To me remains nor place nor time;
My country is in every clime;
I can be calm and free from care,
On any shore, since God is there.
While place we seek or place we shun,
The soul finds happiness in none;
But with a God to guide our way,
'Tis equal joy to go or stay.
Could I be cast where Thou art not,
That were indeed a dreadful lot;
But regions none remote I call,
Secure of finding God in all.
_God Is Everywhere_
[Illustration: MADAME GUYON]
Jeanne Marie Bouvier sat one day writing at her little oaken desk, when
her father approached and, kissing her very gently on the forehead, told
her that he had arranged for her marriage, and that her future husband was
soon to arrive. Jeanne's fingers lost their cunning, the pen dropped; she
arose to her feet, but her tongue was dumb.
Jeanne Marie was only sixteen, but you would have thought her twenty, for
she was tall and dignified--she was as tall as her father: she was five
feet nine. She had a splendid length of limb, hips that gave only a
suggestion of curve line, a slender waist, a shapely, well-poised neck,
and a head that might have made a Juno envious. The face and brow were not
those of Venus--rather they belonged to Minerva; for the nose was large,
the chin full, and the mouth no pea's blossom. The hair was light brown,
but when the sun shone on it people said it was red. It was as generous in
quantity and unruly in habits as the westerly wind. Her eyes were all
colors, changing according to her mood. Withal, she had freckles, and no
one was ever so rash as to call her pretty.
Now, Jeanne's father had not kissed her for two years, for he was a very
busy man: he had not time for soft demonstration. He was rich, he was
religious, and he was looked upon as a model citizen in every way.
The daughter had grown like a sunflower, and her intellect had unfolded as
a moss-rose turns from bud to blossom. This splendid girl had thought and
studied and dreamed dreams. She had imagined she heard a voice speaking to
her: "Arise, maiden, and prepare thee, for I have a work for thee to do!"
Her wish and prayer was to enter a convent, and after consecrating herself
to God in a way that would allow of no turning back, to go forth and give
to men and women the messages that had come to her. And these things
filled the heart of the worthy bourgeois with alarm; so he said to his
wife one day: "That girl will be a foot taller than I am in a year, and
even now when I give her advice, she opens her big eyes and looks at me in
a way that thins my words to whey. She will get us into trouble yet! She
may disgrace us! I think--I think I'll find her a husband."
Yet that would not have been a difficult task. She was loved by a score of
youths, but had never spoken to any of them. They stood at corners and
sighed as she walked by; and others, with religious bent, timed her hours
for mass and took positions in church from whence they could see her
kneel. Still others patroled the narrow street that led to her home, with
hopes that she might pass that way, so that they might touch the hem of
her garment.
These things were as naught to Jeanne Marie. She had never yet seen a man
for whose intellect she did not have both a pity and a contempt.
But Claude Bouvier did not pick a husband for his daughter from among the
simple youths of the town. He wrote to a bachelor friend, Jacques Guyon by
name, and told him he could have the girl if he wanted her--that is, after
certain little preliminaries had been arranged.
Now, Jacques Guyon had been at the Bouvier residence on a visit three
months before, and had looked the lass over stealthily with peculiar
interest, and had intimated that if Monsieur Bouvier wished to get rid of
her it could be brought about. So, after some weeks had passed, Monsieur
bethought him of the offer of Jacques Guyon, and he concluded that
inasmuch as Guyon was rich and respectable it would be a good match.
So he wrote to Guyon, and Guyon replied that he would come, probably
within a fortnight--just as soon as his rheumatism got better.
Monsieur Claude Bouvier read the letter, and walking into the next room,
surprised Jeanne Marie by kissing her tenderly on her forehead--all as
herein truthfully recorded.
* * * * *
So Jacques Guyon came, came in his carriage, with two servants riding on
horseback in front and another riding on horseback behind. Jeanne Marie
sat on the floor, tailor fashion, up in her little room of the old stone
house, and peeked out of the diamond-paned gable-window very cautiously;
and she was sorely disappointed.
