iiiihhir !in; 1 iitiiMiiiiiiiiiiiiihitiniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiliniiiiiiiiiiiiiiitiiiiiil I (nifiiMiinniitiiiMii;! . iiHIlltttUililttUlllltlililltlt UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT LOS ANGELES fr -^v By canon SHEEHAN, D.D Luke Delmege: A Novel. Lisheen: or the Test of the Spirits. A Novel. Glenanaar: A Novel of Irish Life. The Blindness of Dr. Gray; or, The Final Law. A Novel of Clerical Life. Miriam Lucas: A Novel. The Queen's Fillet: A Novel. The Graves at Kilmorna: A Story of '67. Parerga: a Companion Volume to "Under the Cedars and the Stars." The Intellectuals: An Experiment in Irish Club- Life. Tristram Lloyd: An Unfinished Novel. Edited and completed by Rev. H. Gaffney, O.P. Canon Sheehan of Doneraile: The Story of an Irish Parish Priest as told chiefly by himself in Books, Personal Memoirs atid Letters. By Herman J. Heuscr, D.D. LUKE DELMEGE LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO. 5 J FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 2Zl EAST 20TH STREET, CHICAGO TREMONT TEMPLE, BOSTON 2 10 VICTORIA STREET, TORONTO LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO. Ltd. 39 PATERNOSTER ROW, E C 4, LONDON 5 3 NICOL ROAD, BOMBAY 6 OLD COURT HOUSE STREET, CALCUTTA 167 MOUNT ROAD, MADRAS LUKE DELMEGE BY THE REV. P. A. SHEEHAN Author of ''My New Curate," "Geoffrey Austin : Student,'' " 77ie Triumph of Failure,'^ "Cithara Mea," etc., etc. New Impression LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO. NEW \ORK ■ LOiNDOxN • TORONTO 1928 COPTKIGHT, 1900 AND 1901, BY THE AMERICAN ECCLESIASTICAL REVIEW. CoPYRUiHT, 1901, BY LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. All riyhin 7eserved. First Edition, November, 1901. Reijrinted Jan- uary, 1902; May, 1905; .Tanuarv, 1907; March 1910- January, 1916; April, 1920; March, 1924; August' MADE IX THE UNITED STATES "^'^ NOTE A. •arc Through the courtesy of the Editor of the Ameri- :•. CAN Ecclesiastical Review, throug-h wliose pages -) this story has been running as a serial, it is now repro- , duced in book form. CONTENTS CHAPTER I. Introductory . II. The Illusions of Youth III. TuK Sagacities of Age IV. Dies Magna, et — Amara V. A Novel Thesis . VI. Adieux .... VII. En Route VIII. Aliuun .... IX. The Realms of Dis X. "The Strayed Reveller' XI. Circe .... XII. Critical and Expository XIII. Racial Characteristics XIV. AVeighixg Anchor XV. Ayleshurgh XVI. Enchantment XVII. A Last Aphorism . XVIII. Disenchantment XIX. The Stranger am> his Gods XX. Eclectic Catiioi.k ism . XXI. The SuitMKinjKo Tenth XXII. Euthanasia XXIII. The Rhine Falls . XXIV. The Hall of Eclis XXV. Altruism .... vii PAGE 3 17 29 42 53 65 79 95 107 118 129 140 153 166 181 194 207 220 233 249 262 275 286 306 321 VIU CONTENTS CHAPTER XXVI. The Secret of the King XXVII. A Great Treasure XXVIII. Mary of Magdala . XXIX. A Parliamentary Dinner XXX. Cross Currents XXXI. Greek meets Greek XXXII. Percussa et Humiliata XXXIII. Dagox dismembered XXXIV. Cremona and Calvary . XXXV. A Lecture on Biology . XXXVI. A Boast and its Consequences XXXVII. Disillusion .... XXXVIII. Logwood Day .... XXXIX. Martyrdom .... XL. Reunion XLI. A Profession Sermon XLII. Aftermath .... PAGB 337 350 366 378 392 408 421 431 451 465 480 493 509 527 544 556 570 BOOK I LUKE DELMEGE CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY It happened in this way. I was absorbed in a day- dream — an academic discussion with myself as to whether demand created supply or supply elicited de- mand — a hoary question throughout all the debating societies of the world ; and I was making but little progress toward its solution, when suddenly it solved itself in a remarkable manner. I thought 1 heard, above the rumbling and muflled thunder of the colossal printing press, far away in a certain street in New York, the word " Copy " shouted up through a telephone. The voice was the voice of that modern magician, the fore- man printer. " Copy " echoed in the manager's room, where, amid piles of paper, damp, and moist, and redolent of printer's ink, the great potentate sat. " Copy,"' he shouted through his teleplione, with scmiething that sounded like a prayer — but it wasn't — to the editor, many miles away. " Copy," shouted the editor through his telephone — no! that hasn't come yet, but it will one of these days. P>ut ''Copy," he wrote three thousand miles across the bleak, barren wastes of the turbulent Atlantic to one sitting on a rustic seat in a quiet garden in a country village beneath the shadows of the black mountains that separate Cork County from Limerick, and with Spenser's "-gentle ]\lulla" almost washing liis feet ; and " Copy " settled the academic question forever. That mighty modern IMinotaur, the press, must be glutted, not with fair youths of Arcady 4 LUKE DELMEGE and fair maidens of Athens, but with thoughts that spring from the brains of mortals, and dreams that draw their beautiful, irregular forms across the twilight realms of Fancy. This it is that makes literary men irreverent and unscrupulous. Was it not said of Balzac, that he dug and dragged every one of his romances straight from the heart of some woman ? " Truth is stranger than fiction." No ! my dear friend, for all fiction is truth — truth torn up by the roots from bleeding human hearts, and carefully bound with fillets of words to be placed there in its vases of green and gold on your reading-desk, on your breakfast-table. Horrid ? So it is. Irreverent ? Well, a little. But you, my dear friend, and the rest of humanity will have nothing else. " Nihil humani a me alienum puto," said the Latin poet. We have gone a step further. We will have nothing that is not human. The stage may be gorgeous ; the scenery painted by a master hand ; the electric light soft, lambent, penetrating; the orchestra perfect from bass drum to first fiddle ; but the audience gapes and yawns, and is impatient. There is something wanting. Ha! there it is, and we are all alive again. Opera glasses are levelled, men and women hold their breaths lest the least trifle should escape them ; the mighty conductor is nowhere ; all eyes are strained on what ? — a little child, perhaps ; a clown, an Italian shep- herdess, a bandit, a fool, — no matter, it is human, and it is for this figure that stage and scenery, lights, flowers, and music become at once ancillary and sub- servient. And so, when Copy ! Copy ! ! Copy ! ! t tinkled like an impatient electric bell in my ears, I said : I must seek a type somewhere. Look into your inner consciousness, said a voice. No use ! It is a tabula rasa, from which everything interesting has been long since sponged away. Call up experiences ! Alas ! experiences are like ancient photographs. At one time, I am quite sure, this elegant gentleman, dressed in the fashion of the sixties, was attractive and interesting INTRODUCTORY 6 enough. Now, alas, he is a guy. So with experiences. They thrill, and burn, and pierce, then fade away into ghosts, only fit to haunt the garret or the lumber room. No ! get a living, breathing, human being, and dissect him. Find out all his thoughts, dreams, sensations, experiences. Watch him, waking and sleeping, as old Roger Chilling worth watched Arthur Dimmesdale in that teri'ible drama by Hawthorne. Then you have flesh and blood quivering and alive, and the world is satistied. Fate, or the Fates, who are always kind, threw some such subject across my path in those days when imagi- nation was feeble and the electric bell was growing importunate. I knew that he had a story. I guessed at it by intuition. Was it not Cardinal Manning who said, when he was asked to imitate his great compeers, Wiseman and Newman, by writing a novel, " that every man carried the plot of at least one ro- mance in his head ? " Now, this man was a mystic and a mystery. He was a mystic, or was reputed one, be- cause he had once — a young man's folly — written something about Plato ; he was called a mystery, be- cause he wore his hair brushed back from his forehead right down over his coat collar ; and scarce one of the brethren had ever seen his inner sanctum, or was ever able to break through the crust of a deportment which was always calm and gentle and sweet, but which drew an invisible line somewhere between you and him — a line of mystic letters : " Thus far shalt thou come, and no farther." Some thought that he gave himself too many airs and was conceited ; one or two rough-spoken, hard-fisted colleagues dul)l)e(l him as Carlyle dubbed Herbert Spencer : "an immeasurable ; '" but there he was, always calmly looking out on the tossing, tur- bulent ocean of humanity from the quiet recesses of an unluxurious hermitage, and the still deejter and more sequestered recesses of a quiet and thoughtful mind. Like all conscientious interviewers, I had made a few desperate attempts to get inside this mystery and un- 6 LUKE DELMEGE ravel it, but I had always been repelled. I could never get beyond the adytum of the temple, though I coughed loudly, and put the shoes off my feet with reverence. It was unapproachable and impenetrable. One day, however, it was borne to his ears that I had done a kind thing to some one or other. He no longer said with his eyes : You are a most impertinent fellow ! The outworks were taken. Then I wrote him a hum- ble letter about some old fossil, called Maximus Tyrius. To my surprise I received four pages of foolscap on the Fourth Dissertation : — Quomodo ah adulatore amicus distingui possit. Then, one winter's night, I was bowling home in the dark from the railway station, and became suddenly aware that voices were shouting warnings from afar off, and that the line was blocked. So it was — badly. My mysterious friend was vainly trying to cut the harness on his fallen mare, whilst his trap, dismembered, was leaning in a maudlin way against the ditch. "A bad spill?" I cried. " Yes ! " he said laconically. " Is the jar broke ? " I asked. " I beg pardon," he said stiffly. Then I knew he had not heard the famous story. " Pardon me," he said, " I don't quite understand your allusions." '' Never mind," I said, with all the contempt of a professional for an amateur, as I saw him hacking with his left hand, and with a dainty mother-of-pearl-handled penknife, the beautiful new harness. " What do you want mutilating that harness for, when the trap has been kicked into space ? " " I thought 'twas the correct thing to do," he mur- mured. Then I said in my own mind : He is an im- measurable . " Here, Jem," I cried to my boy. He came over, and whilst I held up the mare's head, he gave her a fierce kick. She was on her feet in an instant. INTRODUCTORY 7 " Where's your man ? " I asked. " I don't know," he said wonderingly. We found the man, safe and sound, and fast asleep against the hedge. "Come now," I said, for I had tacitly assumed the right to command by reason of my su[)erior knowledge, " montez ! You must come with me ! " "Impossible ! " he said, "I must get home to-night." " Very good. Now, do you think that you can get home more easily and expeditiously in that broken trap than in mine ? Hallo ! are you left-handed ? " "No, but my right arm is strained a little, just a little." I took the liberty of lifting his hand, and a small, soft, white hand it was. It fell helpless. Then I saw that his face was very white. This showed he was a thorough brick. " Is the jar, — I mean the arm, — broke ? " he said, with a smile. Then I knew he was human. That little flash of humour, whilst he was suffering excruciating pain, told volumes of biography. I helped him up to the seat, and, without a word, I drove him to his house. Tlie doctor called it a compound comminuted frac- ture of the ulna ; we called it a broken wrist. But it was a bad business, and necessitated splints for at least six weeks. I volunteered to say his two Masses every Sunday, my own being supplied by a kind neighbour ; and thus I broke down the barriers of chill pride or reserve, and saw the interior of liis house and of his heart. The former was plain almost to poverty : tlie latter was rich to exuberance. Four walls lintMl with books from floor to ceiling, a carefully waxed floor, one shred of Indian carpet, and a writing-desk and chair — this was his sitting-room. F)Ut the marble manteliiiece was decorated with a pair of costly brass Benares vases, flanked by a pair of snake candlesticks ; and his writ- ing-desk was of Shisham wood, and it perfumed w ith a 8 LUKE DELMEGE strange, faint aroma the whole apartment. Over in one corner, and facing tlie nortliern light, was an easel ; a painter's palette leaned against it, and on it was a half-finished oil-painting — one of those dreamy sea scenes, where the flush of the setting sun is deepening into purple, and the sleeping sea is curled into furrows of gold and lead. A large three-masted vessel, its naked spars drawn like the scaffolding of some airy mansion against the sky, was passing out into the unknown. It was the everlasting enigma of futurity and fate. I had no notion of losing valuable time. I com- menced business the first Sunday evening we dined together. "• I am a story-teller," I said, " and you have a story to tell me. Now, now," I warned, as I saw him make a feeble gesture of protest and denial with his left hand — " don't quote the Needy Knife-Grinder, an' you love me. You have seen a great deal of life, you have felt a great deal, you have resolved a great deal ; and I must do you the justice to say that you have nobly kept your resolution of retirement and seclusion from your species — that is, from brother-clerics. Here are all the ele-' ments of a first-class story — " " But I've never written even a goody-goody story," he said. "I doubt if I have the faculty of narration." " Leave that to me," I said. " Give me naked facts and experiences, and Worth never devised such fancy costumes as I shall invent for them." " But," he protested, " why not seek more interesting matter ? Here now, for example, is an admirable book, exemplifying the eternal adage : ' Human nature is the same the wide world over.' I dare say, now, you thought that Anglican clergymen are moulded into such perfec- tion by university education, and the better teaching of social life, that there is never room for the least eccen- tricity amongst them." " Let me be candid," I replied, " and say at once that such has been my conviction — that at least so far as social virtues are concerned, and the balancing and INTRODUCTORY 9 measuring of daily social environments, tliey were beyond criticism. But have you discovered any freaks or prod- igies there ? " " What would you think," he replied, " of this ? A dear old rector driven to resign liis parish by his curate's wife, against whom he had foolishly warned the afore- said curate in the days of his bachelorship. She affected to believe that he was an antediluvian, spoke to him with the sweet simplicity of a child at tennis parties and five o'clock teas ; then discovered that once he had preached a borrowed sermon, and ever afterwards re- monstrated with him in public on the misdemeanour : ' Ah ! you dear old sly-boots, when you can preach so beautifully, why do you give us that wretched Penny Pulpit so often ? ' " " Look here ! " I said, " that's a perfect mine. Have you any more diamonds like that ? " " Well, not many. The mine is salted. But what do you think of the good rector, who advertised for a curate, married, but childless, to occupy the rectory, whilst the incumbent was off to Nice on a holiday ? " " Well, did he get him ? " '' Rather. Hut tlie ladv was a docf-fancier, and brought with her fourteen brindled hulldogs. That rectory and its fjrounds were a desert for three months. No livinsr being, postman, butcher's boy, baker's boy, dare show his face within the gates. Occasionally there was a big row in the menagerie. The mistress alone could quell it." " How ? " " Can't you guess ? " " I give it up, like Mr. Johnston." "Well, a red-liot iron, which she kept always in the kitchen fire for the purpose." " Rather drastic," I said. "Who could liave thought it in staid England? Verily, Innnan nature is every- where the same." " Which proves ? " he said questioningly. I waited. 10 LUKE DELMEGE " Which proves," he continued, "that there is nothing half so absurd as to deduce general sweeping proposi- tions about nations and races from very slender premises. The world is full of strange faces and strange charac- ters." Then I knew he was coming around. And he did. Poor fellow ! he had to take to bed a few days after, for the pain was intense and the weather was moist. I had great doubts whether our local physician was treat- ing that dangerous wound scientifically, and I proposed a few times to call in some leading surgeon from the city. The medical attendant indeed assented, and I saw he looked alarmed. But my poor friend declined. " It will be all right," he said, " and after all it is but a weary world. Oh ! to slee^D and be at rest forever : to know nothing of the weariness of getting up and lying down, and the necessities of this poor body, its eating and drinking, and being clothed ; to be free from the eternal vexations of men, their vanity, and folly, and pride. I shall dread to meet them even in Heaven. ' Look for me, my dear friend,' as a good poet has said, 'in the nurseries of Heaven.' " Then my heart went out to him, for I saw his had been a troubled life, and day by day I sat by his bedside, whilst partly as an anodyne to pain, partly to please me, he went over the details of his life. Then, one day, I hinted that his life had been a carriere manquee^ and that he was a soured and disappointed man. He raised himself on his left arm, and looked at me long and wist- fully. A slight discoloration had appeared above the fractured wrist. He pointed to it. " That is the black flag of death," he said. " You will find my will in the lower locked drawer of my writing- desk. I have left all to sick and poor children. But you are wrong. I am not soured, or deceived, or disap- pointed. I have a grateful heart to God and man. I have not had an unhappy life. Indeed, I have had more than my share of its blessings. But, my friend," he said earnestly, " I am a puzzled man. The enigma of life INTRODUCTORY 11 t has been always too much for me. You will have guessed as much from all that I have told you. I seek the solu- tion in eternity of the awful riddle of life." He fell back in great pain, and I forgot my calling as interviewer in my sympathy as friend. Dear Lord ! and the world called this man proud. "Now," I said, "you are despondent. Your accident and this confinement have weighed on your nerves. You must let me send for Dr. S . I'll telegraph to the bishop, and he'll put you under obedience." He smiled faintly. " No use," he said, " this is septicccmia. I have prob- ably forty-eight hours to live. Then, Rest ! Rest! Rest! It's a strange thing to be tired of life when I had every- thing that man could desire. This pretty rural parish ; a fair competence ; churches and schools perfect ; and," he gave a little laugh, "no curate. Yet, I am tired, tired as a child after a hot summer day ; and tired of a foolish whim to reconcile the irreconcilable." " And why not give up this brain-racking," I said, " and live ? Nothing solves riddles but work, and stead- ily ignoring them. Why, we'd all go mad if we were like you." "True," he said feebly, "true, m}^ friend. But, you see, habits are tyrants, and I commenced badly. I was rather innocent, and I wanted to dovetail professions and actions, principle and interest (forgive the sorry pun), that which ought to be, and that which is. It was rather late in life wdien I discovered tlie utter ini[)racti- cabihty of such a process. Life was a Chinese [)uzzk'. Then, too late, I tiung aside all the enigmas of life, and flung myself on the bosom of the great mystery of God, and there sought rest. But, beliind the veil! Behind the veil ! There only is the solution." He remained a long time in a reverie, staring up at the ceiling. I noticed a faint odour in the air. " You know," he said at length, " I was not loved by the brethren. ^Vhy ? Did I dislike them ? No! God forbid 1 I liked and loved everything that God 12 LUKE DELMEGE created. But I was unhappy. Their ways puzzled me, and I was silent. There was nothing sincere or open in the world but the faces of little children. God bless them ! They are a direct revelation from Heaven. Then, you will notice that there is not a single modern book in my library. Why ? Because all modern litera- ture is lies ! lies ! lies ! And such painful lies ! Why will novelists increase and aggravate the burdens of the race by such painful analyses of human character and action ? " " Now, now," I said, "you are morbid. Why, half tlie pleasures of life come from works of imagination and poetry." " True. But, why are they always so painful and so untrue ? Do you think that any one would read a novel, if it were not about something painful ? — and the more painful, the more entrancing. Men revel in creating and feeling pain. Here is another puzzle." It was so sad, this gentle, pitiful life drawing to a close, and without a farewell word of hope to the world it was leaving, that I had neither comment nor consolation to offer. It was so unlike all my daily experiences that I was silent with pity and surprise. He interrupted me. "Now for the great wind-up. To-morrow morning you will come over early and administer the last Sacra- ments. When I am dead, you will coffin my poor remains immediately, for I shall be discoloured sadly and shall rapidly decompose. And you know we must not give our poor people the faintest shock. I wish to be buried in my little church, right under the statue of our Blessed Lady, and within sound of the Mass. There I spent my happiest hours on earth. And I shall not rest in peace anywhere but where , I can hear the Mass-bell. You think I am wandering in my mind ? No. I am quite collected. I often debated with my- self whether I should not like to be buried outside, where I should hear the people walking over my grave. INTRODUCTORY 13 But no ! I have decided to remain where the Divine Mother will look down with her pitying eyes on the place where this earthly tabernacle is melting into dust, and where the syllables of the mighty Mass will hover and echo when the church is silent betimes. And no foolish epitaph. 'Here lieth,' and ' pray for his soul.' That's all." He was silent for a little while ; but now and again a faint shudder showed me the agony he was suffering. "I am tiring you," he said at length ; "but sometimes I dream that in the long summer twilights, when my little village choir is practising, some child may allow her thoughts, as she is singing, to pass down to where the pastor is lying ; and perhaps some poor mother may come over to my grave, after she has said her Rosar}-, and point out to the wondering child in her arms the place where the man tliat loved little children is lying. We are not all forgotten, though we seem to be. Here, too, is another puzzle. I am very tired." I stood up and left the room, vowing that I would leave that poor soul at rest forever. I administered the last Sacraments the following day, after I had seen the doctor. He was much distressed at the fatal turn things had taken. " He had not antici- pated ; 'twas a case for hospital treatment ; the weather was so sultry ; he had dreaded amputation, etc. No hope? None." The patient was right. And so two days later, exactly as he had anticipated, we were grouped around his bedside to watch and help ])is last struggle. But even in that supreme moment, his habitual equanimity did not desert him. Courteous to 11.11 around, apologizing for little troubles, solicitous ivbout others, eagerly looking forward to the lifting of the veil, he passed his last moments in life. Then about six o'clock in the evening, just as the Angelus ceased tolling, he cried : — " 'Tis the soul -bell, the passing-bell, is it not?" "'Tis the Angelus," I replied. " Say it with me, or rather for me," he said. Then 14 LUKE DELMEGE a few minutes later : " 'Tis growing very dark, and I am cold. What is it? I cannot understand — " And so he passed to the revelation. An unusually large number of the brethren gathered to his obsequies, which was again very strange and per- plexing. He was buried as he had desired, and his memory is fast vanishing from amongst men ; but the instincts of the novelist have overcome my tenderness for that memory, and I give his life-history and expe- riences. Am I justified in doing so ? Time must tell. I should, however, mention another circumstance. At the obsequies were two old priests, one bent low with years, the other carrying the white burden of his winters more defiantly. The former asked me : — " Did Luke speak of me, or wish to see me? " I had to say " No ! " He went away looking very despondent. The other called me aside and said : — "■ Did Luke express no wish to see me ? " Now, I was afraid of this man. He, too, was an oddity, — a deep, profound scholar in subjects that are not interesting to the multitude. He was one of the few who knew Luke well. " Yes,'" I said ; " several times. But he always drew back, saying : ' Father Martin is old and feeble. I can- not bring him such a journey in such weather. Don't write ! It will be nothing.' " " Did you think that this accident was a trifle, and that there was no danger of fatal issues?" I coughed a little and said something. " And did you think it was right," he continued, " that the only friend he probably had in the world " — here his voice broke — " should have been excluded from his confidence at such a momentous time ? " " I really had no alternative," I replied. " I did all I could for him, poor fellow ; but you know he was peculiar, and you also know that he was supersensitive about giving trouble to others." '■'• Quite so. But when you saw danger, you should INTRODUCTORY 15 have summoned his friends. This is one of those thinsfs one finds it hard to condone. He has left a will and papers, 1 presume ? " '' Yes," I said ; " 1 have charge of all." " Have you opened the will ? " "Not as yet." "Please do so, and see who are the executors." We opened tiie will then and there, and found that my troublesome interlocutor, the Reverend Martin Hughes, was sole executor. He closed the will at once, and said, coldly : — " Now, wouhl you be pleased to hand over all other papers and conlidential documents belonging to my deceased friend ? You can have no further need of them — " " I beg your pardon," I said ; " the good priest just departed gave me a good deal of his confidence. You know that I was in hourly attendance on him for six weeks. I asked him to allow me tell the story of his life, and lie consented, and granted me full permission to examine and retain all his letters, papers, diaries, manuscripts, for that purpose." " That puts a different complexion on things," said Father Hughes. " You fellows are regular resurrec- tionists. You cannot let the dead rest and bury their liistories witli tliem." "But if a life has a lesson?" I ventured to say, humbly. " For whom ? " " For tlie survivors and the world." " And what are survivors and the world to the dead?" he asked. I was silent. It would be a tactical mistake to irritate this quaint i)ld man. He pondered deeply for a long time. " I have the greatest reluctance," he said, " about con- sentinof to such a thinjT. I know nothing more utterlv detestable than the manner in whieh the secrets of the dead are purloined in our most prurient generation, and 16 LUKE DELMEGE the poor relics of their thoughts and feelings scattered to the dust, or exposed on the public highways for the ludihrium of an irreverent public. And this would be bad enough, but we have to face the lamentable fact that it is not the reality, but a hideous caricature of the reality that is presented to the public — " " You can prevent that," I said meekly. " How ? " " By simply taking the matter into your own hands. No man knew Luke Delmege half so well as you — " " I'm too old and feeble for all that," he said. " Well, let's strike a bargain," I replied. " Every page of this history I shall submit to you for revision, correction, or destruction, as seems fit, if you keep me on the right track by giving me as much light as you can." " It is the only way to avert an evil," he replied. I told him I was complimented. And so, with bits and scraps of frayed yellow paper, torn and tattered letters, sermons half-written, and diaries badly kept, I have clothed in living language the skeleton form of this human life. On the whole, I feel I have done it well, although now and again an angle of the skeleton — some irregularity — will push forward and declare itself. Sometimes it is an anachro- nism which I cannot account for, except on the score of great charity on the part of my deceased friend, who seemed to have preferred that his ignorance should be assumed rather than that charity should be wounded. Sometimes there is a curious dislocation of places, probably for the same reason. And sometimes I have found it difficult to draw the seams of some rent to- gether, and to make times and circumstances correspond with the modern parts of our history. And if "the tear and smile " of Ireland alternate in those pages, it is withal a solemn history ; and many, perhaps, will find in it deeper meanings than we have been able tc interpret or convey. CHAPTER II THE ILLUSIONS OF YOUTH He was a young man, a very young man, otherwise he would not have been so elated when Lucas Delmege^ X ensis, was called out for the fourth time, and he had to request his diocesans to watch the huge pile of premiums he had already won, whilst he passed up the centre aisle of the prayer-hall, and his bishop, smiling as he raised another sheaf of calf-bound volumes, handed them to him, with a wluspered " Uptime, Luca." And yet, if a little vanity — and it is a gentle vice — is ever permissible, it would have been in his case. To have led his class successfully in the halls of a great ecclesiastical semi- nary ; to be w^atched envicnisly by live hundred and sixty fellow-students, as he moved along on his triumphant march ; to have come out victorious from a great intel- lectual struggle, and to receive this praise from his bishop, who felt that himself and his diocese were hon- oured by the praise reflected from his young subject — assuredly, these are things to stir sluggish pulses, and make the face pallid with pleasure. And if all this was l)ut the forecast of a great career in the Church ; if it pointed with the steady finger of an unerring fate to the long vista of life, strewn with roses, and with laurel crowns dropped by unseen hands from above, there would be all the better reason for that elastic step, and that gentle condescension which marked the manner of the successful student, when his admirers gathered c 17 18 LUKE DELMEGE around him, and even his defeated rivals candidly con- gratulated him upon his unprecedented success. Yet, withal, he was modest. Just a little spring in his gait ; just a little silent reception of adulation, as a something due to his commanding position ; and just a little moist- ening of his eyelids, as he dreamt of a certain far home down by the sea, and the pride of his mother as he flung all his treasures into her lap, and his sisters' kisses of triumph for the beloved one — ah me ! who would say nay to this ? Let the sunshine, and the roses, and the love of thy loved ones play around thee, thou pale and gentle Levite, while they may. Soon the disillusion will come, the laurels will fade, and the sunshine turn to gray ashen shadow, and the tender and strong sup- ports of home and love will be kicked aside by Time ^ and Fate ; but the arena of life will be ever before thee, and every fresh triumph will be a fresh conflict, and thou wilt be a friendless one and naked. But how didst thou come to believe that the quiet study hall was the world, and thou the cynosure of all eyes — the prov- erb in all mouths ? Listen, dear child, for thou art but a child. The mighty world has never heard of thee, does not know thy name ; the press is silent about thee ; the very priests of thy diocese do not even know of thy existence. Thou art but a pin's point in the universe. He does not believe it. He has been a First of First,i and the universe is at his feet. His first shock was at the Broadstone Terminus of the Great Midland Railway. A young and unsophisti- cated porter was so rustic and ignorant as to raise his hat to the young priest as he leaped from the carriage. "Why did ye do that?" said an older comrade. " Sure, thim's but collaygians. They won't be priested for another year or two." The porter had not heard of Luke Delmege, and the First of First. He ran his eyes rapidly over the newspapers in the restaurant, where he was taking a humble cup of coffee. 1 First prizeman in his class. THE ILLUSIONS OF YOUTH 19 There was news from all quarters of the globe — an earthquake in Japan, a revolution in the Argentine, a row in the French Chamber of Deputies, a few speeches in the House of Commons, a wliole page and a half of sporting intelligence, a special column on a fav(mrite greyhound named Ben Bow^ an interview with a famous jockey, a paragrapli about a great minister in Austria, gigantic lists of stocks and sliares, a good deal of squalor and crime in the police courts, one line about a great philosopher who was dying — can it be possible ? Not a line, not a word of yesterday's triumph in the academy ! The name of Luke Delmege, First of First, was nowhere to be seen. Could he be, by any possible chance, in the photogra- phers' windoAvs ? Alas, no ! Here are smiling act- resses, babies in all kinds of postures and with every variety of expression, favourite pugdogs, dirty beasts of every kind with tufts of hair on their tails, fashionable beauties, Portias, and Imogens, and Cordelias ; but the great athlete of yesterday ? And the porters made no distinction between him and his fellow-students as he sped southwards to his home ; a few school-girls stared at him and passed on ; commercial men glanced at him and buried themselves in their papei'S ; a few priests cheerily said : — " Home for the holidays, boys ? " But Luke Delmege was but a unit among millions, and excited no more notice than the rest. lie could not understand it. He liad always thought and believed that his college was the Hub of the I'ni- verse ; and that its prizemen came out into the unlet- tered world horned and aureoled with light as from a Holy Mountain. Was not a pri/.e in his college equivalent to a university degree ; and was it not sup- posed to shed a lambent light athwart the future i-areer of the winner, no matter how clouded that career might be? Did he not hear of men who folded their arms and leaned on their laurels for the rest of their lives, and were honoured and respected for their boyish tri- 2C LUKE DELMEGE umphs far into withered and useless age ? And here, in the very dawn of success, he was but a student amongst students ; and even these soon began to drop their hero-worship, when they found the great workl so listless and indifferent. He is troubled and bewildered ; he cannot understand. Well, at last, here is home, and here is worship, and here is love. Ay, indeed ! The news had gone on before him.' Tiie great athlete in the greatest college in the world was coming home ; and he was their own, their beloved. It nearly compensated and consoled him for all the neglect and indifference, when, on entering beneath his own humble roof, where he had learned all the best lessons of life, he found the whole family pi^os- trate on their knees before him. There was his aged father. He laid his newly consecrated hands on the gray head, and pronounced the blessing. He extended his hands to be kissed, and the rough lips almost bit them in the intensity of aft'ection and love. The old man rose and went out, too full of joy to speak. The young priest blessed his mother ; she kissed his hands — the hands, every line of which she knew with more than the skill of palmist. The young priest stooped and kissed her wrinkled forehead. He blessed his brothers, and laid his hands on the smooth brows of his sisters. Reverently they touched his palms with their gentle lips ; and then, Margery, the youngest, forget- ting everything but her great love, flung her arms around him, and kissed him passionately, crjdng and sobbing : '^ Oh ! Luke I Luke ! " Well, this at least was worth working for. Then the great trunk came in, and the vast treasures were unlocked, and taken out, and handled reverently, and placed on the few shelves that had been nailed by a rustic carpenter in the little alcove of his bedroom. There they winked and blinked in all their splendours of calf and gold ; and Peggy re- fused to dust them, or touch them at all, at all, for how did she know what might be in them ? They were the priest's books, and better have nothing to say to them. THE ILLUSIONS OF YOUTH 21 The priests are the Lord's anointed, you know. The less we have to say to them the better ! But a few privileged ones amongst the neighbours were allowed to come in, and look at these trophies, and offer the incense of their praise before the shrine of this family idol, and think, in their own hearts, whether any of their little flaxen-haired gossoons would ever reach to these unap- proachable altitudes. The aged curate, who had given his Luke his First Communion, came in later. " Well, Luke, old man, put on the Melchisedech at last ? How are you, and how is every bit of you ? You look washed out, man, and as ' tin as a lat,' as Moll Brien said when her son came out of jail. A few days' cours- ing on the mountains will put new life into you. The two dogs, Robin and Jiaven, are in prime condition, and the mountain has not been coursed since the great match in May. Ah ! these books 1 these books ! Luke's prizes, did you say, ma'am ? They're vampires, ma'am, sucking the rich red blood from his veins. Thank God, I never bothered much about them ! Here they are, of course : Camhrensis Eversus! By Jove ! I thought that fellow was spun out long since. Why, in my time, thirty years ago, ma'am, — time flies, — that book was declared out of print ; and here tlie fellow turns up as spruce as ever. A regular resurrectionist ! Well, it's all the same. Nobody ever read him, or ever will. O'Kane on the Rubrics ! A good book. Poor Jimmy ! The best soul tliat ever lived. Hurrah ! Murray on the Church/ Poor— old — Paddy ! The tub of theol- ogy I Crolly de Contractibus — " Here a dreadful shudder shot through his stalwart frame. '■'• Now, look here, Luke, you've had enougli of these fellows. Come up to-morrow and dine with us. No one but Father Tim and one or two of the neighbours. What — " " I've not called on the Canon yet," said Luke, timidly. " Never mind ! I won't ask him. You can call to- 22 LUKE DELMEGE morrow. But not too early, mind ! Between four and six. You may be in time for what he calls ' five o'clock tea.' Let me see! I'll say half-past four, so that you can have an excuse for getting away. Don't say you're dining with me, though. He'd never forgive you. Any- thing but that." He fell into a fit of musing. There were some troub- lous memories called u]3. " By the way, what about your first Mass ? " he cried, waking up. " I shall feel much obliged if you will kindly assist me. Father Pat," said Luke. " Of course, of course, my boy," said the curate, " though, indeed, very little assistance you'll require, I'm thinking." '' If I could say my first Mass here under my father's roof," said the young priest, timidly. " Of course, of course," said the curate. " Let me see, though. It's against the statutes of course, with- out the I3ishop's permission; and I don't know — but we'll dispense with statutes on this occasion. Will you take long? " " About half an hour, I think," said Luke. " Ay, it will be many a day, your reverence, before Luke will be able to say Mass like you," said Mrs. Del- mege. " Sure, 'tis you who don't keep us long waiting." " No, indeed ; why should I? Do I want ye to have camels' knees, like the poor old saints over there in Egypt?" "• Mike said there was no use trying to keep up with your reverence. Though you had the Latin, and I be- lieve there are very hard words in the Latin, and we had the English, you bate us intirely." " Look at that for you, now," said Father Pat, looking around admiringly. " Thin, the last time he wint to Cork with the butter, he bought the weeshiest little prayer book j^ou ever saw. 