Such was the opening gun in what became known as the “reformation.”  The conditions had been ripe for it, and in that very moment a fever of repentance spread through the two thousand people who had cowered under his words.  Alike with the people below, the leaders about him had been fired with his spirit, and when he sat down each of them arose in turn and echoed his words, denouncing the people for their sins and exhorting them to repentance.

After another hour of this excitement, priests and people became alike demoralised, and the meeting broke up in a confusion of terror.

As the doors of the tabernacle flew open, and the Saints pushed out of that stifling atmosphere of denunciation, a cry came to the lips of the dozen that first escaped: 

“To the river—­the waters of baptism!”

The words were being taken up by others until the cry had run back through the crowd to the leaders, still talking in excited groups about the pulpit.  These comprehended when they heard it, and straightway a line of conscience-stricken Saints was headed toward the river.

There in the icy Jordan, on that chill December afternoon, when the snows lay thick on the ground, the leaders stood and buried the sinful ones anew in the cleansing waters.  From the sinners themselves came cries of self-accusation; from the crowd on the banks came the strains of hymns to fortify them for the icy ordeal and the public confession.

There in the freezing current stood Joel Rae until long after the December sun had gone below the Oquirrh hills, performing his office of baptism, and reviving hope in those his words had smitten with fear.

His strength already depleted by the long march with the hand-cart party and by the exhausting strain of the day, he was early chilled by the water into which he plunged the repentant sinners.  For the last hour that he stood in the stream, his whole body was numb; he had ceased to feel life in his feet, and his arms worked with a mechanical stiffness like the arms of some automaton over which his mind had control.

For there was no numbness as yet in his mind.  It was wonderfully clear and active.  He had begun a great work.  His words had been words of fire, and the flames of them had spread so that in a little while every sinner in Zion should burn in them and be purified.  Even the leaders—­a great wave of exultation surged through him at this thought—­even Brigham had felt the glow, and henceforth would be a fiercer Lion of the Lord to resist the Godless Gentile.

Long after sensation had left his body his thoughts were rushing in this fever of realisation, while his chilled hands made new in the Kingdom such sinners as came there repenting.

Not until night fell did the hymns cease and the crowd dwindle away.  The air grew colder, and he began to feel pain again, the water cutting against his legs like a blade.  Little groups were now hurrying off in the darkness, and the last Saint he had baptised was standing for the moment, chill and dripping, on the bank.