In some of her dreams (and these dreams she thought were very bad), she
had pictured a lover coming alone on a foam-flecked charger; and as the
steed paused, the rider leaped lightly from saddle to ground, kissing his
hand to her as she peeked through the curtains. For he discovered her when
she hoped he would not, but she did not care much if he did.
But Monsieur Guyon's eyes did not search the windows. He got out of the
carriage with difficulty, and his breath came wheezy and short as he
mounted the steps. His complexion was dusty blue, his nose tinged with
carmine, his eyes watery, and his girth aldermanic. He was growing old,
and, saddest of all, he was growing old rebelliously and therefore
ungracefully--dyeing his whiskers purple.
That evening when Jeanne Marie was introduced to Monsieur Guyon at dinner
she found him very polite and very gracious. His breeches were real black
velvet and his stockings were silk, and the buckles on his shoes were
polished silver and the frill of his shirt was finest lace. His
conversation was directed mostly to Jeanne's father, so Jeanne did not
feel nearly so uncomfortable as she had expected.
The next day a notary came, and long papers were written out, and red and
green seals placed on them, and then everybody held up his right hand as
the notary mumbled something, and then all signed their names. The room
seemed to be teetering up and down, and it looked quite like rain.
Monsieur Bouvier stood on his tiptoes and again kissed his daughter on the
forehead, and Monsieur Guyon, taking her hand, lifted the long, slender
fingers to his lips, and told her that she would soon be a great lady and
the mistress of a splendid mansion, and have everything that one needed to
make one happy.
And so they were married by a bishop, with two priests and three curates
to assist. The ceremony was held at the great stone church; and as the
procession came out, the verger had a hard time to keep the crowd back, so
that the little girls in white could go before and strew flowers in their
pathway. The organ pealed, and the chimes clanged and rang as if the tune
and the times were out of joint; then other bells from other parts of the
old town answered, and across the valley rang mellow and soft the
chapel-bell of Montargis Castle.
Jeanne was seated in a carriage--how she got there she never knew; by her
side sat Jacques Guyon. The post-boys were lashing their horses into a
savage run, like devils running away with the souls of innocents, and
behind clattered the mounted, liveried servant. People on the sidewalks
waved good-bys and called God-bless-yous. Soon the sleepy old town was
left behind and the horses slowed down to a lazy trot. Jeanne looked back,
like Lot's wife: only a church-spire could be seen. She hoped that she
might be turned into a pillar of salt--but she wasn't. She crouched into
the corner of the seat and cried a good honest cry.
And Monsieur Jacques Guyon smiled and muttered to himself, "Her father
said she was a bit stubborn, but I'll see that she gets over it!"
And this was over three hundred years ago. It doesn't seem like it, but it
was.
* * * * *
Read the lives of great men and you will come to the conclusion that it is
harder to find a gentleman than a genius. While the clock ticks off the
seconds, count on your fingers--within five minutes, if you can--five such
gentlemen as Sir Philip Sidney! Of course, I know before you speak that
Fenelon will be the first on your tongue. Fenelon, the low-voiced, the
mild, the sympathetic, the courtly, the gracious! Fenelon, favored by the
gods with beauty and far-reaching intellect! Fenelon, who knew the gold of
silence. Fenelon, on whose lips dwelt grace, and who by the magic of his
words had but to speak to be believed and to be beloved.
When Louis the Little made that most audacious blunder which cost France
millions in treasure and untold loss in men and women, Fenelon wrote to
the Prime Minister: "These Huguenots have many virtues that must be
acknowledged and conserved. We must hold them by mildness. We can not
produce conformity by force. Converts made in this manner are hypocrites.
No power is great enough to bind the mind--thought forever escapes. Give
civil liberty to all, not by approving all religions, but by permitting in
patience what God allows."
"You shall go as missionary to these renegades!" was the
answer--half-ironical, half-earnest.
"I will go only on one condition."
"And that is?"