'Twas about half a finger long, and the print was mighty big. ' I have him now,' sez he ; ' 'tis a quare story if I THE ILLUSIONS OF YOUTH 23 don't lave him behind.' Troth, and yer reverence, ye were at the Be Profundis before he got to the Father Nosther" " Well, you see, ma'am, that's what comes from long practice. But I make it up in the preaching, you know," he said with a smile. " Troth, an' ye do," said Mrs. Delmege, " 'tisn't much, but what ye says comes from the heart." "There now, Luke, there's a critic for you. Look sharp, old man ; but I forgot. You are going abroad. Happy fellow ! 'Tis only in Ireland you come in for sharp hits. Well, don't forget to-morrow. Half-past four ; not a moment later. I'm a model of punctuality. Good-day, ma'am ; oh ! by Jove ! I was forgetting. Give us your blessing, my poor man. Isn't there some kind of indulgence attached?" He bent his head reverently as he knelt and received the benediction. " There, that will do me some good, whatever, and I want it." " The best poor priest within the says of Ireland," said Mrs. Delmege, wi})ing her eyes, as the curate strode down tlie little footpatli, and leaped lightly over the stile. But though Luke echoed his mother's kind words, deep down in his heart there was a jarring note some- where. What was it? That expression, "put on the jNIelchisedech" ? Well, after all, it was a i)retty usual colloquialism, and meant no irreverence. Then, saying Mass in a private house without episcopal sanction? How did that statute bind? Was it siih gravi? Luke shuddered at the tli<)Uhs, liad well-nigh cured him of all his pride and elation ; but he was wondering, between the vibrations of pleasure and dis- gust, at the eccentricities of men, now regarding his academical triumi)lis with contemptuous indifference, and again attaching to them an imiiortance which his common sense told him was not altogether the vapour- 36 LUKE DELMEGE t ings of mere flattery. In fact, men and their ever varying estimates of human excellence were becoming emigmatic ; and, to his own mind, therefore, their instability proved the very worthlessness of the things they praised and applauded. " You are all right now for life, my boy," said Father Martin, timidly. " You have made your name, and it is as indelible as a birthmark. All you have got to do now is to look down calmly on us poor fellows, who never got an Atque.'^ ^ "That's true," said the venerable host._ "Why, when his time comes for a parish, we must build a town for him. There will be nothing in this diocese fit for him." " They'll make him Vicar-Apostolic or Bishop, or something over there," said Father Martin. "He'll become a regular John Bull. If any fellow attempts to examine you for faculties, tell him you are a gold- medallist and he'll collapse." " Or pitch Camhrensis Eversus at his head," said Father Pat. " Well, I'm commencing well, whatever," said Luke, entering into the fun. " So you are, my boy, so you are," said the host, encouragingly. " If you'd only take to the wine of the country, you'd infallibly rise in the profession." " I'm dining with the Canon on Sunday," said Luke, demurely. " What ? " cried all in chorus. " Had you the courage ? " " There's no end to the impudence of these young fellows ! " " My God ! " said Father Tim, solemnly and slowly. " The next thing will be your asking him down to dine at Lisnalee," said the host. "And why not?" said Luke, flushing angrily " What discredit is there in dining under the roof of an honest man ? " 1 The lowest college distinction. THE SAGACITIES OF AGE 37 " And why not ? " said Father Pat, musingly, " And why not ? " said Father Tim, as from afar off. "Ai)d why not?" said Father Martin, looking down mournfully on the young priest. Then the latter began to put a lot of turbulent and revolutionary questions to himself. Am I not a priest as well as he? Why should he not meet my mother and sisters, as well as I am expected to meet his relatives, if he has any ? Who has placed this mighty chaos between us, as between Lazarus and Dives? It is all this infernal, insular, narrow-minded, fifteenth-century conservatism that is keeping us so many hundred years beliind the rest of the world. Could this occur in any other country ? And who will liave the courage to come forward and pulverize forever this stiff, rigid formalism, built on vanity and ignorance, and buttressed by that most in- tolerable of human follies — the pride of caste? " By Jove, I'll ask him," said Luke, aloud. '' No, my boy, you won't. Don't practise that most foolish of gymnastics — knocking your head against a stone wall." ''Then I won't dine with him," said Luke, deter- minedly. " Oh, but you will," said Father Pat, admiringly. " Did ye ever see such an untrained young colt in all your lives? Now, you'll go on Sunday and dine with the Canon ; and I think, if we can put our experiences together, you won't make any egregious mistakes. Where will we begin. Father Martin ? Stand up and show Luke how to take the ladies in to dimier." "Tell your experiences, Pat," said Father Martin, good-humouredly. "That will serve as a manual of eti(][uette — I mean your mistakes." "I never made but one mistake," said Fatlior Pat, with a show of pretended anger, "but that excluded me from the Kingdom of Heaven forever. It was all about one or two little beggarly peas. I had dined well — at least as well as could be expected when you have to have your eye on your plate and on your host 38 LUKE DELMEGE at the same time. I was flattering myself that I had got through the miserable business with flying colours, when some evil spirit put it into my head to pick up a few little peas that lay upon my plate. Now, I didn't want them, but the old boy put them there. I put my fork gently upon one. It jumped away like a grass- hopper. Then I tried Number Two. Off he went like a ball of quicksilver. Then Number Three. The same followed, until they were gyrating around for all the world like cyclists on a cinder track. Then I got mad. My Guardian Angel whispered : ' Let them alone.' But my temper was up ; and there I was chas- ing those little beggars around my plate, for all the world like the thimble-riggers at a fair. Now, I firmly believe there's something wrong and uncanny about peas ; else, why does the conjurer always get a pea for his legerdemain ; and that's the reason, you know, the pilgrims had to put peas in their shoes long ago as a penance, and to trample them under foot. Well, at last, I said : ' Conquer or die ! ' I looked up and saw the Canon engaged in an engrossing conversation with a grand lady. Now or never, I said to myself. I quietly slipped my knife under these green little demons and gobbled them up. I daren't look up for a few seconds. When I did, there was the Canon glowering on me like a regular Rhadamanthus. I knew then I was done for. He said nothing for a few days. Then came the thunder-clap. ' I could foi'give,' he said, in his grandiose way, ' your solecisms — ha — of speech : your ungrammatical and — ha — unrecognized pronun- ciations ; but to — eat — peas — with — a — knife ! I didn't think that such a dread mortification could he in store for me ! ' He never asked me to dine from that day to this, — for which I say, with a full heart, Deo Gratias. But Luke, old man, look sharp. Let me see. Give him a few hints, Tim ! Martin, try and brush up your etiquette." " Tell me," said Father Tim, in his own philosophical way, " tell me, Luke, could you manage to hold a wine- glass by the stem ? " THE SAGACITIES OF AGE 39 " Certainly," said Luke. " And hold it up to the light ? " " Of course," said Luke. " Could you, could you, bring yourself to sniff the wine, and taste ever so little a drop, and say : Un I that's something like wine ! That Chateau ' Yquem, sir, is the vintage of '75. I know it, and 1 congratulate you, sir, upon your cellar ! " " I'm afraid not," said Luke, despondently. *' If you could, you were a made man for life," said Father Tim. " Do you know anything about flowers ? " he asked after a long pause. " I think I know a daisy from a buttercup," said Luke, laughing. " Could you bring yourself — you can if you like — to give a little start of surprise, somewhere about the laiddle of dinner, and gasp out in a tone of choking wonderment : Why, that's the Amaranthus Duraudi! I M'as always persuaded that there was but one speci- men of tliat rare exotic in Ireland, and that was in the Duke of Leinster's conservatory at Carton ! " Luke laughed and sliook his head negatively. ''You lack tlie esprit, the courage of your race, me boy," said Fatlier Tim. " 'Tis the dash that gains the day ; or, siiall I call it," he said, looking around, " impudence 7 " After a long ])ause, lie resumed : — " Did ye ever licar of a chap callctl liotticelli ? " " Never ! " said Luke, laughing. " Why, my dear fellow, your education has been shock- ingly neglected. What were you doing for the last six or eight years that you never heard of Botticelli / "' " Somehow. I managed to get on without him," said Luke. " What was he — a c'ook ? " " No use," said Fatlier Tim, shaking his head ; "he'll be turned out ignominiously, and "we'll all be dis- graced." " I'm afraid," said Father Martin, " 'tis too late now, 40 LUKE DELMEGE Tim, to give him lectures on botany or the old masters, we must be satisfied with telling him what not to do." "I suppose so. Go on, Martin," said Father Tim, resignedly. " Don't eat out of the front of the spoon ! " said Father Martin. " Don't make any noise when eating ; no more than would frighten a rabbit," said Father Pat. " As you value your soul, don't put your hands on the table, between the dishes," said Father Tim. " You're a teetotaller, aren't you ? " said the host. " You're all right, tho' he thinks it vulgar ; and so it is, horribly vulgar. But you won't be tempted to ask any one to drink wine with you. He'd never forgot that." " Don't say ' please ' or ' thank you ' to the servants for your life. He thinks that a sign of low birth and bad form," said Father Tim. " Is there anything else ? " said Father Martin, rack- ing his memory. " Oh, yes ! Look with some con- tempt at certain dishes, and say No ! like a pistol-shot. He likes that." "■ If he forgets to say ' Grace,' be sure to remind him of it," said Father Pat. " Oh, yes ! of course, and won't he be thankful ? " said Father Tim. "■ Well, many thanks. Fathers," said Luke, rising. " I must be off. Not much time now with the old folks at home ! " " Tell Margery we'll all be down for tea, and she must play all Cardan's airs — everv one," said Father Pat. "■ All right," said Luke, gaily. He had gone half-way down the field before the curate's house wlien he was peremptorily called back. There had been a consultation evidently. " We were near forgetting," said Father Tim, anx- iously, "and 'twould be awful, wouldn't it?" The other two nodded assent. I THE SAGACITIES OF AGE 41 " If by any chance he should ask you to carve — " " Especially a duck," chimed in Father Martin — " Say at once that your mother is dead — that you know she is — and cut home for the bare life, and liide under the bed." " All right, Father Tim, all right ! " said Luke, laughing. "But couldn't you manage about that wineglass — just to shut one eye, and say what I told you ? " said Father Tim, in a pleading tone. "No ! No ! " said Luke, "never ! " " By the way," said Father Martin, " do you know anything about poultry? Do you know a Dorking from a Wyandotte ? " But Luke had vanished. " What are these professors doing in these colleges, at all, at all ? " said Father Martin, when the trio re- turned mournfully to the table. " Why do they turn out such raw young fellows, at all, at all ? " "Why, indeed?" said Father Tim. " Hard to say," said Father Pat. CHAPTER IV DIES MAGNA, ET — AMARA " Father Luke, if you please, Miss," said Mrs. Delmege to her youngest daughter, Margery. I regret to say that that young hxdy was an incorrigible sinner in this respect ; and this maternal correction was required at least ten times a day during the brief, happy days that Luke was now spending at home. It was " Luke," " Luke," " Luke," all day long with Margery ; and the mother's beautiful pride in her newly ordained son was grievously shocked. " You think he's no more than the rest of ye," said Mrs. Delmege, " but I tell you he is. He is the anointed minister of God ; and the biggest man in the land isn't aiqual to him." But how could Margery help the familiarity in her sisterly anxiety that Luke should make a glorious debut, first at last Mass the following Sunday ; and secondly, — and I regret to say that I fear it -was deemed more important, — at the Canon's dinner-table on Sunday evening ? '^ Sure I'd rather he was home with us on the last Sunday he'll spend in Ireland," said Mrs. Delmege. "• And sure Father Pat could come ujJ, and we could have a nice little dinner for 'em. But, after all, when the Canon asked him, it would never do to refuse. Sure it's just the same as the Bishop himself." " I know that horrid Mrs. Wilson and her grand, proud daughter will be there, and that they'll be look- ing down on poor Luke — " 42 DIES MAGNA, ET — AMARA 43 " Father Luke, Miss ! How often must I be telling you ? " "Very well, mother. Be it so. But Luke and I were always playmates, and it sounds more familiar." " But you must remember that Luke — ahem ! Father Luke — is no longer a gossoon. He's a priest of God, and you must look on him as such." " Of course, of course, mother, but I know they'll make him uncomfortable with all their airs and non- sense. To see that Barbara Wilson walk up the aisle on Sunday is enough to make any one forget what they're about. You'd think it was the Queen of Eng- land. I wonder she doesn't go into the pulpit and preach to us." " Wisha, thin, her mother was poor and low enough at one time. I remember well when the Canon was only a poor curate, like Father Pat, (iod bless liim ! and when his sister was — well, we mustn't be talking of these things, nor placing our neighbours. Perhaps, after all, there's a good heart under all their grandeur." " I wouldn't mind," said ^Margery, stitching on a but- ton on the grand new stock she Avas making for Luke, "but Father Martin said the other night that Luke — " "There agin," said tlie mother. " Could teach half tlie diocese theology. But what do these people care ? I know they look down on him, and he's so sensitive. He won't stand it, 1 tell you, mother." So the sisterly anxieties ranged over every possible accident to her idol until Sun(hiy morning came. Ah ! that was a great day at Lisnalee. They were going to see their best-beloved at the altar of God. And Luke was going to celebrate, there on the predella, wliere he had knelt thirteen years ago, and raised, with fear and awe, the very vestments he was going to wear to-day. And there, at the same wooden rails, had he received for the tirst time liis Holy Communion ; the first of the numy times, as child, student, minorist, subdeacon, deacon, he had knelt amongst the poor and lowly, 44 LUKE DELMEGE Sunday after Sunday, during his happy vacations. It was all over now. Never more would he kneel there with the congregation. "Friend, go up higher." He had heard the words, and henceforth he was to stand on high as a mediator and teacher, where hitherto he had been the suppliant and the pupil. The little church was crowded to the door ; and when Luke appeared, holding the chalice in his hands, a thousand eyes rested on his youthful face. He had just had a brief but animated debate in the sacristy. " Was he to read the 'Acts ' ? " " Certainly." " And the ' Prayer before Mass ' ? " " Of course." "He never could do it." " He must ; and read the publications, too ; and, Luke, if you could muster up courage to say a few words to the congregation, they'd all be delighted." But Luke drew the line there. Trembling, half from joy, half from fear, rigid as a statue, he went slowly and reverently through the sacred ceremonies, with what raptures and ecstasies, God only knows ! Once, and once only, had Father Pat ("a proud man this day," as he described himself) to interfere. It was just at that sublime moment called the " Little Eleva- tion," when Luke held the Sacred Host over the chalice, and raised both to God the Father, and murmured, " Omnis honor et gloria." Just then a tear rolled down the cheek of the young priest, and Father Pat had to say : — "Hold up, man ; 'tis nearly all over now." But it took some minutes before he could compose his voice for the Pater Noster ; and ever after, no mat- ter what other distractions he might have had in cele- bration, he never repeated that "Per ipsura, et cum ipso, et in ipso " without remembering his emotions at his first Mass. Father Pat had provided for the young priest a modest breakfast in the sacristy. It was a wise pro- DIES MAGNA, ET — AMARA 45 vision, for he had serious work before him — no less than to impart his priestly blessing to each and all of the vast congregation. It was a touching and impres- sive sight. There they knelt on the hard shingle — young and old, rich and poor, all reduced by their com- mon faith to a dead level of meekness and humility ; and the poor beggarwoman or hodach, who cringed and whined during the week at some farmer's house, now felt that here was neutral ground, where all had equal rights, and where no distinction was acknowledged. And so the brilliant sunshine gleamed through the wliispering leaves, and fell on gray hairs, or the rich auburn tresses of some young girl, or the fair gold of some child ; and througli the green twilight the young priest passed, uncovered and full of emotion, as he laid his hands on some old playmate or schoolfellow, or some venerable village-teacher to whom he had been taught to look up with veneration from his childhood. And the little children doubled around trees, and shot down to the end of tlie queue to get a second blessing, or even a third ; and many were tlie boasts heard in school that week of the many times some curly-headed youngsters had stolen the young priest's blessing. But was it all sunshine and music ? Well, no I You see it never is. There nuist be gray clouds to bring out the gold of the summer sun ; and there must be a dis- cordant note to empliasize the melodies that sing them- selves to sleep in the liuman heart. And so, just a wee, wee whisper blotted out for the momeut all this glory, and hushed the music that was kindling into a full-throated oratorio in the breast of the young priest. He was pushing his way gently through the erowd that was jammed at tlic narrow gate which led into the chapel yard, when he heard just in front of him, and so near that he touched the rough frieze coat of the speaker, these words : — " But it is quare that he has to go on the furrin' mission. Sure, "tis only tliim that can't pay for their- selves in college that has to go abroad." 46 LUKE DELMEGE " How do we know ? Perhaps, after all, Mike Del- meg'e is not the sthrongc man we tuk him to be." " And I hard that Bryan Dwyer's son, over there at Altamount, is goin' into the college to be a Dane, or somethin' grate intirely." "• And sure they wint to college thegither. And if this vounsr man " — he threw his thumb over his shoulder — - " is the great scoUard intirely they makes him out to be, why isn't he sint into the college instid of goin' abroad?" '•' Well, Father Pat, God bless him ! says that Luke had no aiqual at all, at all, in Manute." " I suppose so. Mike Delmege has a warm corner ; and sure I see a fine flock of turkeys in the bawn field. Wan or two of 'em will be missin' soon, I'm thinkin'." " I suppose so. Did ye notice how narvous the young priesht was at the ' Acts ' ? Why, my little Terry could do it betther. And what did he want bringing in the Queen for ? " " He's practisin'. He's goin' to England, I under- shtand ; and he must pray for the Queen there." "Begor, I thought the Church was the same all over the wurruld. Wan Lord — wan Faith — wan Bap- tism — " " Sh ! " said his neighbour, nudging him ; and Luke went home with a very bitter sting in his chalice of honey. It was not exactly the unkind allusions made by these ignorant cottiers, or the ill-concealed sarcasm about his own dearest ones, that nettled him. These things, in- deed, were ugly, irritating facts ; and to a proud spirit, they were doubly galling on such a day of triumph. But the Bishop had ignored him and his successes, and had kept at home and placed in a position of honour in his native diocese a student who never had distinguished himself in college, or even appeared amongst the suc- cessful alumni at the great day of distribution. What was all this ? Had not the Bishop smiled on him, and DIES MAGNA, ET — AMARA 47 congratulated him, and told him how he reflected honour on his diocese ? And now he should go abroad for six or seven years, whilst his junior, a distinctly inferior man, was lifted over the lieads of tldrty or forty seniors, and placed at once in a responsible position in the Dioce- san Seminary ! Luke was choking with chagrin and annoyance. He put his liand to his forehead mechani- cally, and thought he found his laurel crown no longer the glossy, imperial wreath of distinction, whose per- fume filled half the world, but a poor little corona of tinsel and tissue-paper, such as cliildren wreathe for each other around the Maypole of youth. He was very morose in consequence ; and, when he entered the house, and found all gathered for the mid- day meal, he looked around witliout a word, and with- out a word passed the tlireshold again, and moved down toward the sea. " Poor boy ! " said the mother, affectionately ; " that last Mass was too much for him, entirely. And sure I thought the people would ate him." But Margery, with the affectionate instinct of a sister, saw deeper, but only said : — " 'Tis this great dinner this evening that's troubling him. I wish he were left at home with us." Luke crossed the fields rapidly, and then lightly jumping over a stile, found himself in one of those un- fenced fields that slope down to the sea. A few sheep, nibbling the burnt grass lazily, scampered away ; and Luke, jumping the rugged stones of a rougli wall, found himself in a tisherman's cottage. The family were at dinner, and Luke, taking off his hat, said cheerily in the Irish fashion : — " God bless the work ! and the workmen too ! " " Wisha, thill, God bless you. Master l^uke, and "tis you're a thousand times welcome 1 Mona, get a chair for the priesht." " And this is my little Mona," said Luke, affection- ately ; " dear me, how she is grown I " " And she got your reverence's blessing this morning, 48 LUKE DELMEGE glory be to God ! Wisha, thin, Master Luke, how my heart swelled whin I saw you at the althar." " And wasn't Moira there ? " said Luke. " Where is Moira ? " Moira was making her toilette, if you please, but now came forward blushing. Mona and Moira were twins, and it was Luke who insisted that they should be called Irish names. " I have not much to boast of myself," he said, " but 'tis a shame that our little children should not be called by their beautiful Celtic names." " This little fellow," said the father, pointing to a child, who was trying to choke himself with milk and potatoes, " was watching your reverence all the time. And sure, whin he come home, nothin' would do liira but to get up on a chair, and say the ' Dominis wobis- cum ' like any priest. Wisha, who knows ? Quarer things happen." " I was thinking of taking a pull in the little boat," said Luke ; " I see the oars and rowlocks in their old places. Is she stanch and sound as ever ? " "Stanch as ever, your reverence," the fisherman replied. " Will you want one of the byes ? " " No ! I'll manage by myself. If you give me a hand to float her, I'll do the rest." " And a good hand ye are at the oar, Father Luke," said one of the boys. " Begor, ye could turn her agin any of us." " Now, now, now, no Blarney, Dermot ! No, no, one will do ! I'll keep her out for an hour or two." "■ Just as long as your reverence plases," said the old man. "And, as the day is hot, we'll take down the sail, and make a yawnin' of it." Luke pulled slowly out to sea ; and the swift exer- cise, and the ever-changing aspects of the ocean, and the invigorating breeze, drew his thoughts away from the perplexing and irritating subjects that had lately been vexing him. There is something, after all, in what poets have sung about the soothing influences DIES MAGNA, ET — AMARA 49 of Nature. Her mother's hand smooths down all the ruflled aspects and angry asperities of human feeling and thought ; and her great silence swallows up in a kind of infinite peace, as of heaven, the buzzing and stinp-incr of that hive of hornets, where " Each one moves with his head in a cloud of poisonous flies." No wonder that the best of the world's workers have sought peace in communion w^ith the solitude of Nature, and strength from the great sublime lessons she teaches to those who sit at her feet. And it was with the great- est reluctance, and only by a tremendous effort, that Luke Delmege, this momentous day in his life, turned away from the sybaritic temptation of yielding himself up wholly to the calm and placid influences of sun, and sky, and sea ; and, like so many other fools, souglit peace, the peace that lay at his feet unsought, in a dread introspection of self, and a morbid and curious analysis of men's principles and thoughts about himself and his little place in the world. It was his first great plunge into the feverish and exciting pastime of analyzing human thought and action ; and then trying to synthe- size principles that shrank from each other, and became a torture and a pain from the impossibility of ever reconciling their mutual antagonism and repellence. It was the fatuous dream that Luke pursued through life with all the passion of a gandjler around the green cloth ; and it beckoned him away from AA'ork of solidity and permanence, and left him in middle-age a perplexed and disappointed man. In another way, liowever, this was no novel experi- ment. Very often, during his summer holidays, when his ambition had been stimulated by his academic suc- cesses to work more freely and largely for further dis- tinctions, he had lain down in this same boat, and, looking up at the blue eye of Heaven, he had spent hours in revolving the terminology and meaning of some philosophical or theological puzzle, and had re- viewed all the authors, and all the authors' opinions 50 LUKE DELMEGE that had been arrayed for and against it. It was a practical and useful way of imprinting on memory all that books could tell ; and very often, in the winter montlis that followed, he fell back gratefully on these al fresco studies, and the immense storehouse of matter he had accumulated with the sun as his lamp, and his desk the heaving sea. But this morning, as he rocked in the thwarts of his sea-cradle, and heard nothing but the chirp of a sea-lark, or the scream of a sea-gull, or the gentle lapping of the pure green water within six inches of where he lay, he had commenced the proemium of the vaster studies, where no authors were to be trusted and experience alone could teach. But he was com- mencing his singular and irremediable mistake of sup- posing that the elusive and ever-changing moods of the human heart could be reduced by propositions to a level rule, and that human action was controllable always by those definite principles that he had been taught to regard as fixed and unchangeable truths. Once and again, indeed, he raised himself a little, and allowed his eyes to wander over the beautiful, peaceful prospect that lay before him. Lap, lap, sang the tiny, sunny waves. He stretched out his burning hand, and they clasped it in their cool palms. He saw far away the green fields, as they sloped from the sea and were half dimmed in a golden haze. White specks, which he knew were the gentle sheep, dotted the verdure here and there ; and great patches of purple heather stretched down and blended their rich colours with the deep red of the rocks, which again was darkened into cobalt, that the gentle waves were now fringing with white. Look long, and rest in the vision, O troubled soul ! Why should the murmur of a few mites beyond that horizon of peace trouble thee? Altogether, thou art forgotten, there in thy Nautilus-boat on the bosom of the mighty deep. Cast from thee care, and forget the stings of the wasps who dare not come hither to fret thee ! Alas ! and is it not true of us, that we must have the bitter myrrh in our wine of life j and DIES MAGNA, ET — AMARA 51 that we create cares for the luxury of fretfulness, where the world has left us in peace ? " There are two ways of looking at this question," said Luke in his soliloquy, as if he were addressing a class of students, " the subjective and the objective. Let us take the latter first as the more reasonable. Why should I be troubled because I am going to Eng- land and my class-fellow to the seminary ? Which is the better prospect? Which would you select, if the matter were left to yourself ? To see a new country, to get on to the gangway of the world, where all types of races are passing to and fro in endless variety, or to be shut up in a vulgar little place, teaching 3Iusa, 3Iusae to a lot of snivelling school-boys, and decimal fractions to a crowd just freed from a country National school ? To stand in the pulpits of cathedrals, and speak to an intel- ligent and well-read audience, those wonderful things you have been reading in Suarez or St. Thomas, or to blind yourself poring, night after night, over the Geonjics of Virgil, or the Anabasis ? To deal with inquiring, anx- ious minds, who listen to you breathlessly for the key to the mighty problems that are agitating them in their uncertainty and perplexities ; to have the intense grati- fication of satisfying lionest inquiry, and leading into the fold truthful but darkened souls, who will look up to you as their spiritual Father forevermore, or to lead successfully through a concursus a few brats, who are punning on your name, and drawing caricatures of your face on their greasy slates ? " " Ridiculous ! " said Luke, aloud. " But let us see the subjective side. You, Luke Del- mege, First of First, that is Senior Wrangler in the first ecclesiastical college in the world, have been set aside coolly, but contenqituously, and the preference of a dio- cesan honour has been given to a student admittedly and distinctly your inferior ! You have got a slap in the face from your bishoj), not so gentle, thougli more metaphorical, than when he touched your cheek in Con- firmation and said — (was it sarcasm? God forbid I) 52 LUKE DELMEGE — Pax tecum ! You are snubbed before the diocese ; the stigma will cling to you during life, and be reflected on your family ! Does not this arrangement imply that, in some respect, morally, of course — in character, in tlie power of ruling and governing, or teaching, you are distinctly inferior to your humble classmate? You know St. Thomas better ; but he says his prayers better, my dear Luke ! There is your distinct inferiority; and you see now how wise that old medieval monk was when he said : — * Tunc videbitur sapiens in hoc mundo fuisse, qui pro Christo didicit stultus et despectus esse.' ' Tunc amplius exaltabitur simplex obedientia, quam omnis secu- laris astutia.' ' Tunc plus laetificabit pura et bona conscientia, quam docta phi- losophia.' * Tunc plus valebunt sancta opera, quam multa pulchra verba.' "Yes, yes," cried Luke, impatiently, as the boat rocked beneath him ; "but that's all 'tunc!' 'tunc!' What about ' nunc ! ' ' nunc ' ? Can it be that men's judgments are like God's ? Then why was so much stress laid upon our studies ? Why were we applauded as brilliant and successful students ? Why were we stimulated to study by every human incentive that could be held out to us ? Why did the Bishop himself congratulate me if he had other ideas ? Was there ever such a puzzle as the ways of men .'" The Sphinx and the Isis-Veil were nothing to them i Then I'll fall back on the realities — the ob- jectiveness of things. There alone is truth. But is it truth ? " said the puzzled young priest. He had never read : — " Only this I have known, that God made man right, but he entangleth himself in an infinity of questions." CHAPTER V A NOVEL THESIS " There is the Angelus, Luke," said Margery Delmege, anxiously, as Luke came in from the fields holding his IJreviary open with one finger. "Hurry up, you'll hardly l^e in time ; and it won't do to keep grand people waiting." Luke did not reply. He had read somewhere of a saint who was reading the 3Tirabilia of None when a great monarch was announced, and he went on calmly reading. "He was in audience with the 'King of Kings.' " So Luke read on to the end, nut noticing liis sister's anxiety. Then he said the Sacrosanctae, and then : — " Well, Margy, you were saying something ? " "• 1 said you'll be late, and that won't do. There are your cuffs, and I put in your best sleeve-links ; and let me see your collar. You must change that. Why, 'tis all damp. What have you been doing?" Luke looked calmly down on the black tresses of his beloved sister, as she fussed and worried about his toilette. " A regular Martha ! " he whispered. " Martha or no JNlartha, you nmst be turned out of this house decently. ]\Iind, come home early — that is, as early as politeness will allow. And if that horrid Miss Wilson says anything offensive. — I'm sure she Avill, — treat her with sih'ut contempt." "All right, Margy. That's just in my way." " And come home early, mind. Father Pat will be here to tea ; and — what else '/ " 63 54 LUKE DELMEGE "Never mind, Margy. We'll resume the thread of our narrative in another chapter." Margy watched his fine, tall figure as he swung down along the road, and then went back to get the tea things ready, but with many misgivings and forebodings. The irritation of the morning had one good effect. It had steeled Luke's nerves, so that it was quite in a self-confident, jaunty way he pulled the bell vigorously at the Canon's residence, and then gave a more timid knock. He was ushered into the drawing-room by the tidy little servant, and announced as "Father Delmege." Then he was frozen into ice. The two elderly ladies, dressed in black silk, with thin gold chains around their necks, looked at him for a moment, and then turned to each other. " As I was saying, my dear, the report is that they are separated, or going to be. It couldn't end other- wise. All these naval fellows, you know, coming up there at all hours — well, well, we mustn't be unchari- table." The only other occupant of the room was a young lad, about six-and-twenty years of age, who, faultlessly dressed in evening costume, leaned languidly against the mantelpiece, and would have looked ineffably bored but that he appeared to derive untold gratification from the contemplation of his face in the looking-glass over the mantelpiece. Indeed, to further this ecstatic reverie, he had put aside carefully two bronze vases that held summer flowers, and had even pushed away the clock with the singing birds that had fascinated Luke a few days before. And let it be said at once that the reflected image was, without doubt, a beautiful one. A face, olive pale, was surmounted with a dark mass of hair that fringed and framed it to perfection ; and through the tangled curls, a faultlessly white hand was just now running, and tossing them hither and thither with careful indifference. Two blue-black eyes looked steadily out from that white face, or rather would look steadily if they were allowed. But just now it seemed A NOVEL THESIS 55 an effort to look at anything but that fair figure in the (quicksilver. Languor, deep, somnolent languor, was the characteristic of this youthful face and figure ; and a pained expression, as if the anticipation of the evening's pleasures was an unmitigated annoyance. He looked calmly at the young priest, and then resumed his studies. Luke, chilled and frozen, sank into a chair, and began to turn over the leaves of an album. Alas! he had not unloosed the clasp, when a very musical box chirped out : " Within a mile of Edinhoro' Town."" He closed the album hastily, but too late. On went tliat dreadful tinkling. He took up a book called Cdehrities of the Century. He was beginning to be interested, when the door shot open, and another guest, a solicitor, was announced. He was warmly welcomed by the ladies, got a languid nod and " Howda " from tiie Phidian Apollo, and took no notice whatever of Luke. He sank quietly into the sofa, and commenced the " clitter-clatter " of good society. Then the door opened again, this time to reveal unannounced a fair girlish form, and a face very like that of Apollo, but toned (hnvn by feminine taste into features that were singular in their beauty, but excluded all appearance of singularity. Luke was prepared for anotiier cold douehe of good society manuers ; but P)arl)ara Wilson walked straight towards him, held out her hand, and said : — " Father Delmege, 3'ou are ever so kind to come. Mother, this is Luke Delmege, of whom we have heard s ) often. This is my aunt, Father Delmege. Louis, have you met Father Delmege? " The Phidian ApoHo turned languidly around ; and without removing his hand from his pocket, he nodih'd, and said : — '' Howda?" " Mamma, you missed such a treat this nioniing. It was Father Delmege's first Mass ; and oh I it was beau- tiful ! And dear^Father Pat was there, and the sun was resting on liis beautiful white hair, like a nimbus. 