Chapter XII (1)

THE PRINCIPLE OF SOCIAL EQUALITY PUT TO THE TEST.

Madame de Meglior continued to reside with her niece, and made herself so agreeable, that the arrangement promised to become permanent.

Euphrasie continued to exhibit the same impassive exterior; in appearance she was but the slave of her mother's will. The duchess regarded her as almost a nonentity, at least after the fears excited by Eugene's religious tendencies had in some measure subsided.

But Annie! "a change had come o'er the spirit of her dream." She, always disposed to romance, was unguarded now. Formerly, Adelaide had acted as a check upon Annie's fondness for equality, fraternity, liberty. Now that that restraint was withdrawn, she imprudently allowed Alfred Brookbank to treat her more and more as an equal. It is doubtful whether, even if she had reflected, she would have foreseen the consequences, for in her most republican moods, she never forgot that she was a Miss Godfrey of Estcourt Hall; and though to amuse herself and pass away the time, she was willing enough to discuss equality and the "rights of man," she certainly expected to receive full credit for the condescension in allowing to an inferior the privilege of such "free discussion" with herself. Home was dull, her sister gone, and her cousin gone too: her mother was always ailing now, and her father, ever newly absorbed by some pet plan, kept his darling Hester {336} constantly at his side. Annie was alone, and somewhat desolate: Alfred Brookbank always on the look out for an excuse to bear her company and amuse her. Annie was becoming accustomed to his attentions, without attaching any more definite meaning to them than she would to the attentions of any one of the numerous dependents of her father's house, when, one day, he took advantage of a private interview to make a formal profession of love. This was indeed a surprise; for, though any one else might have expected it, Annie had never once thought of such a probability. Marriages in her family had always been conducted so differently. Besides, she had never looked on Alfred as other than patronized. She had not dreamt of such presumption, though she had allowed him freely to broach in her presence his doctrine of the "inherent equality" of such individuals as are of equal calibre of intellect, and of the right of all mankind at large to freedom and equality. Her manner of receiving this declaration was certainly not very flattering; for she drew herself up in a somewhat haughty manner, and replied that the proceeding was so unexpected, so uncalled for, that she did not know how to answer it, for Mr. Alfred must be aware that the difference in their social position rendered such a proposal unanswerable.

"To one of ordinary mind, perhaps," said Alfred, somewhat chafed; "but to one like yourself, endowed with an understanding above the petty conventionalities--"

"I am not above recognizing my duty to my family, Mr. Alfred, and you must be aware that no one member of it would consent to this."

"Nay, if you only allowed me to hope I had any interest in you, I am sure Mr. Godfrey would not refuse your wishes."

"I have no wish to trouble him on the subject," was the cold rejoinder, somewhat haughtily expressed.

"I may not hope then--"

"You may hope nothing on this subject whatever. Let it be dropped now and forever. If I can aid your prospects--"

"You will patronize me. Thank you, Miss Annie, but patronage from you would suit my temper badly. I had thought there was one being in the world superior to the influences of prejudice, of conventional distinctions; but you, too, deem me an inferior, because I boast not of paltry wealth or of gentle descent. Inferior as you deem me, you shall yet feel my power--yes, my power!"

His language and his told were those of a madman, and his flashing eyes gave him a frenzied appearance. Trembling with rage, the quondam lover left the presence of his adored, meditating in bitterness the most direful revenge.

Had Annie put any faith in his professions of love to herself, she would have been undeceived by this burst of rage. Love had not animated him--that was apparent enough; his disappointment was but a foiled ambition; yet after permitting upward of two years' attentions, conscience told her he should have met with a less haughty rebuff. The retrospect showed her she had encouraged him. She had then partly drawn upon herself a merited rebuke. She could but acknowledge this, and, humiliated, Annie would willingly have done her part in repairing the evil she had occasioned by promoting his advancement in life but this was beyond her power. The next news she heard was that Alfred Brookbank had prevailed on his father to advance him a large sum of money, and had set sail for America.

