I am accustomed to judge of men by their companions, and books are companions.  So whenever I am in a parlor alone I always examine the book-case, or the centre table—­if there is one.  In Mrs. Wheaton’s parlor I find no book-case, but a large centre table on which there are several annuals with a great deal of gilt binding and very little reading, and a volume or two of plates, sometimes handsome, more often showy.  In the library, which opens out of the parlor, I find sets of the classic authors in library bindings, but when I take one down it betrays the fact that no other hand has touched it to open it before.  And I know that Jim Wheaton buys books to furnish his house, just as he buys wall paper and carpets.  At Mr. Hardcap’s I find a big family Bible, and half a dozen of those made up volumes fat with thick paper and large type, and showy with poor pictures, which constitute the common literature of two thirds of our country homes.  And I know that poor Mr. Hardcap is the unfortunate victim of book agents.  At Deacon Goodsole’s I always see some school books lying in admirable confusion on the sitting-room table.  And I know that Deacon Goodsole has children, and that they bring their books home at night to do some real studying, and that they do it in the family sitting-room and get help now and then from father and from mother.  And so while I am waiting for Mr. Gear I take a furtive glance at his well filled shelves.  I am rather surprized to find in his little library so large a religious element, though nearly all of it heterodox.  There is a complete edition of Theodore Parker’s works, Channing’s works, a volume or two of Robertson, one of Furness, the English translation of Strauss’ Life of Christ, Renan’s Jesus, and half a dozen more similar books, intermingled with volumes of history, biography, science, travels, and the New American Cyclopedia.  The Radical and the Atlantic Monthly are on the table.  The only orthodox book is Beecher’s Sermons,—­and I believe Dr. Argure says they are not orthodox; the only approach to fiction is one of Oliver Wendell Holmes’ books, I do not now remember which one.  “Well,” said I to myself, “whatever this man is, he is not irreligious.”

I had just arrived at this conclusion when Mr. Gear entered.  A tall, thin, nervous man, with a high forehead, piercing black eyes, and a restless uneasiness that forbids him from ever being for a moment still.  Now he runs his hand through his hair pushing it still further back from his dome of a head, now he drums the table with his uneasy fingers, now he crosses and uncrosses his long legs, and once, as our conversation grows animated, he rises from his seat in the vehemence of his earnestness, and leans against the mantel piece.  A clear-eyed, frank faced, fine looking man, who would compel your heed if you met him anywhere, unknown, by chance, on the public street.  “An infidel you may be,” I say to myself, “but not a bad man; on the contrary a man with much that is true and noble, or I am no physiognomist or phrenologist either.”  And I rather pride myself on being both.