Mrs. Conway replied: "I think I do, Jacob, and I think he speaks the truth. The godlessness of Rising Branch is a matter of remark even now; there has never been a church nearer to it than the one at Craggy Hill"

"That is three miles away," interrupted Eurilda. Mrs. Conway finished, and a greater activity in our village life without some restraining, or rather guiding, force may be no desirable boon.”

"Mr. Sarcott never wanted a church here," said Eurilda.

He won't sell any land for one now, I'll bet," added Jake.

Mrs. Conway cast a look of reproof at the careless boy, who tried to turn it aside with: "Oh, I forgot again, mother."

His mother noticed the slang no further, but said: "People dislike the presence of standing rebukes to their ways of life, children."

Both Jake and his sister looked doubtful about the meaning of this remark, but their mother ventured no explanation.

In the meantime Uncle Joe Sales had reached the village store, in front of which he again hitched his horse and dismounted. Rising Branch village, to distinguish it from the neighborhood which bore the same name, was generally called the "village." It stood on a rise of land that sloped toward the stream before spoken of. The road crossed the stream again beyond the village by a bridge similar to that over which Uncle Joe had come.

At this point the railroad from Hanaford was to touch Rising Branch, and was to follow the course of

A store, a

the stream down the valley to Carterville. blacksmith shop, and a half-dozen houses formed the nucleus around which was to grow a "big town" when the railroad came.

A general air of listlessness pervaded the place; the blacksmith shop was closed and the smith himself, a burly fellow in blue overalls, and with a great quid of tobacco in his mouth, sat on an empty sugar barrel in front of the store, eyeing the movements of Uncle Joe.

The latter paid back his nod of recognition with: "How d' ye do, Robert? Out o' work to-day?"

"Yes," said the smith, "I am out o' the old shop for awhile, too. I'm goin' onto the road Monday. When we get the old smoker through here I won't have ter lay idle more nor half my time." The smith spoke this in a drawling tone that suggested that his compulsory idleness was not a grievous yoke.

Uncle Joe replied: "I hope not, Robert; I hope not."

"Wish he'd call me Bob. I don't want to be Roberted," growled the smith to the storekeeper, who had come to the door.

But Uncle Joe was too far away to hear. He had not entered the store, but was walking rapidly toward a large, white house: the finest one in the village.

ARTHUR C. PIERSON.

EDITORIAL.

BY

CURRENT COMMENT.

Y whomsoever arranged, and for whatever purpose (and this may be effectually concealed in the maze of professional lying called diplomacy), the spirited sparring-match — without gloves-between the European light-weights, Servia and Bulgaria, has served to fix the eyes of the world once more upon the center and pivot about which European international politics has revolved for many years-Constantinople. They who suppose that Herat and her rugged mountain gateway are the real objects of Russian ambition, have forgotten the history of a thousand years; nor do they take account of those traditionary forces and hereditary tendencies which set in motion historic currents as powerful and persistent as the Gulf Stream. National, as well as individual, life is directed chiefly by these antecedent currents, and the independent estimate of ends and choosing of objects can change them only by one. degree on the circle of the compass in a generation. But could you demonstrate to Russia that India, and not Turkey, is the great prize of the stupendous forthcoming European International Heavy-weight Worldchampionship Mill, still Russia knows that Constantinople, and not Cabul, is the gate of India. Of what avail to England would it be to hold the key to those outer gateways, Gibraltar and Cabul-simply the stormdoors of the great oriental treasure-house-if Russia were already in the vestibule ?

However, the scene, the nature and the result of this impending conflict are not to be determined so much by these remote prizes and politic considerations as by those traditionary sentiments and tendencies already mentioned. These sentiments are both political and religious, and in parallel currents are bearing the Russian ship of state inevitably towards Constantinople. The political tendency may be traced through all the monarchies of continental Europe in the effort to revive the form and spirit of Roman Imperialism. Cæsarism crops out not only in the titles, Czar, Kaiser and Imperator, but also in the senseless militarism and predatory spirit everywhere found. There goes along with this the instinctive conviction that Imperialism will flourish best in its ancient seat. The same conviction with respect to Ecclesiastical Imperialism accounts for the stubborn tenacity with which the Catholic Church has clung to Rome. It was this sentiment that compelled every would-be Cæsar, from Charlemagne to Napoleon, to lead his legions into Italy and crown himself at Rome; and it was the same sentiment that aroused the jealous Pope to see to it that these fledgling Cæsars did not find a seat in Rome. Somewhere thereabouts was to be found the meat on which if these same Cæsars should feed they would become too great. Despairing of ever being able to impersonate Imperalism undisturbed in its proudest and most ancient seat, Napoleon, actuated by this universal fetich of locality, sought to reach that seat of ancient empire second in splendor and sanctity-Constantinople. Failing by way of Egypt, he sought it by way of Russia, if there is ever to be found any key to the riddle of that disastrous Moscow march. What possible ground of

quarrel could Napoleon have with Russia except that he wanted Constantinople? And why should Russia care whether Turk or Gaul was seated on the Golden Horn? It was not so much a question of nationality as of title. There was a great gap between Sultan and Cæsar. When the time should come for the Sublime Porte to give place to the Imperator of sublime port-that ancient and original lord of the manor-he must come in the person of the legitimate heir, the Slav. This sentiment will as surely lead some Czar to the Bosporus as it has led Western Cæsars to the Tiber.

The religious sentiment connecting title and authority with locality and ancient inheritance is still stronger, as we have seen, in the case of the Roman Catholic Church. The Holy Seat may be transferred, but the sanctity remains. Paul preached and Peter perished (traditionally) at Rome-not at London, or Paris, or Avignon. Here, if anywhere, that system of religion which makes so much of places and pilgrimages, must flourish.

Now, all that Rome is to Catholicism, Constantinople is to the Greek Church. The ancient and original seat of ecclesiastical empire, she is the center towards which all religious currents set. From Russia, at least, all roads of political and ecclesiastical ambition lead to Constantinople, and as soon as the ancient highways are sufficiently cleared of the medieval robbers which Western Christendom has defended in consideration of a share of their plunder, we shall see Czar and Patriarch hastening back to the old thrones to revive their old splendors and their old jealousies and quarrels. This may come soon, or later, but come it must, and will open the next real chapter of European history.