THE story of the spiritual undoing of the Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins is one on which the carnal mind has ever lingered with peculiar relish. Cruel and injurious embellishments have gradually accrued to the naked truth, and, in fact, have nearly led to the worthy man's unfrocking; and it is with no intention of resuscitating an ancient scandal that I am induced to relate the plain facts, leaving to an indulgent, golfing public the final judgment of his error.

      On a glorious Sabbath morning in June the Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins, having carefully adjusted his white tie and placed his sermon in its neat "skeleton," left the parsonage a full hour before his usual time, and walked rapidly down the road, every step bearing him farther away from the old meeting house whose white spire was visible over the apple blooms.

      Born of a Scotch mother, the Rev. Isaiah had spent his boyhood in Edinburgh, playing golf with the kilted youngsters of his acquaintance. Devoted at an early age to the church, he had come to view the game with abhorrence because it was pursued with unholy zeal on the Sabbath, and had ultimately grown to regard it as a peculiarly dangerous device of the devil.

      Hence he had ceased to play long before he came, a young man, to study theology at Andover, his father's home. While it is not improbable that he knew in a vague way that the ancient game was obtaining some foothold in America, it may practically be assumed that he had forgotten this particular source of temptation, it having passed out of his life.

      In an evil day the devil recalled that he had no prestige worth mentioning in a certain little Connecticut village, and inspired some desultory summer boarders to lay out a six hole course over its pastures, not more to the amazement of the simple sheep than that of the guileless inhabitants. Whereupon evil ways fell upon that village, and divers young men, who were wont to don very stiff shirts every Sabbath and sing lustily before the Lord, forsook the religion of their fathers and hied them, albeit surreptitiously, to the links. And the Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins remembered that there was an insidious form of temptation known as golf, and was sore vexed. Hence upon this particular Sabbath the good man was "stalking"; the game being no less than the two most penetrating tenors of the rural choir, whom he had observed stealing away across the meadows as he shaved that morning before his tiny window.

      His approach was splendidly timed. He came upon his prey just where the third hole crosses the road. Reuben Holcomb was in the very act of driving from a podgy tee when he caught the black figure from the tail of his eye, and he sliced wretchedly into a clump of alders.

      Elmer Harding expressed audible satisfaction at his opponent's mishap, until he, too, saw his pastor, and silence reigned for a space.

      The clergyman was the first to break it.

      "Young man, you are in a condition of great danger," he said solemnly to Reuben.

      The latter, with a rustic idea of repartee, muttered something about being "dormie three." The attempted levity enraged the Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins.

      "You mock! Know, then, that you are courting eternal destruction! This is the third Sabbath on which you have absented yourselves from meeting, and to what purpose? To — to — to slice abominably," he concluded somewhat lamely, as his eye chanced to fall upon the ball gleaming provokingly in the clump of alders.

      The backsliders pricked up their ears.

      "What do you know about slicing?" demanded Reuben, stung by the criticism of his stroke. "You could not hit the ball at all!"

      "I refuse to discuss the matter," replied the clergyman with dignity, not to be drawn. "Your soul is in peril. Follow me to the meeting house, and never let me see you profane the Sabbath again!"

      So saying, he reached out for the driver, which Reuben sulkily allowed him to take. And again the devil conspired against the little New England hamlet.

      It was a beautiful driver — plenty of wood in the head, and a clean, straight face, unviolated by raucous file. It thrilled in the parson's fingers like a live thing.

      In his chastened heart glowed the fire which, once kindled, may smolder, but can never be extinguished. For the first time in twenty years the Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins felt the grip of a good shaft in his fingers.

      "I'll tell you what, Mr. Hodgkins," said Elmer, who was a slow thinking but very practical young man, "you play out the three holes with us, and if you beat our best ball we will never play golf again on Sunday as long's we live; will we, Rube?"

      "We never will!" answered Reuben, with the cordial assent of a man who bets on a sure thing.

