Page:Biography and Family Record of Lorenzo Snow monochrome.djvu/47

 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 21 east end of the Temple, while Father Smith and others, as usual, occupied those of the Melchisedec Priesthood on the west. Soon after the usual opening services, one of the brethren on the west stand arose, and just after he commenced to speak, one on the east interrupted him. Father Smith, presiding, called to order—he told the apostate brother that he should have all the time he wanted, but he must wait his turn—as the brother on the west took the floor and commenced first to speak, he must not be interrupted. A fearful scene ensued—the apostate speaker becoming so clamorous, that Father Smith called for the police to take that man out of the house, when Parrish, John Boynton, and others, drew their pistols and bowie-knives, and rushed down from the stand into the congregation; J. Boynton saying he would blow out the brains of the first man who dared to lay hands on him. Many in the congregation, especially women and children, were terribly frightened—some tried to escape from the confusion by jumping out of the windows. Amid screams and shrieks, the policemen, in ejecting the belligerents, knocked down a stovepipe, which fell helter-skelter among the people; but, although bowie-knives and pistols were wrested from their owners, and thrown hither and thither to prevent disastrous results, no one was hurt, and after a short, but terrible scene to be enacted in a Temple of God, order was restored, and the services of the day proceeded as usual.

But the next day Father Smith, and sixteen others, were arrested on complaint of the apostate party, charged with riot, and bound over for their appearance in court to answer to the charge. With others, I was subpoenaed as a witness, and I found the court scene as amusing as the Temple scene was appalling. The idea of such a man as Father Smith so patriarchal in appearance so circumspect in deportment and dignified in his manners, being guilty of riot, was at once ludicrous and farcical to all sane-minded persons. And after