Paris Again — Hopes and Fears — Success — Inquiry Meetings — Plans About Conducting Meetings — Specimens of Usual Work in 1881 and 1882

THE rest of this year (1881) passed on in the usual way: the work on the increase, but the labourers not increasing. The interest of the different audiences is deepening, and the blessing so much longed and prayed for seems falling more and more plentifully.

His letters are very numerous from this period on to the end. Those to myself would occupy a large space; but they must be withheld from want of room. His diary is now blank. He has no leisure even for its brief jottings.

But success makes him fearful as to the future. How is this success to be maintained, guided, and preserved from the inroads of error and human excitement? If the Salvation Army take hold of the French mind and its tactics be adopted, the fruit of all the present labour and prayer may be destroyed, and the result only be a harvest of a shallow religionism at the best, perhaps of fanatical delusion. “France is awake,” he says, “and the Protestants of the next generation will be more inclined to work than their predecessors; but if the religious life of France is turned into this most seductive channel, it will be most disastrous.” Cruelly assailed by “salvationism,” “perfectionism,” and “brethrenism,” and other forms of selfish sectarianism, would the converts be able to stand their ground? Religious crotchets multiply, and every hatcher of a new idea thinks himself bound to form a new sect, and to proselytise, or rather to steal, from existing Churches. Every appliance, however wild, whether addressed to the eye or ear, is called in by the “Salvationists” to supplement the supposed feebleness or failure of the Gospel, and to awaken the passions of the crowd; and when the sound of the drum, and trumpet, and flute, and bassoon, and the profane parodies of wanton songs have died away, what of religion will remain? What of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of calmness, and gentleness, and love, will be found among the promoters or followers of this religious frenzy, this latter-day lunacy, which bears no shadow of resemblance to the stillness and peace of apostolic Evangelism? Dreading the effects of excitement, and false doc-S^tccess. -1 1 1

trine, and uncatholic rivalry among the little flock or flocks that were now being calmly gathered, he resolves to toil the harder, so as, if possible, to consolidate the work and indoctrinate the disciples who through the ministry of the Mission had been gathered in. “The work I am doing” (he says, in reference to these invasions of error), “is of such importance that it is impossible to think of a rest or a night’s absence without the work suffering.”

In November, 1881, he tells me that there never was such a serious spirit among the people, and such a manifest desire to hear the Gospel for the Gospel’s sake. “They know well what it is now. It is no longer mere curiosity with them. Rivoli is full every night — mostly of men — and of these mostly young men. I sent to one of these young men, ‘La Yraie Paix ’ and ‘La Saintet Selon Dieu,’ before I left for Clermont; and he thanked me in a letter, in which he said, ‘Yous avez senti que venu de loin, et arriv d’hier, j’avais besoin d’etre guide et soutenu.’”

Striking cases are occurring. A young man attending the Agricultural School at Versailles, who had shown interest in the Gospel, came out most boldly, rose up in a meeting, and gave testimony to the power of the Gospel with great clearness and decision. He said that it was the persistent invitation to the people to read the Scriptures for themselves that struck him most. In doing this, he had received the light, and did not mean to hide it.

He begins inquiry meetings at Gare d’lvry, and a Bible-class; — thus getting better at the people, whose eagerness impresses him greatly. He finds the dispensaries of great use, though as yet there are only two of them. People crowd to them who never heard of the meetings; and several instances of striking conversion follow: one an artist-photographer at Les Ternes. He feels that it is a time of blessing in the Mission: and adds, “I long for more to come, and exceed our expectations.” Yet he notes that at a new meeting opened at Alfortville, near Charenton, Alain, the evangelist, had been attacked by a “rowdy baud of regular * mauvais sujets,” repvis de police,’’” rendering it necessary to send for the police, “a thing,” he adds, “which we very seldom have to do.”

About this time Mr. M’All prepared a scheme for giving the Lord’s Supper to the converts in the different halls. This was to be done, not in connection with any special church, but on the basis of the Evangelical Alliance — the pastor of the district to be at the head. But the French pastors declined. The converts clung to the Mission-hall, where they had found the eternal treasure, and where they got the teaching, which they understood and relished. So the plan was relinquished. Another plan for a

Sticcess.

“Society fratemelle” was talked of, but at that time came to nothing. Something, however, will require to be done for the converts. Why should they not have the Lord’s Supper in their much-loved halls?

