The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1894-09-23
DEACON GOzZLE's LITTLE STORY
About How the Church Debt was Lifted
by q Mysterious Stranger,

you know said Deacon Gozzle, I'D often
heard OF men going away from their native viii
lage 10 the city and getting rich. and finally
coming back to settle and building n fine house,
or building a house and coming there to spend
their nine or giving the town a library. or
building a new church or a school house, or do
ing something good that showed that their heart
was in the old town. But the queerest thing OF
that sort ! ever heard OF happened in my town,
and II happened in the church that | belonged to.
There came TO our church one Sunday a
stranger, just an ordinary looking stranger In
good Sunday clothes, and we put him as we
always did strangers in as good a seat as we had,
which happened to be in this case the best seat
In the middle aisle, a fact for which we were
afterward very grateful. We didn't observe
anything very remarkable about this man, he
listened To the sermon, and stood up with the
rest when they sung, and when the plate was
passed he dropped In a bill. That was Kind o.
remarkable, but not so dreadful remarkable for
folks sometimes did put bills In the plate in our
church. But when We came to straighten out
the collection and count II, which we always did
after meeting, we did encounter the most re-
markable thing that had ever happened in that
church; the bill that the stranger had put in
folded Up so small and quiet was a thousand
We'll, il there'd been an earthquake in the
Town there couldn't any more people have heard
or II, nor any quicker, and everybody wondered
who he was. He was stopping at the hotel and
keeping very quiet. and next day he went away,
and then every body wondered II he'd ever come
back. He did the next Sunday, and he went 10
church, and he dropped another bill in the plate
when 1t got TO him, folded up small, Just like the
other. IL was another thousand.
Then there was excitement. The man went
away the next morning Just the same, but he
thousand, and he kept coming and going IN
that way until he'd put in nine thOusand-dnlla
olllss win The excitement growing all the time,
ooo Ihere was a mortgage on the church OF $IO,-
got II into their heads that the stranger WAS
paying oil this mortgage, and everybody was
very gian OF II. IL wasn't a poor town, BY ann
means, but IL was a farming town, where cash
Masn't oysrplentiful and $4,000 seemed like a
great deal OF m~oney-which II was and this
man Was paying IL, or everybody thought ne
Was, and when IL came 10 the next SUNDAY tha
tenth sunday, which everybody sort OF felt WAS
going 70 Dc the last one. and the one that would
tel who the stranger was, YOU COULDN'T get into
the church, But We managed 20 make room for
him when he came, and he did come, and We
gave MN the identical pew he sat In the first
sunday. Well. when the plate came around ne
Ky, M M 1nother. He'd done it-he'd paid the
After that he didn't keep himself ouita Al
quiet he MAS around the village more. and drst
one and then another recognized him. aud then
eVery body that was old enough wondered maj
everybody hadn't recognized Rim from tba bS
ginning. He was born and raised there and had
gone away when he WAS q young man o. tNsnfv
70 make his fortune, and he'd made IL not In
Slttes opt out on the plains raising cattle, and
didn't look like a cowboy when became back; hs
looked lust like anybody and acted 90.
ne did AAy aftersArd that paying the church
asot "a more fun than he'd ever Struck In his
ssSsi Psakins; bat hi heart Tn sure " !
A4 m-L II