"That from my province you withdraw all armed men--all sign of compulsion
of every sort!"
Fenelon was of noble blood, but his sympathies were ever with the people.
The lowly, the weak, the oppressed, the persecuted--these were ever the
objects of his solicitude--these were first in his mind.
It was in prison that Fenelon first met Madame Guyon. Fenelon was
thirty-seven, she was forty. He occasionally preached at Montargis, and
while there had heard of her goodness, her piety, her fervor, her
resignation. He had small sympathy for many of her peculiar views, but now
she was sick and in prison and he went to her and admonished her to hold
fast and to be of good-cheer.
Twelve years before this Madame Guyon had been left a widow. She was the
mother of five children--two were dead. The others were placed under the
care of kind kinsmen; and Madame Guyon went forth to give her days to
study and to teaching. This action of placing her children partly in the
care of others has been harshly criticized. But there is one phase of the
subject that I have never seen commented upon--and that is that a mother's
love for her offspring bears a certain ratio to the love she bore their
father. Had Madame Guyon ever carried in her arms a love-child, I can not
conceive of her allowing this child to be cared for by others--no matter
how competent.
The favor that had greeted Madame Guyon wherever she went was very great.
Her animation and devout enthusiasm won her entrance into the homes of
the great and noble everywhere. She organized societies of women that met
for prayer and conversation on exalted themes. The burden of her
philosophy was "Quietism"--the absolute submission of the human soul to
the will of God. Give up all, lay aside all striving, all reaching
out, all unrest, cease penance and lie low in the Lord's hand.
He doeth all things well. Make life one continual prayer for
holiness--wholeness--harmony; and thus all good will come to us--we
attract the good; we attract God--He is our friend--His spirit dwells with
us. She taught of power through repose, and told that you can never gain
peace by striving for it like fury.
This philosophy, stretching out in limitless ramifications, bearing on
every phase and condition of life, touched everywhere with mysticism,
afforded endless opportunity for thought.
It is the same philosophy that is being expressed by thousands of
prominent men and women today. It embraced all that is vital and best in
our so-called "advanced thought"; for in good sooth none of our new
"liberal sects" has anything that has not been taught before in olden
time.
But Madame Guyon's success was too great. The guardians of a dogmatic
religion are ever on the scent for heresy. They are jealous, and fearful,
and full of alarm lest their "institution" shall topple. Quietism was
making head, and throughout France the name of Madame Guyon was becoming
known. She went from town to town, and from city to city, and gave courses
of lectures. Women flocked to hear her, they organized clubs. Preachers
sometimes appeared and argued with her, but by the high fervor of her
speech she quickly silenced them. Then they took revenge by thundering
sermons against her after she had gone. As she traveled she left in her
wake a pyrotechnic display of elocutionary denunciation. They dared her to
come back and fight it out. The air was full of challenges. One prelate
was good enough to say, "This woman may teach primitive Christianity--but
if people find God everywhere, what's to become of us!"
And although the theme is as great as Fate and as serious as Death, one
can not suppress a smile to think how the fear of losing their jobs has
ever caused men to run violently to and fro and up and down in the earth,
crying peace, peace, when there is no peace.
Now, it was the denunciation and wild demonstration of her fearing foes
that advertised the labors of Madame Guyon. For strong people are not so
much advertised by their loving friends as by their rabid enemies.
This happened quite a while ago; but as mankind moves in a circle (and not
always a spiral, either) it might have happened yesterday. Make the scene
Ohio: slip Bossuet out and Doctor Buckley in; condense the virtues of Miss
Frances E. Willard and Miss Susan B. Anthony into one, and let this one
stand for Madame Guyon; call it New Transcendentalism, dub the Madame a
New Woman, and there you have it!