Time passed on. Estcourt Hall became duller every day, and beyond the arrival of a new family in the neighborhood there was nothing of interest outside. This family consistent of a dowager Lady Conway, her son and daughter. They had purchased "a place" near the sea for the benefit of Lady Conway's health. Their own estates, or rather the son's estates, were in a neighboring shire. They {337} were not intellectual, but they were wealthy and of good family, and in time an intimacy sprang up between them and the Godfreys, none knew how or why, and in a few months after, to the surprise of every one, "The Morning Post" announced that Sir Philip Conway, Bart., had led to the altar Miss Annie Godfrey, second daughter of E. Godfrey, Esq., of Estcourt Hall.

The marriage was strictly private. Eugene left Cambridge for a day or two to be present at it, but he soon returned to college. Of the nature of his studies no one guessed. He did go in for honors, as his father would have wished. Nevertheless his tutors made a good report of him, and the secluded life he led made many suppose that he was pursuing very deeply some pet hobby of his own.

Indeed, this was partly true; for although at his first return to Cambridge he was much dejected, he soon began to reflect that Euphrasie was very young; that she not only was now completely dependent, but that she was likely to continue so; and that the most unlikely thing that could happen, was the gratification of her wish to enter a convent. He trusted to time to teach her this, and a new hope sprang up within him, and that, too, at the very moment that his friend M. Bertolot, began to hope he had mastered his feelings for Euphrasie, and become reconciled to the inevitable separation.

Eugene spoke not of his love, but with renewed ardor he addressed himself to study the most important relationships that can exist for man. Guided by the counsels of M. Bertolot, he mastered the evidences of Revelation and then assured himself that that revelation, _once given_, was divinely protected: that that which was intended to shed light on the human soul, darkened by sin, was not a dubious _ignis fatuis_, subject to human vagaries, but an unerring guide and an unfailing lamp. We will not follow him through his arguments now, as we shall have occasion to make him speak for himself on a future occasion.

Time passed on. Annie had been married a year or more. Truth to say, she was somewhat _ennuyée_ at present. Her husband resided chiefly on his estate, and this was at some distance from Estcourt Hall. There was little society in the neighborhood, and Sir Philip's tastes corresponded very little with her own.

The young baronet was perfectly well-intentioned, but neither refined nor cultivated. The society of his farm-bailiff, the walk to the fatting-stalls, the talk about the respective fattening qualities of turnips and mangold-wurzels, the speculations on the relative value of farm-yard manure, of guano, or of soot, and dissertations whether each or all should be applied as top-dressing or should be worked into the soil; such were his occupations, and sooth to say, he excelled in the pursuits he had adopted. No beasts at Smithfield could show finer points than Sir Philip's: no farm was in finer model order: his tanks, his barns, his under-drainings, and his irrigations, together with his prize cattle of every description, were the admiration of the agricultural world. He was truly a "lord of the animal creation," and he prided himself on being so. Of intellectual culture he had small appreciation; but as he had great ideas of order, and deemed himself master by right of "the masculine being the most worthy gender," (which was the only idea he retained from his Latin grammar, that had been vainly endeavored to be flogged into him at school,) he would ill have brooked interference with his rights. To him, a wife was a necessary appendage, nothing more; as to allowing a woman to dictate to him, the thing was absurd. He was "a lord of creation," and though he wished the world to pay due respect to Lady Conway, because she was his wife, yet it is questionable whether he himself would have allowed a woman a voice on any {338} subject beyond those connected with domestic economy, and even here he reserved to himself the power of veto. He loved his wife, certainly, because he thought it was a part of his duty to do so; besides, he really had some sort of animal affection for her. Annie was well-made, of good birth, well-educated; to say the least, he was as proud of her as he had been of the animal which had won him the first prize at the Smithfield cattle-show. It was part of his system to have the best specimens of animal existence domesticated on his estate, and Annie did not disgrace his other stock.

But Annie; poor Annie! She was alone in the world, though surrounded by everything that could procure bodily ease or bodily enjoyment. She had horses to ride, she had a carriage to ride in, she had gardens and hot houses, plantations and shrubberies; but to her cultivated mind where was the response? To the poetry that strove within her for expression, where was the listener?

"The thought that cannot speak Whispers the o'erfraught heart, and
bids it break!"