“We are going,” he says, “to open a children’s meeting in Mr. Campbell’s hall, Kue Lauriston, on Thursday at five. I have opened one at Versailles on Tuesdays at five, and had forty children yesterday. Mr. Greig was with me, and spoke at both meetings (children’s and adults’), and did it admirably. He has a wonderful talent for bringing down the Gospel in all its fulness to the intelligence of the children.” Both these meetings went on; and Mr. Dodds attended them almost regularly, not intermitting any of his other work. He found this very exhausting, and would fain have given up the Lauriston one, to which he had not pledged himself; but no other superintendent could be found for these unruly children. “We are really,” he says at this time, “in great need of workers, and I think that money would be better spent on training a few young men than in adding halls. If you can send us any regular good lady-worker, she would be welcome. What the Mission needs is a substratum of settled workers.”

There can be no doubt of the truth and wisdom of this last remark. This Mission is far too important to be left to anything like a haphazard support. Like other native societies it must have its regular well-paid staff of evangelists or pastors or workers, by whatever name they may be called. And if, in order to accomplish this, extension be for a while arrested, the arrestment will be for the ultimate benefit of the work.

He writes to me of his after-meetings at Gare d’lvry and Grenelle; upwards of sixty in each remaining behind to be conversed with. “They are very timid, and we cannot get them to say much. But they lift up their hands as a sign that they want to be prayed for, and that is a great effort for them; and they let them down before we can well see them. One man found peace last Thursday night at Gare d’lvry, a sugar refiner. He had heard of Eugene Petit, the French ouvrier, who died there some time ago in peace. Will you ask your prayer-meeting to remember these two stations especially, and the others also? There has been quite a gathering in at Les Ternes. If we had only more workers, devoted men and women, what could we not do!”

In this letter there is a paragraph which I must not withhold. I give it without remark: “We have been very busy arranging our HodeU Fraternelle, which is to replace our project for giving the communion, rejected by the pastors. My heart is sore and heavy for our poor people, who are needing spiritual privileges, and are refused them. If ever men lost a great opportunity, these pastors did so on that day when they rejected our proposal. They are only half awake to the tremendous issues which are unfolding themselves in France. This country may be won now. In a short time it may be beyond reclaiming.”

I should not have ventured to give such a decided sentence did I not know how strongly Mr. Dodds felt upon this point, and that these words may be regarded as his dying message to the pastors of France. He loved the pastors; he enjoyed their fellowship; and he longed to carry them along with him in his plans for the evangelisation of their native and his adopted land. But perhaps they thought that his plans would not suit the genius of the French people, and that his Saxon energy or Scottish fervour was carrying him too far.

The “after-meetings,” which he is now carrying on at the different stations, give him double work; but they are of signal use, and they bring him into closer contact with the people. Very solemn meetings he feels them to be, and in his letters at this time he often refers to them. “But,” he writes, “when you get to talk with these people afterwards, what a mass of darkness their mind is. Kome has done her work, and done it so effectually as no one can understand unless he has experienced it personally or come into contact with the people. The absence of all deep sense of sin is remarkable. There is no conscience. I have been struck with the way in which the converts receive the Gospel. They invariably say something like this: ‘J’ai quelque chose dans mon coeur que je n’avais pas auparavant, ‘I have something in my heart which I had not before.’ This ’ something’ is all they are conscious of Conviction of sin follows after. I feel when speaking to them in the after-meeting that I am dealing with cases very different from those I should meet with in Scotland.”

Impressions are being made in many quarters. “I had,” he writes, “a deeply interesting conversation with a blind woman at Grenelle; she is certainly a Christian. She said to me, ‘J’etais si grand pecheresse, que je n’osais pas m’approcher de Dieu, mais maintenant plus je m’approche de lui par la priere plus je suis heureuse.’ A man said to me that he was once so fond of doing evil that nothing would have given him greater pleasure than to chuck a stone into that same old woman’s tin, which she holds to receive the sous of passers-by. He has been a ’ great sinner ’ in his day, and not so long ago as to have acquired a good character among his neighhours. He is now a decided Christian. He passed into light with no great struggle nor sense of sin; but he is now inclined to doubt his salvation, because he feels the struggle so hard.”

Several of his letters at the beginning of 1882 refer to such cases.” So many don’t understand what it is all about. They think they are all saved. ‘Oh, they say, ‘I know all these things. I have read Lamenais ’ (les paroles d’un croyant). Such is a specimen of the answers given. The work of dealing with the people is very difficult.