      I am aware that I shall here and now alienate many of those who have cared thus far to pursue the case of the Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins. By all the laws of precedent, he should have flown into a righteous indignation and scored the ribald young men for their impiety.

      Perhaps the few slight outlines I have drawn of his early youth have not been given due consideration. Perhaps the reader of this tale has never gone a golfing. If so, there is no further profit for him in this sketch.

      I have said that the estimable clergyman held in his hands the driver he had snatched from Reuben Holcomb, as a brand plucked from the burning. Now, it is an invariable instinct of humanity to use a cane or stick as a switch, to knock off daisy heads therewith, or at least describe figures in the air. The Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins cut at a dandelion head — and was lost.

      He recognized instantly the superiority of the shaft — with the spring in the right place, close to the whipping. He knew that he could drive a ball that would open the eyes of these godless young men. What if (whispered the devil) he could insure their spiritual enlightenment as well?

      His theology was rugged enough; not for an instant would he have entertained the heresy that it ever could be justifiable to do wrong that right might ensue; yet he was tempted on this Sabbath morning through two frivolous young rustics and fell with a crash from the very apex of the thirty nine articles.

      "Done," said the reverend gentleman, little guessing that he should rather have said "Undone." And, no one else being in sight, and the hour for services yet remote, he laid down his sermon, deposited upon it his primeval silk hat, teed a new ball upon a pinch of sand, and indulged in a preliminary waggle.

      It was this waggle which caused the first uneasy qualm to stir in the hearts of the sinners. It was not the awkward jab of the tyro, but the graceful, supple limbering up of the experienced, if rusty, golfer. The parson essayed a three quarters swing.

      The result was not wholly satisfactory. He topped the ball badly, and it rolled but thirty or forty yards, and settled on a flat stone.

      Both Reuben and Elmer secured fair distance. The Rev. Isaiah called for a cleek, and retrieved himself magnificently — the ball soaring straight towards the distant flag.

      The stroke was a revelation to the young men, and caused them renewed uneasiness; for they were honest youths at heart, as golfers ever are, and if defeated foresaw their Sunday outings forever gone. Upon arriving where the parson's ball struck, however, it was seen to be in a deep, cuppy lie, although in the course.

      "Do you call this a fair green?" demanded the clergyman in anguish, as he dug it out with a mashie.

      As a result, he was playing the odd with both Elmer and Reuben on the putting green, they having played safe; and his ball was thirty yards from the hole. He made a gobble — and lost the hole. One down.

      A horrible fear smote his heart. He had never thought of defeat, for he was a proud, stern man, used to carrying to the bitter end whatever he undertook. If he were beaten, was he not responsible for the souls of these young men? They would probably consider themselves justified in playing golf on Sundays to the end of their days, and would doubtless die full of years and health and sin — just as he had witnessed scores of times in Scotland.

      The sense of his error smote him for the first time when he was one down. It is a condition favorable for introspection.

      The next hole he won in a par five. Both sides were anxious; but the Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins was the steadier. Years of self repression were beginning to tell.

      So they came to Number 6, and the parson teed his ball for the honor.

      The sun was warm, the case was urgent, and he removed his coat, collar, and cravat, and turned up his stiff white cuffs. Then he spat upon his hands, gripped the driver hard in his left, and was just swinging back when his eye fell upon an ominous procession winding up the hill.

      No golfer has any special sense of time when engaged in his proper vocation. The hour for service had passed, and the wondering flock were shepherdless.

      But the little daughter of a parishioner whispered that she had seen Mr. Hodgkins walking rapidly down the pike more than an hour ago; and an exploring party of two set forth to recover the missing pastor.

      Hence it was that Deacon Hezekiah Perkins, toiling noisily up the hillside, saw the Rev. Isaiah just as he spat upon his hands and addressed the expectant ball — and the latter saw the pillar of his church, just as he was swinging back for a mighty smite, savoring more of St. Andrews than of Gideon.

      The young men saw also, with a fearful delight, as of a timid man at his first bull fight; and Deacon Ezra Cook would have seen, only he was temporarily eclipsed by the broad back of his brother pillar.

