The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-10-04
M GORGE ELIOT

community by not only announcing that he was one--which might have been forgiven--but by acting like one.
 He assailed the standards of proper society by declining to wear neck cloth and dressing like workingman. He outraged all business principles by declining any longer to live on the income derived by his mother from the sale of her late husbands Cancer Cure and Famous Restorative Elixir and Pills, because. he asserted, after his i've years study of medicine he had learned enough to know that they were worse than useless. Scarcely had he struck this blow at the founda- tions of commerce before the dumb founded people of Little Treby learned that instead of following the genteel profession of medicine he proposed to earn his living with his hands at watchmaking.
 His moth CT called on all the neigh bors to witness that her husband had possessed a wonderful gift of prayer, and that his life had been that of blameless Christian, proving decislve- ly that the medicines were on a good religious basis and approved of In principle by the Bible itself, though not specifically mentioned In the Sacred Book.
 Finding her son Felix impervioAs to her arguments, she sought the counsel of the Rev. Mir. Lyon, minister of the Independent Chapel of DisE enters. MT. Lyon groaned when he heard her voice dn the passage of his little house--a house not quite so good as the parish clerks. but considered quite sufficient for a Dissenting Minister. "She darken- eth counsel by words without knowl- edge" groaned he, rand angers the reason of the natural man. Lord, give me patience T know that my sins are heavier for Thee to bear than this fwoman's folly"
 The little, odd-looking. rusty old man listened to her patiently, and then invited Felix to call on him. The young man vent prepared to hear Pharisaical doctrine clothing cunning worldly advice in Biblical words; in- stead, the large brown eyes of the little minister kindled when Felix said; T know that the elixir is an absurd farrago, that the pills may be as bad as poison to half the people who swal- low them and that the cancer cure might as we'll be bottled ditch water. If I allowed the sale of these medi- cines to go on, and my mother to live out of the proceeds, when l can keep her by the labor of my hands, I've not the least doubt that should be a rascal"
 MrALyon shook hands with the young
  agreed with him, too, in his decision to undertake manual labor and to be- come a wofktngman@ in order to be really able to help them by sharing their lot.
 The views of Felix Holt and Mir. Lyon were not shared by the young woman who entered the room while minister introduced as his daughter Esther. Esther was not the type that one would expect to find In a dissent ing preach her's humble household. A delicate scent, faintly suggesting the perfume of a garden, was waited dS she entered. Felix had the sense of an elastic walk, the tread of small feet, long. beautiful neck and a high chown of shining brown plaits. with curls that floated backward-al things that suggested a fine lady to him. fine lady was always offen- sive to the young radical; as daugh- ter of this rusty old Puritan, she was so incongruous as to be almost hate ful.
 Esther. for her part. bowed indifrsr- ently. She glanced at Felix and thought him a most peculiar person; but even while she noticed his lack of waistcoat and cravat she noticed, too, that he was not insignificant. Shaggy headed. gtrong-limbed, with large. clear gray eyes and firm lips. he was striking, though rough.
 When she sat down she dropped a book. Felix picked it up. "Byron's poems?' said he disgustedly. What! Do you stun your memory with Byron, Miss Lyon? suppose you admire Childe Harold and other gentlemen like him. full of unspeakable woes, who employ hairdressers and look at them-A selves in glasses"
 kr 1. .trra R1, lnA Axe. like way, with refined sauciness and sarcasm. She hardly knew whether to resent or despise the words of this uncouth giant who lacked all grace and charm and tact and seemed to prefer what was unusual and ugly.
 "A peacock" thought Felix when he left. q should like to come and scold her every day, and make her cry, and cut her fine hair of"
 MT, Lyon's congregation did not like Esther any more than Felix did, or thought he did. She had been educat- ed In France and had accomplishments that struck the strict dissenters as be- ing altogether unsafe for her rank. The richer church people were glad enough to engage her to teach their daughters, but for all that their imag- nations were prostrated by the in- congruity between weekly prayer meetings and conversance with so worldly a language as the French.
 In return she despised their imper- feet English, their vulgarity, their mar rowness and their tasteless garments She spent all her earnings on gloves Sh oes and hosiery. She was proud that the best-born and handsomest girls at school had always said that she might be taken for a born lady. Her pretty instep, clad in a silk stocking, her It, tie heel just rising from a kid slipper. her irreproachable nails and delicate wrist were objects of delighted con- sciousness with her. She felt that 1t able to use without disgust any but the finest cambrio handk erchiefs and freshest gloves.
 Mir. Lyon loved and admired this un- reBenerate child more, he feared, than was consistent with due preponderance Of impersonal and ministerial regards. He prayed for her with tears in his study, humbling himself for her spirit ual deficiencies. and then came down stairs to fall into timorous subjection to her wishes. Thus in his dInEy house there was light-footed, sweet-voiced Queen Esther.
 She loved him and recognized the purity of his character and the quick ness of his intellect, in spite of what seemed dreary ptety that selected ev- erything that was least interesting and romantic in life and history. But his old clothes had a smoky odor and she did not like to walk with him. because habit of pouring forth some reflections about the traces of Divine government or about a peculiar incident narrated fin tha life of some faInous dissantar