« said Kit checking himself, and knocking at the
door.
    A second knock brought no reply from within the house; but caused a woman
over the way to look out and inquire who that was, awanting Mrs. Nubbles.
    »Me,« said Kit. »She's at - at Little Bethel, I suppose?« - getting out the
name of the obnoxious conventicle with some reluctance, and laying a spiteful
emphasis upon the words.
    The neighbour nodded assent.
    »Then pray tell me where it is,« said Kit, »for I have come on a pressing
matter, and must fetch her out, even if she was in the pulpit.«
    It was not very easy to procure a direction to the fold in question, as none
of the neighbours were of the flock that resorted thither, and few knew anything
more of it than the name. At last, a gossip of Mrs. Nubbles's, who had
accompanied her to chapel on one or two occasions when a comfortable cup of tea
had preceded her devotions, furnished the needful information, which Kit had no
sooner obtained than he started off again.
    Little Bethel might have been nearer, and might have been in a straighter
road, though in that case the reverend gentleman who presided over its
congregation would have lost his favourite allusion to the crooked ways by which
it was approached, and which enabled him to liken it to Paradise itself, in
contradistinction to the parish church and the broad thoroughfare leading
thereunto. Kit found it, at last, after some trouble, and pausing at the door to
take breath that he might enter with becoming decency, passed into the chapel.
    It was not badly named in one respect, being in truth a particularly little
Bethel - a Bethel of the smallest dimensions - with a small number of small
pews, and a small pulpit, in which a small gentleman (by trade a Shoemaker, and
by calling a Divine) was delivering in a by no means small voice, a by no means
small sermon, judging of its dimensions by the condition of his audience, which,
if their gross amount were but small, comprised a still smaller number of
hearers, as the majority were slumbering.
    Among these was Kit's mother, who, finding it matter of extreme difficulty
to keep her eyes open after the fatigues of last night, and feeling their
inclination to close strongly backed and seconded by the arguments of the
preacher, had yielded to the drowsiness that overpowered her, and fallen asleep;
though not so soundly but that she could, from time to time, utter a