But Annie's was not a spirit to be easily broken. Naturally expressive, she would have sought interest even among the cottagers, had not her husband's jealousy forbidden it. He was a _magnifico_, and he liked not that his wife should be more popular than himself. He wished to gain the name of being a liberal benefactor to his laborers and cottagers, and would not share his reputation even with the being to whom he had plighted his faith for life. Annie was thus thrown on her own resources. Brought up intellectually, she found a resource in books; and though at times cast down, she rallied again, for youth is buoyant, elastic, hopeful, and a literary taste carries in itself a wonderful power of compensation. But Annie was no dreamer, and the ideas that suggested themselves demanded action, which as yet they were denied: yet Annie read on, and thought on. The time for action will one day surely come, she thought.

"Lady Conway," said Sir Philip one day at the breakfast table, "do you know any thing of a Mr. Alfred Brookbank?"

Annie almost started; she certainly changed color, but Sir Philip was not observing her; so she answered, "Yes--no--yes; that is, Sir Philip, the family lived at Estcourt, and sometimes visited at the Hall."

"He has bought old Gordon's land, and is about to become our dear neighbor."

"Indeed! How did he get the money? He was poor when I knew him."

"He has made very fortunate speculations in America; besides which he succeeds to his father's property".

"Is Dr. Brookbank dead?"

"He is, and has left a considerable sum behind him; he economize unknown to his family, it seems."

"But even so, there is an Elder brother."

"No, he died in America; of this there is certain news."

"In America!" said Annie. "I did not know he was ever there".

"No? Well, it seems he ran off with a neighbor's wife, took her to America, got tired of her, left her, and went off to the woods. There he lived some time, but one day was found at the foot of some rapids, drowned."

"But how did his family know this?"

"Some stranger to that district identified the body and gave evidence before the presiding magistrate, after which they searched the shanty in which the man had lived, and found papers corroborative of his being Walter Brookbank, and these papers, with sundry articles, they sent home to his family, according to the address given by the stranger, and they were found to have belonged to Walter."

"Strange concurrence of events! Who was the stranger?"

"He gave his name as William Jones."

{339}

"Jones! I suppose Smith, Brown, or White would have served his purpose equally as well?"

"Why do you suppose that Jones was not the man's name, my lady?"

"I do not know, only it seems to me a most improbable tale."

"Improbable! Why, the family believe it, at any rate."

"And the second son is to be established in the neighborhood?"

"Yes; he intends to occupy himself in superintending land. I have some thoughts of employing him myself."

"I thought you said he inherited considerable property."

"Yes, but he has determined to let his mother enjoy the income arising from the paternal estate, and has also promised to care for his sisters' fortunes. Dr. Brookbank died intestate, it seems, but this young man says that shall make no difference. He appears to be actuated by very high principle".

Annie did not answer. She was uneasy; especially at the idea of Alfred's managing her husband's affairs. She feared some sinister motive. Her husband noticed the discontented expression of her countenance.

"Do you not like Mr. Alfred Brookbank?" He asked.

"Well, I hardly know," said Annie; "but at least I do not consider him a man of business. He was not when I knew him; besides, he is young for an agent; an older man might suit you better, Sir Philip."

"I am not sure of that; old men are apt to be obstinate and to have plans of their own; I choose to look into my affairs myself, and to make my own arrangements; so that his inexperience signifies but little, provided he is industrious, and that his American success proves him to be."

Annie knew not what objection to offer, and a dark foreboding came over; was this in any way diminished when, some few weeks afterward, Mr. Brookbank was announced, and Sir Philip, instead of receiving him in his library according to his wont with gentlemen visitors, directed him to be shown into the parlor, in which he and Lady Conway were sitting. Annie would have escaped had it been practicable, but as her departure would have attracted Sir Philip's observation, she thought it more prudent to remain.

Alfred entered, and his bearing was so respectful, so distant, that Annie would have been reassured, had she not felt that at intervals, when Sir Philip was not looking, Alfred fixed his eyes upon her with the gaze of a basilisk; and once when she chanced to look at him she thought the expression of his features perfectly demoniacal. What she had to fear she knew not, but that she did fear something was certain.

