'What a need there is for effort and energy; or real religion and common
sense!'--MRS. BOOTH.
One Sunday, when Catherine and her mother went to the Meeting as usual,
they found a 'Special' there, taking the services. He was quite different
from the other Specials, and Catherine could not help noticing him with
extra interest. He spoke to the people's hearts, and was not so much
occupied in preaching a good sermon as in getting some one converted. But
he did preach a very good sermon for all that, and chose this verse as
his text--'This is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world.'
A few days later Catherine and her mother were spending the evening with
a friend, when the very same preacher came in, and was introduced to them
as the Rev. William Booth.
Catherine knew they had one subject in common--love for souls; but before
the evening ended she discovered that the young minister was quite as
earnest as she was herself in fighting the Drink curse and all that was
connected with it.
A few Sundays later Mr. Booth preached again in the same building, this
time as the minister, or, as we should say, 'Officer in charge,' and no
longer as a Special. And now you will guess that the two often met, and
that, because they had so many interests in common, they soon learned to
know each other well, till respect grew into friendship, and friendship
into love.
Catherine was at this time twenty-two years old, and Mr. Booth was three
months younger; but, though you would have said they were old enough to
know their own minds, they did nothing hastily, and would enter into no
engagement till they were quite sure of God's Will in the matter.
Had Catherine ever before thought of the day when she would get married?
you, perhaps, ask. Oh, yes, indeed, and when but a girl of
sixteen--directly, in fact, after she was saved--she settled in her own
heart what sort of a man her future husband must be. First, she decided,
he must be truly converted, and a total abstainer, not to please her,
but from his own choice. Then he must be a man of sense, or she could
never respect him; and, if they were to be happy, they must feel and
think alike on all important matters.
Ah, if our women-Soldiers and Cadets to-day would but follow our Army
Mother's example, there would be fewer unhappy marriages and wrecked
lives!
But in her secret heart Catherine had also, girl-like, some ideas about
the sort of man she would like to marry, if she might choose. He should
be a minister--that was the nearest she could get to an Officer in those
days; William was a name she particularly liked, and--if only he might be
tall and dark! If you had been there when Katie Mumford first listened to
his preaching you would have seen that he was 'tall and dark' indeed.
But though William Booth loved Catherine with a deep and holy love, which
increased each time they met, yet he was very poor, and he wondered if he
ought, under the circumstances, to ask her to share his lot. He wrote a
letter to her, telling her how perplexed and troubled he was, and her
answer shows us that, right from the very earliest days, before they were
even engaged, her one desire was that his soul should prosper.
'My dear friend,' she begins ... 'The thought that I should cause you any
suffering or increase your perplexity is almost unbearable. I am tempted
to wish that we had never seen each other. Do try to forget me, as far as
the remembrance would injure your usefulness or spoil your peace. If I
have no alternative but to oppose the Will of God, or trample on the
desolations of my own heart, _my choice is made_. "Thy will be done"
is my constant cry. I care not for myself; but Oh, if I cause you to err,
I shall never be happy again.'
It was not the fear of poverty that frightened her, for a few days later
she says:--
'I fear you did not fully understand my difficulty. It was not
circumstances. I thought I had assured you that a bright prospect would
not allure me, nor a dark one affright me, if only we are _one in
heart_.
My only reason for wishing to defer the engagement was that _you_
might feel satisfied in your mind that the step is right.... If you are
convinced on this point, let circumstances go, and let us be one, come
what may.'
This is exactly what they did, and after meeting, and together
consecrating their lives to God, they solemnly pledged themselves to each
other.
And now began a three-years' engagement, in which, though often for long
months at a time they never met, they remained true to each other and to
God, in thought and word and deed.
Many of the beautiful letters that our Army Mother wrote to The General
at this time, I am glad to tell you, have been kept, and we will look
together at some of the ways in which she tried to help and cheer him.