were baked of their expected ridicule of
dingy sacredotal sable and long cloth tails.
There was moment or so of anticipate
ba L Il,
missionary gagged the homogeneously mot
ley crowd; then turned upon the hanging
sign and read, in silent emphasis of its dec
laration; then turned calmly to the elbow
ing crowd. A pair of hands rested care
lessy upon flexible hips. The silence was
complete. He spoke, low but firmly:
81 have come to build church at Ke-
hoes Bari
No minstrel premier ever more convused
an apprecative audience with comic yarn.
Such screams of laughter and hoarse
whoops of mirth. OF all ridiculous things
they had dreamed, this was the richest. A
church at KehOe's! Kehoes children roared
amain. Out of it all arose a clear tenor
voice. With untiinching grace and earnest
smile, the young minister was singing,
singing until the wild, derisive howl died
down through exhaustion and they listened
again. This was a novelty. Sweet and
strong rang out the young, clear voice.
The urslne crowd almost forgot they came
to revile, in the unexpected
''Sweet by-and-by'' was new song to
them, and good voice precious rarity in
their bacchanals; but Sweet and 'beau-
tiful' were too effeminate words for the
crude vocabulary of Kehoes Bar. They
struck no sympathetic chord. The shy
and-by' had no sweets for those warped
natures-their sieved, Graded, greed-wash-
ed, blood-splashed shores were all but
''beautiful, and the murmur of adverse in
tent bubbled up anew. The singer paused
a moment, irresOute, his eyes wandering
above the passion tossed human waves
before and around him, with their irOnical
murmurs, aggressive front and nervous
movement. He had thought to speak but
words failed him, now, at his need.
Stretching out his hand almost appealing
ly, the silence became as that before a
storm.
He gazed out over the muddy stream into
the last radiance of the dying day lighting
his pleading face and golden hair, and sung
with thrill of yearning that wondrous
prayer-sOng:
Jesus, lover of my soul
Let M To thy bosom ty
While the nearer waters roll,
While the tempest still is nigh"
There was sharp, agonized cry in the
crowd-a struggle fight-nO-an hercu-
lean gold-washer, wild and unkempt, wrench
ed his way through the swaying mob, and,
leaping to the plank, almost savagely
cutched the singer by the shoulders
"Them's the words-sing them there
agin-'while them nearer waters rolls
sing 'em aginr'
With startled fervOr and deeper ire
NOR of feeling that rung of victory, out
quivered the pleading words:
Jesus, lover of my soul.
Let me TO thy bosom fly
While the nearer waters roll"
"Them's it!-Stop right wher ye is, par
son-'while them nearer waters rollsr-
I've got suthin' ter say. Boys, We all
knowed Dick Norcott?" A strang new
light was in the miners wolfsh eyes. A
stir breathed assent from the crowd, breath
less, vOiceless, to hear what all this meant.
For well they knew Dick Norcott-or
had known-young, quiet and strange when
he came among them, his life-hope killed
by mistake that was not crime. Abused,
brow-beaten, bullied, cursed and threaten
ed daily, uncomplainingly and ever I'M
fiinchingly he had worked steadily at his
claim, day in, day out, while the year ran,
under the bitter stigma of cOwardice, for
with one horrible memory ground into his
soul, he refused for all to fight-and be-