It was not only Alfred that had come to reside in the neighborhood; his mother and two sisters accompanied him. The rectory of Estcourt had passed to another, and there was no mansion on the paternal acres suited for the refined tastes of the family, so they had come to reside with Alfred in his newly purchased dwelling. A certain degree of visiting between the families would have been necessary for old acquaintance sake, but more soon became inevitable from the ascendency which Alfred shortly obtained over the mind of Sir Philip. He flattered himself into the baronet's good graces, and made himself so agreeable that Sir Philip began to think it impossible to live without him. Annie tried in vain to stem the torrent of intimacy, that threatened almost to domesticate Alfred in her house. Sir Philip was far too wise a man to be governed by his wife, so he listened to none of her remonstrances; and at times there was a look of triumph, as well as of hatred, in Alfred's features, that made her almost tremble in his presence. Annie was naturally strong-minded, yet she could not overcome this sensation, which was almost a martyrdom, particularly as she suspected Alfred was aware of the torment she underwent. She wrote to {340} her aunt, who was still at Durimond Castle, to request that she and Euphrasie would come and spend some time with her, hoping to gain courage in their society, and perhaps protection; but the answer was unpropitious:

"The Duke of Durimond had returned home seriously unwell, and at that moment it would be improper and unkind to leave the duchess without society."

Annie must, then, endure life as best she could. Alfred found himself visiting at Sir Philip's on terms of apparent equality, and often a party was made up of such society as the neighborhood afforded, expressly for the purpose of introducing the family so obnoxious to Annie. Nay, she was in a manner compelled to take her turn in visiting them, repugnant as it was to her feelings.

On these occasions Annie behaved with condescension and politeness, but with nothing more. She received Alfred with the most formal courtesy; he returned her salute with one of apparently the most profound respect. Few more words were interchanged than were absolutely necessary.

It was the current opinion that Lady Conway liked not the society of her inferiors, and Sir Philip, participating in the idea, strove to combat it, although he was no leveller in general; but in Alfred's case he thought the prejudice she entertained ought to yield to such superior merit.

One evening a social party met at Sir Philip's. Singing and dancing were going on; but Alfred was unusually dull, he could not be prevailed upon to join in any amusement. The baronet, fancying his wife's coldness might have had some influence in producing this effect, said to her in the hearing of all the party:

"My lady, was Mr. Brookbank so dull when he visited at Estcourt Hall? Did he never sing to you there?"

"Mr. Brookbank has a very fine voice," was the reply; "I have often heard him sing beautiful melodies."

"Nay, then, call upon him, in memory of 'Auld lang syne,' to sing for you, my lady; no other has the power to arouse him to-night."

Annie turned to Alfred and said in a dignified manner, "You here Sir Philip's request, Mr. Brookbank; will you consider it mine?"

Alfred started, looked at her, and bowed. He answered in a tone so low that only she could hear its purport:

"You have asked for a madman's song, my lady; what else can memory produce?"

Declining the offer of an accompaniment, he seated himself at the piano, and drew forth notes so wild, so terrific, that the whole party were electrified; then assuming the mien and gesture of one crazed in his intellect, his loud and clear voice gave full force to the following:

Oh! bid me not recall the past,
Though calm appear my features now
Hid though from sight the fevered blast,
That caused the spirit's overthrow.

'Tis not in mortal power again
Youth's buoyant transport to recall;
'Tis hushed--forever hushed--the strain
That could with Schilling the heart enthral.

Visions of truth have passed me by,
Mocking the sense, with shapes unreal,
Filling each pulse with melody,
Thrilling the heart with joys ideal.

And freedom, independence, love.
In dreams have risen to my sight--
In dreams essayed my heart to prove.
They vanished at return of light.

And earth is all unholy now.
Venal its joys!--its highest bliss
To lay that false ideal low--
To crush the hope of happiness.

Love gone! one wish doth yet remain--
One thought the maddened brain to whet:
Joy vanished! Its fell rival--pain--
Forbids the spirit to forget.

Pain, pain triumphant, speaks of power
To seize the serpent's foulest sting.
Therewith to bid the tyrant cower.
Back to return the poisoned spring.

Yes! I'll unveil those mocking forms,
Those shapes of grace, all seat from hell;
I will reveal the latent storms
That 'neath the placid surface dwell.

