David was enlisted by the employers of labour, the farmers, chemical works, mining and smelting-works managers, squires, and postmasters to restore order.  He preached against the Revivalists.  Not with any lack of sympathy, any apology for the real ills which they denounced.  He spoke with emphasis against the loosening of morality, recommended early marriage, and above all education; denounced the consumption of alcohol so strenuously and convincedly that then and there as he spoke he resolved himself henceforth to abstain from anything stronger than lager beer or the lighter French and German wines.  But he threw cold water resolutely on the fantastical nonsense that accompanied these emotional outbursts of so-called religion; invited his hearers to study—­at any rate elementarily—­astronomy and biology; did not run down football but advised a moderate interest only being taken in such futile sports; recommended volunteering and an acquaintance with rifles as far preferable, seeing that we always stood in danger of a European war or of a drastic revival of insolent conservatism.

Then he made his appeal to the women.  He spoke of the dangers of this hysteria; the need there was for level-headed house-keeping women in our councils; how they should first qualify for and then demand the suffrage, having already attained the civic vote. (Here some of the employers of labour disapproved, plucked at his arm or hem of his reefer jacket, and one squire lumbered off the platform.) But he held on, warming with a theme that hitherto had hardly interested him.  His speeches were above the heads of his peasant audiences; but they were a more sensitive harp to play on than the average Anglo-Saxon audience.  Many women wept, only decorously, as he outlined their influence in a reformed village, a purified Principality.  The men applauded frantically because, despite some prudent reserves, there seemed to be a promise of revolt in his suggestions.  David felt the electric thrill of the orator in harmony with his audience; who for that reason will strive for further triumphs, more resounding perorations.  He introduced scraps of Welsh—­all his auto-intoxicated brain could remember (How physically true was that taunt of Dizzy’s—­“Inebriated with the exuberance of his own verbosity!").

And the delighted audience shouted back “You’re the man we want!  Into Parliament you shall go, Davy-bach” and much else.  So David restored the five villages to sobriety in life and faith, yet left them with a new enthusiasm kindled.  Before he departed on his return to London and the grind of his profession, he had effected another change.  Because he had spoken as he had spoken and touched the hearts of emotional people, they came trickling back to his father’s church, to the “British” Church, as David now called it.  Little Bethel was empty, and the pastor-blacksmith not yet out of the asylum at Swansea.  The Revd.  Howel Williams trod on air.  His sermons became terribly long