56 LUKE DELMEGE And we all got Father Delmege's blessing, and why didn't you preach ? We were dying to hear you — " '' Well," said Luke, " you knoAV, Miss Wilson, it is not customary to preach at one's first Mass — " " Ah, of course, on ordinary occasions. But we wanted to liear you, you know. Where is the blue rib- bon ? Why don't you wear it ? " " The ' blue ribbon ' ? " said Luke, in amazement. " Yes. Didn't you carry off the ' blue ribbon ' in May- nooth ? Father Martin said that tliere hadn't been so dis- tinguished a course in Maynooth for over fifty years." " Father Martin is too kind," murmured Luke, who had now thawed out from his icy loneliness, and felt grateful beyond measure to this gentle girl, who had, with the infinite and unerring tact of charity, broken down all the icy barriers of good society. Mrs. Wilson and her sister woke up, and manifested a little interest in the young athlete. The solicitor rubbed his hands, and murmured something about his old friend, Mike Delmege, *•' as good a man, sir, your respected father, as is to be found in the Petty Sessions District ; " and even Apollo paused from his hair-teasing, and looked with a little concern and some jealousy at Luke. Then the Canon entered with one or two other visit- ors, who had been transacting business with him, and dinner was announced. " No, no," said Barbara to her uncle, in reply to an invitation ; " I intend to sit near Father Delmege dur- ing dinner. I have lots to say to him." Ah, Margy ! Margy ! thought Luke, what rash judgments you have been guilty of ! Won't I surprise you with all the goodness and kindness of this contemp- tuous young lady? The dinner was simple, but faultless. The conversa- tion simmered along on the usual topics — sports, which occupied then a considerable share of public interest in Ireland. One young champion was especially applauded for having thrown a heavy weight some incomputable distance ; and his muscles, and nerves, and weight, and A KOVEL THESIS 57 training were all carefully debated. If ever we become a wealthy people, our national cry will be that of the ancient Romans — Fcaiem et Circetises ! Then came the Horse Show that was to be held in August. Here the ladies shone by their delightful anticipations of the great Dublin carnival. Then the Flower Show, just coming on in a neighbouring town. Here the Canon was in his element, and said, with an air of modest de- preciation, that he had been assured that : — " My Marshal Niel — ha — shall certainly carry First Prize ; but I know that my Gladiolus Cinquecentus will be beaten. A happy defeat! for Lady — ha — Descluse has assured me that this time at least I really must give her the — ha — victory." '•' But, my dear Canon," said the solicitor, as if giving not a legal, but a paternal advice, and in a tone full of the gravest solicitude, " you ouglit not, you know. I assure you that a victory of this kind is not to be lightly sacrificed. Consider now the money value df the prizes — " " Ha ! Ha ! " laughed the Canon, " the legal mind always runs into — lia — practical issues. The days of chivalry are gone." "Well, now," said the solicitor, humbly, "of course, sir, you must have your little joke ; but seriously now, consider the importance of gaining a prize in such a contest. After all, you know, horticulture is a branch of lesthetics ; and you know, sir, with your vast expeii- ence, how important it is for the Churcli nowadays to be represented, and represented successfully, before our separated brethren, in such a delightful and elevating and refining pursuit as the culture of flowers." "Ah, well, jNlr. Grilfiths ; but chivalry — where is chivalry ? " "Chivalry is all very well," said Griffiths, driving home the argument, " but our first interest is — our one interest is — the Church. And consider your posi- tion — the leading re])resentative of the Church in this district — I might say in this country. See what a dreadful 58 LUKE DELMEGE injury to religion it would be if you were defeated, sir. Of course, 'tis only a flower ; but it's defeat ! and the Church, sir, mustn't be defeated in anything or it succumbs in all." " There is something in what you say — ha — indeed," replied the Canon, "■ and I shall — ha — give the matter furtlier consideration. But take a glass of wine." " Ah, this is wine," said Grifhths, sniffing the glass and holding it up to the light. " Now, if I may be so impolite as to venture to guess, I should say that wine cost a centum at least." " Add — a — twenty," said the host. "I thought so. Very unlike the stuff we have to drink at our hotels, even on Circuit. Vinegar and water, and a little logwood to colour it. This is wine." ''Mr. Sumner, you are taking nothing. Try that Madeira ! " Mr. Sumner was saying nothing, but he was steadily absorbing vast quantities of wine. He was one of those calm, beautiful drinkers, whose senses never relaxed for a moment whilst the new must was j)oured into the old bottle, and seemed to evaporate as speedily as it was taken. Luke watched him wonderingly, and with a certain amount of admiration, and was stricken into silence partly by the surroundings, which to him were unique and awful, partly by the nature of the conver- sation, which tripped lightly from the muscles and calves of athletes to the fine points of a horse ; and from the age of a certain brand of wine to the baromet- rical rise and fall of stocks and shares. He had been hoping in the beginning that the course of conversation would turn on some of those subjects that were of in- terest to himself — some great controverted point in the literature or philosophy of the past, or some point of heresy, or some historical fact that he could lay hold on, and perhaps enchain the interest of his hearers. Wouldn't some one say " Canossa,' or " Occam," " Libe- rius," or even " Wegscheider " ? Would they never A NOVEL THESIS 59 turn tlie conversation into something intellectual or elevating-, and give him a chance? Once, indeed, Bar- bara, in reply to an observation from her aunt that she was killed from ennui in that country place, said laughingly : — " Lady Clara Vere de Vere, If time hangs heavy on your hands, Are there no beggars at your gate ? Are there no poor about your lands ? " But, alas ! that was but a little puff of intellectual smoke that speedily vanished in the clear atmosphere of utter inanity. And Luke was bending over to say a complimentary word to Barbara, when the silent signal was given and the ladies arose. Luke was so absorbed in what he was saying that he did not heed a gesture from the Canon. Then he awoke to the thunder : — " Father Delmege ! " and saw the Canon pointing angrily to the door. Poor Luke ! He liad studied all his rubrics carefully, and knew them down to every bend and genuflection ; but he had never been told of this rubric before. He blushed, stammered, kept his seat, and said : — "' I beg your pardon. I do not understand — " To add to his discomfiture, he found that Miss "Wil- son's dress had got entangled around liis chair. Blush- ing, liumbled, confused, he tried to disentangk' the gray silk ; but he only made it worse. Then the Apollo arose with a calm smile, raised the chair, gave the flounce a kick, and, opening the door wdtli a bow tliat would have made Count d'Orsay die with envy, ushered the lauLrliinfT ladies from the dininer-room. The Canon was so pleased with the achievement that he almost forgave Luke; and Luke was questioning himself an- grily: Where now is all your learning and useless lumber? And why the do not the i)rofessors in our colleges teach us something about the practical issues of daily life ? " Anything new in your profession, Louis ? " said the 60 LUKE DELMEGE Canon, airily, as the gentlemen drew their chairs to- gether and lighted their cigars. " Oh, dear, yes ! " said Louis, leisurely. " We are always forging ahead, you know ; moving on with ex- press speed, whilst you gentlemen of the Law and the Gospel are lumbering heavily along in the old ruts." " Ha ! Ha ! " laughed the Canon. " Very good in- deed ! Lumbering along in the old ruts ! And what might be the newest discoveries now in medical science ? Some clever way of shortening human life ? " " Well, no ! We are beginning to touch on your province, I think. Our sappers and miners are begin- ning to dig under your foundations." " But you won't stir the grand old fabric, Louis ? " said Griffiths. " You can't, you know. You'll find bones and skulls, of course ; that's your province ; but you'll never shake the foundations. Will he. Canon ? " " Oh, dear no ! Oh, dear no ! " said the Canon, feebly. " But those men of science are really — ha — very enterprising, and, indeed — ha — aggressive. But I cannot see, Louis, how your noble science can conflict with theology. The schools of medicine and the schools of theology are — ha — so very distinct." "They merge in the psychological school, I should say," said Louis. " And j)sychology becomes physi- ology." At last, at last, Luke, cometh your chance ! Here is what you have been dreaming of the whole evening. Psychology ! The very word he had rolled under his tongue a thousand times as a sweet morsel. The soul ! the soul ! Psyche, his goddess ! whom he had watched and studied, analyzed, synthesized, worshipped with all the gods of science from the " master of those who know " downwards. No hound that had seen or scented his quarry was ever strung to such tension of muscle or nerve as Luke, when at last all the twilight vistas opened, and he saw the broad fields of knowledge and science before him, and Psyche, Psyche, like Atalanta in the fields at Calydon. A NOVEL THESIS 61 " How can psychology merge in physiology ? " said Lnke, with dry lips, and in a nervous manner. " I alwa3's considered that physiology treated only of animal mechanism." "And psychology treats of?" said Louis Wilson, blandly. '' Of — of — the soul, of course," said Luke. " And is not the soul a part of the animal mecha- nism ? " said his antagonist. " Certainly not," said Luke. "It is conjoined with it and distinct from it." " Conioined with it I where ? " said Louis. " I have made post-mortems again and again, and I assure you, gentlemen, I have discovered every other part of human anatomy ; but that which you are pleased to call the soul, I have never found. Wliere is it? What is its location ? " " Now, now, Louis," said the Canon, with feeble deprecation, "this is going far, you know. But, of course, this is only for the sake of — ha — ha — argu- ment. This is only a — ha — post-prandial academic discussion. Proceed, Mv. Delmege." Poor Luke was now getting a little excited, lie had never been taught that tirst of accomplishments, self- control and reserve. Indeed, he had been so accus- tomed to success in the thcxcs that had been arranged for students in his college, that he quite resented the very idea of being opposed or catechised by tliis young fop[)ish doctor. Wlien he folded his soutane in May- nuoth and said, half-sarcastically, in the scholastic form : "Sic nri/inii(>il(irls, rloctissime Dornine .'" his antagonist had gone down pell-mell before liim. And the idea of this young freshman attacking the fortresses of Catholic philosoi)hy was intolerable. In a Avortl, Luke was losing tem|)er. " The veriest tyro in i)hih)so])liy," he said (it was a favourite expression of his, when he wanted to overwhelm 62 LUKE DELMEGE utterly an antagonist), " knows that the soul is a simple substance, residing, whole and indivisible, in every part of the human frame." "• This is part of the human frame," said Louis, pulling a long black hair from his forehead, " is my soul there ? Then go, thou soul, into everlasting noth- ingness." He plucked the hair in pieces and let it fizzle away at the glowing end of his cigar. " This is flippant, if not worse," said Luke. " No one holds that a separated member carries with it the soul." " Do you not hold that there is a separate creation for each human soul ? " " Yes. That is of faith." " Where's the necessity ? If life springs from ante- cedent life (that is your strong point against biologists), and if the soul is existent in every part, when there is life, does not the soul pass on to the new life, and be- come the animating principle in its embryonic state ? " '' That is heresy," said Luke. " That is the heresy of TertuUian. St. Thomas — " " I thought," said his antagonist, blandly, " we were arguing as to facts, and not as to opinions." "• But I deny that opinions are opposed to facts," said Luke, timidly. " You may not be aware," said Wilson, " that the greater part of your treatises on Moral Theology are arranged with the most childish ignorance of physio- logical facts that are known to every school-boy who has passed his first medical." " And are you aware," said Luke, hotly, "that many of your profession who have passed their last medical are wise and humble enough to acknowledge that what you call facts are still the arcana and mysteries of Nature ? " " Perhaps so," said Wilson, airily. " But writers that lay down moral laws for the world, and base these laws on the operations of Natural Law, should try to understand these latter first. By the way, have you read anything of electro-biology ? " L NOVEL THESIS G3 "No ! " said Luke, humbly. " Have you read anything about psychic forces through Animal Macfuetism ? " '•'' No,'' said Luke. " Have you heard of Reichenbach and his theory of Odic Forces? " J^uke shook his head humbly. He was stunned by the noisy emptiness of words. Wilson threw him aside as a worthless antagonist and addressed Sumner. "• Did you see the last by Maupassant, Sumner ? " "The last you lent me," said Sumner. "It is pretty tattered now. But really, you know, Wilson, I think these French fellows go a little too far, you know. Fm not squeamish, you know ; but really, you know, that fellow makes your hair stand on end." Wilson laughed rudely and shrugged his shoulders. " Men of the world mustn't be squeamish about trifles — " "(Gentlemen," said the Canon, "I think we shall join the ladies at tea." " I shall give you a volume by Gabriele d'Annunzio, our latest Italian writer," Luke heard Wilson saying to Sumner, as he stood in the porch to finish his cigar. " Pity those young clerical gentlemen don't read up with the requirements of the day." " I think you read too much, Wilson," said Sumner. "You can't keep straight, you know, if you are too well acquainted with these things, you know." " Sumner, you have a hard head for liquor." " It is not in the power of whiskey to make me drunk," said Sumner, modestly. " Well, I have a hard head in other matters," said Wilson. " \>y the way, did you ever try laudanum ? " "No! ''said Sumner. "I wouldn't venture beyond the bounds of honest liquor." " You ought. Nothing braces a man like it. You see there's a total want of agility in tlicse clergymen because they are so afraid of stimulants. I'm sure, 64 LUKE DELMEGE now, my uncle would be almost clever ; but, you notice, he touches nothing. And that young greenhorn — " " Who ? " "That young clergyman — a mere farmer's son — do you know that there is not on earth such a greenhorn as a clerical student ? Now, if he took a little opium, according to De Quincey's prescription, well boiled, and with plenty of lemonade or orangeade, he would be passable — " " Well, Louis, you bowled him over certainly." " Yaas ! I should say so. And good Lord ! what an accent ! I wonder will he sing ? " CHAPTER VI ADIEUX Mortified and irritated, vexed at himself for his shortcomings, savage with others for their unkindness, Luke passed into the drawing-room. Somehow, his anger gave a tinge of pallor to his In-own, healthy face, that made him look quite interesting ; and it was with something like kindness that Mrs. Wilson beckoned him to a seat near herself on the sofa, and chatted affa- bly with him for a few moments. She also engaged his services in helping around the tea from a dainty wicker-work table ; and he was beginning to feel a little more comfortable, thouo^h still determined to escape at tlie lirst opportunity, when the Canon asked liim abruptly to turn over the leaves of the music on the i)iano, at which IJarbara w'as now seated. Lvd^e was about to excuse himself by saying w^th perfect truth that he knew nothing about music ; but in a weak moment he rose, and whilst Miss Wilson's lingers wandered over the keys, he stood, statue-like and mo- tionless, near her. In a few seconds she nodded, and lie turned the leaf witli the air of an expert ; and then the full absurdity of tlie situation broke suddenly ujxm him. and dyed neck and face and u]i to the roots of hair in deep crimson of shame and confusion. For he re- membered that at tlie last retreat a jiicture of a worldly priest was held up to their reprobation — a picture, not too higldy coloured, ])nt grimly painted by a strong and merciless liand. There it was, lurid and ghastly, or pitifully ludicrous, as you choose or your mood may F 66 66 LUKE DELMEGE be — the limp, unmuscular, artificial cleric, who, with all the insignia of Christ and the Cross, is perpetually aping the manners and customs of the world, and in dress and manner and conversation is forever changing and shifting, like a mime on the stage. Ah ! Luke ! Luke ! and hither hast thou come, even on the day of thy first Mass. Burning with shame and self-scorn, he had sense enough left to whisper, " You will excuse me ! " and retreated ignominiously to a corner, where, over the pages of an album, he thought unutteral)le things. He woke up, after what appeared to be an hour, by hearing the Canon say: — "That duet from — ah — Trovatore^ Barbara; or, perhaps, Louis would sing, 'Hear Me — ha — Gentel Maritana ' ! " The two voices blended beautifully, and at another time Luke would have listened with pleasure, but not to-night. Oh, no ! it has been a day of humiliation and suffering, and even the gentle spirit of Music for once fails to bring peace and healing on her wings. There was a hushed and whispered colloquy between Barbara and her mother, and then the former, with some hesitation, approached to where Luke was sitting, and said timidly, holding her hands pleadingly before her : — " Mother would like to hear you sing, Father. I'm sure you sing well — " "I assure you, Miss Wilson, I'm quite unaccustomed to — " "Now, I know you have a lovely baritone from the way you said the ' Prayers ' to-day. Do, Father ! " What could he sing ? " Believe Me, If All ? " Hush ! "Oh ! Doth Not a Meeting Like This Make Amends?" Absurd I " There's a Bower of Roses by Bendameer's Stream?" Sickly and sentimental! Yes, he will, by Jove ! He'll take a subtle revenge by ruffling the pla- cidity of this smooth and aristocratic circle. Won't they laugh when they hear it at home ? Won't Father Pat smite his leg like a Vulcan, and declare that it was the ADIEUX 67 best thing he ever heard in his life? But it will be impolite and shocking ! No matter I Here goes ! And drawing himself up to his full height, and lean- ing one arm on the mantelpiece, Luke sang out in the noble baritone, that had often echoed at Christmas plays around tlie gloomy halls of Maynooth — " From Howth away to famed Dunboy, By Kerry's beetlinj^ coasts, With liglitniiii;- speed the summons flew To marshal Freedom's hosts. From Limerick's old historic walls To Boyne's ill-omened tide The long-watclied signal swelled their hearts } , . With Vengeance, Hope, and Pride." j" * ' The Canon was gasping and his face lengthening as in a spoon ; the ladies smiled in horror ; Apollo looked up, angry and contemptuous ; Griffiths was about to say : — " Now, you know, Father Delmege, that's rank trea- .jon, you know" — but on went Luke, his rich voice thunderinfj out the sono- of rebellion in the ears of these excellent loyalists : — " They're mustering fast — see, Slievenamon Its serried lines displays ; Mark !iow their l)urnished weapons gleam In morning's ruddy blaze; While proudly floats the flashing green AVlicre purl the blague and Lee. Hurrah ! mv boys, we've lived, thank God, } , ■ To set the Old Land free ! " y" '*• The Canon was shocked beyond expression ; yet a tender old-time feeling seemed to film his eyes, for the Mague was rolling past his door, and the summit of Slievenamon could be seen from the window. Luke rapidly shook hands with the ladies, whilst Barbara, in her enthusiasm, asked : — " Who wrote it ? You miist give me the words and the music, Father ! 'Tis worth all the operas ever written." 68 LUKE DELMEGE He nodded to Griffiths, took no notice of the Apollo, shook hands with the Canon and thanked him for his hospitality, and dashed out into the cool air with a throbbing heart and a burning forehead. He was pushing along in his swift striding way, and had reached the road, when he heard a flutter of silk behind him ; and there was Barbara Wilson, a little out of breath and very white. He waited. " Father," she said pleadingly, " I understand you are going on the English mission ? " " Yes," he said wonderingly. " Might I ask where will 3'ou be ? " " I cannot say," he said, " but in one of the south- eastern counties." " Thank God," she said fervently. Then after some hesitation, and gulping down some emotion, '•' I want you to make a promise." -If I may." " You may meet my brother in England. He has been in Brighton, an assistant to a physician there. He is now in London attending St. Thomas' Hospital. If you meet him, will you be kind ? " " I'm not much attracted by your brother, Miss Wil- son," Luke said bluntly. " I know ; but you are a priest, and his soul is at stake. You do not know, but I am afraid that he is — that he is — oh ! my God ! weak in his faith. You may be able to help him I " " Of course, if I come across him in the course of my ministrations — " " The Good Shepherd sou[/ht out the lost sheep," said Barbara. " But, you know, one does not like a repulse," said Luke. " It is a question of a soul," said Barbara, her eyes filling with tears. " Say no more. Miss Wilson," said Luke, " you shame me. I heard your brother give expression to some shocking things this evening; and I confess I con- ADIEUX 69 ceived a strong and violent aversion to him ; but now that you have appealed — "" " Thank you, oh, so much ! And there's something else about poor Louis — " She put her fingers to her lip, musing. Then, after a pause, she said : "• Never mind. You'll find it out for yourself ; but you promise ? " " I promise," he said. " And you won't allow his arrogance and pride to repel you ? " " I liope not," said Luke. " God bless you ! " she said fervently, clasping his hand. " Hallo, old man ! Alive and kicking ? " was the cheery welcome of Father Pat, who, snugly ensconced in a capacious arm-chair in the parlour at Lisnalee, was stroking down the fair curls of a little lad, an orphan child of a younger brother, whom Mike Delmege had adopted. How calm, and simple, and homely the little parlour looked to Luke's eyes, dazzled and dimmed by the splendours of the Canon's house, and half-blinded from tlie emotions aroused during the evening. The image remained imprinted on the retentive retina of Luke's memory for many a day, and came up, amongst strange scenes and sights, to comfort him with its holy beauty. Often, in after years, when sitting at the tables of noblemen, who traced their blood back to the invaders, who bit the sands at Hastings, that cloud- dream of his seaside home rose soft and Ix'autiful as a piece of enchantment raised to the witchery of soft music ; and often, on the streets of Soutliwark at mid- night, when the thunder of the mighty stream of human- ity rolled turljid and stormy along the narrow streets, did lie see, as in a far-off picture, nari'owed in the i)er- spective of memory, the white farmliouse above the breakers, and the calm, beautiful, twiliglit holiness that slept above it — a canopy of peace and rest. He saw the two windows that ventilated tlie parlour — the one looking northward over soft gray meadows and golden 70 LUKE DELMEGE cornfields, that stretched away till they were lost in the jjurple and blue of the shadowy, mysterious mountains ; the other looking southward over masses of purple heather, to where the everlasting sea shimmered in sil- ver all day long, and put on its steel-blue armour against the stars of night. There was the tea-table, with its cups and saucers and its pile of dainty griddle-cakes, cut in squares, and fresh from the hands of Margery ; and golden butter, the best that was made in the Grolden Vale; and thick, rich cream; and fragrant strawberries, nestling in their grape-like leaves. And there was his good father, a stern old Irish Catholic of the Puritan type, silent and God-fearing and just, who never allowed a day to pass without an hour of silent communion with God, in his bedroom after the midday meal, and on whose lands the slightest whisper of indelicacy was punished by immediate expulsion. There sat the kindly mother, her beautiful white hair arranged under her snowy cap, and the eternal beads in her hands. There, gliding to and fro, was Margery — a perfect Martha of housewifely neatness and alertness ; and Lizzie, the grave, thoughtful Mary of the household ; and there was Father Pat, best and kindest and truest of friends, to whose arms chil- dren sprang for affection, and in whose hands the wild- est collie or sheepdog was glad to lay his wet nozzle, after he had valorously defended his premises. Luke flung himself into the arm-chair by the southern window and asked Margery for a " decent cup of tea." "• Well, I suppose now you are fit to dine with the Duke of N ," said Father Pat. " You have passed your entrance examination into decent society to-night." " It wasn't so severe an ordeal as I supposed," said Luke. '^ The Canon was kind ; and Miss Wilson — " Margery paused with the teapot high in air. "Miss Wilson made everything easy." Margery drew a long, deep breath of doubt, and shook her head. '•' Do you know what I think, Father Pat ? " said Luke. ADIEUX 71 " No. Go on," said Father Pat. " That there's a lot of real kindness under all the Canon's formalism ; and that he is at heart a good- natured man." " Humph ! " said Father Pat. " How did you come to that conclusion? For I have longer experience of him thyn you, and I have not reached it yet." "Well, I don't know," replied Luke. "It is a little thing ; but it is little things that tell. A straw, you know. I was singing — " " You were siufjinsf?" said Father Pat. " Did you really sing ? " said Margery. "What did you sing, Father Luke?" said Lizzie, who was a more obedient pupil than her sister. " I was just saying that when I was singing ' The Muster ' — " Father Pat jumped from his chair. " Yon don't mean to say that you sang that red-hot rebel song in the Canoii's presence ? " he said. "Every line of it," replied Luke, "and I have prom- ised the words and the music to Barbara Wilson." He looked in a quizzical way at his sister. "Well, Pm blessed," said Father Pat, resuming his seat, " but that beats Banagher. Wait till I tell Tim and Martin." He looked at Luke with a certain feeling of awe dur- ing the rest of the evening. "Well, I was saying," said Luke, coolly, "that I thought — perhaps 'twas only imagination — that the Canon's eyes softened, and that something like kindli- ness came into them, as from the memory of the past." " Ay, indeed ! and so well there might," said Mrs. Delmege. " I Avell remember when there wasn't a more tinder or more loving priest in the diocese than you. Father Maurice Murray. Sure 'twas well known that his sister had to lave him because he liad not two shoes alike ; and he used to stale the mate out of the pot to give it to the poor.'' "I mind well the day," said old Mike Delmege, in a 72 LUKE DELMEGE musing way, as if he was trying to call up a fast-van- ishing picture, " when he wint in, and took up that poor girl. Bride Downey (she is now the mother of the finest childhre in the parish), out of her sick-bed, sheets, blankets, and all, and she reeking with the typhus, the Lord betune us and harm, and spotted all over like the measles, and took her over and put her in the van for the hospital, while all the people stood away in fright, and even the man from the workhouse wouldn't go near her. And it was you, Canon Murray, that arranged her bed in that workhouse van ; and sure you took the faver, and went near dying yourself at the time." "He's not the same man, Mike, since thin. They say the faver turned his head, and he got tetched," said Mrs. Delmege. " No ! but his grand sister, who ran away from the sickness, and wint up to Dublin, where she got into a castle or something, and married a big man, 'tis she that turned the poor man's head." " I wish she had turned it the right way," said Father Pat, " for certainly 'tis screwed on the wrong way now." " Father Martin says, too, that he is a rale good man under all his airs and nonsense — " " Father Martin ? No one minds him," said Father Pat ; " he'd speak well of an informer or a landgrabber." " Why, thin, now. Father Pat, no one knows as well as your reverence that there 'ud be many a poor family on the roadside to-day but for the same Canon. Sure they say that when they see his grand writing up in Dublin, with the turkey-cock on the top of the letther, and two swords crossed, that they'd give him all he ever asked for. And sure whin the Widow Gleeson was served last autumn, and there was nothing before her but the workhouse, and the Canon wrote to the agent, but he had only plain paper without the turkey- cock, they took no more notice of him than if he was an ordinary poor counthry parish priest. What did he do ? He took the train up to Dublin, and walked into the office. Phew ! whin they saw kis grand figure, ADIEUX 73 they ran into rat-holes before him. Believe you me, Father Pat, there are very few priests in the country can make the Canon's boast, that no little child will ever sleep in his parish without a cover betune it and the stars." " That's all right, Mike,"' said Father Pat ; " but why doesn't he keep his grand airs for grand people ? — " " Why," said Mike Delmege, " sure he must practise ; and where would he practise but on you and me ? " " Well, he might keep them for Sundays and holi- days," said Margery, wlio hated the whole lot, " or when his errand sister and niece come down from Dublin, and speak plain to plain people." <■' True, iSIargery," said Father Pat ; " we're a plain, simple people, and we want phxin, simple priests." P)Ut somehow Margery didn't like that either. ''Luke," said Father Pat, buttoning up his coat, "do you mean to say you're not joking, and that you sang 'The Muster ' to-night ? " "I was never so serious in my life," said Luke. "You sang it all?" "Every line ! " " Down to — *' ' No more as craven slaves we bend To despot, king, or queen; God sliields the riolit, — strike sure and fast, 'Tis for our native Green.' " " Quite so ! " " And he didn't get a fit ? " "Not uj) to the time I was leaving." " Well, he has got one now. Fll have a sick-call to him to-night. By Jove ! what will Tim and Martin say ? Well, let me see ! You're off on Friday. Tim will have you to-morrow ; ^NLirtin on Tuesday : you'll be with me on Wednesday. We'll leave him to you, ma'am, on Tliursday. Is that all right ? " "All right," said' Luke. " The best crachure that ever lived," said Mrs. Deb f4 LUKE DELMEGE mege, as Father Pat strolled down the moonlit field. Just at the stile he thought of something and came back. They were all kneeling, and Luke was reciting the Rosary. Father Pat heard the murmur of the voices, and paused. And there outside the window he took out his own Rosary beads and joined in that blessed prayer that echoes night after night from end to end of Ireland. Then he stole away quietly and mounted the stile. " By Jove ! " he said to himself, as he crossed shadow after shadow from the trees on the high hedges, "I believe he's in earnest. But who'd ever believe it ? What will Tim and Martin say? We'll be talking about it till Christmas." On Tuesday Luke called to see the Canon and make his adieux. He was not quite so nervous as on previ- ous occasions, but he expected to receive a severe repri- mand and a long lecture on his future conduct. Nor was he disappointed. " I think it my duty," said the Canon, after they had exchanged preliminaries, " to say — ha — that there were a few things at our little — domestic meeting on Sunday, which I — ha — could hardly approve of. Is it possible that you were never — ha — instructed by your professors to rise with the ladies after dinner, and hold the door open as they — ha — departed ? " " It is not only possible, but a fact," said Luke, with the old contentious spirit of logic-chopping coming back to him. " Besides, sir, I was engrossed at the time, and didn't hear you say ' Grace.' " This was really good for Luke ; but he didn't see how his rapier struck home. " I can really hardly credit it," said the Canon. " It is painful to reflect that we alone should be supposed to learn, by — ha — some kind of intuition, the ameni ties of social intercourse." The Canon was so pained that for a few moments there was dead silence, broken only by the ticking of the clocks. ADIEUX 75 " Then," he resumed, at length, " your rencontre with my — ha — clever nephew was hardly a happy one. I thought the interrelations between body and spirit were part of your — ha — philosophical curriculum." " Your nephew was Christian enough to deny that there was such a thing as soul at all," said Luke, flush- ing. The idea of being catechised on philosophy by this old man, who probably had never heard of a more recent writer than Tongiorgi or Liberatore ! And all this to a " First of First " ! " Ha ! that was only for a post-prandial argument," laughed the Canon. "But you lost temper and got confused. And you never heard of these — ha — Odic forces ? Dear me ! What are our professors doing ? And with what singular equipments they furnish our young men for the battle of life ! " There was another spell of silence, during wdiich Luke drew up to the bar of justice, and solemnly con- demned his professors as a set of "effete old fossils." " I should hardly," said the Canon, resuming, " care to allude to that — ah — ill-timed and rather vulgar — melody to wliich you treated us ; but you are — ha — going to England, and 3'our mission will be — ha — inoperative and ineffectual if you import into the ministrations of your daily ministry sueli treasonable principles as those contained in that — ha — street- baUad. You were never taught operatic music in Maynooth ? " " No, sir," said T^uke ; "it was sternly interdicted." "Dear me I how reactionary ! And it is so^ha — refining. Did you notice that pretty duet, ' Ai nostri monti'?" 