Thus proudly I'll unveil deceit;
Thus fearfully I'll stifle pain--
The mask torn off--made known the cheat--
Ne'er shall the false one rest again!

With trust destroyed, with pleasure gone,
Earth yields the soul no fitting mate;
But standing fearless and alone
The vengeful spirit lives--_to hate_.

{341}

The emphasis that was given to this wild song struck terror to the hearts of the hearers, especially as the singer himself seemed frantic with excitement When it was finished a pause ensued, as if all present wanted to take breath; and Sir Philip found voice to say:

"Why, where on earth, Brookbank, did you learn such a ditty as that? You have absolutely frightened the young ladies; they think you half mad, yourself."

"It is the lay of a madman in good earnest," said Alfred, "he who composed it was crazed by disappointed love; I sing it now and then as a warning to young ladies not to be too cruel."

He looked round the room for Annie as he spoke; but Annie was no longer there; every line of that song had spoken volumes to her, in telling her what a bitter enemy she had raised, and as the last word vibrated on the singer's lips, she left the apartment. When she returned she was very pale. She felt conscious that Alfred was watching her every movement, and that feeling made her miserable.

TO BE CONTINUED.

------

From Chambers's Journal.

AUTUMN.

Autumn is dying, alas! Sweet Autumn is near to her death;
All through the night may be felt her languid scented breath
Coming and going in gasps long-drawn by the shivering trees,
Out on the misty moors, and down by the dew-drenched leas.

Autumn is dying, alas! Her face grows pallid and gray;
The healthy flush of her prime is momently fading away;
And her sunken cheeks are streaked with a feverish hectic red,
As she gathers the falling leaves, and piles them about her bed.

Autumn is dying, alas! Her bosom is rifled and bare;
Gone is the grain and the fruit, and the flowers out of her hair,
Whilst her faded garment of green is blown about in the lanes,
And her ancient lover, the Sun, looks coldly down on her pains.

Autumn is dying, alas! She lies forlorn and alone;
The little chorusing birds have a broken, unhappy tone
As they fly in a crowd to the hedge when the evening mists arise,
To curtain the bed of death, and shadow the closing eyes.

Autumn is dying, alas! But to-night the silent cloud,
Dropping great tears of rain, will come and make her a shroud,
Winding it this way and that, tenderly round and around,
Then catch her away in its arms from the damp, unwholesome ground.

Autumn is dead, alas! Why alas? All her labor is done,
Perfected, finished, complete, 'neath the wind and the rain and the sun;
All the earth is enriched--the garners of men run o'er;
There is food for man and beast, and the stranger that begs at the door.

Look to thy life, O man! Swiftly approaches the night;
Whatsoever thy hand finds to do, do it with all thy might.
Labor right on to the end: let thy works go forth abroad;
Then turn thy face to the sky, and enter the "joy of thy Lord."

------

{342}

From The Dublin Review.

PROTESTANT PROSELYTISM IN EASTERN LANDS [Footnote 103]

[Footnote 103:
1. The Gospel in Turkey, being "the Tenth and Eleventh Annual
Reports of the Turkish Missions-Aid Society." Published at the
Society's Office, 7 Adam Street, W.C.; at Nisbet's; and Hatchard's,
London. 1864-5

2. The Lebanon: a History and a Diary. By David Urquhart. London;
Newby. 1860.

3. Journal of a Tour in Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Greece. By
James Laird Patterson. M.A. London: Dolman. 1852.

4. Prospectus of "the Syrian Protestant College." Issued by "The
Turkish Missions-Aid Society." London. 1865.]

There are few impartial and well-informed Protestants who will not confess that their missions throughout the world have invariably proved to be utter failures. No matter to what sect or denomination they belong, or from what country or association their funds are derived, Protestant missionaries, as preachers of that gospel about which they speak so much, never have converted, and we believe never will, convert the heathen save by units and driblets, hardly worthy of mention. In India, in Turkey, in Africa, among the South-Sea Islanders, and the Red Indians of America, the result of Protestant missionary labor is the same wherever it has been tried. The people to whom their missionaries are sent may, and often do, become more or less civilized from intercourse with educated men, and often learn from those who wish to teach them higher matters, some of the arts and appliances of European life. Some few certainly embrace what their preachers deem to be Christianity; and occasionally, but very seldom, small communities of nominal Christians are formed by them. But to bring whole regions of the inhabitants to the foot of the cross--to convert whole nations to Christianity--to prove that their converts have embraced a system in which a man must do what is right as well as believe what is true--are triumphs which have hitherto been reserved for the Catholic Church, and for her alone.