But with this difference: petitions to the President of the United States
to arrest this female offender and shut her up in the Chicago jail,
indefinitely, after a mock trial, would avail not. Yet persecution has its
compensation, and the treatment that Madame Guyon received emphasized the
truths she taught and sent them ringing through the schools and salons and
wherever thinking people gathered themselves together. Yes, persecution
has its compensation. In its state of persecution a religion is pure, if
ever; its decline begins when its prosperity commences. Prosperous men are
never wise and seldom good. Woe unto you when all men shall speak well of
you!
Surely, persecution has its compensation! When Madame Guyon was sick and
in prison, was she not visited by Fenelon? Ah, 'twas worth the cost.
Sympathy is the first attribute of love as well as its last. And I am not
sure but that sympathy is love's own self, vitalized mayhap by some divine
actinic ray. Only a thorn-crowned, bleeding Christ could win the adoration
of the world. Only the souls who have suffered are well loved. Thus does
Golgotha find its recompense. Hark ye and take courage, ye who are in
bonds! Gracious spirits, seen or unseen, will minister to you now, where
otherwise they would have passed without a sign! But from the day Fenelon
met Madame Guyon his fortune began to decline. People looked at him
askance. By a grim chance he was made one of a committee of three to
investigate the charges brought against the woman. The court took a year
for its task. Fenelon read everything that Madame Guyon had published,
conversed much with her, inquired into her history and when asked for his
verdict said, "I find no fault in her."
He talked with Madame de Maintenon, and Madame de Maintenon talked with
the King, and the offender was released.
Soon Fenelon began to utter in his sermons the truths he had learned from
Madame Guyon. And he gave her due credit. He explained that she was a good
Catholic--that she loved the Church--that she lived up to all the Church
taught, and besides knowing all that Churchmen knew she knew many things
beside.
Have a care, Archbishop of Cambrai! Enemies are upon thy track. Defend not
defenseless womanhood: knowest thou not what they have said of her? Speak
what thou art taught and keep thy inmost thoughts for thyself alone. Have
a care, Fenelon! thy bishopric hangs by a spider's thread.
The years kept slipping past as the years will. Twelve summers had come,
and twelve times had autumn leaves known their time to fall. Madame Guyon
was again in prison. A stranger was Archbishop of Cambrai: Fenelon no
longer a counselor of kings--a tutor of royalty. His voice was silenced,
his pen chained. He was allowed to retire to a rural parish. There he
lived with the peasants--revered, beloved. The country where he dwelt was
battle-scarred and bleeding; the smoke of devastation still hung over it.
Not a family but had been robbed of its best. Death had stalked rampant.
Fenelon shared the poverty of the people, their lowliness, their sorrows.
All the tragedy of their life was his; he said to them, "I know, I know!"
Twelve years of Madame Guyon's life were spent in prison. Toward the last
she was allowed to live in nominal freedom. But despotism, with savage
leer and stealthy step, saw that Fenelon was kept far away. In those
declining days, when the shadows were lengthening toward the east, her
time and talents were given to teaching the simple rudiments of knowledge
to the peasantry, to alleviating their material wants and to ministering
to the sick. It was a forced retirement, and yet it was a retirement that
was in every way in accord with her desires. But in spite of the
persecution that followed her, and the obloquy heaped upon her name, and
the bribe of pardon if she would but recant, she never retracted nor
wavered in her inward or outward faith, even in the estimation of a hair.
The firm reticence as to the supreme secrets of her life, and her
steadfast loyalty to that which she honestly believed was truth, must ever
command the affectionate admiration of all those who prize integrity of
mind and purity of purpose, who hold fast to the divinity of love, and who
believe in the things unseen which are eternal.
* * * * *
The town of Montargis is one day's bicycle journey from Paris. As for the
road, though one be a wayfaring man and from the States he could not err
therein. You simply follow the Seine as if you were intent on discovering
its source, keeping to the beautiful highway that follows the winding
stream. And what a beautiful, clear, clean bit of water it is! In Paris,
your washerwoman takes your linen to the river, just as they did in the
days of Pharaoh, and the bundle comes back sweet as the breath of June.
Imagine the result of such recklessness in Chicago!