'I'he Canon placed tlie tips of his fingers together. " Yes, it was pretty," murmured Luke. " And my nephew's rendering of ' Hear j\[e, Gen — tel Maritana'?" " I did not follow that," said Luke. "And then to compare that fiery Marseillaise, which you so unwisely, but, indeed, rather melodiously ren- 76 LUKE DELMEGE dered ! Do you think now really — ha — that ' Hurrah, me boys,' is an expression suited to a drawing-room audience, or do you not see that it would be more fit- ting in a street-corner ballad or the heavy atmosphere of a — ha — tap-room ? " Luke was silent and angry. " It is quite possible," continued the Canon, " that you will be thrown a good deal into — ha — English society. You may be invited to dine with the — ha — aristocracy, or even the — ha — nobility. I hope, my dear young friend, that you will never forget yourself so far as to introduce into such lofty and refined circles such dithyrambic and — ha — revolutionary ballads as that under discussion." Luke said nothing, but continued tracing the pattern of the carpet. " You must sink your extreme national sensibilities," said the Canon, "in the superior ambitions of the Church, and take care not to offend the prejudices of our dear English brethren by too-pronounced references to those — ha — political issues on which we — ha — differ." There was truth in all that the Canon was saying, though put rather brutally, and Luke had only to listen. Then there was a surprising change of front. " I have written to the Bishop and obtained the requisite permission for you to celebrate three Masses in your father's house, not only now, but on all subsequent occasions when you may — ha — be resident in your paternal home — " " Oh, thank you so much, Canon," said Luke, most gratefully ; "that's a great favour." The Canon went on, not noticing the ebullition. "As I was saying — ha — I think this arrogation of rights that are parochial seems hardly consistent with Canon I^aw ; but I have not insisted too warmly on my privileges as parish priest, lest I should seem wanting in the respect due to the lofty dignity of the episcopal bench. But I took — ha — the opportunity of remon- ADIEUX 77 strating with His Lordship for having set aside one of my parishioners, and selected one of ratlier mediocre abilities, if I am rightly informed, for a position in the diocesan seminary which demands both talent and char- acter.'" Luke was at first bewildered. Then he saw through the Canon's kindness beneath his coat of buckram. ''I'm sure Lm greatly obliged to you, sir, for such trouble. I confess I did feel some annoyance at first, but now I should prefer to go to England." "And I quite approve of your decision," said the Canon, suavely ; " indeed, it is one of the chief regrets of my life that I was unable to graduate on the English mission. Nevertheless, the slight to my parishioner remains, and I shall not forget it." Here the Canon sank into a reverie, as if meditating a subtle revenge against the Bishop. " Do you know," he said, waking up suddenly, " any- thing of the science of heraldry ? " "• No," said Luke, promptly. " That's a very serious loss to you," replied the Canon ; " what did you learn, or how did you employ your time ? " " To tell the truth, Em beginning to think," said Luke, "that whatever I learned is so much useless lum- ber, and that I must get rid of it somehow and commence all over again." " A very proper resolution,'' said the Canon. " Now, let me see ! — Uelmege ! That must be a French or Norman name. Could, your family have been Hugue- nots ? " "Tliey were Palatines," said Luke. "They lived over there at Ballyorgan in the valleys, and became Catholics several generations back." " How very interesting ! " said the Canon. " Our family, as you are aware, are Scotch — ^Murray, Moray. It was one of my ancestors who held the painter of the boat for Mary Queen of Scots when she was escaping from that castle, you know ; and it was the great queen 78 LUKE DELMEGE who, extending her gloved hand to my — ha — ancestor, gave our family its motto. ' Murray,' she said, ' Mur- ray, sans tache.' I hope," continued the Canon, after a pause, ••' that I and my family will never bring a blot upon the fair escutcheon of our noble house." Luke did not know exactly what to reply, but he was saved the trouble ; for the Canon rose, and saying, in his most grandiose manner, "■ that he understood it was customary to demand — ha — a young priest's blessing," to Luke's consternation, the old man knelt humbly on the carpet. Luke repeated the words, but dared not, from old veneration, touch the white hair. And the Canon, rising, placed an envelope in his hands, and said : — ^ When you have said your three Masses, kindly say ten Musses for me ! Good-bye ! I shall hope — ha — sometimes to hear of you from your excellent father. Good-bye ! " The astonished and bewildered young priest opened the envelope when he had passed out of sight of the presbytery, and took out, with mingled feelings of sur- prise and gratitude, a note for five pounds. " 'Tis a queer world," said Luke. " I wonder when shall I understand it." If you value your peace of mind, Luke, let the mighty problem alone ! It has vexed humanity from the beginning, and shall remain insolu- ble to the end. Find your work and do it. But who was ever content with this? Or what greatest sage was ever satisfied to look at the Sphinx of life without asking the meaning in her eternal eyes? CHAPTER VII EN ROUTE The next few days passed pleasantly and cheerfully for Luke. The inestimable privilege of being able to say Mass in his father's house blessed and hallowed the entire day ; and if occasionally he allowed himself to be tormented by the accidents and circumstances of life, or by grave questionings about men and their ways, all these vexatious troubles evaporated the moment lie sat with his three clerical friends ; and all jarring and dis- sonant sounds were merged and disappeared in the glo- rious dithyramb of friendship. The three friends were known in tlie diocese as the "Inseparables." They formed a narrow and exclusive circle of themselves, and all candidates for admission were sternly blackballed. They dined together and supped together on all festive occasions. They took their summer holidays together at Lisdoonvarna ; and there they insisted that their rooms should be on the same corridor and adjacent, and that tlieir chairs shouhl be placed together at the same table. At Kilkee, which is popularly supposed to be the liygienic supplement of Lisdoonvarna, just as the cold douche is supposed to wind up a Turkish bath, they bathed in the same pool or pollock hole, went together to Looji Head, or the Natural Bridges of Ross, f(x)led around during the hot day together ; and if they ventured on a game of billiards after dinner, two played and the other marked. If any one else came in or interfered, tlu' three talked away together. At home, they were equally e::clusive. Every Sunday evening, winter and summer, they met, to " cele- 79 80 LUKE DELMEGE brate the Eleusinian mysteries," said jealous outsiders, but in reality to dine ; and the dinner on each occasion, and at each table, never varied — chickens and ham, followed by a tiny piece of roast mutton ; one dish, generally of apples, as second course, and that was all. Tlie only occasion wlien there was a shadow of a cloud between them was when Father Martin got a new house- keeper, and she treated her guests to what she was pleased to call a chancellor-pudding. The guests looked at it suspiciously, but declined to partake. Father Martin, always gentle and polite, made profuse apolo- gies. " Give me the old horse for the long road," said Father Tim. So, too, the "Inseparables" held the same opinions on politics, the only difference being that Father Martin looked upon such things from a theoreti- cal and academic standpoint, whereas Father Tim held himself passive, and Father Pat was disposed to be fiercely and relentlessly aggressive. Some said it was genuine, downright patriotism; some thought it was opposition to his pastor. No matter. There it was ; and the great newspapers spoke of him as a " true soggarth, who was upholding, under difficult and trying circum- stances, the noblest traditions of the Irish Church." These laudatory lines Father Pat had cut out, and pasted into the cover of the Pars Aestiva of his breviary, where they formed occasionally the subject of an impromptu meditation. And as these three excellent men were obliged to make their wills in conformity with the stat- utes of the diocese, it was understood (though this of course was a secret) that the two executors of him who should predecease the others were to be the survivors. What the last survivor was to do history does not tell. And yet, with all the unbroken intimacy extending over many years, no three men could be more unlike in character, disposition, and education than the " Insepa- rables." Father Pat Casey was an open-air priest, who lived in the saddle, and was the familiar and intimate of every man, woman, and child in the parish. We might say, indeed, in the three parishes ; for his brother EN ROUTE 81 clerics often good-humouredly complained that he for- got the rectification of the frontiers, and poached rather extensively on their preserves. He had a genuine, un- disguised horror of books. His modest library consisted of St. Liguori in two volumes, Perrone in four, Alzog in two, and Receveur in ten. There were, also, about fifty volumes of the Delphin classics, which liad come down to him from a scholarly uncle ; and in the midst of these was a single volume of De Quincey, with an account, amongst other essays, of the last days of Kant. This volume was the occasion of perpetual inquiry and interrogation. "Where in the world did I pick it up? Who the mischief was this Kant ? W^hat a name for a Christian! Martin, I am sure I must have stolen it from jou in a fit of abstraction." But he would not part with it — not for its weight in gold. It had served him well a few times. It was always lying on the parlour table, except during meals, Avhen it went back to the bookshelf ; and once a high- born English lady, who had called to inquire about some poor people in the neig]d)ourhoo(l, took it up, and said: — "• I'm glad to see you interested in my favourite author, Father.'' And once, when the Bishop paid an impromptu visit, he found Father Pat deeply immersed in abstruse studies. '•• Reading, Father Casey ? " said the Bishop, as if lie were surprised. " Yes. my Lord," said Father Pat, demurely. The liisliop took up the volume, turned over the leaves with a slight uplifting of the eyebrows, looked at Father Pat questioningly, looked at the book, and sighed. There were a few })rints of sacred subjects around tlie walls, one or two engravings signed Kaut'niann, which Father Pat was told were of priceless value. But the masterpiece was over the mantel ; it represented three or four horses, bay and black, their skins shining like mirrors. One was hurt, and a groom was chafing the Q 82 LUKE DELMEGE fore foot. It was by one of the old masters, and it was called " Elliman's Embrocation." " Take down that vulgar thing," said his parish priest, on one of the few occasions when he visited his curate. Father Pat obeyed, but put it back again. It was the source of innocent and ineffable pleasure to him. Father Pat didn't preach. He only spoke to the people. Hence, after thirty years of zealous ministra- tion, he remained a curate ; and there seemed no like- lihood that he would ever be asked, in his own words, " to change his condition." Father Tim Hurley was pastor of aneighbouring parish — a one-horse parish. He had no curate — a fact in which he took great pride when speaking to his fellow- pastors, but which he deplored, almost witli tears in his eyes, when in the company of curates. Once, in his early days, he liad had the supreme misfortune of mak- inof an excellent hon mot, and an unwise admirer had called him " Thou son of Sirach." From that day for- ward he assumed the aphoristic mode of speaking ; and sometimes it was a torture to his friends to see him, in much agony, labouring to twist and extort from his inner consciousness some pithy phrase that would help him to conserve or extend his reputation. Under the un- wise advice of his friend Father Martin, he had laid in a stock oj writers who had been remarkable for their wit and powers of repartee ; but it was mighty hard to bring around Rochefoucauld in a conversation about the diocese, or Epictetus when they were talking about the harvest. And so Father Tim was driven, by the stress of circumstances, to fall back upon his own originality ; and if, sometimes, he failed, he found, on the whole, that in his flights of fancy his own gray feathers were better than borrowed plumage. Father Martin, again, was almost a direct antithesis to his friends ; and as it was from him Luke's future life took some of its colour, I must give him a little more space just here. Father Martin Hughes was not originally intended for EN ROUTE 83 the Church, but for the Bar. For this purpose he had spent two years in Germany, passing from university to university, lodging in humble cottages by the banks of legendaij rivers, or in the solitudes of black mountain forests ; and here he had learned to prize the simple, cleanly lives, gray and drab in their monotony, but gilded by the music and the mystery that seems to hang like a golden cloud above the Fatherland. In after life he often recurred, with all the gratefulness of mem- ory, to the kindliness and unaffected politeness of these simple peasants and wood-cutters ; and the little marks of sympathetic friendship, such as the placing of a bunch of violets with silent courtesy on his dressing- table, or the little presents on his birthday, when his portrait was decorated by some Gretchen or Ottilie, were graved indelibly on a memory almost too retentive. Then the pathos of the German hymns, sung by a whole family around the supper table, and to the accompani- ment of a single table-piano, such as you see in every German household, haunted him like a dream ; and when, by degrees, he began to realize that this country, which but a few years back had been cursed by a foreign tongue, had now, by a supreme magnificent effort, cre- ated its own language, and a literature unsurpassed for richness and sweetness, he saturated himself witli the poetry and philosophy of the country, which gave a new colour and embellishment to life. Not that he troubled himself much about the cloudy metaphysics of this school or that, or the line liair-s[)littiiig of philo- so})liical mountebanks who ridiculed the scholastics lor logic-chopping, yet imitated in untruth the worst fea- tures of systems they condemned ; but he allowed the fine mists and mountain dews of Schiller, Richter, and Novalis to wrap him round and saturate his spirit, and thanked God that He had given poets to the world. The last months of his pilgrimage he had spent above the Necker, in the grand old town of Heidelberg, and he never saw it after l)ut in such a sunset dream of colouring, and such an overhanging heaven of azure, as 84 LUKE DELMEGE arches the golden landscapes on the canvases of Turner. But it was there and in the lonely recesses of the Hartz mountains, where village after village clustered around the church spire and the white tombs of the dead, that the gentle afflatus was breathed on him that turned his thoughts from the forum to the pulpit and from the world to God. But he never abandoned his German studies during all his after life. He had conceived the original and apparently extravagant idea of engrafting German ideas, German habits and manners on the peas- antry at home, and he had written one thoughtful article on the affinity between German and Irish thought and tradition. He thought to show tliat German idealism and Celtic mysticism were the same, and that the issue of an alliance between the thoughts and sympathies of these nations should necessarily be a healthy one. But he was hooted from the literary stage. France, and France alone, was to be our wet-nurse and duenna — and Father Martin went back to his books and his dreams. He was, therefore, a cipher, a nonentity, for a silenced voice is supposed to denote and symbolize emptiness in a loud-tongued, blatant land. Then, again, his accomplishments and learning were merged and forgotten in the fact that he was the gentlest, the most imperturbable of men. And partly by native dis- position, partly by habit and cultivation, he had come to that pass when he did not think it worth while to differ with any one about anything. He answered, " Quite so ! " to the most absurd and extravagant state- ment. Hence, after conferences and such like he was generally reputed dull, because he did not choose to take part in discussions, which had no interest for him. But there was a tradition amongst the "Inseparables" that after these occasions strange sounds of laughter used to be heard from the recesses of his library. But this was a mistake. It was only a musical box that used to play twelve airs, and which always required winding on these particular occasions. So said the '•'■ Inseparables" to the gentiles ; but they had a Freemason secret amongst EN ROUTE 85 themselves that Father Martin did verily and indeed enjoy a joke. And in one of the secret recesses of his library, which no one was allowed to penetrate but the " Inseparables," he had a lar^e ring or rosary of photo- graphic portraits — Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, Goethe, Wieland, Richter, Novalis, and Herder. The centre panel was for a long time vacant. Then one day it was tilled — filled with a cabinet portrait of a man who, at his own dinner table, used to say by ges- tures, if not articulately to his worshippers and syco- phants : " Behold, am I not your lord and master ? " and they answered him and said : " Yea, verily, thou art our lord and king." And the horrible story went abroad that Father Martin, the demure monk and eremite, used to sit in his arm-chair for hours together, contemplating tliis circle of genius with the centre of conceited emptiness, and laugh loud and long at the dismal contrast. Luke was privileged to spend his last three days in Ireland in the company of these kindly men. Why he was admitted within the magic circle Avas a great puzzle to him, tlie only answer to which he found in Jiis })ro- spective exile. The profit he derived from this inter- course was probably not an appreciable quantity ; but liis nerves got smootlied out and calmed. It is true, indeed, that Father Tim gave laboured utterance to one or two of his oracular sayings, which, not being quite consistent in tlicir moral bearing with what Luke had been taught, occasioned him not a little anxiety and scruple. For example, Father Tim strongly inculcated on Luke the paramount necessity of ''not selling himst'lf cheap." " The world takes you, my boy, at your own valua- tion. Hold your head high, and put a big price on yourself." "But surely. Father," remonstrated Luke, "that would be quite inconsistent with Christian Immility." "Humility? (tod bless me, my boy, you'll be ])ulU'd and draeffjed throu'di the mud : you'll be tiainiiltMl into 86 LUKE DELMEGE compost by the hoofs of men if you attempt to make little of yourself." Luke was silent. " An eel has a better chance than a salmon," said Father Tim, on another occasion, " of making his way in the narrow and twisted and shallow channels of Irish life." After a long pause of pleasure, he added : " But an eel is not a salmon for all that." The brethren nodded assent. " You have a good name to go to England with, my boy," he said, at his own dinner-table on Monday even- ing. " Who was the fool that said : ' What's in a name ? A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.' " "A great fellow called Will Shakspere," said Father Martin. " 1 thought so. One of those birds who hatch the eggs of others. Now, will any one tell me that Del- mege — and if you can pronounce it in the French fashion so much the better — is not a wholesomer name for an exile than O'Shaughnessy or O'Deluchery ? You'll find that this fellow will come back to us with an accent like a duchess, and that he'll find out that his ancestors fought at Poictiers, and that he is a first cousin, in the collateral line, to Joan of Arc." " It is a curious form of insanity," said Father Mar- tin, ''and every one is more or less affected." " Except myself and Father Pat. I could never trace the Hurleys or the Caseys be3'ond the three-years-old and four-years-old factions. But I believe they were very conspicuous in these crusades." He added, in his tone of quiet sarcasm : " When I get a little money together, which is a rather problematical issue at pres- ent, I'm going to get my notepaper crested, like the Canon — two shillelaghs rampant — very rampant — on a background of red — very red, with the motto, Nemo me. impune lacessit, or its Irish translation, Don't tread on the tail of my coat ; and I'll also pay for Father Pat's, for he'll never have a penny to bless himself with." EN ROUTE 87 " And wouldn't you kindly suggest an heraldic crest and motto for Father Pat?" said Father Martin. " Certainly. A death's-head and crossbones couch- ant, on a black ground, with the motto of Napoleon : Frappez-vite — frappez-fort, or in the vernacular : Wher- ever you see a head^ hit it! " " No ! no ! " said Father Martin ; " that would not be appropriate. Give him the surgeon's knife and the motto, Mescissa vegetius resurget."" To explain which parable we should add here that Father Pat was an amateur surgeon, principally in the veterinary department. He had a little surgery, a room about eight feet square, off the hall ; and here he per- formed operations on animals that would have made Lister die of envy. Here he had put into splints the broken leg of a blackbird, who, in exchange for the gratuitous service, then and there abdicated his free- dom, and became the melodious companion of the priest. Here, too, dogs of all shapes and breeds were brought to him, and whilst he treated them with infinite gentle- ness, and they licked his hand in gratitude, and the wistful, swimming look gathered into their eyes, as indeed into all eyes, human and other, in crises of their lives, some thought that he dropped a tear into the em- brocation, and moistened the ointment in this old human wa3^ In spiritual matters, too, he was an able and tender physician. I am not sure that he was a distin- guished theologian, or that he could weigh opinions in the balance, like that sensitive plate in the Bank of England, that flings good coins to the right, and light, spurious ones to the left, and quivers, as if in doubt, when a dubious coin is submitted, and reasons in its own mechanical way, and finall}' drops it. Hut Father Pat had a sovereign remedy, a pure ana'sthetic, an anti- septic salve for all the wounds of hunianit}', and that was Epikeia. It was never known to fail him, and the consequence was that patients flocked to him from town and country and went away rejoicing. " I can't make it out," he said. "• Fm not much of a 88 LUKE DELMEGE theologian, and the Lord knows I'm not a saint. I suppose 'tis the grace of God and an honest face." " No matter," said Father Tim, in reply ; " he'll never come to decent notepaper. Ah, me ! if Pat had only held his head high, how different he would be to-day ! Luke, my boy, hold your head high, and let every year increase your valuation." " Tell him about Tracey," said Father Fat; "it might frighten him." "About Tracey, that poor angashore in the city? Well, he's an awful example. He had a good parish — as good a parish as there is in the diocese. It is my own native parish — " " It is the Siberia of the diocese," hinted Father Martin. " It's my own native parish," said Father Tim, " and though I shouldn't say it, there's as good a living there — well, no matter. What did our friend Tracey do? Instead of thanking God and his Bishop, he flew into the face of God, he insulted the Bishop, he insulted the people, and he insulted me." The memory of the in- sult was so vivid and painful that Father Tim could not speak for several seconds. " He began to make meditations, if you please, with the result, of course, that he Avent clean off his head. His delusion was that he was too elevated as a parish priest, God bless the mark ! and that his salvation would be more secure on a lower runof of the ladder. He resigned his parish and became chaplain to a city hospital. He is low enough now. He may be seen wandering around the streets of the city with a coat on him as green as a leek, and he looks like an anatomy. Of course he is off his head ; and the fun is, he likes to be told it. And if you'd politely liint that he has been, and must have been, suspended for an occult crime, he'd shake your hand like a hungry friend whom you had unexpectedly asked to dinner." " By Jove ! " said Luke, forgetting himself, and strik- ing the table, "the first vacation I get, FU make a pil- grimage to the city and kiss that man's feet." EN ROUTE 89 "That's easy enough," said Father Tim, "because his shoes are usually well ventilated, and he's not shy about showing his toes. Meanwhile, Luke, spare these few glasses of mine. They are all I have, and this is a hungry parish." " Tell me, Father Martin," said Luke, as the two went home together, "is that true what Father Tim told about that priest in Limerick? Because one never knows when he is serious and when jesting." " Literally true," said Father ]\Lartin, with that tone of seriousness which was natural to him, and which he only suppressed in moments of relaxation. "And'are cases like this very rare?" asked Luke. "Not so rare as you may imagine," replied Father Martin, " but not so remarkable." " I suppose the man is worshipped," said Luke, gaug- ing the popular estimate by his own. "Quite the contrary. He is regarded by all as an imbecile. The people only think of him as one 'tetched in his mind.' " "But the brethren — his own — who understand his heroism?" "Oh!" said Father Martin, with a long breath. " Well," he said deliberately, " here, too, there is com- passion, but no great admiration. He is not called a fool, but he is treated as such. I remember a few months ago a magnilieent sermon, preached by a great pulpit orator, on "Humility.' It was really beautiful, and the picture he drew of St. Francis, hooted by the people of his native town, and called 'a fool,' was pho- togra[)hic in its perfect details. But when he met Father Tracey, with his old green coat at the dinner table afterwards, it was deliglitful to see his condescen- sion. He shook hands with him, apparently with some reluctance, but said immediately after to one of a group of his admirers : ' Poor fellow ! poor fellow ! ' lint the cream of the joke was that an excellent man, immedi- ately after, spoke of the distinguished orator as the 90 LUKE DELMEGE exact and happy antithesis of wretched failures like Father Tracey." " It's a dreadful enigma," said Luke, wearily mop- ping his forehead. "I don't know where I am." " You see Father Tim's advice was not so far absurd as you seem to think. We are all like frogs in a swamp, each trying to croak louder than his fellows, and to lift his stupid head somewhat above them out of this dreary Slough of Despond. And for what, think you ? That he might have a better opportunity than his fellows to see the fens and quagmires of this dreary existence, and inhale the more deeply the marsh-miasms of this fever-stricken and pestilential planet." " But, surely, you do not agree with what Father Tim said ? " said Luke, in an accent of despair. "■ I fully agree with his conclusion that, if you are humble and lowly and self-effaced, 3'ou will certainly hd crushed into compost under the hoofs of wild asses. But — " He stopped, and Luke watched him. " I believe, also, that the highest Christian teaching is true ; and that no real work is done in the world except by humble and lowly men. Did you notice the two photos on my mantelpiece ? " " Yes ; your idols ? " "According to mood. When I am disposed to be contemptuous or scornful or too zealous, I turn to Sa- vonarola ; he was my deity for half my life. When I am in a gentle and charitable mood, I light a taper before the Cure of Ars." "'Tis all a mighty puzzle," said Luke. " Ay, 'tis a mad world, my merry masters," answered the priest. Then, after a long pause, he said : — "I dare say you're pretty tired of the advice and wisdom of your seniors. But you have had a great misfortune. You have come into the world worse equipped than if you had been born blind or lame. You have a hundred naked, quivering nerves, wide open on every square inch of your body. Happy you if you had been born with the hide of a rhinoceros. EN ROUTE 91 As this is not so, I say to you, first, with the Grecian philosopher — " Hahita tecum. Dwell as much as you can with your own thoughts. Secondly, — "Make God your companion, not men. Thirdly, — " Feed not on ephemeral literature, but on the mar- row of giants. Good-bye ! till to-morrow." On Friday afternoon, Luke was launclied on the high seas in the London steamer, and into the mighty world at the same time. The enigma of life was going to be shown him for solution on larger canvas and in deeper colours in the strange and unfamiliar environ- ments of English life. BOOK II CHAPTER VIII ALBION Not tlie white cliffs of Dover, ])ut the red loam of Devonshire downs, where the sandstone was capped by the rich teeming soil, saluted our young exile the fol- lowing morning. He had risen early , and, shaking off the mephitis of a stuffy cabin, had rushed above, just as the sailors were swabbing the decks. Here he drew in long, deep breaths of the crisp, cool sea air, as he watched the furrows cut by the coulter of the sea-plough, or studied the white towns that lay so picturesquely under the ruddy cliffs. "• And this is England," Luke thought. "England, the far-reaching, the imperial, whose power is reverenced by white, and black, and bronzed races ; and whose sovereignty stretches from the peaks of the Himalayas to the Alps of the southern Archipelagoes." Luke couldn't understand it. She lay so quiet there in the morning sun, her landscapes stretched so peaceful and calm, that symbol of power, or of might far-reaching, there was none. '' I tliought," said Luke, aloud, " that ever}' notch in her cliffs was an embrasure, and that the mouths of her cannon were like nests in her rocks." " "Lis the lion coucluint et dormant,'''' said a voice. Luke turned and saw standing close by an officer of the ship, a clean-cut, trim, well-defined figure, clad in the blue cloth and gold lace of the service. His face, instead of the red and bronze of the sailor, had an olive tinge, through which ])urncd two glowing, gleaming brown eyes, whiili just then were sweeping the coast, as if in search of a signal. 95 96 LUKE DELMEGE " I have often had the same thoughts as you, sir," he said, as if anxious to continue the conversation, " as we swept along here under more troublous skies and over more turbulent seas than now. It is the silent and sheathed strength of England that is terrible. I have seen other powers put forth all their might by land and sea : I have not been moved. But I never approach the English coast without a feeling of awe." " I dare say it is something to be proud of," said Luke, who was appreciative of this enthusiasm, but did not share it. "Perhaps not," the officer replied ; "it is destiny." "You see the Cornish coast," he continued, pointing to a dim haze far behind them, in which the outlines of the land were faintly pencilled. " Would you believe that up to the dawn of our century, fifty years ago, that entire peninsula was Catholic ? They had retained the Catholic faith from the times of the Reformation. Then there were no priests to be had ; Wesley went down, and to-day they are the most bigoted Dissenters in Eng- land ; and Cornwall will be the last county that will come back to the Church." " Horrible ! " said Luke, sadly. " And yet so thin is the veneering of Protestantism that their children are still called by the names of Cath- olic saints, Angela, and Ursula, and Teresa ; and they have as many holy wells as you have in Ireland." " It must be a heart-break to the priests," said Luke, "who have to minister amid such surroundings." "I only speak of it as a matter of Fate," said the of- ficer, dreamily. " It is the terrific power of assimila- tion which Protestant England possesses." " You must be proud of ybur great country," said Luke. " No, sir," said the officer, " I am not." Luke looked at him with surprise. " Ireland is my country," the officer said in reply, " and these are our countrymen." He pointed down into the lower deck, where, lying prostrate in various ALBION 97 degrees of intoxication, were four or five cattle-dealers. They had sought out the warmth of the boiler during the night ; and there they lay, unwashed and unkempt, in rather uninviting conditions. Their magnificent cattle, fed on Irish pastures, were going to feed the mouths of Ireland's masters, and tramped and lowed and moaned in hideous discord for food, and clashed their horns together as the vessel rolled on the waves. It was altogether an unpleasant exhibition, and Luke turned away with a sigh. In the early afternoon, the boat, after sheering close under the Eddystone lighthouse, swept around the beau- tiful woodlands and shrublands of Mount Edgcumbe, and the splendid panorama of Plymouth harbour burst on the view. Here again Luke was disappointed. Ev- erything looked so calm, and peaceful, ;tnd prosperous, that he found it difficult to understand that there to the left was one of the greatest dockyards and marine emporiums and store-houses in the world ; and his eye ranched aloncf until, liidden under the bosky covers and the abundant foliage of Mount Edgcumbe, he saw a long, low wall of concrete, and there were the bulldog mouths of England's cannon. " Going ashore, sir ? " said the chief mate, the officer who had previously accosted him. " No," said Luke, dubiously. " Let me introduce my wife and little girl, sir," he said politely. " We are running in, as I am leaving iNLarguerite with the Notre Danic nuns here." " You are going further. Father ? " said the lady, with frankly })olite Lisli manner. "Yes," said Luke, '' I'm going to London. I have a sister Margaret also," lie said, tenderly watching the child's eyes, '' but we call lier Margei-y." " We shall be lonely after our little woman," said the officer; " but she will l)e in safe hands." " Do you know what Marguerite means, little one ? " said Luke. "No, Father," said the child. H 98 LUKE DELMEGE " It means a pearl. Be tlion," he said, assuming a tone of unwonted solemnity, "a pearl of great price." '■' Bless her, Father," said the Catholic mother. And Luke blessed the child. All that day, whenever he had a spare moment from his Office and a few necessary studies, he was absorbed in two reflections. The awful spectacle of those drunken men in the morning haunted him like a nightmare. They had risen half drunk from their hot, hard bed, and stupidly had passed him near the gangway with a maudlin : " Fi' morn'n, Fazzer ! " And he was study- ing all day the mighty problem, that has occupied more attention than half the more serious problems of the world. What is it ? What is it ? — the fatal bias towards intoxication that seems to distinguish the race ? Indolence, vacuity of thought, the fatal altruism of the race ? What is it ? Or is it only a political calumny ? And side by side, alternating rapidly with the bitter reflection, came the question : Why will not Irish mothers educate their children at home? Have we not convents, etc. ? Why, it is Irish nuns who are teach- ing here in Plymouth and throughout England. What is in the English air that the same teachers can teach better here than at home? Or is it the everlasting serfdom of the race, always crouching at the feet of the conqueror, always lessening and depreciating its own large possibilities ? Let it alone, Luke, let it alone ! Except, indeed, as an exercise, to while away a long afternoon under sleepy awnings, and to soothe your nerves with the dull mechanic interplay of questions that are forever seeking and never finding an answer, let it alone, let it alone I But Luke was not made thus. He had a great taste for the insoluble. Late in the evening he heard the same officer chatting freely in French, and with the absolute ease of a native, with a young governess who was returning to her home from Ireland. He listened, not with curiosity, but just to see if he could distinguish one word. Not a word ! ALBION 99 And he had got a prize in Frencli in his logic year. " Hang Wegscheider and the Monophysites," thought Luke. Now, I shoukl like to know where is the connection between Wegscheider, a fairly modern German, and people that lived fifteen centuries ago? But that is the way the lobes of the brain work and interchange ideas, not always sympathetic, or even relevant, especially when the schoolmaster is in a passion, and demands too much work at once from his willing pupils. Next day the vessel had swung into the gangway of the world — that mighty sea-avenue that stretches from the Downs and the Forelands right up to London Bridfje. The vessel's engines were slowed down, for this was a pathway where the passengers had to pick their steps ; for all along the banks at intervals, where the plastic hand of man had built wharves and (^uaj's, there was a plantation of bare masts and yards that cut the sk}' ; and now and again a stately steamer loomed up out of the eternal haze, and grew and swelled into colossal blackness ; then passed and subsided into the dimensions of a waterfowl that troubles the tranquil waters with swift alarm. Bound for the Orient, and laden witli freights of merchandise — from the mecha- nism of a locomotive to the Brummagem-made idol for far Cathay; bound for the Occident, and laden to the water's edge, and stuffed chock-full with rolls and bales from the looms of Manchester ; bound for the roaring Cape and the sleepy isles of the Pacific ; bound for the West Lidies and the Bermudas, whence Nature lias tried in vain to frighten them with her explosive earth- quakes or the dread artillery of her typhoons ; or homeward from far climates, and with the rusty marks of the storm on their hulls, and their sailors staring at the old familiar sights on land and water — like fairy shuttles, moving to and fro across the woof of many waters, — the fleets of the empire came and went, and Luke fancied he saw the far round world as in a magic mirror, and that he smelt the spices of Sultans and the 100 LUKE DELMEGE musk of the gardens of Persia, as the stately argosies swept by. It was a magnificent panorama, and recalled the times when the Mtwe Magnum was swept by the oars of the Roman triremes, and dusky Ethiopians sweated at the galleys of their Roman masters. Then the vision faded, and in the raw cold of an exception- ally sharp morning, Luke stepped across the gangway and looked down at the mighty sewer of a river, and came face to face with all the squalor and fsetor of Lon- don life. He was calmly but courteously received at the pres- bytery attached to the cathedral ; and it surprised him not a little to perceive that his arrival was regarded as an event of as ordinary importance as the closing of a door or the ticking of a clock. He took his seat at the dinner-table ; and he might have been dining there for the last twenty years, so little notice was taken of him. He was a little surprised when he was told : — " Delmege, if you want bread, you can get it at the side-board ; but cut the loaf even, please." He was a little amused when some one asked : — " I say, Delmege, is it a fact that the curates in Ire- land give dinners at a guinea a head ? " He replied : " I have dined with curates, and even with parish priests lately, and the dinner did not cost a cent per head." " Tell that to the marines," was the reply. And he was almost edified, yet partly nonplussed, when his former interrogator took him out promptly after dinner to show him the slums, and coolly told him on returning that he was to preach to a confraternity that evening. But what struck him most forcibly was, the calm in- dependence with which each individual expressed his opinion, and the easy toleration with which they dif- fered from each other, and even contradicted, without the slightest shade of asperity or resentment. This was a perpetual wonder to Luke during his whole career in England. ALBION 101 The following Friday he was submitted to a brief examination for faculties. His examiners were the Vicar-General and the Diocesan Inspector, a convert from Anolicanism. " In the case of a convert," said the Vicar, without Dreliminaries, "whom you ascertained to have never been baptized, but who was married, and had a grown- up family, what would you do ? " " I should proceed with great caution," said Luke, to whom the question seemed rather impertinent and far- fetched. He had been expecting to be asked how many grave professors were on this side, and how many excel- lent writers were on that side, of some abstruse theo- logical problem. " Very good," said the Vicar, "and then? " " I think I should let it alone," said Luke. " Very good. But these good people are not mar- ried. Could you allow them to remain so ? " " It depends on whether they are bona fide, or mala fide,'''' said Luke, reddening. " Of course they are bona fide,"" said the Vicar. "Look it up, Delmege, at your convenience." " How would you refute the arguments for continuity amongst the Anglican divines ? " said the Inspector. •" How would you prove to a lunatic that black is jiot white, and that yesterday is not to-day?" said Luke. All, Luke ! Luke ! where are all your resolutions about interior recollection and self-restraint ? You are far from the illuininaiive state, as yet ! "That will hardly do," said the Inspector, smiling courteously ; " remember you have to face Laud and the Elizabethans, and Pusey and the host of Victorian divines, now." " We never thought of such things," said Luke ; "\ve thought that the old doctrines of Transubstanti- ation. Purgatory, Confession, etc., were the subjects of controversy to-day. No one in L-eland even dreams of denying that the Reformation was a distinct secession." " Very good, very good," said the Inspector. " One 102 LUKE DELMEGE word more. In case you had a sick-call to St. Thomas's Hospital here ; and when you arrived, you found the surgeons engaged in an operation on a Catholic patient, which operation would probably prove fatal, what would you do ? " " I would politely ask them to suspend the operation for a few minutes — " " And do you think they would remove the knives at your request, and probably let the patient collapse ? " " I'd give the patient conditional absolution," said Luke, faintly. " Ver}^ good. You wouldn't — a — knock down two or three of the surgeons and clear the room ? " said the Vicar, with a smile. " N-no," said Luke. He was very angry. Dear me ! no one appears to have heard of Wegscheider at all. " That's all right," said the examiners. " You'll get the printed form of faculties this afternoon. Confes- sions to-morrow from two to six, and from seven to ten. Good-day." Luke went to his room. He was never so angr}^ in his life before. He expected a lengthened ordeal, in which deep and recondite questions would be intro- duced, and in which he would have some chance at last of showins^ what he had learned in the famous halls of his college. And lo 1 not a particle of dust was touched or flicked away from dusty, dead folios ; but here, spick and span, were trotted out airy nothings about ephem- eral and transient everyday existences ; and he had not got one chance of saying — " /S'l'c argumentaris Dominer^ Evidently, these men had never heard of a syllogism in their lives. And then, everything was so curt and short as to be almost contemptuous. Clearly, these men had something to do in the workaday world besides splitting hairs with a young Hibernian. Luke was angry with himself, with his college, with that smiling ex-parson, who had probably read about two years' philosophy and theology before his ordination ; ALBION 103 and with that grim, sardonic old Vicar, who had never opened a treatise since he graduated at Douai or Rheims. Hence it happened that at dinner, when a strange priest asked simply what percentage of illiterates were in the diocese, and the old Vicar grimly answered : — " About fifty per cent. — mostly Irish and Italian " — Luke flared up and said : — " We weren't illiterate when we brought the Faith of old to your ancestors, who were eating acorns with the boars in your forests, and painting their dirty bodies with woad ; and when your kings were glad to fly to our monasteries for an education, nowhere else obtain- able on this planet." The stranger patted Luke on the back, and said " Bravo ! " The Vicar pushed over the jug of beer. But they were friends from that moment. A gnarled, knotty, not in any sense of the word euphonious old Beresark was this same old Vicar — his steel-blue eyes staring ever steadily and with anxious inquiry in them from the jagged penthouse of gray eyebrows ; and his clear, metallic voice, never toned down to politeness and amenity, but dashed in a spray of sarcasm on bishop, and canon, and curate indiscriminately. He would blow you sky high at a moment's notice ; the next minute he would kneel down and tie the latchets of your shoes. A wonderful taste and talent, too, he had for economics ; not ungenerous by any means, or parsi- monious ; but he objected very strongly to any abstrac- tion of jam on tlie sleeve of your soutane, or any too generous disti'ibution of brown gravy on the thirsty tablecloth. Saturday came, and Luke braced liimself for the second great act of his ministry — his first confession. He had scampered over the treatise on Penance the niglit before ; and just at two o'clock he {)assed, witli fear and trembling, to his confessional. He had said a short, tremulous prayer before the Blessed Sacrament ; had cast a look of piteous appeal towards the Lady Altar, and with a thrill of fear and joy commingled, he 104 LUKE DELMEGE slipped quietly past the row of penitents, and put on his surplice and stole. Then he reflected for a moment, and drew the slide. A voice from the dark recess, quavering with emotion, commenced the Confiteor in Irish. Luke started at the well-known words, and whispered Deo gratias. It was an ancient mariner, and the work was brief. But Luke recollected all the terrible things he had heard about dumb and statuesque confessors ; and that poor Irishman got a longer lecture than he had heard for many a day. " I must be a more outrageous sinner even than I thought," he said. " I never got such a ballyragging in my life before ! " Luke drew the slide at his left ; and a voice, this time of a young girl, whispered lioarsely : — " I ain't goin' to confession, Feyther ; but I 'eard as you wos from Hireland, and I kem to arsk assistance to tek me out of 'ell I " " By all means, my child," said Luke, shivering, "if I can assist you in any way ; but why do you say that you are not going to confession ? " " I ain't prepared, Feyther. I ain't been to confes- sion since I left the convent school, five years are gone." " And you've been in London all this time ? " '•' Yaas, Feyther ; I've been doin' bad altogether. It's 'ell, Feytiier, and I want to git out o' 'ell ! " " Well, but how can I assist you ? " " Ev you gi' me my passage, Feyther, to Waterford, ril beg the rest of the way to my huncle in the County Kilkenny. And so 'elp me God, Feyther — " " Sh — h — h ! " said Luke. A cold pers[)iration had broken out all over his body. It was the first time Jie Avas brouo'ht face to face with the dread euibodiment of vice. His next penitent was a tiny dot, with a calm, English face, and yellow ringlets running down almost to her feet. Her mother, dressed in black, took the child to the confessional door, bade her enter, and left her. Here ALBION 105 even the mother, in all other ■ things inseparable from her child, must not accompany. The threshold of the confessional and the threshold of death are sacred to the soul and God. Unlike the Irish children, who jump up like jacks-in-the-box, and toss back the black hair from their eyes, and smile patronizingly on their friend, the confessor, as much as to say, "■ Of course you know me ? " this child slowly and distinctly said the prayers, made her confession, and waited. Here Luke was in his element, and lie lifted that soul up, up into the em- pyrean, by coaxing, gentle, burning words about our Lord, and His love, and all that was due to Him. The child passed out with the smile of an angel on her face. " Wisha, yer reverence, how my heart warmed to you the moment I see you. Sure lie's from the ould counthry, I sez to meself. There's the red of L-eland in his cheeks, and tlie scint of the ould sod hanging around liim. Wisha, thin, yer reverence, may I be bould to ask you what part of tlie ould land did ye come from?" Luke mentioned his natal place. "I thouu'ht so. 1 knew ve weren't from the North or West. Wisha, now thin, yer reverence, I wondlier did ye ever hear tell of a Mick jNIulcahy, of Slievereene, in the County of Kerry, who wint North about thirty years ago ? " Luke regretted to say he had never heard of that dis- tinguished rover, " Because lie was my third cousin b}- the mother's side, and I thouglit yer reverence might have hard of him — " " 1 am hardly twenty-three yet," said Luke, gently, although he thought he was losing valuable time. ''Wisha, God bless you; sure I ought to have seen it. I suppose 1 ought not to mintion it here, _yer reverence, hut this is an awful place. Betune furriners, and Frinchmen, and I-talians, and Jews, and haythens, who never hard the name of God or His Blessed Mother, 'tis as much as we can do to save our })Oor sowls — "' " You ought to go back to Ireland," said Luke. 106 LUKE DELMEGE " Ah ! wisha, thin, 'tis I'd fly in the mornin' across the say to that blessed and holy land ; but sure, yer reverence, me little girl is married here, and I have to mind the childhre for her, whin she goes out to work, shoreing and washing to keep the bit in their mouths — ' In the name av the Father, and av the Son, and av the Holy Ghost. Amin — ' " " Father," said a gentle voice, as Luke drew the other slide, " I am ever so grateful to you for your kindness to my little one. She's gone up to the Lady Altar ; and I never saw her look half so happy before. You must have been very gentle with my dear child." Luke's heart was swelling with all kinds of sweet emotions. Ah, yes ! here, above all places, does the priest receive his reward. True, the glorious Mass has its own consolations, sweet and unutterable. So, too, has the Office, with its majestic poetry, lifting the soul above the vulgar trivialities of life, and introducing it to the company of the blessed. So, too, has the daily, hourly battle with vice the exhilaration of a noble con- flict ; but nowhere are human emotions stirred into such sweet and happy delight as when soul speaks to soul, and the bliss of forgiveness is almost merged in the ecstasy of emancipation, and the thrill of determina- tion to be true to promise and grateful to God. Here is the one thing that Protestantism — the system of in- dividualism and pride — never can, and never will, fathom. With something akin to rapture, Luke Delmege put off his surplice and stole, after a hard afternoon's work, and knelt and blessed God for having made him a priest. CHAPTER IX THE REALMS OF DIS And now commenced a strange life for our young Levite — a life whose circumstances clearly obliterated every lingering trace of desire for far, heroic deeds, which, like martyrdom, would mean one short spasm of pain, and then — the eternal laurels. He began to feel that there was something even higher and nobler than all this — the daily, hourly martyrdom of conflict with Satan and sin — the struggle with evil in its Protean shapes — evil preached from house tops in strong, Satanic accents — or more mildly through tlie press and literature, from the boards of theatres, and the millions of pamphlets and leaflets, that fell, like the flakes of fire in the h{ferno^ on the raw and festering souls of men. Sometimes he walked, for study's sake, through crowded streets, or watched the hideous mass of humanity from the roof of an omnibus. Sometimes he would stand for a dizzy moment at a chemist's window in London Road, and stare at the swirling, heaving, tossing tide of humanity that poured through tlie narrow aqueduct. Never a look or word of recognition amongst these atoms, who stared steadily before them into space, each intent on coming uppermost by some natural princii)le of selec- tion. Luke began to have bad dreams. Sometimes he dreamt of the city as a huge dead carcass, swarming with clotted masses of maggots, that squirmed and rolled in its dread putrescence. Sometimes he saw Britannia, as pictured on coins, with her helmet and trident ; but there hung a huge goitre on lier neck, 107 108 LUKE DELMEGE and that was London. But most often he saw the city as a tenth circle in the cittd dolente. Pale ghosts wan- dered through dark and narrow streets, or herded in fetid alle3^s. They appeared to be absorbed in a silent, but dread and exorbitant quest. What it was, Luke could not see. Some found the desirable thing, and tried to walk along unconcernedly for fear of being robbed ; but there were dark sentinels posted along the avenues, who glided from their lairs and stole the prize even from the most wary passengers. And over all was the smoke of Hell and the brown twilight of the realms of Dis. After this dread dream, Avliich he was unable to shake off for many days, he never saw London but as a shadowy picture of sombre and lurid lights. Whether the early sunsettings of September lighted the blind streets ; or tlie tender grays of October threw a haze around the dying splendours of parks and terraces — he saw only the London of his dream — terram desertam, et tenehro- sam, et opertam mortis ealigine. He began to be alarmed for his health, and he visited a certain physician. A long statement of symptoms, etc., under the keen eyes of ^Esculapius. Prompt reply : " Late suppers. L'isli stomach not yet habituated to English roast beef and potted salmon. All will come right soon. Work ! " Luke took the prescription, and faithfully followed it. He worked in schools and slums, in confessional and pulpit, in hospital and asylum, till his fine face and figure began to be known ; and threw a sunbeam into the tenebrous and sordid places where he had to go. And some one said — it was a holy L-ish nun — "God sent you ! " Ah ! These wonderful nuns ! The glo- rious vivandieres in the march of the army of Christ ! No stars bedeck them, or crosses : no poet sings them ; no trumpets blare around their rougli and toilsome march and struggle ; but some day the bede-roll will be called, and the King's right hand will pin on their breasts the cross of His Legion of Honour. And often and often, as Luke's heart failed him, and he felt he was THE REALMS OF DIS 109 powerless against the awful iniquity that surged around him, the sight of these Sisters, moving quietly through hideous slums, and accepting insults as calmly as their worldl}^^ sisters receive compliments ; or their white lips blanched by the foul air of their schools, and the reek- ing sorties that exhaled from the clothes of these poor waifs, whom they were rescuing from Stygian horrors, smote him with shame, and nerved him by the tonic of noble example for far higher and greater work. And over all the faetor, and smoke, and horror played lam- bent flaslies of Celtic wit and liumour, as brave men jest when shells are crashing and bullets are singing around them. "Come, see our recreation garden," said one, who seemed to want recreation badly, so pale and hol- low-cheeked she looked. She led him up five flights of stairs, then bade hini go out on the leads and look. He did and stood. There was a square patch of blue over- head. All around were brick walls. It was the recrea- tion ground of a prison. He passed around the parapet, and touclied with his hand the grimy ledges wliere the London smoke was festei'ing. And such little patlietic stories as of the child who shouted : " D — n you, don't drown me ! " when tlie baptismal waters were j)Oured upon her head ; or the pretty ancient legend of tlie mariner convert, wlio could never get beyond '•Father, Son, and Holy — Water;" or the apology of tiie old Irish apple-woman for not being able to recog- nize the Figure of the Crucified, " because, ma'am, I haven't my spectacles wid me, and my sight is wake."" Ah mc ! These are the little tragic amusements of mighty martyrs in the crowded amphitheatre of Loji- don life. Sometimes, too, when Luke felt as an airy, gauze-winged butterfly, beating vain wings against the granite walls of ignorance or vice, and his heart sank down in despair, the feeble courtesy and "God bless you ! " of a poor woman, or the smile of a London flower-girl, with lier pretty little bow, and, " Do, please, Father," — would inspirit liim. Or when striding along some populous street, with all the gaudy "Arrys and no LUKE DELMEGE ilippant 'Arriets around, he would dream of Ireland, and what she might have been, suddenly a band, with a green flag and golden harp, and a rush of green-and- gold uniforms, would burst upon him with music and colour, and every man would give the. military salute, there as they tramped the London pavement in military order, to their 3^oung beloved officer. And he would say to himself : " A race to work for and die for, with all their faults." And above all would float the far-off dream of the white, thatched cottage above the cliffs, and tlie murmur of the sea, and the purity and sim- plicity that o'er-canopied with clouds of gold the azure vault that bent above his Irish home at Lisnalee. Luke preached his first sermon very much to his own satisfaction. He had heard ever so many times tliat what was required in England was a series of contro- versial and argumentative sermons that might be con- vincing rather than stimulating. Then one day he read in a Church newspaper that a certain Anglican divine had declared that Calvinism was the bane and curse of the Church of England. Here then was the enemy — to be exorcised by a course of vigorous lectures on Grace. Here Luke was master. The subject had formed part of the fourth year's curriculum in college, and Luke had explored it to its deepest depth. He read up his " Notes," drafted fifteen pages of a discourse, committed it to memory, and delivered it faultlessly, with just a delicious flavour of a Southern brogue, which was captivating to the greater part of his audience, and delightful from its very quaintness and originality to the lesser and more select. Now, Luke was a Molinist, and he told his congregation so. He demolished Calvin and Knox first, and when he had stowed away all that was left of them, he told his wondering and admiring audience that the Thomist and Scotist positions had been carried by assault, and that the Molinist flag was now waving above the conquered garrisons. Many more things he told them, as their wonder grew ; and THE REALMS OF DIS 111 when Luke stepped down from the pulpit, he felt that the conversion of England had now in reality begun. Not that he was very vain ; but it was hard to get rid of the ideas that six years of success and flattery had imprinted on a very plastic and susceptible character. And Luke felt much in the same position he had so often occupied in Maynooth, when he spun syllogisms as a spider spins his webs, and drew unwary flies into their viscous and deadly clutches. The opinion of the congregation varied. That very large section in every congregation to whom the deliv- ery of a sermon is a gymnastic exercise, which has no reference to the audience other than as spectators, con- sidered that it was unique, original, but pedantic. One or two young ladies declared that he had lovely eyes, and that when he got over the hrusquerie of his Irish education, he would be positively charming. One old apple-woman challenged another : — "• What was it all about, Mary ? " " Yerra, how could I know ? Sure it vras all Latin. But I caught the 'grace of God ' sometimes." "Well, the grace o' God and a big loaf — sure that's all we want in this world." A rough workman, in his factory dress, asked : — " Who is this young man ? " " A new hand they've taken on at the works here," said his mate. The opinions of the clergy were not audibly expressed. Luke, indeed, heard one young man hint broadly at the " windmill," by which he understood his own gestures were meant. And another said something about a "pum[)-handle." A young Irish confrere stole to Luke's room late that night, and on being bidden to "come in," lie threw his arms around Luke, thumped him on the back, ran w\) and down the rooui several times, and went through sundry Celtic gyrations ; then : — "■ Luke, old man, I'll tell you, you've knocked them all into a cocked hat." 112 LUKE DELMEGE The Vicar- General said nothing for a few days ; then : — " Dehnege, have you got any more of these sermons ? " " Yes, sir ; I have the series in ' Notes.' " " Burn them ! " " Take the Dublin Review to your room, volume by volume," he added, "and study it. You've got quite on the wrong tack." Luke had his first sick-call. It was urgent. A ma- rine was dying down at the Naval Hospital near Stoke- port. With all the alacrity of a young missioner, Luke passed rapidly through the streets, entered the huge archway of the hospital, inquired the way hastily from a passer-by, was directed to a hall-door, knocked, and was ushered by a trim servant-maid into a handsomely furnished drawing-room. " Very unlike a hospital ward," thought Luke. " Perhaps the parlour of one of the nurses or the matron." He was left here for a long time, wondering at the pictures and books, the dainty accumulations of years by some soul that evidently had taste and wherewith to satisfy it. Then the door softly opened, and a clergy- man, clad in library costume, short coat, etc., entered, gravely saluted him, bade him be seated, and commenced a calm, serious conversation. Luke's bewilderment was increasing, and with it an ever-deepening anxiety about his poor patient, who then and now might be struggling in his death agony. He never saw his mistake, until at last he rose, and the clergyman escorted him to the door, and thanked him for his friendly visit. He had sense enough left to ask the way to the hospital, which was kindly pointed out, and where he found his patient in the death-agony and unconscious. The dying man lay in a little cot at the right-hand side of the long, empty ward. There was no other patient there. An attendant, clad in brown cloth, dec- orated with brass buttons, sat on the bed, coolly reading a newspaper. The hand of death was on the face of THE REALMS OF DIS 113 the poor consumptive. His eyes were glazed, and the gray shadow flitted up and down at each convulsive breath. " Is this the Catholic patient ? " asked Luke, anxiously. " Yaas, he be a Cawtholic, I understan'," said the man. " He is dying," said Luke, who had never seen death before. " Dead in hexactly twanty minutes," said the man, taking out his watch and measuring the time. He re- stored the watch to his pocket and continued reading tlie paper. This awful indifference smote Luke to the heart. He knelt down, put his stole around his neck, tried to elicit an act indicative of conscious sorrow from the dying, failed, gave conditional absolution, administered Extreme Unction, and read the prayers for the dying. The attendant continued absorbed in his paper. Then Luke sat down by the bedside, watched the flitting changes on the face of the dying whilst murmuring a prayer. Exactly at the twenty minutes specified the man rose up. folded liis pai)er, stretched himself, and looked. A last spasm flashed across the gray, ashen face of the dy- ing ; the breathing stopped, fluttered, stopped again, came slowly and with painful efl^ort, sloi)ped again, then a long, deep breatli, the eyes turned in their sockets. That soul had fled. A mucous foam instantly gathered on the ])lue lips and filled the entire mouth. " Did I tell 'ee ? Twanty minutes to the second," said the man, as he wiped the foam from the dead man's lips, and lifted the coverlet, flinging it lightly over the face of the dead man. It was this cool indifference that smote the senses of Luke most keenly. For a long time he could not lV;ime a word to express it, as it appeared to him. Tlieii he stumbled on what he afterwards regarded as the strong- est characteristic of this English people — their sur- prising '' individualism." For while the unit was nothing in this seething turmoil of millions, the indi- I 114 LUKE DELMEGE vidual was everything to himself. Society might ignore him, despise him, calculate him ; but he, understanding all this, went his own way, unheeding and indifferent — a solitary in the awful desert of teeming human life. Everywhere it was the same. Whilst all around the splendid materialism of England asserted and showed itself ; whilst shops were packed full of every kind of luxury and necessary, and the victuallers and pork- butchers vied with the fruit-sellers in exhibiting every form of human food ; whilst public baths were spring- ing up in all directions, and everything ministering to human wants was exhibited in superabundance ; whilst a perfect system of police and detective super- vision guarded human life and safety, each solitary individual walked his way alone. You might live in a street for twenty years and not know the name of your next-door neighbour ; and you seemed to be labelled and ticketed for State purposes, without the slightest reference to your own well-being, except so far as you were a component unit of the State. It was a huge piece of perfect and polished mechanism — cold, clean, shining, smooth, and regular ; but with no more of a soul than a steam-engine. Often when the dread rattle and roar of the huge meclianism tortured the overworked nerves of Luke Delmege, and he felt as if he had been condemned for life to be imprisoned in some huge, infernal Tartarus of cranks and wheels, and the everlasting roar of steam and machinery, he would steal into some quiet street, where, hidden and unseen, as God in the mighty mechanism of the universe, crouched some humble church ; and sitting on the rude benches he would watch for an hour or two the red lamp swinging before the tabernacle, and break out into a soliloquy to ease his overburdened heart : — " Lord, Lord ! how lonely and silent, how hidden and neglected Thou art ! Of all the millions who swarm in this hideous city, how many, how few, are aware of Thy awful Presence ! There they pass and repass. Thy creatures, made by Thy hands, and yet to return to THE REALMS OF DIS 115 Thee ! They are bent on business, on pleasure, on sin ; but Thou art silent and they do not know that Thou art near ! Thy name is cried in the street ; but Thou, the dread reality, art but an abstraction and chimera ! They think of Thee, as afar off on Sinai or Calvary ; they do not know that Thou art here within touch of their hand and sound of their voice. Weary statesmen, burdened and overladen with thought, are yonder in that pile. They want wisdom, but know not where to seek it — world-wisdom, for they rule the world, and have assumed Thy prerogatives and responsibilities without the knowledge that could enlighten, or the judgment that can discern ! And there close by is the mighty temple where once Thy praises were sung and Thy Sacred Presence rested ; but ' Ichabod ' is now written over its porches. Not Thy Presence, but the dust of many who have done Thee dishonour, is there. And here around are souls perishing from hunger and feeding on husks ; and they have forgotten to cry to their Father for bread. Verily, Tliou art a hidden God, and the world does not know Tliee ! " This loneliness of our Lord in His London tabernacles invariably led Luke to the cognate reflection of the loneliness of God and His hiddenness in His universe. He was rather drawn to this reflection by the habit he had acquired of meditating on the ineffable attributes of God, since the day when his venerable professor told an admiring class that he liad remained up half the night before, absorbed in a reverie, after liaving read Lessius on the ministry and prerogatives of the angels. But whereas, in the lonely fields and on the silent seas and lakes of Ireland, he had been penetrated only by the majesty and immensity of the Creator, liere in seething, riotous, tumultuous London, the loneliness of God affected him even to tears. " To-night," he said, " in all England, but two or three small communities will watcli with God. To- night, whilst all England with its tliirty millions are asleep, one or two tiny communities, there in Devon- 116 LUKE DELMEGE shire, here in Parkminster, there in Leicester, will startle the solemnity of the night with psalms of praise and canticles of adoration. ' Praise the Lord, all ye nations ; praise Him, all ye people.' Alas ! no. All the nations and all the peoples are busy with other things, and the Lord of the universe, bending down to hear the voices of the darkness, of the earth, must turn back with disappointment to the tumultuous worship of His Heaven." And then the thought startled him — could it be that God is as forgotten in the vast Heavens as on earth ? Are all the mighty spirits that people the universe, hover over infant planets, guide colossal suns, revel in the crimson and golden belts of far fairer worlds than ours, and are endowed with higher and more perfect faculties and senses — are all these im- mortals as forgetful of God as we ? And is God as lonely in His universe as here amongst the five millions of London ? It was a dreadful thought, but impossible ! It is only on earth that the mighty Maker is ignored. More shame for those who know Him — to whom He hath revealed Himself ! And then Luke's thoughts would turn to Ireland of the saints. " It ought to be a vast monaster}^" he said ; " one grand, everlasting choir of psalm and hymn, where the praises of God would never cease — never know pause or suspension day or night." Alas ! he did not know until after many years how far the splendid materialism of England had infected and attenuated the spiritualism of Ireland ; and how hearts were throbbing, and eyes looking far forward and eagerly, and ears were straining for the rumble of machinery and the mechanism of Mammon, rather than for the thunder of mighty organs and the raptures of exultant choirs. Nor did he know how the spirit of the supernatural in his own breast was already pluming its wings for flight, and how new ideas — the spirit of the age — ' THE REALMS OF DIS 117 were supplanting it. He only felt dimly that he was carried on, on, on in the whirl and tumult of some mighty mechanism ; that the whir of revolving wheels, the vibration of belts, the thunder of engines, tlie hiss of steam, were everywhere. And tliat from all this tremendous energy were woven fair Englisli tapestries — stately palaces and ancestral forests, trim viUas and gardens like Eastern carpets — and that the huge ma- chinery also tossed aside its refuse and slime — the hundreds of thousands that festered and perished in the squalor of the midnight cities. For over all Eng- land, even in midsummer, hangs a Ijlue haze, and over its cities the aer bruno, in Avhich the eye of the poet saw floating the spirits of the lost. He stepped from the silences of God and the roar of London was in his ears. CHAPTER X "THE STRAYED REVELLER" Doctor Wilson was in his study. He was engaged with a patient. So the faithful servitor told tlie few jaundiced patients who were waiting below and striv- ing under a rather sickly gas-jet to read The Ciraphic and The Jester ; or mutually comparing each other's liver symptoms, and talking of the latest pharmaceutical won- der. Dr. Wilson's patient, or patients, were of a pecul- iar type ; and he was searching diligently for one whom he failed to find. There they were — all yet discovered, — invisible to you or me ; but plainly visible there in tliat dark chamber, under the tiny moon of light cast from a reflector. Unseen themselves, but agents of un- seen powers for the destruction of human tissue, and therefore of human life, they swarmed under the micro- scope ; and Wilson felt about as comfortable as in a powder magazine, or with a charge of dynamite beneath his feet. But he would find it — that — microbe of hy- drophobia, which no man had yet discovered; he would find it and write a treatise on it, and then — Sir Athel- stan Wilson ! " Come in ! " " Mrs. Wilson would like to know, sir, whether you intend going to the theatre to-night." " No ! " sharp and laconic. Then — " Send up those patients ; let me see — Mr. Carnegie." Louis Wilson heard his father's decision, heard and rejoiced. " I shall accompany you, mother." " No, dear. I shall not go. " 118 "THE STRAYED REVELLER" 119 Louis Wilson regretted the decision deeply, but smiled. Mrs. Wilson idolized her son. Louis Wilson despised his mother. Her worship disgusted and amazed him. His contempt intensified her idolatry. He played on her wretched feelings as on a shattered and shrieking instrument, — petted her, laughed at her, coaxed her, contemned her, made her furious with passion or maud- lin with love, repelled her, as at a dinner party a few evenings before, when he hissed at her behind his cards : " Hold your tongue, and don't make a fool of yourself ; " won her back by a lurid description of London revels, in which he played no inconsiderable a part. Of his father he was somewhat afraid, probably because he had to look to him for wa3^s and means. There had been one or two scenes by reason of certain debts that Louis had contracted ; and the father, to relieve his feelings, used language somewhat stronger than is sanctioned by conventional usage. Louis regarded him coolly, told him such expressions were ungentlemanly, that he had never heard the like amongst the high elemental society in which he moved — in a word, made his father tlioroughly ashamed of himself. But there are certain limits even to a doctor's finances ; and Louis, once or twice, had to look elsewhere. This did not increase his filial affection, whicli now was blended with dread and hate, disgust and aversion. " I think I shall have a cigar, then," said Louis to his mother. " I shall hardly return to supper." "• Tiie Doctor won't like to see you absent, Louis," said his mother. " 'Tis his night at the Lodge," said Louis. " He won't miss me.' The last patient (all but the hydrophobic microbe, who positively refused to be diagnosed or to pay a fee) was dismissed ; the last guinea pocketed ; the last entry made ; and the Doctor, a wearied man, with a weight of care showing in gray hairs and puckered eyes, entered the drawing-room. "Where's Louis?" he demanded peremptorily. 120 LUKE DELMEGE " Gone out for a cigar," said his wife. " Confound that cub," said the father. " I believe he hates his home and despises us all." " Now, really, Athelstan, you are unjust to the boy. You repel him, and, domesticated as he is, you drive him where he is better appreciated." " Better appreciated ? " echoed the Doctor, lifting his eyebrows. " Yes, better appreciated," said the good mother. " You ignore the poor boy, and he is frightened of you. Yet I heard Lady Alfroth say the other day at the levee that that boy was a perfect Adonis. What's Adonis, Athelstan ? " " Adonis," said the Doctor, " was an infamous puppy, who did not reflect much credit on his admirer, nor she on him. Does she make herself the Venus of Euploea or the Venus of Apelles, Bessie ? " "I don't know anytliing about them," said poor mamma. " But I do know that my boy is admired by the highest ladies of the land, and that you'll drive him to destruction." " Humph I He is pretty far on the road already. Where's Barbara ? " " I don't know. Probabl}^ in some of the slums, with a basket on her arm and a poke bonnet, like those bold Salvation Army people." " Barbara should be at home. Can it be possible that, with her domesticated tastes, you may be driving her to destruction ? " " I'm sure I do all in my power to bring her into decent society. I have had every kind of invitation for her — to balls and tennis parties ; but the girl has low tastes, I regret to say — " " Inherited from whom ? " " Not from me, certainly. You are constantly taunt- ing me with being too fond of society." " H'm ! Look here, Bessie, let us compromise. Bring up your brother, the Canon, and I'll give a dinner. Who knows ? — we may meet an ' eligible ' for Barbara." "THE STRAYED REVELLER" 121 " She'd rather be kneeling at the feet of a friar," said Mrs. Wilson; but her heart jumped at the suggestion. " Well, that is low enough," said the Doctor; and he laughed at his little pun. " Whom shall we ask?" said Mrs. Wilson. " Oh ! it makes no matter. The Canon will obliterate everybody. By the^way, isn't there a big English preacher coming over here soon ? " "Yes," said Mrs. Wilson. Her plans were ripening to perfection. " He's a near relative to the Duke of B ." " Bessie, the gods are smiling on thee. If ever you care for Heaven after you have the Duke's relative at your shoulder, I'm an apothecary. But, by Jove, won't there be fun ? We'll pit the Canon against the celeb- rity : 'twill be worth a prize-fight in Arizona." "What day shall we say?" asked Mrs. Wilson, who bore her husband's bantering by reason of her triumph. "Any day you please, but immediately after the Horse Show. Calthrop is coming over, and I want to show him something worth remembering." '^ 'lliat horrid fellow from Cambridge, who wrote about germs and things ? '* "Exactly. He is the leading germinologist of the day, except Weismann." " Will lie wear his apron — and — things ? 