But, even humanly speaking--and quite apart from all considerations of the truth as existing only in the ark which our Lord himself built--can we wonder at these results? Are there any who have sojourned in, or even past through the lands where missionaries of both religions work, and have not compared the Catholic priest with the Protestant minister who has come out to preach the gospel in those countries? Take, for instance, and up-country station in British India. Is there a Protestant missionary in the place? If so, he is a man with considerably more than the mere script and staff of apostolic days in his possession. As wealth goes among Englishmen in the East, he is perhaps not rich; but he is nevertheless quite at his ease, and certainly wanting for nothing. He has his comfortable bungalow; his wife and children are with him; the modest one-horse carriage is not wanting for the evening drive of himself and family; nor is the furniture of his house such as any man of moderate means need despise. He has a regular income from the society he represents; and his allowances are generally such as, with a little care, will allow of his living in great comfort. And, finally, if he falls sick, too sick to remain in the country, the means of taking him home again to England or America are forthcoming at a moment's notice. He is generally a good linguist; for having nothing else to do daring six days of the week, he devotes much of his time to the study of the vernacular. {343} He is respected by the European officers of the station; for he is often the only person they ever see in the shape of a clergyman. He is almost always an honest, upright man, with little or no knowledge of the world, and, if possible, less of the natives to whom he is sent to preach. This, however, does not matter; for, except among his own personal servants, he makes no converts, and has but few hearers. There is no positive harm in him, but as little active good. He is a fair sample of a pious-minded Calvinist, but is certainly no missionary, as Catholics understand the word. So far from having given up anything to come out to India, both he, his wife, and his--generally very numerous--offspring are much better off than if he had remained in his native Lanarkshire or Pennsylvania. If he belongs to the Church of England, he is very often a German by birth, and appears to have "taken orders" in the establishment without having for a moment abandoned his own peculiar theological views. Some few Englishmen--literates, hardly ever University men--are to be found here and there, as English Church missionaries; but these are and far between, nor do their labors often show greater results than those of their Presbyterian fellow-laborers. Even Dr. Littledale [Footnote 104] speaks of "_the pitiful history of Anglican missions to the heathen_;" and he might with great truth have extended his verdict to the missions of every other denomination of Protestantism.

[Footnote 104: See The Missionary Aspect of Ritualism, in the Church
and the World. (London: Longmans.)]

In contrast to the Protestant, take the European Catholic missionary in the East, as apart from the native-born priest. He is invariably a volunteer for the work, either a monk or a secular priest, who aspiring to more severe labor in his Master's vineyard, has chosen the hard and rugged path of a preacher of the gospel in pagan lands. As a general rule, you will probably find him living in an humble room in the native bazaar, and depending for his daily bread upon the charity of his flock, or the contributions of any English Catholic officer or civilian who may happen to be in the neighborhood. He is Catholic in his nation as in his creed; for you may find him French, Belgian, Italian, Spanish, Irish, or English. The present writer has met a French nobleman and the son of a wealthy Yorkshire squire laboring and preaching as Jesuit Missionaries to the natives of India and the poor Irish soldiers who form so large a portion of every garrison in that country. Is it, then, to be wondered at if, notwithstanding their superior means and far greater worldly "respectability," the Protestant missionaries do not succeed as ours do; or rather, that whereas our missions are never without fruit, theirs seldom show forth even a few sickly leaves? But the simple fact is, the missionary spirit--or rather the spirit which leads a man, if he believes that duty to God calls him to abandon family, wealth, comfort, health, nay, life itself--never has, and never can be, understood by Protestants, whether climbing the heights of ritualism, or sunk in the depths of Socinianism. Catholics are often angry with Protestants, because the latter are uncharitable respecting monks, priests, and nuns. Catholics are wrong in being angry. Hardly any person who is not a Catholic can understand the spirit which moves men and women to make such sacrifices for the love of God, and counts the loss as so much gain. The very idea of these acts is to him as color to one who has been blind from his birth: he not only cannot understand it, but you cannot explain it to him. This is a truth to which every convert will bear testimony, after his eyes have been opened to the truths of God's one and only Church, and which even few of those who have been Catholic from their youth upward can realize.