But as I rode out of Paris that bright May day it seemed Monday all along
the way; for dames with baskets balanced on their heads were making their
way to the waterside, followed by troops of barefoot or sabot-shod
children. There was one fine young woman with a baby in her arms, and the
innocent firstborn was busily taking its breakfast as the mother walked
calmly along, bearing on her well-poised head the family wash. And a mile
farther on, as if she had seen her rival and gone her one better, was
another woman with a two-year-old cherub perched secure on top of the
gently swaying basket, proud as a cardinal about to be consecrated. It was
a study in balancing that I have never seen before nor since; and I only
ask those to believe it who know things so true that they dare not tell
them. As the day wore on, I saw that the wash was being completed, for the
garments were spread out on the greenest of green grass, or on the bushes
that lined the way. By ten o'clock I was nearing Fontainebleau, and the
clothes were nearly ready to take in--but not quite. For while waiting for
the warm sun and the gentle breeze to dry them, the thrifty dames, who
were French and make soup out of everything, put in the time by laundering
the children. It seemed like that economic stroke of good housewives who
use the soapy wash-water for scrubbing the kitchen-floor. There they were,
dozens of hopefuls on whom the fate of the nation rested--creepers to
ten-year-olds--being scrubbed and dipped, or playing parlez-vous tag in
lieu of towel, as innocent of clothes as Carlyle's imaginary House of
Lords.
And so I passed off from the road that traced the Seine to a road that
kept company with the canal. I followed the towpath, even in spite of
warnings that 't was 'gainst the law. It was a one-horse canal, for many
of the gaily painted boats were drawn only by a single, shaggy-limbed
Percheron. The boats were sharp-prowed and narrow; and on some were
bareheaded women knitting, and men carving curious things out of blocks of
wood, as they journeyed. And I said to myself, if "it is the pace that
kills," these people are making a strong bid for immortality. I hailed the
lazily moving craft, waving my hat, and the slow-going tourists called
back cheerily.
By and by I came to a great, wide plain that stretched away like a
tideless summer sea. The wheat and lentils and pulse were planted in long
strips. In one place I thought I could trace the good old American flag
(that you never really love unless you are on a foreign shore) made with
alternate strips of millet and peas, with a goodly patch of cabbages in
the corner for stars. But possibly this was imagination, for I had been
thinking that in a week it would be the Fourth of July and I was far from
home--in a land where firecrackers are unknown.
Coming to a little rise of ground, I could see, lying calm and quiet amid
the world of rich, growing grain, the town of Montargis. Across on the
blue hillside was Montargis Castle, framed in a mass of foliage. I stopped
to view the scene, and the echo of vesper-bells came pealing gently over
the miles, as the nodding poppies at my feet bowed reverently in the
breeze.
Villages in France viewed from a distance seem so restful and idyllic.
There is no sound of strife, no trace of rivalry, no vain pride; only
white houses--the homes of good men and gentle women, and cherub children;
and all the church-steeples truly point to God. Yet on closer view--but
what of that!
When I reached the town, the church whose spire I had seen from the
distance beckoned me first. I turned off from the wide thoroughfare,
intending just to get a glance at the outside of the building as I passed.
But the great iron gates thrown invitingly open, and a rusty, dusty dog
of Flanders lying in the entry waiting for his master, told me that there
was service within. So I entered, passing through the noiseless, swinging
door, and into the dim twilight of the house of prayer. A score of people
were there, and standing in the aisle was a white-robed priest. He was
speaking, and his voice came so gently, so sure withal, so exquisitely
modulated, that I paused and, leaning against a pillar, listened. I think
it was the first time I ever heard a preacher speaking in a large church
who did not speak so loud that an echo chased his sentences round and
round the vaulted dome and strangled the sense. The tone was
conversational and the manner so free from canting conventionality that I
moved up closer to get a view of the face.