'Twould be liardly riglit, you know, in the presence of the clergy." " He will, then, and you'll see streaks of hell-fire, red and yellow, across his breast. Here goes for a cigar ! If the cub enjoys a cigarette, why shouhln't the old bear enjoy a cigar ? " Mrs. Wilson was alone with her own thoughts and plans for a few minutes. Tlicu a gentle step was heard on the stairs, and llarbara, looking pale and wearied, came in. She flung her hat on the sofa, tidied up lier hair, and asked her mother might she have a cup of tea there in the drawing-room. "I suppose you may," said her mother, peevishly. ■i22 LUKE DELMEGE " Although I must say, Barbara, you would consult bet- ter for our respectability if you would conform more closely to the requirements of elegant society." There spoke the Canon's sister. Barbara said nothing. After tea she drew over a chair, and, taking up a maga- zine, asked anxiously : — " Where is Louis, mother ? " " You care little about Louis or any of your family," answered Mrs. Wilson ; " if you did, you would not avoid meeting those who might be of service to us, and affect the society of the low and disreputable city slums." Barbara was rather accustomed to these monologues, and answered not at all. Mother should speak or go mad. " Your father at last is meeting my wishes, and is about to entertain. Can you help me to form a list ? " " Certainly, mother," said Barbara. " Is it — I hope not — a ball ? " " No. That's some relief for you. He is about to invite some distinguished people to dinner to meet the Canon." " Uncle ? " " Yes. You seem surprised." " And what persons — what class are going to meet uncle ? " " Do you think father would ask any one that was not respectable ? " " Oh, no ! But if I am to help you, I must know is it a medical, a clerical, or a legal dinner ? " " You are becoming sarcastic, Barbara, — a dangerous accomplishment for a young lady." " Now, mother, let us not bandy words. Whom are you going to ask ? " " That is what I want to know. Mr. Calthrop is coming over." Barbara laid down her pen, and looked in pained sur- prise at her mother. " Then you can't ask any priest to meet Am," said she. "THE STRAYED REVELLER" 123 "I would have you kuow," said Mrs. Wilson, angrily, '' that my brother shall be the guest of the occasion. If he sliould be present, no other clergyman can object." Barbara was silent. " We shall ask Monsignor Dalton and Monsignor Williams. Can you think of any one else ? " " There is Father Elton, of Street. He is a very- distinguished man — " " I am afraid it would hardly do to ask any one beneath his own dignity to meet my brother. There's a certain etiquette in these cases." "But Father Elton is a Fellow of the Royal Society, and has frequently lunched at the Castle." " Oh ! " said ^Irs. Wilson, with a gasp of surprise, " indeed ! By all means put down Father Elton. I didn t know he was so distinguished. Then put down Sir Archibald Thompson, of the College of Science, and Algy Redvers, who admired you so much at the Denison's party, and — " '' Mother ? " "Well?" "W'ill tliey come? It will be awkward if you get refusals." " Barbara ! " said Mrs. Wilson, in a faltering tone, " how dare you say such things ! Will they come ? I should say so." " Mother, must this be ? " "It nuist, child," said mother, weeping silently, "but I wish it were over." Dr. Wilson attended the meeting of Lodge No. 8, Moulton Street, and was made ha])py thereby. He liad long since learned that it was only by diligent and ser- vile attention to the plenipotentiaries who ruled the Lodges, and, indeed, every other department in his country, that he could hope for advancement in his pro- fession. True, he had an excellent and giowing re[)U- tation, an excellent and growing and paying clientele ; for, after all, when you have a "liver," it makes very 124 LUKE DELMEGE little difference even if it is Catholic boluses, ordered by Catholic doctors, that relieve you. This is some- times controverted at the Lodges ; and it is maintained that even bottles and pills should have the compass and square written or indented. But a certain residuum of desirable patients did trickle into the study of Dr. Wil- son, and that residuum created an appetite for more. Then there were certain honours and emoluments that were absolutely in the gift of the Lodges ; and these are desirable things, except to a certain class of fa- natics, who, like Oriental fakirs, prefer poverty and retirement. Sometimes, indeed, a " sop to Cerberus " is flung to Catholics, when the tables are too redun- dant and there are no Protestant mouths to feed; and it is Christian and consoling to witness the intense and maudlin gratitude with which the morsels are received and wept over. But how did Dr. Wilson know that he would be there when the crumbs fell, or that some more audacious and hungry Papist might not snatch the cov- eted morsel ? This is a matter admitting of no un- certainty. Brother Wilson, Lodge No. 8, cannot be overlooked. - The meeting was over, tlie night was moonlit, and Dr. Wilson strolled home leisurely. He was accosted at the corner of Denton Street : — " Friend, I owe thee something, and I should wish to repay thee ! " "Oh! some other time, Mr. Pyne," said the Doctor, recognizing a city magnate, one of the last remnants of the Quaker community, who are fast losing their char- acteristics and merging into mere Protestants. •" It is not money I owe tliee, friend," said the Quaker; "I have paid thee all that was due; but I owe thee gratitude." "A rare and unintelligible debt," thought the Doctor. " I had a iiver," continued the Quaker, " and I felt like the saintly man of old, who, when threatened by the Pagan magistrate — ' I shall drag the liver out "THE STRAYED REVELLER" 125 of thee,' answered with Christian gentleness, ' I wish to God you would.' Now, thou hast liolpen me to bring tliat rebellious and ungodly member into better disposi- tions, and I am grateful to thee, and I should wish to repay thee." There was a pause, the Doctor smiling at the Quaker's drollery. " Thou hast a son ?" said the latter, at length. The smile died from the Doctor's face. " He is young and inexperienced, and he hath a fatal gift," continued the Quaker. " And there be a foolish woman, and clamorous, who sitteth on a seat in the liigh places of the city, and she saith, 'Whoso is simple, let him turn in hither.' But he knoweth not that the dead are there, and that her guests are in the depths of hell." " This is all pedantic and ambiguous, Pyne," said the Doctor, testily. "You mean something grave. Would it not be better to explain it fully ? " " Seeing is better than hearing," continued the Quaker, in his solemn way, "better even than faith. Come." He called a cab, and the two drove in silence along winding streets and open thoroughfares, until they came to a fashionable suburb. Here the cab stopped, and the two gentlemen alighted. They moved I'apidly along the smooth pavement and stood before a large mansion, whose hall and windows were unlighted, and over which hung the stillness of death. " Whatever thou seest here," said the Quaker, " wilt thou promise to make neither sign nor sound of recogni- tion ? It is important." " Yes, I promise," said the Doctor, strangely per- turl)ed. They mounted the steps slowly. The bell tinkled, and a footman appeared. " Are the guests assembled ? " said the Quaker. " Yes, sir," said the man, deferentially. " And the banquet ready ? " 126 LUKE DELMEGE "Yes, sir," replied the man. " That will do. I shall tind my own way." He passed rapidly up the broad staircase, dimly lighted here and there by a coloured lamp. The Doctor followed. Their footsteps fell softly on the thick stair- carpet, and did not disturb the solemn silence. A few steps led off the main stairs. Here a door was opened ; but a thick heavy portiere hung down. The Quaker drew it gently aside, and they found themselves in a large dining-room, now fitted as a theatre ; but all the lights burned low until but a faint twilight filled the room, save at the end, where a narrow stage was brill- iantly lighted with electric lamps. Hence they stood and then sat unseen by the audience — a crowd of ladies and gentlemen, all in evening costume, and who besides were so interested by the stage-tableau that they could not hear the almost noiseless entrance of tlie visitors. Nor did the visitors heed them ; for their eyes were riveted on that same stage, where, clad in favvnskins, with a thyrsus in one hand and a winecup in the other, and apparently in an advanced state of intoxication, was Louis Wilson, in the capacity of the "Strayed Reveller." He sat, or rather reclined, on a couch, softened by mosses and ferns ; the fawnskin had slipped from his shoulder, which gleamed like marble ; the dark curls hung low on his neck as he raised his face upward towards the enchantress of Cyprus — Circe. She was clothed in Greek costume, her hair filleted and knotted by circlets of gold and precious stones, and her feet quite bare. Near her stood Ulysses, grim and weather-beaten, his mariner's clothes rather tattered and seaworn, and on his face was a look of gladness as of one who had escaped shipwreck, and yet as of one who had determined not to be taken in the toils of the enchantress. Circe was just repeating the words : — Foolish boy! why tremblest thou? Thou lovest it, then, my wine ? Wouldst more of it ? See, how it glows «'THE STRAYED REVELLER" 121 Through the delicate flushed marble, The red creaming liquor, Strown witli dark seeds ! Drink, then ! I chide thee not, Deny tiiee not tlie bowl. Come, stretch forth thy hand — then — so. Drink, drink again 1 and Louis repeated : — Thanks, gracious One! -Ah, the sweet fumes again! More soft, ah me ! ]More subtle-winding Than Pan's flute-music. Faint — faint I Ah, me ! Again the sweet sleep. " I wish to God he'd never wake out of it," hissed tlie Doctor. " I'd rather see him dead a million times tlian thus." " Hush ! hush ! " said the Quaker. " Come out I " "No, I'll see the damnal)le tiling- to the end," hissed the Doctor. And they did. Then, with a sigh, the Doctor went out, followed by his friend. " What's all this infernal business about ? " said the Doctor. " What do they call this Devil's Drama ? " " Now, now, friend, thou art unreasonably excited," said tlie Quaker. " This is a harmless poem enougli ; written by a very excellent, good man ; and now -.lore or less degraded into what they call Tableaux Classiqiies. If thou wert to see thy excellent son as Perseus, rescu- ing tliat fair lady, Andromeda — " "• And who is that harridan ? " said the Doctor. "A most excellent wife and mother. Didst thou never hear of the beautiful Mrs. Wenham, wife of oiie of the aidea-de-camp to Lord ?" " Certainly," said liis comiianion. Tlie Doctor soft- ened a little under the magic of the name, though he felt his son's degradation keenly. " And that old Silenus — who is he ? " "The reputabh^ and pious Crawford, whose name stands behind six ligures at the Exchange." :28 LUKE DELMEGE " The old ranting hypocrite ! I thought he did noth. ing but cheat on the Exchange, and sing psalms with old toothless cats, and slander over their tea-tables ! " " Now, friend, thou art irritated, and therefore un- just. Even the godly and the pious must have legit- imate recreation ; and thou knowest the object is charitable." " Indeed ! I should be much surprised if my young cub ever did a charitable thing in his life.'' " Oh, yes ! " said the Quaker. " Thou shouldst not object. Is it not one of the tenets of thy own Church — the end justifies the means ? And what can be more laudable than to wean away young baby Papists from their darkness and superstition and bring them into the sunlight of the Gospel freedom ? Good-night, dear friend ! " And the kindly sarcastic Quaker went his way. Next morning the microbe patients had a little rest. There was a scene, a violent scene, in the Doctor's study, in which, for once, the Doctor's honest anger overwhelmed and subdued the keen sarcasm of his son, whilst Barbara and her mother, with white faces, were trembling in the drawing-room. That evening the mail boat from Kings- town had on its deck a very distinguished passenger, with a good deal of the manner and airs of a foreign prince. And then Louis Wilson had to face the humili- ation and misery of his London lodgings during the long vacation, when all the world was abroad, except the vul- gar. He would have fretted a good deal but for 'two resources — the care of his face and figure, and a cer- tain tiny flask which he carried with him everywhere, and a few drops of whose magic elixir wafted him to a Mahometan paradise. I CHAPTER XI CIRCE "I'll insist on cook taking an action for libel against that fellow," said Dr. Wilson, the morning after the great dinner. " Why, he touched nothing but a bis- cuit and an apple. Did he think we were going to poison him ? " No ! Not exactly. But the " great man," besides being extremely and habitually abstemious, as all great thinkers ouo-ht to be, had really some uncharitable sus- picions about the cookery of tlie outer barbarians. He stirred the soup as carefully as if he had expected every moment to turn up a Ijaby's finger, for he had lieard that a great archbishop had once had that delicacy offered him by a Maori chief ; and really, you don't know, you know! And he passed by dish after dish as if he were playing ''Nap" and held a decidedly bad hand. Ikit withal, he was very nice and brilliant ; and, though i)ang after pang of mwrtltication and shame shot through the anxious breast of the hostess, and she feared that it was all a fiasco, after her days of work and nights of worry, nevertheless the afterthou<2-ht : "But he is an Englishman, and near cousin to the Duke of B "" acted as a soothing and mollifying unguent on hurt and bruised feelings. Then, too, the (piick sword-play of words between the "great preacher" and ]Mrs. Wen- liam — !I! What, you ask, with a line full of notes of exclamations, do you mean to say Mrs. Weidiam — Circe! — was there? Yes, indeed, and veiy much in evidence. There had been an angry intermarital de- bate as to the propriety of asking her, on that same K ^ 129 130 LUKE DELMEGE night when Louis was peremptorily ordered from his father's house ; but the name had already been inserted on Mrs. Wilson's list, and how could they think of offending one of the greatest potentates at the Castle? The Doctor bit his lip. It wasn't a case for explana- tions. And he was obliged to admit that Mrs. Wenham was charming. With the splendid individualism of her race, she came to the banquet in a simple dress. Whilst some of the other guests had as many rings on each fin- ger as the poles of a curtain, she had but one. But in a moment she coolly monopolized the conversation, or rather dualized it with her distinguished fellow-coun- tryman. The imperial and dominant race assumed pro- prietorship here, as in all other departments. The Scythians were silent. It is quite true, in the beginning, Circe gave a little start of surprise on beholding so many representatives of the Church Militant around her. But this quickly subsided. After all — that is, after she had, by a vig- orous process of reasoning, conquered that instinctive and reverential dread of the priesthood which is com- mon to Mrs. Wenliam and the world, and argued, rather vainly, that they were no more than those Ritualistic clergymen whom she had met so often, and so often despised, she concluded that they were, after all, only humans, and, as such, legitimate and easy prey. And, to save time, she thought she would conquer the gen- eralissimo, and all the subalterns would then capitulate. " You find the country interesting ? " " Yes," he replied, feeling his way. " So far, I am, indeed, highly interested." " Your first visit ? " " My first visit," he replied, " and one to which I have eagerly looked forward." "• I hope, then, you will turn the pleasure into a study. You will find a good many things to interest you." " I have found a great many interesting things ; and even a larger number of interesting persons so far," he said, with a bow and smile. CIRCE 131 "If you had had the good fortune and the better taste of being at the Horse Show these last days, you'd have seen still more interesting studies. There was an immense number of clergymen there — more, indeed, than I have ever seen at hippodromes elsewhere. I should say it was a curious ethnological study — that almost universal taste of Irishmen for horseflesh." '* You speak as if you had not the honour of being an Irishwoman," said the great one. " I am English — or rather Scoto-English," said Circe. " It is quite a disappointment," said the great one ; but they shook hands metaphorically across the table, as Stanley and Livingstone, when they stepped out of the shade of the palms and bamboos, and recognized the pith helmets and revolvers. It was the only trace and visible sisrn of civilization that had been left them. " That passion for horses and dogs has been always a characteristic of our people," said a Monsignor. " We must have been a nomadic race at one time." " I have been reading somewhat like it in one of Matthew Arnold's poems," said a lady. " I think it was ' Sohrab and Rustum.' " " Is he not the author of the ' Strayed Reveller ' ? " said Dr. Wilson directly to Mrs. Wenham. She looked at her interrogator blankly for a moment, then coloured a little, then frowned, then answered : — "I never read modern poetry." It was a bad hit, but she had passed through many campaigns. " I>y the way, Mrs. Wilson," she said blandly, "I understood that your boy was in Dublin. I did hear some ladies enthuse rather too markedly about him a few days hence. But how can the boy help being so handsome ? " " Jezebel ! " said the Doctor, between his teeth. " And it is quite a series of conquests," said the woman of the world, turning to Rar])ara : "you, little witch, mesmerized that young fool, Kendal, at the Den- 132 LUKE DELMEGE ison's the other day. By the way, Doctor, look out for the list of Jubilee honours. Great complaints that the medical profession has never yet been sufficiently rep- resented or acknowledged there." " Wer kami die Weibercheti dressiren,^'' said Father Elton, breaking in upon the conversation from a quiet chat he had been carrying on with the younger of the two Monsignori. He did not understand the sword- play between the Doctor and Mrs. Wenham; but he saw that there was some veiled antagonism there, and it interested him. " You are well read in ancient legend and poetry ? " he said, turning towards Mrs. Wenham. " Not quite as well read as you savmifs^"" she said, bridling under the interrogation ; " but quite well enough acquainted with them to know that they used up all human thought, and that all the pallid and sickly growths of modern times are ideas transplanted into uncongenial climates and soils." " There, now. Dr. Calthrop," said Father Elton, " there's what your clever countrywomen think of all your miraculous discoveries in science — pallid and sickly transplantings." " I didn't include science," said Mrs. Wenham ; " but as ^ou have said it, I adhere to it," which was generous of Mrs. Wenham, and seemed to imply a new interest in this Roman priest. " I would give a good deal to be assured of that," said Calthrop with slow emphasis, for he was a heavy man ; " I assure you I am quite tired of the deification of my masters, and I have long suspected that they have but feet of clay." " It is only a simple and familiar fact in all human history. I cannot speak much for your department. Doctor, for I am extremely sorry to say I do not know what it is, but there is one general and unmistakable fact or principle in nature — flux and reflux ; and there must be, as George Eliot puts it, an equivalent systole and diastole in all human inquiry." CIRCE 133 "Carlyle is the author of that expression, I think,*' said Father Elton. "No ! George Eliot," said Mrs. Wenham, looking steadily at him. " I won't permit my favourite to he rohbed by a Scotch parrot, that screams in broken German." " Oh ! oh ! " said Father Elton, " and you said you were half Scotch. Is there a general propensity among the Celts to turn the spit ? " " Your remark, Mrs. Wenham," said Dr. Calthrop, after a good deal of thought, "has impressed me. I shall look up the ancients. And you say there's noth- ing new under the sun ? " " Nothing," said Mrs. Wenham ; " even human na- ture is unchanged. Even your Christianity," she said, looking calmly around on all the clerics, from her great fellow-countryman down to the Canon, and up again to Father Elton, " is but a repetition of the ancient philoso- phies, Greek, Egyptian, and Hindoo." " Except that ? " said Father Elton, insinuatingly. "I except nothing," she said, fixing her glowing eyes upon him, "Except that?" Father Elton repeated, smiling. " Except that the ancient philosophies made their professors humble ; and — " she stopped, fearing to proceed. " And that Christianity is the culmination and per- fection of all. Dear me, think of a nineteenth-century lady actually quoting St. Augustine ! " " Oh ! the days of miracles are not yet departed," she laughed. "No, indeed," said Father Elton, drawing himself to- gether. " I remember," he continued, " a rather curi- ous incident that occurred to myself only a few months ago. You've all heard of Knock, of course. Well, I was really anxious to see for myself all that could be authenticated about these marvellous apparitions. So I went down, put up for a few days in an imin-ovised hotel, and .looked around. I saw nothing but the mir- 134 LUKE DELMEGE acle of the people's faith and piety, and the miracle oi suffering ever patiently borne. We are the most in- credulous of mortals, except when facts swim into the sunlit domain of Faith. Well, one evening at dinner, I sat near a young gentleman from Dublin, who also had been prosecuting inquiries. He asked me bluntly what I thought — that is, what the Church thought about miracles. 1 explained the doctrine as simply as I could. When I had finished, he said in a simple way : — " ^ I am an unbeliever. I was brought up a Protestant, but I have lost all faith. But I am of a rather curious turn of mind ; and I have so much natural religion left that I am interested in other people's beliefs. This brought me here. I shall test every case, I said, and ascertain where delusion ends and miracles begin. I know the ^remendous power exercised by the mind over the body and how nervous maladies can be cured by mere mental concentration. But let me see one clear case of consumption or hip disease or cancer healed, and I shall think it necessary to retrace my steps and re- consider my position. Now just watch this ! A few evenings ago, just at the dusk, I went up to the church accompanied by my mother and sister. We stood oppo- site the gable where the figures were supposed to have appeared. There was an immense crowd, staring with dilated eyes to see what Avas about to come out from the invisible silences. Probably I was the only cool and exacting and incredulous spirit there. My mother and sister were Protestants, but sympathetic. I stood be- tween them, leaning one hand on the shoulder of each. The Litanies — is that what you call them? — -com- menced. I had no sympathy with all those metaphori- cal expressions: "Ark of the Covenant," " Morning Star," " Tower of David "; but I admitted they were beautiful. The innumerable candles were lighting ; and I was looking around, coolly scrutinizing the faces of the be- lievers, when to my utter amazement I saw the statue of the Virgin slowly expand to life-size ; I saw the flesh- colour come into the cheeks and neck ; I saw the eyes CIRCE 135 open widely and look down with infinite pity at me. I was entranced, fascinated, mesmerized. I pressed my hands heavily on the shoulders of my mother and sister, and cried in a passionate whisper : Look ! look ! It was not a momentary phasis ; it lasted all through to the end of the Litany ; and there I stared and stared at the phenomenon ; and all the time the eyes of the Virgin were fixed on me with that peculiar expression of sadness. "Don't you see it?" I cried passionately to my friends. " See what ? " they exclaimed. " Why, the apparition! Look! look! before it disappears ! " "You are bewitched ! " my sister cried ; "there is absolutely nothing but the statue and the lights! " I said no more, but continued to gaze. Once and again I shut my eyes and then rubbed them vigorously. But there was the apparition unchanged, until at the last strophe of the Litanies a mist seemed to swim before it, and then slowly the figure dwindled down to the size of the statue, the flesh-tints disappeared, and in a few mo- ments I saw nothing but the clay image and the lifeless eyes. But were I put on oath then, I should have said that there was an apparition. The hallucination lasted only a little while. When I had got back to my hotel I was convinced it was an optical delusion. And so it is with all your miracles — the action of a disordered stomach upon the optic nerve.' " ' And your mother and sister ? ' I said. " ' They were more impressionable,' he replied. ' But it is all evaporated in the swing and swirl of life.' " I had quite forgotten the incident," continued Father Elton, "and even the name, until it all came back as you were speaking, Mrs. Wenhani. 1 think, — but I am not quite positive, — that the gentleman's name was Menteith." All throuQ-h the little narrative iNIrs. Wenham's larcre eyes were fixed on the speaker, wondering, speculating, angry, fi-ightened. When Father Elton had finishctl, she looked down modestly at her folded hands, and said meekly : — 136 LUKE DELMEGE " That is also my name. And your acquaintance was my brother. I remember the circumstance well." " Oh ! indeed," said f'ather Elton, " how curiously I have stumbled on such an interesting circumstance. And now, Mrs. Wenham, did the experience of your excellent brother really impress you ? " Mrs. Wenham looked as innocent as a Child of Mary on the day of her profession. " I have never failed to say the Rosary of the Virgin every day since then," she said. Father Elton looked long and steadily at her. She calmly returned the gaze. Then Father Elton turned aside to the nearest Monsignor ; and he must have heard some excellent stories during the next twenty minutes, for he laughed and laughed until the tears ran from his eyes. There was a silence of embarrassment for the next few minutes, broken onl}^ by a gallant attempt on the part of the Canon to collect the scattered forces. " Might I ask — ha — " he said, addressing the preacher, '■'• do you — ha — use the same heraldic crest and motto as the Duke of ? " " No ! " came uncompromisingly from the great preacher. " How very interesting ! " said the Canon. " We have no time to think of such things in Eng- land," said the preacher. " Dear me ! " said the Canon. " I thought you had no responsibilities — ha — except an occasional sermon." " The sermon is only a recreation, particularly wlien I have had to preach to such an intelligent audience and to meet such interesting company as I have been favoured with this evening," said the preacher. " Then we — ha — hope to have the honour of a repe- tition of your visit ? " said the Canon. The preacher shrugged his shoulders. As the ladies filed out, Father Elton held the door open. Circe was last. " It was not a matter to be spoken of at a public dinner CIRCE 137 table," she whispered ; " but you must really take me up, and bring a poor lost sheep into the true fold." " With great pleasure," he replied. Ah, Cii'ce ! Circe ! A great enchantress you may be with budding ApoUos and young Adonises, who have not yet put on the calm of the eternal gods ; but " your sweet eyes, your low replies " will never turn these steeled and passionless priests into porkers, Circe ! She tried her wiles on more yielding material, and as- certained in twenty minutes from Barbara, (1) that her father was really anxious for a title ; (2) that her brother had left Dublin rather unexpectedly, why and wherefore Barbara did not know ; (3) that Barbara was thoroughly ashamed of this evening dress she was wear- ing, and had striven successfully to cover it with all kinds of webs and woofs of lace ; (4) that she had a great dread of Father Elton, who was so clever, and a great reverence for the purple, and a great love for cer- tain uncouth, barefooted meditcvalists down there in a street that was generally festooned with all manner of human integuments, and that was onl}- held together by the Caryatides, who, with arms akimbo, sustained from morning to night its creaking and rotten postels and architraves ; (5) that Barbara's little soul had no other ambition or craving for pleasure except a quiet hour after a hard day's work, down there in the dimly lighted church, where the great lamp swung to and fro, and there was silence, but for the rattle of old Norry's beads. And the Avoman of the world, calling up her own history, and the many secret histories that were locked up and sealed in the cabinets of memory, looked this young girl all over, and looked through her eyes and the lines of her mouth, and satisfied herself that there were no secret corridors and avenues there. Then the woman of the world, wondering at this curiosity, put a few other leading questions, which glanced harmlessly off the armour of a pure ingenuous soul. Then the woman of the world fell into a deep reverie, and woke 138 LUKE DELMEGE up to hear herself whispering : " The days of miracles are not passed. It is a child, and a miracle." Later on, when the gentlemen had entered the draw- ing-room, it was noticed that Mrs. Wenham was rather silent and thoughtful. " A clever woman, playing a clever part ! " thought Father Elton. " A little bored by the Scythians," thought the preacher, " as, indeed, I confess myself to be." " Jezebel is repenting," said Dr. Wilson. " Has she a foreshadowing of the dogs ? " Not at all, for the prophets were all dead in Israel. She took an early leave. Barbara would accompany her to her carriage. Dr. Wilson said a frigid good- night. Barbara whispered : — " You may be able to do something for papa, Mrs. Wenham." " You may be assured I will, for your sweet sake," said Mrs. Wenham. " And — and — if ever — that is, you may meet Louis in London, will you — won't you — oh ! dear Mrs. Wenham!—" " There, go in from the night-air, you little saint, decolletee," said the woman of the world, as she said " good-bye ! " " There are a few innocents still left in the world," she said to the mute who accompanied her. " 'Tis a pity ; for Rachel will yet have to shed tears. And there should be no tears ! none ! " she cried almost viciously. " But steeled nerves and stony hearts and minds that won't turn back on the inevitable. What dreadful fate is before that child ? For she cannot be spared. The soldiers of Herod are abroad, and the air is full of the sound of weeping. I should like to see her God, though. Let me see — ten — 'tis early, is it not ? " She pulled the cord and gave a direction to her coachman. He said nothing, but turned the horses' heads, though he went near falling off his perch. CIRCE 139 Then the woman of the world found herself in the dark porch of a church, whither she had picked her way, but with dreadful misgivings as to the condition of iier silks and shoes. Dark figures flitted by her in the dim light, dipped their hands somewhere, muttered their charms, and disappeared. She entered, but saw nothing but a few yellow jets that darkened the gloom. She moved up the centre aisle, and saw the red lamp swinging. She watched it eagerly. It had some curi- ous fascination al)oat it. She had seen similar lamps burning before eikons in Russia once, when her husband was military attache to the Court ; and she had often seen the same lamps at the corners of the Italian streets before images of the JNIadonna. But they weren't like this altogether. What was it ? Then she discerned slowly that she was not alone, but that the church was crowded. For faces paled from out the darkness, and whispers and a cough broke on her startled senses. She saw long rows of men and women, mute as statues in the halls of the dead. What were they doing ? And that red lamp ? She was seized with a sudden panic and fled. "• May the sweet Mother of God protect you, and may God give you a happy death and a favourable judgment," said a voice from the darkness of the porch. *' It was a plunge in the Inferno,'" slie said. " What madness came over me ? " Death — Judgment! Death — Judgment! Death — Judgment I Death Judgment! So sang the merry wheels, as 'Mow on the sands, loud on the stones " her carriage whirled away. CHAPTER XII CRITICAL AND EXPOSITORY "YoD" really surprise me, Father Elton," said Dr. Calthrop, when the gentlemen had sat down with an air of unspeakable freedom and lighted their cigars, " and you interest me, because I really must admit that we are disposed sometimes to suffer from swelled heads in our generation. But now," he said coaxingly, "• do you not really dread us ? We have pushed you back behind the ramparts, and are just forming en echelon for the last attack." " To vary the simile," said Father Elton, smiling, " tell me, did you, a city man, ever chance to see the rooks following the sower in a ploughed field ? " " Yes, yes, to be sure," said the Doctor. " Well, you know, we are the rooks. Every French gamin is taught to say : Quoi ! quoi ! after us in the streets. But, as you are well aware, the careful and thrifty rooks follow the track of the sower to pick up the seeds he has dropped, and assimilate them. They are not afraid of the sower. And they laugh, actually laugh, at the hat on the pole and the streaming rags, which are supposed to frighten them." "■ I cannot well follow you," said the slow Doctor. " Well, my dear sir," said Father Elton, " we are the rooks. You are the sowers. Every fact you drop from the bag of science, we assimilate it for our own use. You may label it ' Poison ' if you like. We laugh and pick it up. Your scarecrow — the end and final judgment on all religion and revelation, — we look at it boldly, cackle at it contemptuously, and fly away." " I see," said the Doctor, laughing. " But some 140 I CRITICAL AND EXPOSITORY 141 day the sower will get mad and string up one or two of you." '' That would be unscientific," said the priest. " And, above all other things, the rooks have faith in the philosophy and imperturbability of the seed-sower. To string up one or two of us would be a retrograde pro- ceeding ; and science is essentially progressive." " But the whole tone of you gentlemen in matters of controversy appears to me to be distinctly apologetic. There is a rubbing of the hands and an action of dep- recation observable in all your literature that seems to say : ' For God's sake, don't anniliilate us alto- gether ! '" " I cannot speak of Irish controversies," said the preacher, breaking in suddenly, " but for us in England let me say tliat we hold our heads as high as any phi- losophers or unbelievers. Perhaps, Doctor, you mis- take courtesy for want of courage." " Well, no," said the Doctor, in his slow, heavy way ; " but I confess you solicit aggressiveness on our part by your delightful humility, and yonr rather pronounced and deferential obsequiousness to men of science. Things weren't so, you know ; and your new attitude makes us suspicious." " We are 'umble, very 'umble. Doctor," said Father Elton, who now put on his war-paint over his drawing- room manner. "■ You are quite right. We are most literal in our Christianity. We turn the one cheek when the other is smitten ; and when 3'ou take our coats, we flincr our cloaks after vou. We are dreadfuHv deferential and apologetic. In fact, the science ot apologetics is our only science at present. Amongst our learned brethren, a new discovery in science, or a pretended one, is hailed as if a new star had swum into our luu'izon ; and when you discover a new germ, or find out somethinc: new about cells, thev take off their hats and genuflect, and say : Venite, adoremus ! " " Now, now. Father Elton, really now, this is an exaggeration," said the })reacher. 142 LUKE DELMEGE "If I — ha — understand the reverend gentleman aright," said the Canon, grandly, " he — ha — means an act of worship to the Creator, for the — ha — unex- pected development in the — ha — what-you-call-'ems." " Canon," said Father Elton, bitterly, " I mean noth- ing of tlie kind. I mean that a certain class of our co-religionists are so infatuated by their enthusiasm, or paralyzed by their fear, that they worship every new development of physical science ; and that, in the wor- ship of the animalcula, they forget what is due to the Creator and His authority on earth, instead of saying: ' Go on, go on, ye delvers in darkness. Every jet of flame you cast on the secrets of Nature lights a lamp for us before the shrine of the Eternal.' And the whole thing is ludicrous. As that excellent lady said, a few minutes ago, it is but the systole and diastole in all human inquiry. The ghost of Democritus has appeared in the nineteenth century ; and he rattles his chains, like every decent ghost — 'atoms,' 'germs,' 'cells,' we hear it all da capo, only Weismann differs from Eimer, and Siciliani differs from Binet. And now, at last, whilst they have been delving away in the subterranean vaults of Nature, the very soul of Nature has flown up- wards, and escaped the vision of the dwellers in dark- ness. But at the mouth of the pit, lo, the watchers behold it, and shout down to the blackened pitmen, with their tallow candles and smoking lamps : ' Come up ! come up ! there are colossal potentialities in the psychic capacities of matter. It is easier to explain the soul than the phenomena of inheritance, and the psychic capacities are developing themselves. Come up, come up quickly, or you may stumble upon God ! ' " " I admit there's a defect somewhere," said Dr. Calthrop. " There is," said Father Elton, who intended to silence the enemy's guns forever, " there is. And that is, you men of science have been a little premature in discounting the science of metaphysics. We Catholics pursue the two together. You have abandoned the CRITICAL AND EXPOSITORY 143 mind-science forever. Hence, you see Nature through a telescope ; we through a binocular. And we get the better view. And we are satisfied not to see too far or too much. ' I am all that has been, that shall be ; and none, amongst mortals, has hitherto lifted my veil.' Or, as one of your few thoughtful poets has put it : — " ' Shall any gazer see with mortal eyes? Or any searcher know by mortal mind? Veil after veil must lift — but there must be Veil after veil behind.' The star — the cell — the soul — these be impenetrable enigmas." " Well, of course, we make all allowance for you Irishmen," said the preacher ; " but you are not placed in our difficult position, and, therefore, you cannot un- derstand our mode of action. We are dealing with a powerful and prejudiced antagonism, which, with sin- gular disingenuousness and want of candour, is forever repeating the cat-calls of past prejudices against us. You know, of course, that tliere is a congenital belief in the Protestant mind that we are opposed to the natural sciences, and that we dread them." " Yes, and you encourage that belief by your artificial enthusiasm. 