'Julia was late to-day, as usual. Poor dear Julia, what a generous soul she is!'

Scidmore began to fidget. 'Late? How did that happen? She left our office long before ten o'clock.'

'Oh, but you don't know Julia! She did a thousand and one things before she arrived here. And such a disheveled creature as she was! And so full of apologies and troubles! Nothing to speak of - she laughed them all away in five minutes.'

"Then she did n't tell

'About the insurance? I should say she did. She was so worried for fear you'd be distressed about it all. She admitted that she was to blame. But she knows how conscientious you are, and she was afraid -'

Scidmore impatiently interrupted his wife. Julia Norris ought to have some business sense, Kitty; upon my word she should. And it has worried me. A woman like that one never can be sure of just what she does think. It's an even chance that deep down she believes that she delivered the message to me, and that I neglected it.'

He could feel his face flushing with mingled indignation and disapproval as he voiced his displeasure.

Kitty got up to pour a glass of water. 'Why, John,' she half chided, 'I'm sure Julia would n't be guilty of such a thought. You don't know her-generous - impulsive. Why, she'd forgive you for neglecting, if you really had neglected anything. As a matter of fact she said very decidedly, "If I'd been dealing with anybody but John Scidmore, I do believe I'd be inconsistent enough to try to blame the other fellow, but of course I know

'Yes,' he broke in excitedly, 'that 's just it. That's the way she puts it, to you. But such a remark as that just bears out what I say - she's not altogether satisfied. I know what she

thinks; I saw it in her face this morning- this is what comes of trying to help one's poor friends.'

His wife stopped pouring water and laid down the pitcher. 'Nonsense. Julia Norris has perfect faith in you.'

'Why should she have?' he persisted hotly. 'Is n't it just as possible for me to forget, to overlook a telephone message, as the other fellow? I'm not infallible any more than she is.'

'No,' Kitty returned very quietly. 'I don't think she imagines that you are infallible. But she knows that if you took her message and forgot it, you'd admit it.'

He rallied from this blow with a feeling of fierce antagonism. 'Well,' he sneered sarcastically. 'If she's silly enough to have any such notions, she does need a guardian! As a matter of fact, I'd conceal my mistakes as quickly as any one else would.'

Kitty began to laugh, a full-throated. indulgent laugh, that made him bite his lips. 'What a lot of foolish brag you're indulging in, Johnny Scidmore. Well, after all, let's forget about it; Julia herself laughed it off.'

He crumpled the napkin in his hand. 'Yes, that's just it. She can laugh over it, while we why, if we lost ten thousand it would be a tragedy. I could n't help thinking to-day after she'd left the office, suppose, just suppose, I had received Julia Norris's 'phone message - and forgotten it. The very thought made me sick all over.'

He paused, frightened at the lengths to which his uneasiness had forced him. His wife's smile gave way to a puzzled look as she returned very quietly, —

'Do you really think it worth while to face these imaginary situations?'

His resentment flared again at the comfortable evenness of her tone. 'Yes, I do,' he snapped back. 'It helps one to exercise one's morals. I wanted to know just how I would act in such

an emergency. And I've found out. The very thought frightens me too much. I know that I should feel morally bound to confess, but I'd never have the courage of my convictions. Now, what do you suppose you would advise me to do in a situation like that? What would you tell me to do?'

Kitty Scidmore looked straight at her husband. He dropped his eyes.

'I would not advise you, John,' she said, distinctly.

He glanced up at her. 'You'd not say a word?'

She shook her head. 'No, it would n't be necessary.'

He began to stir his tea. His hand was shaking, and his spoon rattled noisily against the teacup.

VI

After he had helped Kitty with the dishes, John Scidmore left the house for a walk. It was a calm, beautiful night, lit by a slender moon hung high in the heavens and stars twinkling cheerily. As he went along the elm-shaded streets, he drew in deep breaths, striving to steady the tumult within him. Kitty's words hummed themselves into his inner consciousness. 'No, John, it would n't be necessary.' What did she really mean? Did she think he had the courage to settle such a question decisively- righteously? Did He stopped, turning the phrase over in his mind. He knew that materially he had been a failure. People called him a nice fellow and let it go at that. Was it possible for his wife, the wife who had lived so close to all his weaknesses, to glorify him with so large a hope? The thought began to thrill him.

He heard the Old Library clock on the University campus chime nine.

He began to walk slowly in the direction of the chiming clock. He was still undecided, still battling with his cow

ardice. The shrill whistle of an incoming train arrested him. This same train would swing back to San Francisco in ten minutes. He retraced his steps. In ten minutes-His legs seemed weighted. He wondered whether he would really catch it.

