Let us hold ourselves then as souls upon whom a great charge is laid." When he had ended and knelt again to pray Maggie felt instantly the inevitable reaction.

The harmonium quavered and rumbled over the first bars of some hymn which began with the words, "Cry, sinner, cry before the altar of the Lord," the man with the brown, creaking boots walked about with a collection plate, an odour of gas-pipes, badly heated, penetrated the building, the rain lashed the grey window-panes.

Maggie, looking about her, could not see in the pale, tired faces of the women who surrounded her the ardent souls of a glorious band.

Their belief in the coming of God had, it seemed, done very little for them.

It might be true that the history of the soul was of more importance than the history of the body, but common sense had something to say.
Her mind went back inevitably to St.Dreot's church, her father, Ellen the cook.