'You do protest too much, gentlemen.' What you want is a Christian Pascal, just as we want another Swift, to heap scorn upon all anti-Christian philosophy in every shape and form." " But we sliall be called ' aggressive.' " "And why not? After nineteen centuries of a career, marked in every cycle and century b}' miracle, surely our time has come to hold up to the eyes of the thous^htful the raufijed vesture and the pasteboard idols of the world. •• Tiiese be thy gods, (.) Israel ! ' IJelieve me, my dear Father, that our want of aggression and determination is the main cause of our want of larger success. Give back blow for blow, and scorn for scorn. Vinegar cut through the Alps for Hannibal ; milk and honey would not have done it." 144 LUKE DELMEGE " Tertiillian was not canonized," said the preacher, " No ; and he was jnstly refused canonization. But will any man contend that Tertullian did not do more, by his fierce invective, to undermine the strength of Pagan and Imperial Rome, than any of his meeker brother-apologists ? " '' Well, but you must admit. Father Elton, that our Church enjoys far larger liberties under the English flag than under any foreign power, even though nomi- nally Catholic." "Certainly. But what then?" " Well, then, it behoves us to be patient and circum- spect." " Yes. Obey the higher powers. That is our teach- ing. But I am not speaking of the higher powers. I am speaking of the lower, infernal powers, who, through science, literature, and a vulgar and venal press, use every oj^portunity to defame us, and hold us and our teachings up to ridicule, and who are the secret con- spirators that hold the strings of governments, and move their puppets at their will. Look at your litera- ture, how defiled it is with anti-Catholic scurrility ! Did you ever hear of a Catholic writer who held up an Anglican parson or Nonconformist minister to scorn ? Never. But your whole literature reeks with infamous calumnies on dur priesthood. Why, half your novels deal with Jesuits and the Inquisition. And your ' seer and prophet,' when he is not shrieking ' Oh ! heavens,' or '■All de mi,'' is ridiculing the ' simulacrum ' of a Pope, or screaming about an imaginary ' dirty, muddy-minded, semi-felonious, proselytizing Irish priest,' who is sup- posed to have disturbed the by no means normal equa- nimity of 'his goody.' What is the result? Voters become smitten with the virus and madness of bigotry; then statesmen are influenced, and Acts of Parliament passed, and the whole thing is liberty and progress. Why, witness all Catholic France to-day, passing meekly under the yoke, at the dictation of a few dirty Jewish rags ! But the pitiful thing is that we sit down and CRITICAL AND EXPOSITORY 145 tamely submit to all this. If we want a clear proof of the continuity of our Church with that of the Catacombs, it is found in our serfdom. The Angel of the Apoca- lypse may mark our foreheads with the mystical sign of Tau; but, by Jove, the Angel of Destiny has branded the Sigma of slavery on our backs." ''I am afraid, Father Elton," said the preacher, "your desire to emphasize your contentions has led into the national tendency towards exaggeration. I assure you we get on very well over there in ' darkest England,' and that we are not so sensible of persecution, perhaps because not so sensitive about trifles, as you imagine. Besides, our people are really not so much influenced by literature as you seem to imagine. It would sur- prise you to find how little my countrymen care about their prophets. They think more of their purveyors and their bread and ale." " We had but one '• man ' in our century," said Father Elton, pui\suing his own train of thought, " and that was lie who armed his Irish subjects iu New York, and then told its mayor that the first contingent of savage bigots that made its appearance in the city would find that city in flames ! " "•I am — ha — afraid, gentlemen," said the Canon, who was very much disturbed, " that we are approaching — ha — rather questionable and — ha — dangerous sub- jects, that may — ha — introduce in their train some — ha — slight acerljity that would mar tlie harmony of this pleasant meeting. Suppose we adjourn to the — ha — more equable and — ha — temperate atmosphere of the drawinof-room." Father Elton and the preaclier walked out together. " The good Canon," said tJie latter, " did not quite seem to understand his uneomi)limentary allusion. He implies that we have been indulging a little freely." Father Elton laughed, but looked anno3'ed. There was a family conclave late that evening. "Why don't they do something for that Father 146 LUKE DELMEGE Elton?" said Mrs. Wilson. "Why don't they make him a Monsignor or something ? Why, he's not even a Doctor of Laws ! " " Why do they make boobies of baronets, and judges of jugglers ? Why are they always putting round men into square holes, and vice versa? ^' said her husband. " I am — ha — more convinced than ever of the — ha — wisdom of the Church," said the Canon, " in not having advanced to — a — ha — position of respecta- bility and honour one who holds such extreme views. That clergyman is — ha — positively revolutionary, and — even — ha — anarchical in his ideas." " Are there many like him in Ireland ? " asked Dr. Calthrop. " Most happily, no ! " said the Canon. " The vast number of our clergy are amiable, industrious, respect- able members of society ; strictly observant of the laws of their — ha — Church; and obedient and — ha — re- spectful to constituted forms of government." " Because if you had a few thousand, or even hun- dred, of that species with his intelligence and vivacity, you need not have been whining for your Catholic Uni- versity so long," said the Doctor. " I can't see for the life of me what these clergymen dabble in science for ? It is bad enough to have ' priests in politics,' but 'priests in science,' monopolizing our every department, and possibly anticipating our discov- eries, would be intolerable," said Dr. Wilson. " That man, now, seems to have been reading up all our sci- entific authorities. Did he quote Shaler and Eimer, Calthrop ? " " Ay, and seemed to know them well. After all, it touches their own department ; and I must say that I brought that unpleasant discussion on myself. But I confess your good clergyman is to me a greater surprise than anj^thing I have seen on this memorable visit. How little we know of each other ! " " Mrs. Wenham thinks very highly of him," put in Mrs. Wilson, diffidently. " I lieard her say to Bar- bara : ' That is a man to hold souls in leash.' " CRITICAL AND EXPOSITORY 147 " That's women's ways," said her husband. " They like a master. They are ambitious to rule ; but they love being ruled. No woman can be an autocrat. She must have a higher power to worship." " Did you say, Bessie," asked the Canon, " that that — ha — excellent clergyman visits at the — ha — Vice- regal Lodge and lunches at the Castle ? " " There is no doubt about it, Canon," she replied. " He is even a favourite with Lady C , who consults him on many points." "Then I presume he suppresses — ha — his rather ad- vanced and — hii — subversive principles ; and probably presents the teachings of the Church in an — ha — at- tractive guise." " Depend upon it, he does nothing of the kind," said Dr. Calthrop ; " he is not a man to water down his principles, and if he did, he would lose all his piquancy." " But the recognized authorities, sir, the — ha — rep- resentatives of the Queen, hqw can they listen without — ha — emphatic protest to such disloyal principles?" asked the ('anon. " Oh, these eccentricities are quite tolerable, and even amusing," said the Doctor, " to Englishmen. It is only when we see such principles reduced to practice by silent and steady organization that we bring down the whip. " Ijut the language, sir ! — " said the Canon. "We never mind talk,'" said the Doctor; "it is the silence we dread." And the Canon thenceforward was dumb. " There's a letter from Louis by the evening mail," said Mrs. Wilson, addressing her husband. "A mod(\st request for twenty pounds ? " asked the Doctor, lifting his black eyebrows. " No, indeed. You can read it. There's nothing of that kind in it." And the tilial letter ran thus : — "Dearest Mother: — Arrived here quite safely on the 11th and looked np my old di,2[,Q,ings. Things were pretty rough and disorganized, as 1 was not expected so soon by the housekeeper. 148 LUKE DELMEGE None of my chums has returned, and London is yet a desert. The natives are just now swarming on the cool hillsides or in the deep valleys of the Alps, or leaning over the gunwales of their yachts in the Mediterranean, or fishing in the Xorway rivers. But there is a pretty large crowd of country cousins in the streets, very open as to their mouths, but very close as to their pockets. They move in squads, and seem to be in a condition of chronic i^anic. You can imagine how dull all this is ! Nothing to do. Hot streets, blaz- ing skies, no society. Well, a little. We had a meeting of the pre-Raphaelites on Monday evening, in which, before parting for the long holidays, several arrangements were made. I am booked for a lecture on ' Turner ' some time in January. We had also a garden party up the river at Uskholme. A select few of the rab- ble of artists, poets, musicians, etc., met at the house of Lady L , whom you already know as a patroness of the arts. She asked me to come. I pleaded headache, sunstroke, several engage- ments. No use. I had to go. It was delightful. Slightly bar- baric, but rather novel and quite fit for hlase people. But these things don't suit me. I am working hard. I have got permission from the Resident Surgeon to attend St. Thomas's every day. I go through every ward and every case in succession. It is weary work. But I have an axe to grind. By the way, tell Barby I am not neglecting the ' one thing necessary.' I was at Vespers at the Cathedral on Sunday evening. The music was gorgeous ; the cere- monial superb. But the sermon ! I ! Alas ! who was the preacher, think you? Our young peasant friend, who sang that rebel song that so shocked uncle. It was awful. Just a potpourri of medi- peval absurdities — free-will, grace, pre-determination, prescience. And such an accent ! Great heavens ! You could cut it with a knife and hang your hat on the splinters thereof. What are they doing in those Irish colleges? I have heard an acquaintance say that a young priest is the greatest greenhorn in existence. But our Church is deeply concerned in these things. No Protestant could take away with him anything but contempt after hearing this scholastic rhodomontade. Far different was another experi- ence of mine. I went over lately to hear Dr. Vaughan, Master of the Temple, preach. Don't be alarmed, dear mother ! You know Catholics can go where they like here, without prohibition. Such calm, majestic, well-reasoned, well-delivered language I had never heard before ; and such self-reliance without affectation, and self- restraint without coldness. " I wish I were a theological student, and could sit under his chair." " Ls that all ? " said Dr. Wilson. " That's all," said the proud mother, " except a few trifling personal remarks at the end." CRITICAL AND EXPOSITORY 149 " The young cub ! " said the father. "I think," said the Canon, "that that is — ha — an admirable letter. It manifests distinctly four or five — ha — features that are very consoling. It is clear that our dear boy is moving in — ha — excellent soci- ety. That distinguished lady who — ha — had the goodness to invite him to her garden party must have seen something more than usually attractive in Louis. Then, his devotion to — ha — study — clinical, is it not, Doctor ? What zeal and perseverance it needs to re- main whole days in the — ha — dreadful wards, in mo- mentary — ha — danger of contracting disease ! Then, his attention to his — ha — religious duties. Vespers are not — ha — obligatory in our Church, Dr. Calthrop ; but you see how early — ha — impressions and careful Christian training mould the — ha — entire future ca- reer of our bovs. What is that, Bessie ? The music was — ha — " " Gorgeous ! " said Mrs. Wilson, consulting the letter. "I am sure that is — ha — excellent criticism," con- tinued the Canon. " And then his witty, indeed, rather too free — ha — remarks on preaching! But, then, young men, young men ! And his solicitude for the Church — the appearance she — ha — makes before the public ! How lamentable that they will not turn out — ha — better types from our colleges ! Mark the — ha — distinction between this — ha — rude young Celt and that refined and polished clergynum — named, Bessie?" " Dr. Yaughan, Master of the Temple ! " said INIrs. Wilson, again consulting the letter. " Dr. Vaughan, Master of the Temple," echoed the Canon. "And how does Louis — ha — describe this clergyman's eloquence ? " " Calm, majestic, well-reasoned, well-delivered," said Mrs. Wilson, reading. '" Calm, majestic, well-reasoned, well-delivered," echoed the Canon, leaning on each word with emphasis. " I should say tliat such a — ha — discourse was most cred- itable and — ha — respectable." 150 LUKE DELMEGE " What would you think of Louis becoming a theo- logical student ? " said Dr. Wilson. The Canon saw the sarcasm, and winced. " I should say, indeed," he replied, " that at this period of his career it would be — ha — inadvisable to change. But I am — ha — quite sure that whatever profession Louis adopts, he will maintain the honour — ha — of our family, sans tache.^'' " Come, Calthrop, and have a final cigar," said the Doctor. " I say, Wilson," said Dr. Calthrop, as he pinched off the end of his cigar, " you'll forgive the comparison ; but your good brother-in-law reminds me strongly of the 'Father of the Marshalsea,' or Casby." " He is neither," said Dr. Wilson, " but quite an in- genuous, good man, who has put on a little mannerism with age. Some think it the result of disease, for it is certain he was a red-hot rebel in his youth. There is a curious story told of him. When he took possession of his first parish, he had scarcely arrived when he got a mes- sage from the local magnate to have his church cleared of pews, benches, and seats early on Monday morning, for that the landlord's corn should be threshed there." " What ? " cried Dr. Calthrop, removing his cigar. " I am speaking of facts," said Dr. Wilson. " The priest took no notice of the order, but summoned some few sturdy parishioners ; and when the landlord's men had arrived, they were confronted with quite a regi- ment of rapparees. They were unprepared, for this had never occurred before. They had always been allowed to thresh their corn on the chapel floor. They had to retreat, and inform at headquarters that there was an insurrection ; and tlien — " "And then?" said Dr. Calthrop, deeply interested. " And then the landlord asked the priest to dine ; and ever afterwards there was a cover laid for the priest in the mansion ; and he actually got permission to hang up a bell in an extemporized turret." " It seems to me," said Dr. Calthrop, " that we Eng- CRITICAL AND EXPOSITORY 151 lish will begin to understand you somewhere about the day of general judgment." " I'm afraid we'll hardly be disposed to continue the acquaintance then," said Dr. Wilson. " We'll have to part company that day, if not before." Dr. Calthrop laughed. " But the little affectations of the Canon date from that event," said Dr. Wilson. "He became a man of peace, and is one of five or six of his profession in Ire- land who believe in landlords — and the Utopia, where the lion lies down with the lamb. Hitherto he has been justified. His parish is a paradise. He has a consid- erable private income, and it all goes to improving the condition of his people. The cabins have become cot- tages. The old manure heaps are swept away. Flow- ers, vegetables, new breeds of poultry — everything novel and progressive he has introduced. No one dare oppose him. He is an autocrat, or rather a patriarcli. His very mannerism affects the people strangely. When he stands at the altar on Sunday morning and sa3's ' Ha I ' you would think Moses had come dt)wn from the moun- tain, so reverential and awed are the people. He doesn't boast ; but what the Jesuits did in Paraguay, he is doing in his own parish." " I'm so glad you told me. I'm really proud to meet such a man," said the guest. " O si sic omnes ! " " But like all his class, who are not entirely absorbed in their sacred duties, he must twine his tendrils around something. And lu; has chosen Louis and Barbara instead of a dog or a liurse." " I am not surprised at his affection for his niece," said Dr. Calthrop: "she is the gentlest and sweetest girl I have ever seen. I have never seen a hawk and a dove in close company till to-night, when I saw that woman sitting near her at the dinner table." "Ay!" said Dr. Wilson, and liis voice would have broken sadly but for that blessed cigar ; " but like all things else, she Avill leave me. Now, I could si)are Louis easily, but I can't spare her. She'll go and he'll 152 LUKE DELMEGL stay ; and I am not certain which will be the more bitter trial." " Go where ? Where will she go ? " said Dr. Calthrop. " Look here, Calthrop ! You cannot understand. It is all the d — d literalness of this religion of ours. ' Go sell all thou hast and give to the poor ; ' — ' Consider the lilies of the field ; ' — ' What doth it profit a man ? ' — 'Deny thyself, take up thy cross, and follow me.' This is what we are ever hearing ; and these young featherheads believe it all and take it letter by letter." •' It sounds very like the Gospel, though," said Dr. Calthrop. " Of course. But this is the nineteenth century. ' Consider the lilies of the field ! ' What chance would any unfortunate man have, with such a belief as that, amongst the army of rabid and unscrupulous Orange- men here in Dublin ? He would be in the workhouse in a month." " I suppose so," said Dr. Calthrop, smoking leisurely. "■ Now, there's the beauty of your religion," said Dr. Wilson. '' It fits you like a dressing-gown — ease, beauty, elasticity. You can sit, stand, or lie. You can be any- thing you like — Turk, Jew, or atheist, Freemason, agnostic, Socinian, — but no one minds. You can rob, steal, swindle, and sit down calmly the following Sun- day and hear that such have no place in the Kingdom of Heaven. I call that delightful. But let one of our musty, barefooted friars say, with certain emphasis next Sunday : ' Come, rise up, and follow the footsteps of blood,' why, every little girl is dying to start at once for China or Japan, and get her little neck chopped off by some pig-tailed savage. And this will be the way witli Barbara. Instead of a few balls and parties, and then a decent marriage, she will become a ' servant of the poor,' or kitchen-maid to a parcel of lunatics." "• And your son — has he similar notions ? " " Will sow his wild oats, I suppose." " And then ? " "And then depend on his uncle for a dispensary." CHAPTER XIII RACIAL CHARACTERISTICS Luke Delmege had passed through the stages of pri- mary education at a national school, of secondary edu- cation at college ; he was now enrolled as graduate in the great University of the World. Books were his professors, and men were his books. The former were fairly consistent in their teaching ; the latter were for- ever puzzling and troubling him with their strange inconsistencies. The fragments of the best of human literature that have escaped the corrosion of centuries could be pieced together and made a harmonious whole ; but not even charity itself, the best and most cunning of artists, was able to reconcile with themselves, or with any standard of truth or principle, the ever-varying ec- centricities of men. Hence came Luke's final tempta- tion, to whicli he succumbed, as we shall see — namely, to live in ideas, not in action ; and hence, here in the Babylon of the world, he yearned from time to time for more liberty of thought, free from action ; for a little solitude to soothe weary nerves and a perplexed mind. One of the many weary tilings that puzzled Luke in these, his novitiate days, was the tremendous waste of power, moral and intellectual — the output of energy and zeal in every parish in England, and the infinitesi- mal results. He could not understand why all England should not be gathered into the fold, as sheep would flock to a mountain refuge at the approach of a storm. Here was Truth ; here was Peace ; here was Grace ! Why dwell ve in the valleys of darkness when tlie mountain of light is so near ? \V hy perisli m the storm 163 154 LUKE DELMEGE when the shepherd beckons to the safety of His fold ? He took up the weekly papers. Yes ! Life, vitality, energy everywhere. Sermons, exhortations, organiza- tions — sermons, convincing and appealing ; exhorta- tions, pathetic and luminous ; organizations, perfect and vital ; but it was ploughing the sea and casting seed on the desert. The claims of the Church were irrefragable and invincible. So Luke thought and felt. He took up an Anglican paper. His eye caught the lines : — " And wliilst thus we can contemplate with pride and satisfac- tion the history of our Church from the days of Augustine until now ; its purity of doctrine, untouched by superstition ; its consist- ency and comprehensiveness ; its beautiful ritual, that never de- generates into mummery ; and the vast number of heroic souls it has given to the world and the world's most sacred causes, we are speechless with astonishment at the insolence of this Italian mis- sion, that has unhappily got a foothold in our midst. It is as if a colony of hinds was sent to colonize and civilize a university." Luke read it over twice with blazing eyes. Then he rolled the paper into a knot ; and played Rugby football around his room for the next half an hour, accompany- ing the amusement with the following soliloquy : " The English truthful ? They are the greatest liars and hypocrites on the face of the earth. They are too con- temptuous to stoop to lying in private life. They care too little about you to condescend to lie. But in poli- tics, commerce, religion — whenever a point has to be gained, they will lie like Satan." He raised the subject at dinner that day. His confreres laughed. It was only Celtic effervescence. " But you know, Delmege," said Arthur, a bright young priest, " if you want to practise a |>as seul or an Irish jig in future, please try the Chapter-room, and don't throw down my ceiling." A few days later he crossed Westminster Bridge, and doubling hither and thither through narrow streets, he stood before a medireval church. It looked like a piece of Pompeii, dug from the dust of centuries. He en- tered. The beautiful stained glass almost blinded him RACIAL CHARACTERISTICS 155 with its colours ; but lie only cast one curious look around, said a short prayer, and went out. It was not art, but a man he was in quest of. He knocked at the presbytery door and was ushered into a small, gloomy parlour. Its furniture consisted of a round mahogany table, two chairs, and a dilapidated sofa. The day was dark, and the gloom so great that Luke coukl not read Compline. In a few minutes the door opened and a priest entered. He was a tall, handsome man, very dark, with thick black hair, just turning to gray, and great glowing eyes, that gave one at once the idea of great penetration and strength. The first quick view said unreservedly : " This is a giant amongst men — one who will leave his mark on the age." But alas I it was as if a lay figure had its props suddenly loosed ; for after the first brief salutation, the world-weary priest flung himself on the sofa with a gesture and an aspect of infinite weakness or pain. Luke timidly put a few questions on some theological subject, which were courteously answered ; and then, passing his hand across his foreliead, this great convert said : — " I know you will excuse me. Father, when I tell you that I am not at all well, and even conversation is pain- ful and wearying. I am threatened with neurastlienia from overwork, and 1 must go abroad Allow me to say good-evening." Luke stammered an apology as he took the proffered hand. He looked up onto the finely cut, worn face ; and as he thought "this man sacriticed a. thousand a year, and broke every family tie for the sake of truth, and is now a martyr to work for Christ," his heart repented of his rash judgments on the race ; and with Celtic im- ])ulsiveness, he stooped and kissed the white hand that lay in his own, and de[)arted with strange sensations. " Neurasthenia ! Thaiik God, -we never heard of that in Ireland. But is it a subject to thank God for? Is it not better to wear out than rust out? And is tliere not something in that singular philosophy of St. Paul 156 LUKE DELMEGE about ' spending and being spent for Christ ? ' And omnia detrimentum feci, et arbitror, ut stercora?' Which of the two would you choose, Luke ? To pass on, in smooth and placid respectability to the canon's stall foreshadowed for you by the Canon, or to be utterly wrecked in middle age like this martyr-priest, who has now to go abr(Xid and be supported by charity for the remainder of his life ? " There is no doubt whatever that this latter is the more heroic. But is it prudent? Is it consistent with com- mon sense ? And Luke was confronted with another puzzle. And if he felt that the sublime philosophy of Christianity was altogether in favour of self-sacrifice and suffering, on the other hand the '■" common sense of all mankind " was just as emphatically against it. And which is right ? Dear me I dear me ! what an enigma is life I But that weary figure and furrowed face haunted Luke for many a long day. It was evening now. The lamps were lighted, and he turned back into the church. The seats were being gradually filled, and Luke determined to wait for Bene- diction. He sat under one of the gas jets and took out his diurnal to finish Compline. Then, just as the sac- risty clock tolled seven, the same wearied, broken priest, preceded by a few acolytes, emerged from the sacristy and knelt before the high altar. He looked stooped and shaken, and his voice was almost inaudible as he recited the Rosary. There was a short, sweet hymn to our Blessed Lady ; and then the tired priest ascended with difficulty the steps of the pulpit. " Surely he's not going to preach ? " said Luke. Ah ! yes, he was. No relaxation or intermission here, until the poor frame sinks to rise no more. It was a voice from the grave. It sounded so gentle, so mournful ; and the preacher seemed to experience such tremendous difficulty in seizing and arranging his fugi- tive thoughts, that Luke every moment expected a bad break-down. It was quite clear that the faculties of EACIAL CHARACTERISTICS 157 the mind were refusing to work. They had been driven too hard, and were in revolt. And so there were repe- titions and very inconsequential arguments, and a very few words were mumbled and mouthed as if from a semi- paralyzed tongue ; and a few verbs were misplaced and mispronounced, and there was an agonized look on the preacher's face, as if he were face to face with a trial whose issue might Ije fearful and sudden. Luke couldn't bear it. He looked away and thought : Only a few years ago this man had won the Ireland Scholarship and the Newdigate Prize at Oxford, and was in a fair way towards a Fellowship and a Mitre. What a sacri- fice ! What a chano-e ! Then the concluding- words came clear and solemn : " You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." These were the last public words of the speaker, and Luke was per- plexed to liear them. During the solemn rite of Bene- diction that succeeded, Luke saAv only bowed lieads, nor was there even a whispered prayer ; but at that most toucliing prayer which is said just as the monstrance is replaced u])on tlie throne, that prayer for the convcn-- sion of England that takes one back insensibly to luiuiau catacombs and pagan imperialism, Luke thought he heard the sound of sobbing. " It cannot be," he said ; " these English are too stolid." But a few moments later he saw faces of well-dressed ladies wet and glistening with tears, \\lii(li immediately wer(^ wiped away; for, you know, we are Englisli, and, above all things else, we must not vicld to sentiment or demonstrative piety, and I>uke thought — I'acial char- acteristics are humbug. Tlie human lieart is the same everywhere. Me passed rapidly along the streets on his way homewards. He was brt)ught to a sudden standstill on the side way of the Strand b}^ a long queue of men, two and two, who, ranged on tlie outer edge of the pavement, waited in calm, stolid silence for sometliing tliat was slow in coming. There was quite room enough on the 158 LUKE DELMEGE inside path for pedestrians. What is it ? A funeral? No, not at such an hour. It was only fifty or sixty men, waiting for a place in the theatre close by. They were as silent as mutes. " What a laughing, rollicking, joking crowd that would have been in Ireland ! " thought Luke. " Verily, they take their pleasures sadly ! After all, they are a stolid, unfeeling race ! And what mer- curial beings are we ! " Just then, an arm was locked in his, and a very marked Hibernian voice exclaimed : — " Well, Luke Delmege, who'd ever think of seeing you here, waiting to get into the Gaiety ? The world is topsy-turvy enough ; but I never thought you could turn such a somersault." Luke laughed at the absurdity, as he recognized an old college acquaintance, who had " cut " in his physic year, had then become a successful journalist, and was now one of that famous band of matadores who were fretting the flanks of John Bull. " Come along," said the " Mimber," " we'll have a cup of tea here at the ' Marguerite,' and then you must come to see a field night at the House. No ! no ! no excuses ! there's electricity in the atmosphere, and sure to be a thunderclap to-night." " Then why are you not at your post ? " said Luke ; "isn't the House open since four? " " Quite so, old man, if you allow me to use such a familiarity with an old chum, but we allow the animals to feed from seven to half-past eight. Then, when well gorged with meat and wine, they're an easy prey." " And do you keep your heads cool ? " said Luke. His friend lifted up a cup of tea, and nodded significantly. " Tell me," said Luke, " and you can tell me, for you have experience, do you believe in 'racial char- acteristics'? The problem is puzzling me dreadfully." The Member laid down his cup, took out a cigarette, lighted it, looked long at Luke, and spoke : — " Racial characteristics ? I do, firmly. I believe, for example, that we, Irish, are the coolest, most judicious, RACIAL CHARACTERISTICS 159 most calculating, far-seeing race on the face of the earth. Our cunning is Ulyssean ; our wisdom is Promethean, and, as for tenacity, nothing in all creation can beat us — but an oyster ! Come ! " They walked rapidly down by Trafalgar Square, past the great Whitehall buildings, and, just as they ap- proached the Westminster Palace Yard, on a sudden the vast rush through the crowded thoroughfare stopped as if by magic. Stately carriages, gaily dressed pedes- trians, cabs, horses — all stood still, as if petrified. The Member looked calmly at the imperial demonstration in his honour for a moment, then moved across swiftly, and, unlocking his arm from that of the astonished Luke, he said : — " You go around by the public entrance. I shall meet you in the lobby in a moment." Luke had not long to wait in the famous lobby, just long enough to see that, if there be on the face of the earth a levelling, democratic spot, where all distinctions are fused down, and all human hopes concentred and unified in one desire, it is here. That desire is to see your own Member. Luke had not long to wait. Gaily and happily at ease, dispensing smiles all round, yet maintaining a certain unperturbed dignity, his friend ap- peared. The i)oliceman saluted and shouted : ''The Rev- erend Luke Midge." Luke admitted the impeachn:ent, and was led into the inner sanctuary througli rows of marble busts and stately pictures of long-buried states- men, whilst the disappointed mob howled in their hearts outside. Into the inner lob))v, sacred to statesmen, mix- inof amontjst notabilities, rubbing his shouhler against Cabinet ministers, the wondering Luke passed with Ids guide, who accosted a gorgeous official and demanded a ticket for his friend. "• You can have a seat in the gallery, sir," said the official with awful deference, " but I regret to say that all the seats are taken under tlie gallery." " I beg your pardon. There's one vacant," said the Member. " 1 insist on having that seat." 160 LUKE DELMEGE " That seat, sir, belongs to Lord Vavasour. He's just dining witli the Secretary for Home Affairs, and has kept it engaged till his return." " You should know the rules of the House, sir," said the Member. '•■ No stranger can retain a seat, except he is in actual possession." " Quite true, sir," said the official. " You must not consider me discourteous ; I was trying to smooth matters. Name, please ? " " Delmege ! " said the Member, as the official handed the ticket to Luke, who, half ashamed and almost terri- fied, passed wondering up the narrow stairs, and in a moment was in the " House." It was a wonder, a sur- prise, a disappointment; but we needn't repeat the old story here. Luke sat still on his narrow bench, rnd gaped. " Take off your hat, please ! " Luke had forgotten his politeness and his loyalty. The official said quietly and politely : " It's like a school, sir ; and, by-and-bye, you'll see some rough horseplay." " Does this — this — assembly control the destinies of 300,000,000 people ? " asked Luke. " It thinks so ! " said the man. Just then the suj)porters of the Government began to drop in. Luke was on the Government side of the House. There was but a low balustrade between him and them. In they came, flushed as to face, and very white as to capacious shirt front. They congregated in groups of three or four, and began to exchange re- marks. There was a pleasant odour of whiskey and patchouli in the air. " I thought the English never drank spirits," said Luke. "The racial characteristics are a puzzle." Yes, the air was electric. You couldn't tell why. There were no indications. There was no great debate on. Members lounged and chatted and laugfhed. There was no drawing up and marshalling of forces, no organ- izing of battalions, no arrangement of reserves. But the air was electric. You felt it tingling in your fin- b RACIAL CHARACTERISTICS 161 gers, and running up along your spine. The servant felt it. " There's something on to-night, sir ! " he said. Three feet away from where Luke sat, close to one of the pillarets that sustained the gallery, a very little man, with a very long coat, a bald head, and a heavy mustache that curled up to his ears, was engaged in earnest consultation with a colleague. "• Tlie leader of the House, sir," whispered the servant. At last, the hours stole on to eleven, and Luke began to think it was time to go home. His friend, the Mem- ber, came over, sat on the balustrade, and began to chat gaily. Not a word between him and the full-dressed mob around. They'd have torn him limb from limb if they dared. " Going home ? " he cried to Luke. " You'll do noth- ing of the kind. The Lord has given you a chance that will never occur again." Just here, an old officer, gray -headed and gray- bearded, spoke to the Member. He was a su])piiant — a humble, abject, beseeching client. He begged and entreated the Member to bring on some wretched thing about pensions, or to promise to speak if the bill were introduced. " I shall do nothing of the kind," said the Member, haughtily. '' We have other work before us to-night."' The officer slunk away, cowed and discomfited. Luke's opinion of his country was rising steadily. '•'Now I must be off," said the Member. "There is big-wig in the chair. Now,' sit fast, old man. And look here ! Don't let your feelings overcome you ! If you cheer, or toss up your liat, they'll turn you out, and you won't see a bull-baiting again." And so Luke waited patiently, now watching the confused, anxious crowd at the ministerial side of the House, and again fixing his eyes on that silent, serried mass tliat thronged the lowest benches on the left of the Speaker's chair. And here, the object of all vision, of all thought, of all anxiety, sat the Man of Mystery, M 162 LUKE DELMEGE silent, immovable, whilst anxious ministers looked to him for a sis^n or some articulate utterance of what he was brooding over and plotting there in the corner seat just below the gangway. At last, one of his lieu- tenants rose, and moved the adjournment of the House. The proposal was met with a shout of indignant scorn. A division was demanded, and Luke, with the rest, was relegated to the lobby. In a few minutes it was over, and they returned. The Government had a sweeping majority. There was a cheer of exultant triumph. The first lines of the enemy had been repulsed. The debate went on. Then quietly, a second lieutenant rose in his place, and moved the adjournment of the House. This time a yell broke from the ministerial benches. The adjournment was fiercely and angrily refused. A division was demanded, and another Pyrrhic victory gained. There was a mighty shout from the ministerial lists. Calm and immovable sat the Irish (/uerrilleros, whilst their opponents, wild with passion, appeared to be lashing themselves into frenzied madness. The debate went on ; and just as the hands of the clock pointed to twelve, a division was again demanded. With suppressed, but badly suppressed passion, the leader of the House leaned forward on the despatch-boxes and hissed : — "If we have to remain in session for forty-eight hours the Government is determined that this measure shall pass ; nor will the House adjourn until that is accomplished." The captain of the guerrilleros sat silent and grim. And then a peal of electric bells ; and then the solemn march through the turnstiles ; another Governmental victory, and the House settled down to business again. Then arose another of the lawless but disciplined phalanx, and moved the adjournment of the House. There was another angry yell ; and again Agamemnon spoke : — " I assure the honourable gentlemen at the other side of the House that the Government has no intention of RACIAL CHARACTERISTICS 163 yielding on that point, and that the House must remain in session until this measure is carried." Then the Silent One arose, and eight hundred beings, the flower of English intellect, hung breathless on liis words. They were few. Passing his hand behind his coat-collar, and then running it down through his thick hair, he spoke in the echo of a whisper ; but it was heard in every cranny in the building: — "• The Right Hon. gentleman refuses to adjourn the House. I tell him the House will adjourn, and the sooner the better." It was a plain challenge to the omnipotence of Eng- land, and as such was accepted. This time there was no shouting. The division bell rang. The members trooped through the turnstile. Another victory for the Government ; but the leader of the House again came forward, and leaning his arms again on the despatch- boxes, he said, almost humbly : — " There's no use in prolonging the useless debate in the face of such obstruction. The House stands adjourned." The officials laughed. The ministerial following was bewildered. Then, as they recognized their defeat, tliey muttered curses on their leaders ; and angry, shamed, disappointed, they trooped from the House. The victors did not even clieer. l^uke thought : " I'll never believe in racial cluiracteristics again. I knew they were always humbug ! " His friend, the jNlember, came over. "• Wasn't that pretty ? Crumpled up, like a piece of tissue-paper ! " ^ Can you kee}) it up ? " (pieried Luke. His friend looked long and earnestly at him. " Yes, till victory, which we, the descendants of kings, shall then most royally throw away. 