Standing before the massive façade of the Hotel Fairmont, John Scidmore had a fleeting hope that Julia Norris would not be at home. But almost as instantly he felt a desperate need to clear himself at once. If he waited even an hour he could not vouch for the outcome. He walked rapidly into the lobby, gaye his name to the hotel clerk, and awaited the reply with beating heart. Mrs. Norris was in. A bell-boy, answering the clerk's summons, showed him to her apartments.

A maid ushered him into a reception room. He sank into one of the luxurious chairs, drumming upon its arms with nervous fingers.

A lamp on the centre table threw a rich, golden light over the surroundings. Thrown over a chair a lace scarf fell with the undulating softness of a cascade. Near a vase of blood-red roses a long white glove had been dropped carelessly.

He did not wait long. Julia Norris came toward him with her usual warm smile, and a hand outstretched in welcome. He stood up. She was very simply dressed, in white, and a band of velvet at her throat set off a fine cameo ringed with pearls, but her air of quiet elegance caught and held his resentful eyes. A fierce, unreasoning hate began to sway him; for a moment his vision blurred.

As she stepped back to pick up her lace scarf from the chair, John Scidmore recovered his poise.

'I was afraid you would be out,' he began inadequately.

She threw the scarf about her shoul

ders. 'I was preparing to drift downstairs to watch the dancing,' she answered. 'You caught me just in time.'

He stood irresolutely, almost awkwardly, watching her dainty manipulations of the filmy lace. Then quite suddenly, so suddenly as to surprise even himself, he blurted out,

'I lied to you this morning. I took your order for insurance. I forgot to place it.'

She stood for a moment in silence. 'What made you —'

John Scidmore shrugged. His vision was clearing. He felt quite calm. 'You suggested the idea yourself. You were so ready to take the blame. I suppose it was self-preservation. I began to strike blindly as any desperate man would. I'm not what they call a success I never have been. You know how it is, some people- Oh, well! Some of us don't get by, that's all.'

He turned away. Julia Norris touched him on the shoulder. 'John, can't you see that the ten thousand dollars does n't matter to me? But you and Kitty - you and Kitty do matter.'

He began to crush his hat between his clasped hands.

She threw the scarf from her shoulders. 'Look here, John —'

He stopped her with an abrupt gesture. 'I've won this victory for Kitty's sake,' he said. "This is the first time in my life I've lived up to her hope of me. If you were a failure you'd realize how much that means.'

She was standing by the vase of roses, scattering petals with ruthless fingers. She crossed over to him and put both her hands in his.

VII

As John Scidmore rode home he felt desperately tired. He never remembered a day that had seemed longer.

He dragged up the elm-shaded street, down which he had whistled his confident way twelve hours before, a shuffling, ineffectual figure. As he opened the front door his hand shook.

He lingered in the hall, hanging his hat with unnecessary care, twisting his necktie into shape, smoothing the thin wisps of hair about his temples.

He found Kitty in the living-room. A tiny fire crackled in the grate. Standing in the doorway he watched the needle which Kitty deftly plied slipping about its task with fascinating gleams. Her face was happily flushed and she was humming softly to herself. The elegant memory of Julia Norris rose before him. He saw again the golden shower of light from the huge tablelamp, the vase of American Beauty roses, the lace scarf thrown carelessly across a brocade chair. He pressed his lips together and entered the room.

Kitty looked up. He stopped short. 'Something new?' he ventured.

She gave a little laugh. 'New? I should say not. Just freshening up a bit for to-morrow.'

"To-morrow?' he echoed dully. 'What's on for to-morrow?'

'Guest day at the club. Mrs. Wiley has asked me to pour tea. What kept you out so late, Johnny?'

He crossed over to the fire, pulling his easy chair into place. 'I went over to the city to see Julia Norris.'

He stood a moment, undecided, his

The rose-petals were dropping in a steady shower upon the table. He saw them lying lightly on the white glove. He felt a great relief as he put his clenched hand to his eyes.

on the chair. He was waiting for Kitty to question him. Finding that she did not answer, he turned and looked at her. She was intent on her sewing, but he fancied that the flush of happiness suddenly had fled her cheeks.

'I went over to see Julia Norris,' he repeated desperately. 'You said your advice would n't be necessary."

He sank into a chair. Across the room he heard the monotonous ticking of a clock.

He was wondering what Kitty would say.