It was too dark to see well, but I came under the spell of the man's
earnest eloquence. The sacred stillness, the falling night, the odor from
incense and banks of flowers piled about the feet of an image of the Holy
Virgin--evidently brought by the peasantry, having nothing else to
give--made a combination of melting conditions that would have subdued a
heart of stone.
The preacher ceased to speak, and as he raised his hands in benediction,
I, involuntarily, with the other worshipers, knelt on the stone floor and
bowed my head in silent reverie.
Suddenly, I was aroused by a crashing noise at my elbow, and glancing
round saw that an old man near me had merely dropped his cane. A heavy
cudgel it was that falling on the stone flagging sent a thundering
reverberation through the vaulted chambers.
The worshipers were slipping out, one by one, and soon no one was left but
the old man of the cudgel and myself. He wore wooden shoes, and was
holding the cordwood fast between his knees, rolling his hat nervously in
his big hands. "He's a stranger, too," I said to myself; "he is the man
who owns the rusty dog of Flanders, and he is waiting to give the priest
some message!"
I leaned over towards my neighbor and asked, "The priest--what is his
name?"
"Father Francis, Monsieur!" and the old man swayed back and forward in his
seat as if moved by some inward emotion, still fingering his hat.
Just then the priest came out from behind the altar, wearing a black robe
instead of the white one. He moved down with a sort of quiet majesty
straight towards us. We arose as one man; it was as though some one had
pressed a button.
Father Francis walked by me, bowing slightly, and shook hands with my old
neighbor. They stood talking in an undertone.
A last struggling ray of light from the dying sun came in over the chancel
and flooded the great room for an instant. It allowed me to get a good
look at the face of the priest. As I stood there staring at him I heard
him say to the old man as he bade him good-by, "Yes, tell her I'll be
there in the morning."
Then he turned to me, and I was still staring. And as I stared I was
repeating to myself the words the people said when Dante used to pass,
"There is the man who has been to Hell!"
"You are an Englishman?" said Father Francis to me pleasantly as he held
out his hand. "Yes," I said; "I am an Englishman--that is, no--an
American!"
I was wondering if he had really heard me make that Dante remark; and
anyway, I had been rudely staring at him and listening with both ears to
his conversation with the old man. I tried to roll my hat, and had I a
cudgel I would surely have dropped it; and with it all I wondered if the
dog of Flanders waiting outside was not getting impatient for me!
"Oh, an American! I'm glad--I have very dear friends in America!"
Then I saw that Father Francis did not look so much like the exiled
Florentine as I had thought, for his smile was winning as that of a woman,
the corners of his mouth did not turn down, and the nose had not the Roman
curve. Dante was an exile: this man was at home--and would have been,
anywhere.
He was tall, slender and straight; he must have been sixty years old, but
the face in spite of its furrows was singularly handsome. Grave, yet not
depressed, it showed such feminine delicacy of feeling, such grace, such
high intellect, that I stood and gazed as I might at a statue in bronze.
But plain to see, he was a man of sorrow and acquainted with grief. The
face spake of one to whom might have come a great tribulation, and who by
accepting it had purchased redemption for all time from all the petty
troubles of earth.
"You must stay here as long as you wish, and you will come to our old
church again, I hope!" said the Father. He smiled, nodded his head and
started to leave me alone.
"Yes, yes, I'll come again--I'll come in the morning, for I want to talk
with you about Madame Guyon--she was married in this church they told
me--is that true?" I clutched a little. Here was a man I could not afford
to lose--one of the elect!
"Oh, yes; that was a long time ago, though. Are you interested in Madame
Guyon? I am glad--not to know Fenelon seems a misfortune. He used to
preach from that very pulpit, and Madame was baptized at that font and
confirmed here. I have pictures of them both; and I have their books--one
of the books is a first edition. Do you care for such things?"
When I was broke in London, in the Fall of Eighty-nine! Do I care for such
things? I can not recall what I said, but I remembered that this
brown-skinned priest with his liquid, black eyes, and the look of sorrow
on his handsome face, stood out before me like the picture of a saint.