'Diil I really hurt you, poor old lUiU ? Em awfully sorry. Get up, old man, and come have a drink.' That's the finale to the comedy you have witnessed. Good-niglit ! " The great clock of St. StepluMi's was chiming "one" as Luke crossed Westminster Bridge. 164 LUKE DELMEGE " Glad I have a latch-key," he murmured ; " the old Vicar wouldn't like it, and he sleeps with one eye open." A party of revellers was coming towards him. They tried to jostle him off the footpath. At another time he would have yielded ; but the si:)ell of conquest was upon him. He resisted, and came into personal contact with one, who was almost intoxicated. It was Louis Wilson. He, too, recognized Luke ; and turning away, he said to his companions : — " 'Tis only a peasant priest from Ireland. I know a little of the fellow. He hath a pretty sister." The next moment Luke's strong hand was on his collar, and he swung him round. " Now, gentlemen," said one of the revellers, " this is Westminster and not Donnybrook. Keep quiet, or bedad, and begorra, you will find yourselves in the lock-up." " Your names, gentlemen, please," said an officer, moving up. Luke heard as in a dream : "11 Albemarle Buildings, Victoria Street." Wilson passed on. " Never mind, sir," said the officer, as Luke fumbled for a card ; " it will rest here unless he prosecutes. But take no notice of these fellows in future." There was no real sleep that night for Luke. Amidst the agony and shame and remorse that kept the wheels of his brain burning and revolving, he thought of coun- try and home. He saw the calm peace of Ireland rest- ing as in a cloud above and beyond this hateful Tartarus. He would give worlds to be at home — at home at Lisnalee, pencilled in shadows above the misty, beloved sea. He would sacrifice a few years of life to be in the midst of the kindliest people on earth, awa}^ from these horrible automatons ; and he saw with tears the little parlour, and the " Inseparables," and Father Tim dropping aphorisms at leisure, and at leisure drop- ping slices of lemon into his glass. And then the RACIAL CHARACTERISTICS 165 burning shame came back again, and, as he dropped into an uneasy slumber, he muttered : " I believe there are racial characteristics after all." When he woke from unhappy dreams next morning the spectres had vanished. London, life, ambition, a great future were all before him, Lisnalee was a gray, blurred shadow of the past. CHAPTER XIV WEIGHING ANCHOR It was inevitable that an airy, impetuous, variable spirit like this should, under pressing circumstances, weigh anchor and drift with the tide. Gradually, as his fine genius asserted itself, he rose above all his con- freres, both in the excellence and the efficacy of his work and in his unquestionable superiority of intellect. The Rev. Luke Delmege was beginning to be noticed. His Bishop, who had returned from Rome, and then from a long round of visitations, appeared not to remark hira particularly, which Luke, in his rising pride, set down to national prejudice. Once the Bishop said : — " Delmege, you are not quite so mercurial as the gen- erality of your countrymen. Don't you like your sur- roundings ? " Then Luke protested that he was happy, very happy, and did not seek a change. Once, too, the old Vicar said in his rough, kindly way : — "Here you are again, Delmege! It is a bad thing for a young man when the papers notice him. You'll have as much space soon as Madame Seigel's Syrup." But the younger men were more explicit and generous. His name had gone across the river, and he had been in- vited to preach at the Commercial- Road, and to lecture to workingmen at the Mechanics' Hall in Holborn. He had pushed on his schools until the Inspector wondered at his own report, and the Diocesan Inspector had asked for him as an assistant. 166 I WEIGHING ANCHOR 167 Meanwhile, and, of course, imperceptibly, all this externation was affecting his character deeply. His soul was starved. All his energies went off in enthusi- astic work. He never perceived that it was sheer materialism, Avhen the soul was absent. In the begin- ning he consecrated his work and put a soul into it. Then, as vanity assumed control and men's praises echoed around him, he puslied forward wildly. Work, work, work — here was his cry! The gentle personal love for his Divine Master hallowed and sanctified Ins earlier efforts ; but by degrees this evaporated in favour of a Cause. But the Cause was an Impersonality, though he called it "the Church." If he had identi- fied the Church with its Divine Spouse, all would have been well. But no ! The honour of the Church, the advancement of the Church, the glory of the Church — words always on liis lips, and of such awful and lial- lowed significance, — conveyed no meaning, no life to his actions. He would have been deeply offended, if any one had hinted that he had degenerated into a form of worship that is generally veiled under a sacred guise — and only labelled by the truthful malice of the world, or the still more truthful revelations of humility — egotlieism. Did not the ancient monks say, Lahorare est orare? And here just now is not the sage of Chelsea preaching the same divinity of work '! And is not Stanley in Christ Church, and Jowett in IJalliol, stimulating the flagging energies of Oxford undergraduates by the same? Work, Avork, work, for it is the law of the uni- verse, — the laws of birth and death, of stars and flowers ' Work, because thereby you are identified with Nattire by obeying its sacred laws, and thereby alone is true happiness attainable I If any one had whispered to Luke in tliese days, when he tliought he was soaring on the highest altitudes of inspiration: "Come apart and rest a little wlnle ! " he would have scorned the sug- gestion as a temptation to abuse of the highest instincts and betrayal of the most sacred interests. It was rather fortunate for Luke that, amidst the 168 LUKE DELMEGE inevitable jealousies aroused by all this publicity, he had just strength of mind enough to move steadily onward, though not unbiased or undisturbed. He liad not yet had experience enough to write on the tablets of his mind the Pauline summing up of existence — intus timores; but his life was not lacking in those external modifications which the Apostle styles — the /oris piignce. Unfair and unfavourable criticisms, little hints of possible imprudences in public utterances, vague suggestions of subdued heresy, the complete suppression of some fine public lecture — these were the drawbacks in a buoyant and most hopeful career. In the moments of doubt and depression that followed, — and they were many, — a memory of past times, of the frugal banquets of the " Inseparables," of Father Tim's drolleries and of Father Pat's kindness, would recur to him ; and sometimes there would float across the unda irreme- abilis a tiny letter from the cottage above the sea at Lisnalee, or from the library of Father Martin — hope- ful, cheerful, amusing, as a butterfly would float in from spring meadows and lose itself in the horrors of some Lancashire factory, or as a child would place a flower in the fingers of a bronze and unfeeling statue. Then Luke had a friend. And it needs not the sacred en- dorsement of Holy Scripture, or the expansive comments of that great interpreter, Shakspere, to be assured that the best gift of the gods to man is a true and truthful friend. And Luke's friend was not afraid to tell the trutli. Witness this. They were walking on the banks of the Serpentine. " I always choose this place for quiet meditation," said the friend, in an explanatory tone to Luke, who was rather surprised to be suddenly introduced into the mighty gangway of Life-Guards, servant-maids, and babies ; " here you are alone, as much alone as Werther and his stars. You meet no one that will trouble the rim of your hat ; babies, — God bless them I — are liappily unconscious. The other elements of civilization here in the heart of the world are too much WEIGHING ANCHOR 169 engrossed with each other to heed you. I am alone with the stars. Now, Delmege, old man, can you bear an operation? For I am going to do what my judgment calls the rashest and maddest and most ungrateful thing — 1 am going to pull a friend's tooth. It is quite true that tooth is aching. Nevertheless, man is an ungrate- ful animal. I know you won't bite ; but j)romise not to say a cuss-word. I can't bear that." "All right," said Luke, "go ahead! I'm used to it. There never before was such a target for the small shot of gratuitous advice. I am as bad as if I had the in- fluenza. P]very old woman at home made herself a Minerva, and every old duffer a Mentor. And here it is worse. It is quite clear the world regards me as a complete .and unmitigated fool ! " Which little speech shows how far Luke had gone in the way of the "galled jade." " Now, look here," said the candid friend, " all that's quite true — " " I l)eg your pardon," said Luke, stiffly. •• Ahem ! I mean that — you know — it may be quite true, you know — that advice, very well meant — you know — does not always comprehend the entire sur- roundings — look at that impudent slut with that soldier ! " " Oh ! I thought you were alone with the stars," said Luke ; which at once restored his friend's equilibrium. " Well, now, look here, Delmege, it seems to me that you have two careers Ix'fore you. On tlie one liand a life of usefulness and labour, hidden, unsuspected, no storms, no trium})hs, but a reward exceeding great ; and on the other a life of blare and brilliancy, tliunder and lightning, honours and crosses, and then — " "I understand," said Luke. "You'd have me choose the luunbler and safer path ? " "Well," said his friend, dubiously, "perhaps ! " " Let me tell you," said Luke, " once and forever, that I have deliberately chosen the other ; not because of its honours and emoluments — 1 despise them ! but 170 LUKE DELMEGE the Church requires it. Ours is not the Church of the Catacombs, but of Constantine ! " " It's a truth and a faUacy," said the candid friend. " Meanwhile, allowing all that, and presupposing that you are right in your decision, I don't admit it, you know — " " Don't admit what ? " said Luke. " That the Church requires very brilliant men, or that the world is much in need of them." " The world regards the Church as a molehill," said Luke ; " a subterranean, cryptic, concealed system, bur- rowing under all the states and governments of the world, — its conspirators blinking and purblind in the light of day, and with vision enough only to plot, and delve, and undermine all the institutions of civilization." " Out of which of the infidel reviews did you pick that rhodomontade ? " said the friend. " There now," said Luke, " you are losing temper, and the tooth is not yet drawn." " Quite true. But now for the operation. I think you are going too fast and will get derailed. All this newspaper notoriety, 'able controversialist,' 'brilliant lecturer,' etc., is quite enough to turn any head not well screwed on ; and yours, you know, ah — " "Go on," said Luke, "go on." " I'm hurting you," said the candid friend. " Oh ! not at all," said Luke. " I rather like it. It is so ingenuous, you know. You were saying some- thing about my head." " I see I'm hurting you," said the friend. " Now, I'll put it in a better way. Did you ever feel an impulse to go down on your knees and kiss the hem of the gar- ment of some poor, lialf-witted, illiterate old duffer, who knew just enough of Latin to spell through his breviary, but who was doing, with sublime unconscious- ness, the work of his Master ? " Luke was struck dumb. These were almost his own words, expressed with enthusiasm not quite two years ago. WEIGHING ANCHOR 171 " Once," he said faintly ; " but I had no experience." " And did you ever," said the friend, not noticing, " did you ever feel an irresistible inclination to get behind some great, intellectual prodigy, who was sweep- ing the whole world before him apparently, and with one glorious coup-de-main block his hat before all his admirers ? " " Never," said Luke, emphatically. " I think that is narrow-minded and illiberal." " Well, I did," said his friend, dryly. " Look here, now, Sheldon," said Luke, " once and forever let me say that I feel, and am sure, that the unnatural delay in the conversion of England is pri- marily due to this cause. You, English, are so narrow and conservative and petty in your views that you'll never appeal successfully to the broad human spirit of the age. You don't understand the Zeitgeist. The whole trend of human thought is to reconcile revelation with intellect ; and out of the harmony to evolve a new and hopeful instauration of human blessedness. Now, we must take our rightful place in this renascence. It won't do to be silent. Or, rather, we must speak out boldly and conlidentially, W'ith large, free interpreta- tions of natural and supernatural revelations, or hold our tongues altogether. Falls er nicht schweigt ! ''' " Good heavens ! " said Father Sheldon, "where did you pick up that horrible jargon ? What in the name of common sense, man, are you reading ? " " Tliere now, there now," said Luke, " you don't read, my dear fellow. There's the great drawback. Tlicre's no use in arguing further. We move on different jjlanes of thought. By the way, are you coming over to Hermondsey to dine to-morrow?" Father Sheldon said nothing. He had failed to pull that tooth ; and of all botches in creation, an unsuccess- ful dentist is the worst. " Poor fellow," he said in his own sanctum afterwards, "he's on tlie down grade, thougli he ap])ears to be sky- flying. That rush for Mass in the morning, and the 172 LUKE DELMEGE substitution of the Rosary for the Office are bad signs. German snatches won't make up for it. Well, the re- treat is at hand, thank God ! Who knows ? " The retreat came, and the retreat was over ; and Luke was the same — only worse. The preacher was a distin- guished man, and, therefore, a failure in that line. Luke was delighted — and was lost. " He had never heard such command of language before ; " " he did not know, till then, how religion could be lifted so beautifully into the regions of transcendentalism ; " " how philosophy, in the hands of a master, can be made the handmaiden of religion ; " " and how both together can be clothed in iridescence by the mastery of our mother tongue ; " "yes, of course, he was apologetic, and why not ? He was speaking to his equals, and was cpite right in assuming that they knew all that he knew ; " "he said ' sheol ' for *• hell ' ; well, why not ? It's the correct word, if you go so far ; " " and he always spoke of ' eschatology ' in place of 'eternity'; very well, isn't that the scientific term ? " etc., etc. " Ah ! " he said to Father Sheldon, " these are the men we want. I'd give half a year's salary to see him invited over to Ireland to give a series of retreats. Wouldn't he wake them up from their lethargy '! Wouldn't he show them what culture and education can do ? " " I thought your country used to be called the 'Island of Saints'?" said P'ather Sheldon. " Certainly ; so it was. You tried to rob us of that as of everything else. But you can't ! " " But the preacher said that the saints and their lives were never intended for imitation, but for ad- miration." " And quite right. Do you mean to say that Simon Stylites would be allowed to remain twenty years or twenty days on the obelisk in these times ? " " Perhaps not. But what then becomes of your countrymei:^ and their distinguished title ? If there's WEIGHING ANCHOR 173 no room for one saint, what do we want with a whole island full of them?" " Look here, Sheldon, you are a horrible reactionary — a medifevalist — an Inquisitionist ! How in the world will men like you ever convert England ? " " Fm not sure that it's worth converting," said Fatlier Sheldon, lazily ; "but I'm sure of one thing — that that modern idea that we are to hold up our saints, our beautiful saints, Francis and Ignatius and Alphonsus, Clare and Rose and Scholastica, as so many dime-mu- seum freaks, to be looked at and wondered at as Divine Curiosities and no more — is the most horrible conclu- sion which our Catholic neologists have ever reached." " I give you up, Sheldon," said Luke. " Fll write to-night to a confidential friend in Ireland to get over Father Azarias as soon as possible. He has a big field there." " I suppose so. May the Lord grant you, Irish, a good conceit o' yersel's." Tliey were sitting at coffee in the library. It was Sun- day, and dinner was at four P.M., instead of the usual hour, one o'clock. Tlie P>is]io[) had said a few pretty things about the distinguished preacher the day before at dinner. But the Lisliop was inquisitive. He liked to gather opinions — nn excellent thing. You need never ado[)t them, like the good Irish prelate who declared with emphasis that he never took an impor- tant step without consulting his canons. " Hut do you always follow tlieir counsels, my Lord ? " The Bisho}), emphatically : "Never ! " Hut they wei'c at coffee. "• Mow tlid you like the retreat ? " Luke was effusive and enthusiastic. The Vicar said : " So far as I am concerned, he might as well have been plaving a flute the whole time. It was certainly very pretty." " Father Sheldon, what are you poring over there ? " said the Bishop. Father Sheldon was a great favourite. 174 LUKE DELMEGE In a solemn, but half-careless manner, as if he had stumbled on a chance passage. Father Sheldon read from the big, brass-bound Bible : — " Michaeas said to Achab, King of Israel : ' Hear thou the word of the Lord. I saw the Lord sitting on His throne, and all the army of heaven standing by Him, on the right hand, and on the left.' And the Lord said : ' Who shall deceive Achab, King of Israel, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-Galaad V ' And one spake words in this manner, and another otherwise. And then came forth a Spirit, and stood before the Lord, and said : ' I will deceive him.' And the Lord said: 'By what means?' And he answered : ' I will go forth, and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.' And the Lord said : ' Thou shalt deceive him, and shalt prevail : go forth and do so.' " The Bishop was silent, and serious. The Vicar shook all over, and snorted once or twice, which was his way of laughing boisterously. A young priest said : " You haven't brought much charity out of the retreat, Father Sheldon ! " Luke said : " There is no use in talking here ; Father Sheldon is a bronze statue, with his face turned to the past ! " " That's all right, Delmege. But when a man comes to dress and drill one hundred priests, so as to refit them for better work amongst a few hundred thousand souls, and when, perhaps, one of these captains is himself trembling in the balance, we expect something else besides ' Sing a song of sixpence,' and ' Isn't that a dainty dish to lay before the king ? '" You'd like to see a portrait of Luke Delmege just at this time. Well, here it is : — " 11 Albemarle Buildings, Victoria St., W. C. "Dearest Mother : — I went up for my first-half a week ago, but got plucked. The questions were beastly. MacKenzie, an old Scotchman, who lived on oatmeal till he came to London, and now doesn't know himself, was my chief examiner. He asked the most absui'd questions, — the percentage of fibrin in the blood, the specific difference between enteric and adynamic fever, the effect of hydrocyanic acid, etc. I was thoroughly made up in sur- WEIGHING ANCHOR 17^ gery, for -which I have a peculiar taste, yet he iievei- asked a ques- tion, except something ridiculous about the treatment of embolisms, and I could have given him lights in psychological and mental science, where I am A 1, but he never asked a question. Then, he's not a gentleman. 'Young mon,' said this red-headed High- land savage, ' I'd recommend you to qualify as a hairdresser. It is a branch of surgery, ye ken.' I have reported him to the ti'ustees, and demanded a second examination. Dr. Calthrop is down here, examining in bacteriology, and, pardon the pun. lie's backing me up. By the way, tell Barby that her clerical friend is coming out. He now parts his hair in the centre, and has assumed an lonico- Doric accent. P)ut I must say he preaches well and effectively. In fact, he's becoming a crack lecturer on this side. I cannot compare him, of course, with the Master of the Temple, for there will be always wanting that ei^prit and those little nuance.^ of thought and expression that denote the university man. But he is strong and versatile, and I think, when he gets into the Attic accent, he will do fairly well. Just tell Pap that there was a blunder in the ex- amination programme, and I am going up again. Perhaps he may write to Caltlirop, wdio is a power here. I'll let him know later on about MacKenzie, and he'll probably give him a wigging. Evi- dently, the uncouth fellow didn't know who I was. " Ever affectionately, " Louis J. Wilson, B.A." One of the effects of wliicli epistle was tliis : — " DuHLiN, Sept. 8, 187—. "Rev. Dear Father: — I must write to tell you how proud and pleased we all are at seeing your name so frequently in the Catholic Times and Tahlcl, and in so honoured a way. And now comes a letter from Louis, enthusiastically souiuling your praises. I should give extracts, but I am afraid I sliould hurt yon. But he is a great admirer of yours, and I cannot help thinking that our dear Lord has created this reverence and admiration in order that you may exercise a holy controlling influence over ]ioor Louis in the midst of London temptations. I am supjwsing that you have not met him as yet in Loiulon ; but his address is: 11 Albemarle Buildings, Victoria Street, London. W. C. and I am sure, if you could spare tiine to call on him, he would be highly pleased and flattered by your condescension. Do, dear Father! It is a iiuestion of a soul and its future, and your reward will be exceeding great. Sophy Kennedy, an old schoolmate of mine, now in Kensington, has also written "to say she has been to liear you ; and when I told lier you were a friend of mine (this was presumi'tuous, of c(nirse) she 176 LUKE DELMEGE actually sent me congratulations, and doubted if I'd acknowledge ' small people ' any more. " 1 am taking up too much of your valuable time with my nonsense ; but our next letter from Louis will be a breath from Paradise. " I am, dear Rev. Father, respectfully yours, "Barbara Wilson." " A pan of hot coals on my head ! " said Luke. " I must really look up the lad. I dare say he has forgotten our little rencontre. Of course, he felt he deserved richly what he got." And, accordingl}', some days later, he again crossed Westminster Bridge, and found his way to Albemarle Buildings. The Buildings were laid out in flats, on the French system. A respectable, middle-aged woman kept the keys. " No, Mr. Wilson was not at home — had gone to the 'ospital," she supposed, " and would not return till late. He rarely dined at 'ome." Luke was turning away, not too disappointed, for he dreaded the interview, although prepared to be very con- ciliatory and condescending, when the woman said : — " I perceive you're a clergyman, sir, and perhaps a friend of this young gentleman." " Well, we are acquaintances at least," said Luke, straining at the truth, " and I am much interested in him." " Well, then, sir," she said, " if some one would take him in 'ands. I fear he's not doing well. Would you walk upstairs, sir ? " They went upstairs, although Luke felt that he was intruding somewhat unwarrantably on the privacy of another. The woman unlocked a door and ushered him into an apartment filled with some strange, pungent, aromatic odour, such as hangs around a druggist's or perfumer's shop. There was chaos everywhere. Pipes of all shapes and forms, pots of unguents, masks and wigs, photographs, some quite fresh, some faded, of actresses and beauties. There were two side by side in WEIGHING ANCHOR 177 a frame. One was subscribed " Circe " ; the other, which Luke recognized as Barbara's, was simply marked by one red spot, which Luke soon discovered was a heart on hre. Over the mantelpiece hung a splendid enlarged photograph of the Canon, and in the frame was inserted a shield with the arms of the Murray family, and their motto. Sans tache. " It would cost me my situation, sir," she said, " if it were ever known that I brought you here ; but I am a mother, and I know wot it is to see the young go astray. Has this young gentleman a father or mother ? I know he has a sister, for every post brings 'im a letter from 'er. He never mentions his j)arcnts." " Yes. I understand his parents are living. I know little of them ; but I know his sister and their uncle." He pointed to the })hotograpli. " Well, sir, the i)oor young gentleman is doing badly. He often comes 'ome hintoxicated, has picked up with a dangerous lot — " "• Does he read ? " queried Luke, looking around in vain for thick folios and bones. ''A good deal of these," she said, pointing to a lieap of tattered novels. " But these are the real dangers," — she pointed to the photographs, and took down a phial from the mant('lj)icee. " He can take all that in a day,'" she said, pointing to the label, " enough to kill ten men. And he won't stand much longer, sir ; mark my words, he won't stand much longer, unless some one ste})s in to save him. '• Vou won't see him sometimes for days together," slie continued. ''I knocks and knocks, and, thiid^s I, we'll lia\'e a erownei-'s in(|uesi here soon. And then he comes out a-shaking all over like a lias[)en, an' his laee a-shining like the hangels. lUit it ain't liangels, init devils, he has seen." " I'm much ol)liged to you for your confidence," said Luke, coming downstairs. " 1 must see to it at once." "• And you won't mention to no one what I have showed you?" said the woman. N 178 LUKE DELMEGE " Never fear," said Luke. " A pretty bad case ! " he thought, as he wended his way homewards ; " a pretty bad case. I must write to his sister or uncle. And tliis is the fellow I was half- afraid of a couple of years ago in that drawing-room. It needs travel and experience to know the world after all, and to know that there are few in it that are not beneath you." Which shows that Luke had now fully adopted the philosophy of one of his Mentors, and was. holding his head — very high. t BOOK III CHAPTER XV AYLESBUKGH " I HAVE been thinking of making some changes in the Cathedral staff," said the Bishop to the Vicar in the library. "• I'm not too well satisfied with the seminary, and should like to see more life and progress there. Would not Father Sheldon, with his very high ideas about the priesthood, be an admirable guide for young students ? " '"' Certainly," said the Vicar, " except that, like myself, lie speaks too plainly sometimes." '' Very true," said the Bishoj). '' There would be some danger there. And J must remove Delmege — " " Delmege ? " said the Vicar, quite alarmed. " Yes, for his own sake. I see clearly he is rather too interested in the platform — too little in the pulpit." " lie speaks well, and is doing excellent work," said the Vicar. •' True : but is all that he says either useful or edify- ing, do you think ? " '^ Weil, he does rub the wrong way sometimes," said the Vicar, reluctantly. "I had been thinking of speaking to him seriously about some of his utterances," said the Bishop. •• 'I'liat perj)etual har[)iug on the Kiiglish schism and mi Irish fidelity does not exactly i)lease our English audience. 'We kept the Faith in Ireland when, at the dictation of a savage king, i/ou Hung aside the glorious heritage,' does not soothe the British mind." 181 182 LUKE DELMEGE " I should say not," said the Vicar, laughing. " But it is the truth, not its utterance, that is painful." " Then," said the Bishop, resuming, " I turned over a file of newspapers the other day, and came across this singular passage in one of his lectures : — " The English mind is by nature antagonistic to Catholic truth. It was not Luther, it was the legend of ' Faust ' that prepared the way for the Reformation. The world was tired of asceticism and saints. So v/ere the English. They wanted the gods, their liberty, their sensuality. They found their gods in such satyrs as Luther and Henry; they found their liberty in the assertion of individual freedom ; sensuality followed. And if all England were Catholic again, and the Pope presumed to order an additional fast-day, you would call out the Reserves and mobilize tlie fleet at Spithead." " Yes, I remember," said the Vicar, laughing. " The fellow has the knack of putting the truth unpleasantly. I remonstrated with him. ' Is it true or false ? ' he said. ' Perhaps true,' I replied. ' Then why not tell it ? ' he said. He can't understand that it is not always desirable to advance unnecessary truths." " He wants experience," said the Bishop. " I was going to say 'correction.' But, you know, these fire- eating Irishmen won't take correction. Then I thousrht of sending him to Whitstable. But that is too great a responsibility — " " I shall miss him greatly," said the Vicar. " He is a fine, manly young priest ; hits straight from the shoul- der, and is undoubtedly a clever fellow. What a pity these high-blooded natives won't bear the bit ! " "Then I thought of Aylesburgh," said the Bishop. " I could bring up old Collins here. But would Drys- dale be able to control this young enthusiast ? " " I think so. Delmege, the moment he recognizes the sanctity of his pastor, will be as wax in his hands." " Be it so, then," said the Bishop. " I shall miss him sadly," said the Vicar, with some- thing that seemed like a sob. " No doubt, we are a leaden lot." The following Sunday evening there was an impor- AYLESBURGH 183 tant function in the Cathedral. The Bishop was to assist in Cappa magna. Luke was to preach. All were assembled in the inner sacristy just before the ceremony commenced. Luke was slightly nervous. It was the first time he had to preach in the Bishop's presence, and, say what you please, it is an ordeal to speak before an accom})lished preacher, who also holds the keys of life and death. " Would you assist the Bishop ? " said Arthur, who was master of ceremonies, "whilst I look after the altar." Luke moved forward and took up the Cappa magna. Now, the Cappa magna is the most beautiful of all the beautiful vestments with which Mother Church, in her great love, clothes her children. I cannot conceive how any lesser genius than that of Michael Angelo could have devised it. A judge's ermine is nowhere in com- parison, and even the coronation robes of royalty pale into insignificance before it. But, like all beautiful things in Nature and art, it must be handled with science and skill and delicacy. You succeed by a liair's breadth, and it is a success. You fail by a most tri- fling misdirection, and it is a consummate and irre- mediable failure. Now Luke had neither science — because he knew nothing about this airy, fluffy, deli- cate thing ; nor skill — because he had never touched it before ; nor delicacy — for his strong, muscular fin- gers had not yet tapered into sensitive, nervous points. But he had all the confidence of inexperience. He took up the beautiful silk and ermine in his arms, and tossed it lightly over the Bishop's head. The Bishop shouted : "Take care! " But it was too late. The Bisho]) found that the long, shining masses of crimson silk hung like a curtain l)efore him. " You have put it on wrongly,"' he said angrily. Luke tried to remedy the blunder by shifting the ermine around. It refused to be shifted. Luke was as crimson as the silk. Me pulled and shifted and tugged. 184 LUKE DELMEGE "Take it off," said the Bishop. More easily said than done. Luke lifted it, and then found the Bishop's head hopelessly entangled in the mighty mazes of tlie silken net. Then came a series of objurgations and apologies accompanying the tremen- dous conflict, whilst every moment seemed to involve the Bishop more hopelessly in the silken intricacy. The brethren moved not. There was a faint sound as of a titter ; but no ! British equanimity and self-poise were proof against the temptation, and no one stirred from his statuesque position to help the struggling ag- onists. It was too good to terminate or interrupt. They enjoyed it in British fashion by looking at one another. Just then the master of ceremonies came in. He ran his hands into the pockets of his soutane, looked around calmly, and said aloud : " Well, I'm blessed ! " Then, moving forward, he pushed Luke gently aside with " Allow me ! " and, putting his arms under the tangled silk and ermine, he gently lifted it, turned it around, kicked back the long, shining train, and it was done. Then he ordered all forward, and Luke, with burning face and tingling nerves, took his place in the procession. He found it difficult to compose himself during Vespers, and forgot all about his sermon in the painful retrospect, until Arthur bowed to him, and took him over to receive the episcopal blessing. The Bishop saw his embarrassment, and showed, as only a Bishop can, some invisible and intangible kindness. Then Luke was in the pulpit. He stammered through his text ; then recovered himself, and spoke the first four sentences of his sermon well. His clear, metallic voice tolled slowly through the great overcrowded building, searching into every corner, as he leaned on every syl- lable and accented every final consonant. Then, in an unhappy moment, his memory reverted to his little gaucheries in the sacristy, and, as the shame came back, he forgot the trend of his discourse and began to floun- der through some dreary platitudes. But pride came to his relief, and his heart began to pump blood into his AYLESBURGH 185 brain, until all the faculties fortified took up their work again, and the paralysis ceased, and the faithful and pliant instrument obeyed the soul ; and without blunder or flaw, the beautiful discourse flowed on to the end, and men drew breath and said *' It was good ! " After Benedic- tion, and before divesting himself even of his biretta, the Bishop came over, shook Luke warmly by the hand, and said : — " I have rarely heard anything so beautiful and practical ! " whicii, from a Briton, meant a good deal. Next day Luke was in his library. The spirit of work had now seized him and possessed him, until he felt work, work, work, was the elixir of life. He had now determined to plunge deeper than ever into his slums, and to drag out of their horrors the souls that were festering there. For this purpose he had drawn up a large map, showing every street, lane, alley, and court in his district, and was just giving the finishing touches to an aristocratic and classical spot, called Granby Court, Granby Lane, off Spittal Alley, when the door opened and the Bishop entered. " At work, Delmege ? " " Yes, my Lord ! " " What would you think of going to Aylesburgh ? " "Ay — ay — Aylesburgh?" stanunered Luke. " Yes ; I am sending you on to Drysdale. He is a brusque Briton, but a good felhnv. You'll like him. When could you be ready '.'' "' " ()h ! at any time your Lordship pleases," said Luke, somewhat nettled, and thinking this might mean a fort- night's notice. ""• Well, it's just now three. There's a train at half- past four. Could you meet it?" Then the whole thing burst on Luke's mind, and he said, stiffly, as he rose: "If your Lordship jjleases ! " — and passed out of the room. Whilst he was engaged in packing his few books and 186 LUKE DELMEGE clothes, a timid knock was heard, and Father Sheldon came in. " What's up ? " he cried in amazement. Luke turned away. " What's the matter, Delmege ? Where are you go- ing ? " said Father Sheldon, quite alarmed. " Never mind," said Luke, turning around. " Look here, Sheldon, you are all the same— a pack of hypo- crites. I tried to believe otherwise ; but now my turn has come." " I don't understand you," said Father Sheldon. "Are you going back to Ireland?" " I wish I were," said Luke, bitterly. " Only that I have engaged myself for seven years, 1 should go back by the first train." "But, for heaven's sake, man, what is it all about?" " It's all about this — that I'm ordered off to Ayles- burgh at an hour's notice, as if I had the plague. Of course I should have expected it. The moment a young Irishman makes himself useful, or — or — a — remark- able, that moment lie's shifted to some obscure place." " There may be some reason," said Father Sheldon, diffidently. " Of course there is. The universal reason of jeal- ousy. I shouldn't mind so much, but the good I^xshop was kind and — hypocritical enough to pay a marked compliment last night, and tlien — " " I'm extremely sorry," said Fatlier Sheldon, moodily. " There's more Saxon duplicity," said Luke, bitterly. " I'm quite sure there's not one in tlie house who is half so glad as you are — " " Be it so," said Father Sheldon, going out. As Luke passed down the corridor, he stopped for a moment at the Vicar's door and timidly knocked. " Come in ! " said the gruff, well-known voice. " I'm going," said Luke, briefly. " I know it," said the old man. " There's a quarter due." " I'm sorry for leaving you, sir," said Luke, with a AYLESBURGH 187 gulp; "you have been very kind, and I couldn't go away without saying good-bye ! " The Vicar was writing. He folded the paper in an envelope, and handed it to Luke. " Good-bye, Delmege," he said. That was all. " All alike," thought Luke. " Made out of putty and then frozen." It was a week before he opened the envelope. Instead of £7 10s., the quarter's salary, the check was written for X15. A two hours' run brought the sad and disappointed Luke to his new home. He drove rapidly to the pres- bytery. The rector was not at home. The housekeeper left his lugg'^ge in the hall, and did not even show him his room. He went out to see the church, muttering "brusoue and British enough ! " The little church was very dark, and the air was redolent with incense. He caid a little prayer, and looked around, trying to imagine his congregation. "Somewhat '""iffercnt from the Cathedral," he thought. " I shall not hiive to raise my voice here." He went behind the choir screen, and examined the nuisic. He then studied., the brass tr.blets on the benches, with tlie names oi the pow-proprietors. There was no " Lord," not even a "Sir." "The Canon would be disappointed," lie M'hispered. He meant hiniLielf, though lie did not know it. He started at some names. They were connected with art and literature. " I must mind my P's and Q's here," he whispered. " Let me see." He went up to the })re- della of the altar, and looked around, casting his voice in lmarinc<,tion ui) to the stained Crucifixion that li