HOW THE RENAISSANCE CAME IN PERSON TO NEW ZION The winter months had gone by; all but one of those incendiary lectures had been given, not without storm and tempest; "The Dawn" still came up each week with anger and singing, and the first year of Londonderry's ministry at New Zion neared its close.

The lecture season was presently to end, on the last Friday in March, with a concert which was to include a series of recitations by a lady-reciter from London.

Londonderry had written to a lecture agency for the name of a likely reciter, man or woman, and they had sent him the name of Isabel Strange.
On the occasion of the last lecture, Mr.Moggridge had not been satisfied with the colour of the platform.

It wanted repainting, and I think it very likely that it was a strain of that boyishness which I hope survives in us all, and one of whose quaint fancies is an envy of house-painters, so happy all day with paint-pot and brush and great smooth boards to dab and smooth, that decided him to do the job himself.
Mr.Moggridge had this great element of refinement, that he thought nothing honest beneath him.
It was the Friday of the entertainment, about one o'clock, and though Mr.Moggridge had practically finished the work the day before, he had slipped in during his lunch-hour to give it a final touch or two.

He had brought his lunch in the form of a pork-pie, and while with one hand he plunged the pie occasionally among his red whiskers, with the other he would lean forward and touch up a knot or a nail-hole that needed a little more paint.