“The Gospel wins some by its beauty, its power to satisfy, and they receive it joyfully. The love of Christ is found to be the great persuasive power. But it is a puzzle to find out in some of the cases of inquiry what feeling to appeal to. The Spirit will doubtless do His work, but how are we to approach some of these souls, who appear to be longing for light?” Such are some of Mr. Dodds’ reflections as he moves about his daily work. His great puzzle is the French conscience, or rather the Popish conscience.

“Conscience,” he writes, “is here a hereditary thing. The father hands it to the child, and the iniquity of the father in stifling its voice is visited upon the children. How dead the moral sense is! The more I work here the more astounded I become. Rome has done her work. There is no conscience hardly to appeal to, and no Scripture knowledge to reckon on. No one who has not worked among this people can have any idea of it.”

Some English visitors forget the difference between French and English ways. One at St. Honore wondered because men did not rise at once and say they were saved, or that they wished to be prayed for. On this Mr. Dodds remarks,” It is more difficult at this station than elsewhere. The ouvrier is more susceptible than the bourgeois; the latter listens with the air of a man who says inwardly, ’ 0 oui, je connais tout 9a.’ I had a young man calling on me to-day. His father is an exiled Prussian. He came in, when passing, to my meeting at the Trocadero on Sunday. He attends regularly, and asked my address. I had a long talk with him. When I asked him, some Sundays ago, what he knew of Christ and of sin, he appeared to think he knew all, and that it was wrong of me to doubt him. I felt when sitting beside him to-day that I could say nothing, — only pray. I did try various ways; for he appeared solemnised last Sunday, — bowed his head in prayer, and told me he wished to call on me; and yet to-day, when talking, and when I was trying to isolate the Gospel and Christ from all else, to show him that it was all different from other systems, he said to me, ‘I quite agree with you; do you not see that I am exactly in your

Ltqutry Meetings. 3 1 9

views’ ‘dans vos idees.’ Yet I found he had very clear views regarding the ouvriers. I told him of several conversions, to see if that would awaken any sign of felt ignorance, need, and longing. But no; he remained perfectly passive, and told me he was trying to do good by writing novels, — moral in their tone, I suppose. This young man is like many here; they are not drawn to us or the Gospel by direct spiritual need, or anything like a sense of sin. But they hear such a Gospel nowhere else; and they see that we are different from others, and that we represent the Gospel in our practice. ‘There is truth in that,’ is what they invariably say; and that with many is the first step towards the kingdom. It will not do simply to preach the terrors of the law; a peculiar combination of both law and Gospel is needed. The Roman Catholic teaching has represented such a God to them, — sometimes a furious, irritated God, and sometimes the very opposite, a hon Lieu, a lump of benevolence. I can understand how Luther, before his conversion, said that the very name of Jesus brought terror to his soul. Strange to say, there is something of that kind here, with this difference that the people whose fathers were threatened by the priests, and trembled at the Church’s God and the Church’s tenets, are to-day no longer afraid, though they remember the language of terror. They recognise the thing, but they don’t fear it. Either they will say, ‘Je nai jamais fais du mal au bon Dieu, et le bon Dieu ne me fera pas du mal a moi; ’ or ‘Dieu est trop-bon pour m’envoyer en enfer.’ In the first case ‘enter’ is ignored. In the second it has lost its power, for the reply was created by the continual threat of the

priest. Young is about to enter into our work;

he who was ’ taken in the net ’ at Rivoli, three years ago. He is to be trained. If we had money we could train others. Another man is in the ministere des finances. No one is appointed in France to any office connected with this ministere without his approval. He is a most decided Christian. This will give you some idea of the anti-clerical attitude of the cabinet. If a man is candidate for any position, and is known to attend mass, his name is at once struck off, however good a republican he may be. Paul Bert, a cold-blooded positivist and vivisectionist, is to revise the Concordat, and is already doing it.”

On the 14th of January, 1882, he writes to me very warmly of some interesting cases of conversion that had come to light unexpectedly. They greatly cheer him. “I know of other like instances,” he adds:” so much is this a work of seed-sowing. I feel inquiry meetings here necessary to get at the people. I see, however, that 1 am extreme in my desire to know how to adapt the Gospel to the people. You say. Tell a man whatever or whoever he may be, what God has done! That I feel to be true. I believe that the persevering proclamation of the Gospel to the people, night after night, is what is wanted. We shall soon have our Societe fratemelle constituted in each station. It will bring the truly converted together. ... I never saw the mission so prosperous outwardly, and, above all, spiritually.

