Blair Collection > Rhys Lewis, minister of Bethel

J^HYS LEWIS. 51
misciiief lie may have committed during Ms period of ministra-
tion. Indeed, it was said that the master, on one occasion,
actually smiled upon a servant. I cannot vouch for the truth
of this, for I never once saw a smile on his face save when Mr.
Brown was present. In view of these tremendous advantages.
we were always found on Friday afternoons waiting like mice
to hear whose lot the comforting ministry would fall to on
the following week. Seldom did it come to "Will Bryan's turn
and mine, for the reason that our parents were chapel people,
and that we ourselves hardly ever went to Church except when
distributions of cake took place there. It was our visit to
Church on one Good Friday morning which put an end to the
term of our stay in the school of Soldier Eobin ; and after I
have described that event, I shall, as I have said, bid this
particular Pharaoh an eternal farewell. In contemplating the
circumstances I am about to relate, I hardly understand my
feeling with regard thereto. I have a sort of guilty conscious-
ness for my own mischief, while, at the same time. I am unable
to repress the inward chuckle which will arise when I remember
the part I played. If the feeling is a sinful one, I hope I
shall be forgiven for it. Though it contain the chronicle of
my own wickedness, it is impossible I can pass over such an
occurrence, inasmuch as it has an important bearing upon my
history, and was the cause of terminating that modicum of day-
schooling it was thought best I should receive.
It was a Good Friday morning. There being no service at
the chapel, and the weather being too wet for us to go out to
play, Will Bryan and I went to Church with the rest of the
boys. I had no notion W'ill had any but an innocent object in
going, and he never opened his mouth to me on the way. He
feared, possibly, if he made his intention known to me, I and he
would not have agreed about it. In the old Church there was
a great square, deep-seated pew, capable of holding twenty or
more youngsters, set apart for the accommodation of Soldier
Eobin's scholars. The door once shut upon us we were not able,
on account of the depth, to see even Parson Brown in the
pulpit; neither could any of the congregation see us. The seat
next to ours was long and narrow and here sat the Soldier, all
by himself, that he might overawe the children and keep them