The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1903-09-25

There was a strange incongruity In
the two, and an unconscious challenge
as well.
All next day, which was Saturday,
and, indeed, during the following
week, stood guard over my notice, en-
joying the excitement it produced and
the comments it called forth. 1t was
the advance wave of the great ocean
of civilization which many of them
had been glad to leave behind-some
could have wished forever.
To Robert Muir, one of the farmers
newly arrived, the notice was a har-
binger of good. 1t stood for progress,
markets and a higher price for land,
albeit he wondered "hoo he wad be
kept up" But his hard wrought,
quick spoken little wife at his elbow
"hooted" his scruples and, thinking of
her growing lads, welcomed with I'M
mixed satisfaction the coming of "the
meenister." Her satisfaction was
shared by all the mothers and most of
the fathers in the settlement, but by
the others, and especially by that roll
licking, roistering crew. the Company
coming was viewed with varying de-
grees of animosity. 1t meant a limita-
ton of freedom in their wildly reck-
less living. The permit nights would
now, to say the least, be subject to
criticism; the Sunday wolf hunts and
horse races, with their attendant de-
lights, would now be pursued under the
eye of the church, and this would not
add to the enjoyment of them. One
great charm of the country, which
Bruce, himself the son of an Edinburgh
minister and now secretary of the No
bic Seven, described as letting a fell
low do as he BANKED pleased" would |
be gone. None resented more bitterly |
than he the missionary's intrusion, |
which he declared to be an attempt |
"to reimpose upon their freedom the |
trammels of an Anticipated and bigoted |
conventionality." But the rest of the
Company, while not taking so decided
stand, were agreed that the estab-
lishment of a church institution was
an Objectionable and impertinent as
well as unnecessary proceeding.
OF course Hi Kendall and his friend
Bronco Bill had no opinion one way
or the other. The church could hardly
affect them even remotely. A dozen
years stay in Montana had proved
with sufficient clearness to them that
a church was a luxury of civilization
the west might we'll do without.
Outside the Company of the Noble
Seven there was only one whose opin-
ion had value in Swan Greek, and that
was the Old Timer. The Company had
sought to bring him in by making him
an honorary member, but he refused
TO be drawn from his home far up
among the hills, where he lived with
his little girl Gwen and her old half
breed nurse, Ponka. The approach of
the church he seemed to resent as a
personal injury. 1t represented to him
that civilization from which he had
fed fifteen years ago with his wife
and baby girl, and when, five years
alter. he laid his wife in the lonely
crave that could be seen on the shaded
knoll just fronting his cabin door the
asst link to his past was broken. From
Ill that suggested the great world be-
-ond the run of the prairie he shrank
Is one shrinks from a sudden touch
ipon an old wound.
81 guess I'll have TO move back" he
aid to me gloomily. I
'Why?" l said in surprise, thinking :
f his grazing range, which was ample 5
or his herd. ]
"This blank sky Pilot" He never
wore except when unusually moved. I
"Sky Pilot?' l inquired.
He nodded and silently pointed to the 1
office. I
AOh, well. he won't hurt you. will =
eT' Z
Cant stand It," he answered savage c
=; must get away"
"What about GwenT 1 ventured, c