I made an engagement to meet him the next morning, when he bethought him
of his promise to the old man of the cudgel and wooden shoes.
"Come now, then--come with me now. My house is just next door!"
And so we walked up the main aisle of the old church, around the altar
where Madame Guyon used to kneel, and by a crooked, little passageway
entered a house fully as old as the church. A woman who might have been as
old as the house was setting the table in a little dining-room. She looked
up at me through brass-rimmed spectacles, and without orders or any one
saying a word she whisked off the tablecloth, replaced it with a snowy,
clean one, and put on two plates instead of one. Then she brought in
toasted brown bread and tea, and a steaming dish of lentils, and
fresh-picked berries in a basket all lined with green leaves.
It was not a very sumptuous repast, but 't was enough. Afterward I learned
that Father Francis was a vegetarian. He did not tell me so, neither did
he apologize for absence of fermented drink, nor for his failure to supply
tobacco and pipes.
Now, I have heard that there be priests who hold in their cowled heads
choice recipes for spiced wines, and who carry hidden away in their hearts
all the mysteries of the chafing-dish; but Father Francis was not one of
these. His form was thin, but the bronze of his face was the bronze that
comes from red corpuscles, and the strongly corded neck and calloused,
bony hands told of manly abstinence and exercise in the open air, and
sleep that follows peaceful thoughts, knowing no chloral.
After the meal, Father Francis led the way to his little study upstairs.
He showed me his books and read to me from his one solitary "First
Edition." Then he unlocked a little drawer in an old chiffonier and
brought out a package all wrapped in chamois. This parcel held two
miniature portraits, one of Fenelon and one of Madame Guyon.
"That picture of Fenelon belonged to Madame Guyon. He had it painted for
her and sent it to her while she was in prison at Vincennes. The other I
bought in Paris--I do not know its history."
The good priest had work to do, and let me know it very gently, thus: "You
have come a long way, brother, the road was rough--I know you must be
weary. Come, I'll show you to your room."
He lighted a candle and took me to a bedroom at the end of the hall. It
was a little room, very clean, but devoid of all ornament, save a picture
of the Madonna and her Babe, that hung over the head of the little iron
bedstead. It was a painting--not very good. I think Father Francis painted
it himself; the face of the Holy Mother was very human--divinely human--as
motherhood should be.
Father Francis was right: the way had been rough and I was tired.
The treetops sang a cooing lullaby and the nightwinds sighed solemnly as
they wandered through the hallway and open doors. It did not take me long
to go to sleep. Later, the wind blew up fresh and cool. I was too sleepy
to get up and hunt for more covering, and yet I was cold as I curled up in
a knot and dreamed I was first mate with Peary on an expedition in search
of the North Pole. And the last I remember was a vision of a gray-robed
priest tiptoeing across the stone floor; of his throwing over me a heavy
blanket and then hastily tiptoeing out again.
The matin-bells, or the birds, or both, awoke me early, but when I got
downstairs I found my host had preceded me. His fine face looked fresh and
strong, and yet I wondered when he had slept.
After breakfast, the old housekeeper hovered near.
"What is it, Margaret?" said the Father, gently.
"You haven't forgotten your engagement?" asked the woman, with just a
quaver of anxiety.
"Oh no, Margaret"; then turning to me, "Come, you shall go with me--we
will talk of Fenelon and Madame Guyon as we walk. It is eight miles and
back, but you will not mind the distance. Oh, didn't I tell you where I'm
going? You saw the old man at the church last night--it is his
daughter--she is dying--dying of consumption. She has not been a good
girl. She went away to Paris, three years ago, and her parents never heard
from her. We tried to find her, but could not; and now she has come home
of her own accord--come home to die. I baptized her twenty years ago--how
fast the time has flown!"
The priest took a stout staff from the corner, and handing me its mate we
started away. Down the white, dusty highway we went; out on the stony road
where yesterday, as the darkness gathered, trudged an old man in wooden
shoes and with a cordwood cudgel--at his heels a dog of Flanders.