They have candles burnin', and a big brass cross.

Rags of Popery,--they all belong to the Scarlet Woman, I tell you! But she's a backslider even from that, fer they have some truth; she's a child of the Evil One, with her unbelief!" This was more than Alfaretta could bear.

"Indeed, pa," she cried, "you don't know how good she is, or you wouldn't be sayin' that! Look how she's slaved this winter fer the families that 'a' been in trouble, havin' no work!" "'Tain't what she's done, Alfaretta," said her father solemnly; "works without faith is of no avail.

What says the Scripture?
'A man is justified by faith' (by faith, Alfaretta!) 'without the deeds of the law.' And what says the confession ?" Alfaretta, by force of habit, began to stumble through the answer: "'We cannot by our best works merit pardon of sin, or eternal life at the hand--at the hand--of God, by reason of'"-- Here her memory failed her.
"Well," her father said impatiently, "can't you remember the rest?
'Works done by unregenerate men are sinful, and cannot please God,' you know.
Go on." But Alfaretta could not go on, and the elder would not betray his own lack of memory by attempting to quote.
"So you see," he continued, "it isn't any use to talk of how good and kind she is, or what she does; it is what she believes that will settle her eternal salvation." But Alfaretta was unconvinced.

"Well, sir," she said stubbornly, "it don't seem to me that way, fer she's the best woman, except mother, I ever saw.