His mood was simple, and sweeter than usual.

He felt a passionate need of expression, of emotion.

There was a true disquiet, a genuine disgust with self at the bottom of him, and God seemed more than imaginatively near.

Perhaps, on this day of his youth, of all days, he was closest to the Kingdom of Heaven.
At the smithy he found about a dozen persons, mostly youths, just come out from the two or three mills which give employment to Clough End, and one rather older than the rest, a favourite prayer-leader in Sunday meetings.

At first, everything felt strange; the boys eyed one another; even David as he stepped in among them had a momentary reaction, and was more conscious of the presence of a red-haired fellow there with whom he had fought a mighty fight on the Huddersfield expedition, than of any spiritual needs.
However, the prayer-leader knew his work.