Of course she understood; the whiteness of her face told him that her feminine intuition had bridged the gaps in his explanation. He began to have a terror lest she would come up to him, or speak-perhaps even weep. The fire in the grate flared up suddenly, turned faintly blue, and died. Still Kitty said nothing; still the clock ticked rhythmically.

He leaned back, closed his eyes, and drew a long breath. Kitty was stirring. She came over and dropped gently before the fire, leaning her head against him.

'I forgot to tell you,' she said slowly. 'I asked Julia Norris over for Sunday dinner. She's so awfully stuffed up in that horrible hotel.'

Her bravery smote him more than tears could have. He did not answer, but he just put out his hand and touched her hair caressingly, as she finished,

'It's very grand, I know, and all that. But, after all, it is n't home, Johnny, is it?'

I

THE Oriental I have in mind is the Semite, the dweller of the Near East, who, chiefly through the Bible, has exerted an immense influence on the life and literature of the West. The son of the Near East is more emotional, more intense, and more communicative than his Far-Eastern neighbors. Although very old in point of time, his temperament remains somewhat juvenile, and his manner of speech intimate and unreserved.

From the remote past, even to this day, the Oriental's manner of speech has been that of a worshiper, and not that of a business man or an industrial worker in the modern Western sense. To the Syrian of to-day, as to his an

cient ancestors, life, with all its activities and cares, revolves around a religious centre.

Of course this does not mean that his religion has not always been beset with clannish limitations and clouded by superstitions, or that the Oriental has always had a clear, active consciousness of the sanctity of human life. But it does mean that this man, serene or wrathful, at work or at play, praying or swearing, has never failed to believe that he is overshadowed by the All-seeing God. He has never ceased to cry, 'O Lord, Thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising; Thou understandest my thought afar off. Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me. Such know

And it is one of the grandest, most significant facts in human history that, notwithstanding his intellectual limitations and superstitious fears, because he has maintained the altar of God as life's centre of gravity, and never let die the consciousness that he was compassed about by the living God, the Oriental has been the channel of the sublimest spiritual revelation in the possession of man.

Note the Syrian's daily language: it is essentially biblical. He has no secular language. The only real break between his scriptures and the vocabulary of his daily life is that which exists between the classical and the vernacular. When you ask a Syrian about his business he will not answer, 'We are doing well at present,' but 'Allah mûn 'aim' (God is giving bounteously). To one starting on a journey the phrase is not 'Take good care of yourself,' but 'Go in the keeping and protection of God.' By example and precept we were trained from infancy in this manner of speech. Coming into a house, the visitor salutes by saying, 'God grant you good morning,' or "The peace of God come upon you.' So it is written in the tenth chapter of Matthew, 'And as ye enter into the house, salute it. And if the house be worthy, let your peace come upon it; but if it be not worthy, let your peace return unto you.'

In saluting a day-laborer at work we said, ‘Allah, yaatik-el-afie' (God give you health and strength). In saluting reapers in the field, or 'gatherers of the increase' in the vineyards or olive groves, we said just the words of Boaz, in the second chapter of the book of Ruth, when he 'came from Bethlehem and said unto the reapers, The Lord be with you. And they answered him, The Lord bless thee.' Or another scriptural expression, now more extensively

of the Lord be upon you!' It is to this custom that the withering imprecation which is recorded in the One Hundred and Twenty-ninth Psalm refers: 'Let them all be confounded and turned back that hate Zion: let them be as the grass upon the housetops which withereth afore it groweth up: wherewith the mower filleth not his hand, nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom. Neither do they which go by say, The blessing of the Lord be upon you: we bless you in the name of the Lord.'

In asking a shepherd about his flock we said, 'How are the blessed ones?' or a parent about his children, 'How are the preserved ones?' They are preserved of God through their 'angels,' of whom the Master spoke when he said, 'Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father.' Speaking of a good man we said, 'The grace of God is poured upon his face.' So in the book of Proverbs, 'Blessings are upon the head of the just.'

Akin to the foregoing are such expressions as these. In trying to rise from a sitting posture (the Syrians sit on the floor with their legs folded under them), a person, using the right arm for leverage, says, as he springs up, 'Ya Allah' (O God [help]). In inquiring about the nature of an object, he says, 'Sho dinû?' (what is its religion?) And one of the queerest expressions, when translated into English, is that employed to indicate that a kettleful of water, for example, has boiled beyond the required degree: 'This water has turned to be an infidel' (kaffer). It may be noticed here that it is not the old theology only which associates the infidel with intense heat.

So this religious language is the Oriental's daily speech. I have stated in my autobiography that the men whom