Democratic Sentinel, Volume 8, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 February 1884 — The Watcher in the Pew [ARTICLE]

The Watcher in the Pew

His neck is fitted on a globe-socket, and turns clear around. He sees everything that goes on. The man who comes in late does not escape him, and it is vain for the tenor to think he got that little note to the alto, conveyed between the leaves of a hymn-book, unobserved. The watcher saw it. He sees the hole in the quarter that Elder Skinner dropped in the plate. He sees that Deacon Slowboy has but one cuff. If the door swings, he looks around; if the window moves noiselessly, he looks up. He sees the stranger in his neighbor’s pew, and he sees Brother Batlman, sitting away back under the gallery, furtively take a chew of the inhibited fine-cut. All things that nobody wants him to see, the watcher sees. He sees so much that he has no time to listen.— Burlington Hawk eye.