“Ask your congregation from us, to pray for our meetings. Surely we shall have a blessing; and all this is only the first drops. Oh, for faith to expect!”

In no letter does he omit to give tidings of his mission work, however brief “We had a very good after-meeting at Ivry last night (he writes to me on 20th January); a good deal of conversation at the end with the people. The light is dawning on many. I hope friends will continue to pray for us.” Speaking of a children’s meeting, he closes with these words, “Noisy little vagabonds, but bright and quick.”

During the week of prayer he took part in a meeting at the American Chapel, and in the course of his address dwelt on the beautiful French word for “answer to prayer,” exaucer, showing that it was the same word as exalt, — to answer prayer is to “lift up.” Soon after he had a note from his well-beloved brother, Pasteur Theodor Monod, who was present, in which the following sentence occurs, — “A remarkable

y thing, that a French pastor should go to an English meeting to speak in English, and to be instructed in French! I never had thought of the etymology of exaucer. It is most interesting. Littr and Brachet entirely bear out your remarks on the subject, making exaucer and exhausser to be the same word.”

He complains at this time of the evil reports that some, from what motives he knew not, were getting up against the Mission, and carrying to London, — hindering sympathies and subscriptions. Pasteur Theodor Monod speedily and effectually silenced the rumour in an admirably written letter in defence of the Mission.

He complains, also, of some English visitors who got up a “work of revival,” and boasted of the large number of their converts, in disparagement of those of the Mission; and calmly notes that the present is to a large extent a solving time.

He records (4th Feb. 1882) a striking conversation with a man at Grenelle, — very ignorant, but into whom the light seemed to have broken, — “I don’t know how,” said the poor man, “but I am quite changed from what I was, and my neighbours say so too.” The strange thing was that he hardly used a single religious or Bible word in describing his change. “Knowing the people well,” says Mr. Dodds, “I found in this a very conclusive proof of the reality of the work. He was telling it to me in the language of every-day life. When I said that he must imitate Christ, he answered, ‘Oh! I am sure I can never do that; we can’t be perfect.’ This rejoiced me much, for they are always so perfect 1 I showed how that, having taken Christ as his Saviour, he must take Him as his model. The seed is beginning to spring up everywhere. People wish to force it. Such is not God’s way. Oh! if people would only be content to sow in faith. How I feel very, very often that we are fighting to convince sinners, who are not only ’ in their own sins,’ but who are heavily visited with the sins of their forefathers for hundreds of years. Ours is a work of undoing as well as of doing.”

About this time (Jan. 1882) his appetite began to fail him. To keep up his strength he took strong tea, which increased the evil, though it supplied a temporary stinmlus. “Yesterday,” says a private letter, “we dined as usual at twelve, and he ate very little. Then at four he just swallowed a cup of tea in a choking hurry, and went out, — not taking anything till he returned at half-past twelve, when he took an egg and a cup of cocoa. I don’t know how he is to stand it.”

This was the beginning of his weakness and loss of appetite, produced by overwork and irregular hours, which continued more or less until the end.

He shut his eyes to the evil, and persevered in his work, reducing his system so low that any illness of any kind might have proved fatal. This was sadly imprudent; but work was now to him a necessity and a relief, though its consequences threatened to be so serious, and a collapse inevitable.

Interwoven with his constant reports of mission success, I find remarks on the social aspects of the Kepublic and the political events of the time. “I wonder,” he writes, “if you all realise in Edinburgh what a downfall Gambetta’s has been? I send you a copy oi La France, a paper which gained its spurs at the time of the 16th of May, when Emile Gerardin was editor. It is moderate and wise in its view of the matter, but its language regarding Gambetta is strikingly severe. He has been found out; — very little of a patriot, and a great party man; giving offices to his friends, and creating posts to be filled by his creatures.”

He is suddenly called to lecture to the Young Men’s Christian Association in Paris; and he asks me to send him ChristlieUs “Modern Doubt and Unbelief”; adding, “I have chosen ‘Modern Doubt’ as my subject, and am anxious to systematise my many scattered thoughts, for I have thought a good deal on it.” Then turning to the work that was never out of his thoughts, he closes with, “We specimen of Work in 1881 and 1882. 325

had eighty at the Grenelle prayer meeting on Sunday — two spontaneously giving their testimony most simply, but most impressively.”