      The clergyman laid aside his driver, and stared at the elders — a hapless Suzannah, most cruelly spied upon. There was absolutely nothing for him to say, and he said it.

      "You wa'n't to meetin', so we come after you," remarked brother Hezekiah, after he had got his wind.

      "So I perceive," said the clergyman.

      "The folks is all waitin'," added Ezra encouragingly.

      It was pleasant, and smelled good — that little hill overlooking the sixth hole, and the two deacons unconsciously yielded to the tonic of the morning. Besides, here was a chance to secure fame: they would be called upon to testify to their pastor's fall from grace, and they sniffed gratefully at the scandal in store; so little of excitement visited their poor, meager lives.

      They lingered over the scene, enjoying their victim's discomfiture as a cat does that of her captive mouse.

      Presently Hezekiah noticed that the driver lay close to him, and picked it up curiously. It felt good; even his warty fingers recognized it as a potential bit of wood.

      "Can ye hit 'em fur with this thing?" he asked curiously of Elmer.

      "Huh — y' couldn't hit at all with it, with your heft," sniffed Ezra. Now, there are few things a man will not more readily forgive than an allusion to his portliness. He will admit his baldness, or his rheumatism, or his failing eyesight, amiably enough; but the lean man who has become fat in his latter years will brook no comments on his weight.

      Deacon Hezekiah Perkins snorted with rage.

      "My heft didn't pervent me playin' all round you at shinny when we was to school, did it?" he demanded sarcastically.

      "This ain't shinny," replied brother Ezra judicially. "Ye couldn't hit with it. Best set it down 'fore ye break it."

      "If a man can swing a shinny stick, he can this contraption," said Hezekiah in a voice which carried far towards the distant meeting house with its waiting flock. "If 'twa'n't the Sabbath," he continued, glancing meaningly at the clergyman, "I'd bet I could knock the ball a durn sight further'n you could!"

      The Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins remained discreetly silent. Guile had entered his heart, and he saw no reason why he should interrupt the course of nature.

      "Ye're too hefty," reiterated Ezra obstinately.

      "I be, be I?" grunted Hezekiah, and without further ado he placed the ball on as smooth a bit of turf as he could find (knowing naught of tees), and threw all his two hundred and thirty pounds of "heft" into a mighty swipe.

      Beginner's luck is proverbial. He chanced to hit the ball fairly, and it soared for at least one hundred and seventy yards.

      "Reckon I hain't fergot how to beat ye yet, Ezra," he commented with great satisfaction.

      Now, Ezra by no means awarded due credit to his drive, but concluded that it was due in great part to the improved club. He had always remained thin and wiry, and secretly believed that in preserving his leanness he had preserved his youth, while Hezekiah, to his mind, was already an old man.

      He did not doubt but that he could humiliate his old playmate handsomely, and he had entirely forgotten the errand upon which they came, or even that it was the Sabbath. He set a ball down rather carelessly, drew back the club twice as if to strike, and at the third trial drove it fairly into the earth, so that the head flew from the shaft.

      "There — you have spoiled a good two dollar driver!" cried Reuben. And of a sudden the clock in the distant spire struck eleven, and instantly every one awoke with a start to a sense of his position.

      The Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins was the least flustered. He had already adjusted his collar and tie, and buttoned on his long coat.

      "Brethren," said he, " we are late for meeting. I came to persuade these misguided young men of the error of their ways and bring them back to their places in our choir, where their splendid voices are sorely missed. Let us hasten back, or we shall cause our worthy people alarm. Will you come?" he concluded, with his eyes on the youths.

      And Reuben and Elmer allowed they would.

      Deacon Hezekiah Perkins was secretly jubilant; but Ezra Cook refused to be comforted. He was enraged at Hezekiah's triumph, greatly upset at the thought of having to pay Reuben for his broken club, and most disappointed of all because he dared not enlighten the village as to the spiritual undoing of the Rev. Isaiah Hodgkins.