I must, however, omit much in the way of correspondence and narrative which would have been truly interesting. But it would necessarily involve some repetition, and is besides unnecessary to a view of his life and work. I asked Mrs. Dodds to give me a brief sketch of his movements and occupations at this time, — say for a week, — as a specimen of the whole. Of course, this was somewhat difficult, as each week was varied, though there were certain fixed points; — the regular evening meetings; the Friday prayer meeting; the daily interviews with Mr. M’All in arranging the stations. The sketch is as follows: —

“Late hours in the morning were almost a necessity, if rest was to be had at all. Occasionally Mr. Dodds was aroused first by some messenger waiting in the bureau, some letter or telegram demanding an instant answer, or perhaps it might be his venerable friend. Professor St. Hilaire, patiently waiting for information about his new tracts, or a Bible-woman or worker needing guidance, or a beggar, or, best of all, a soul in distress. Calls like these were always occurring, and might perhaps take up his whole time till noon. If they did not occur, then he could count on the forenoon hours as his most precious time for writing new addresses, revising tracts, writing articles, letters, or doing any one of the hundred things that pressed upon him. Except on Wednesday, when a short prayer meeting of the evangelists required his presence early at Mr. M’ All’s, he rarely went out till after the noon dejeuner, which was the substantial meal of the day. Breakfast had been a mere cup of coffee in French fashion; — the evening meal must depend upon circumstances; but this was a little time of quiet with his family, not broken in upon unless by some unexpected interruption. Immediately afterwards mission business must be transacted, at Mr. M’ All’s, quite near. This might take one, or two, or three hours, according as the details brought up, varied in number and perplexity. Back again, with a fresh budget of affairs and letters, to sit at his desk till summoned to tea, or until some expected guest walked in, — a visitor in Paris, perhaps, or a worker asked to drop in and go on with him to his meeting. This when at home. But latterly his Tuesday afternoons were spent at Versailles, — there a children’s meeting; — a pleasant social meal at the house of one or other of his warmlyattached friends there; — a grown-up people’s meeting; and a late, tired journey home, making up the programme of that day. Thursday was a harder day.

specimen of Wo7^k in 1881 and 1882. 327

His presence was very often required at one of the afternoon schools, sometimes at two schools widely apart; and then the hasty cup of cocoa in some restaurant had to be substituted for the comfortable meal he needed; then on to Gare d’lvry, where perhaps a visit or two as well as a meeting, — and after-meeting, — had to be gone through before getting home. Many remember him on the Friday afternoons, when the prayer meeting had become a social institution, held in the Salle St. Honore, and how eagerly, while tea was handed round, he would stand talking to one after another, arranging little matters, or gleaning good news, leaving his un tasted cup till it was almost time to run to Rivoli or Les Ternes, as the case might be. Thus three afternoons of the week might be reckoned as exceptions to the rule!

With evening the most important part of his work only began. He would come back near midnight to refresh himself over letters and papers which the post had brought from England; or to set to work to answer them.

Saturday was often occupied socially or in making up arrears of letters and accounts, in visits to the poor, or in preparing for his Sabbath work, which, to the last, he never ceased to regret having so little time for. One bit of his preparation was unique. He had procured from America some lapilinum, — a

328 Memcir of Rev. G. T. Dodds.

thick black material on which one can draw as on a black-board. He would pin a square sheet of this against the wall of some room and begin to draw, his own children looking on open-mouthed and wondering the while. With rapid touches he would sketch an illustration for the international lesson of that week; — the storm on the sea of Galilee, the sower, &c., getting the idea sometimes from a child’s story-book, sometimes from a great picture, it mattered not. One of the last he drew was an allegorical picture of faith as a lever moving a huge rock. This sheet he would then roll up and carry to his different schools throughout the week.

During the last summer, his Sabbath work was always at a maximum. If he had not a pulpit to supply, he would find a morning school needing help. At Trocadero the general meeting was preceded by a school. At Grenelle, the same. The after-meeting at the latter place thus made the sixth in one day.

In all this work he was constantly liable to calls in unforeseen directions, — fetes or social meetings, village expeditions and hunts for new halls, forenoons spent in the tract depots or at the printers, public meetings or committees. Of the Mission Interieure and the City Mission he was a member. He was looked to in cases of emergency, not only by the Scotch Church in Paris, but often by the American

Sptcimeii of Work in 1881 and 1882. 329

and Wesley an; French churches also laid occasional claims to him, and rarely did he refuse to preach in case of need. Visitors would arrive suddenly from England or America, and he would gladly put away his work for a delightful talk or a stroll in the Bois de Boulogne, directing them or taking them with him to a meeting.

The private and individual claims on his time were many. Workers came to seek comfort and advice; young converts who wanted to put their hands to the plough and knew not how, needed encouragement; ladies just come from England, inexperienced, and only seeing a mass of work before them which they felt themselves unfit for, had to be shown how to disentangle the mass, and steer through the difiiculties. Differences of opinion had to be settled, jarring workers to be fitted to their places, reproofs not seldom to be administered.

Many scenes I remember, some touching, some amusing. And I should do wrong if I forgot to say that the spirit of fun which sometimes showed itself among the workers was a great help towards bearing the strain. No ludicrous incident failed to produce its effect. One day it is a man begging, with a line purporting to be from M. Paul Bert (the minister) recommending him to Mr. Dodds’ charity! Another day it is some rich story with which Mr. M’All has relieved the dryness of business. Those who go out of their way to seek laughter do not know what it is. Schoolboys and people at earnest work know it in its genuine brightness and freshness.

A young worker comes to complain that his school is dwindling. He may have to be told that his own unpunctuality is killing it. No easy matter, but it must be done. Or a speaker must be told that his addresses are too long, and that the people go out. Or a third must be told that he has been “making controversy,” religious or political, in the meetings. But nothing roused his indignation so much as hearing a speaker run on for an hour simply amusing the people, and giving them no Gospel. This he could not endure. It was his nature to speak strongly, even sternly, in cases like these. He knew it, and watched against himself in this. When the matter was very serious, a letter would be written, sometimes only after much prayer and deliberation. Or a quiet walk home from some meeting would give him the desired opportunity. Often his counsel was received gratefully. In one amusing case it was not strong enough to be understood. The rule “no politics” had been so flagrantly transgressed that Mr. Dodds was commissioned to write to the offender, pointing out what had been done. This he did in a long, courteous,^ and very clear letter. He feared only to have spoken too strongly. He received an specimen of Work in 1881 and 1882. 331

equally courteous answer, in which the writer perfectly concurred in his opinion, thought it a thing much to be deprecated that pohtics should be introduced in these meetings, and wondered only who could have been so indiscreet as to do such a thing!

I remember a lady coming in despair about a school which seemed utterly unmanageable, — coaxing and turning out being equally ineffectual, — the teachers not quite agreed, and a little disposed to blame each other’s method for the unsatisfactory results. How he cheered her, and kindly urged her not to give up, — not grudging the spending of his precious time, and at length sending her away with the promise that he would look in himself!

Another young worker will never forget his loving advice and direction, his way of setting her to work in the most needy places, and telling her how to set about it. Nor will she forget the prayer in his drawing-room the day she left, nor the promise he exacted from her not to desert France, but to return if the Lord permitted.*

In April he visited Scotland in behalf of the Mission. But his stay was short. There are no incidents in this tour of sufficient importance to be recorded. He would not admit that he was feeble. He felt

* He seldom allowed friends to leave the house without a few minutes of social prayer.

well; and he went about his varied work as usual, enjoying, as he always did, the society of friends.* He did not reckon upon that visit being his last, and that, in leaving Scotland, he was bidding it a final farewell. Of the mission he was most hopeful, and regarding himself he had no desponding thoughts. He would not admit that he was losing strength, or that he ought to spare himself The prospects of mission expansion were bright; and the encouragement he met with in Scotland cheered him on. He was specially cheered by the arrangements he was able to make with Mr. Moody for a visit to Paris in the course of the autumn. The “day-spring from on high” seemed to be visiting France; and he looked forward to years of happy and earnest work. For his youth was still upon him, and, though he often felt weariness, he did not believe in exhaustion. He thought himself able for all he had undertaken, and did not think it possible that his strength could give way; though often at night, on returning home, he would say, “I’m tired, I’m so tired.”

* His visit to Locbee was saddened by the failing health of his mother. For some time past each visit had seemed a farewell. He did not think that he was to go first. But mother and son were not to be separated long.