But notwithstanding "the pitiful history" of Protestant missions to the heathen, the work of these gentlemen in that direction is not deserving of {344} other sentiment than that of pity. If men will labor in fields where they can bring forth no harvest, and if others will pay them for doing no good, the affair is theirs, not ours. They never can do harm to the Church in those regions, for they achieve neither good nor evil to any one, further than by giving the natives in places where there are no Catholic missionaries a very erroneous idea as to what the duties of a Christian teacher ought to be. Not so, however, in those countries where Protestantism has sent its emissaries to undermine the faith which flourished among the inhabitants centuries before the very name of Protestant was known or heard of. To help such undertakings, "The Turkish Missions-Aid Society" was established and is kept up, and it is to the two reports of that society at the head of the list of works under notice, that we would call the especial attention of Protestants, even more than Catholics, throughout England.

The "Laws and Regulations" of "The Turkish Missions-Aid Society" are divided into nine clauses, and in the second of these we are told that--

"The object of this society is not to originate a new mission, but
to aid existing evangelical missions in the Turkish empire,
especially the American."

What these "evangelicals" missions are, and to whom the "American" missionaries are sent, we shall see presently. As a matter of course, the society is supported by the very cream of "evangelical" Protestantism, having Lord Shaftesbury for its President, Lord Ebury as Vice-President, and Mr. Kinnaird as Treasurer. The subscriptions are very large indeed, and from the "statement" furnished by the report for 1864-65, we find that no less a sum than £24,672 5_s_, has been sent out to the East for "native agencies" alone, since the commencement of the society, now about eleven years ago; this, of course, being all in addition to the very heavy sums and comfortable salaries furnished by the American society, called the Board of Foreign Missions, by which these missions and missionaries are maintained.

It would appear that the "fields" occupied by these American missions are five in number, and the present condition of them is thus summarized in the eleventh, the latest, annual report, now before us:

[Transcriber's note: The column titles are
abbreviated as follows:
MS.--Missionaries
NA.--Native assistance
SAOS.--Stations and Outstations
CH.--Churches
CM.--Church Members
SCH.--Schools
ASA.--Average Sabbath Attendance
SMF.--Scholars male and female]

Fields MS. NA. SAOS. CH. CM. SCH. ASA. SMF.

Western 45 73 45 19 512 37 1569 1615 Turkey

Central 19 54 27 14 998 26 3125 1717 Turkey

Eastern 21 74 50 14 403 51 2201 1889 Turkey

Syrian 24 37 22 8 200 25 650 548

Nestorian 16 81 36 0 529 0 3000 0

Total 125 320 120 55 2642 139 10545 5100

These "missions" have been at work, some more, some less time; but a fair average for the whole would be about twenty-five years. It will be observed that in the five "fields" there are but 2,642 "church members," or what, among Catholics, would be termed communicants. The individuals who come under the head of "Average Sabbath Attendance," can no more be termed Protestant then his grace the duke of Sutherland can be called a Catholic because he was present at the funeral of Cardinal Wiseman. But we will grant, for the sake of argument, that the 2,642 "church members" are earnest, consistent Protestants. If so, and taking into calculation only the funds furnished by the Turkish Missions-Aid Society, as quoted above, these converts I'm not very valuable, for they have only cost something less than ten pounds each. But if to the £24,672 5_s_., we add all that the American Board of Missions has paid in the same period as salaries for missionaries, for "native assistants," for schoolmasters, rents, building of churches, printing, books, and the passage-money of missionaries and their families to and from the East, we shall find that there is not one of these individuals whose conversion has not one way and another cost around three thousand pounds. At this price {345} they ought to be staunch anti-papists, for their religion has been a very high-priced article.

Let us turn for a moment to the second book on the list at the head of this article. No one who has read a line of the well-known Mr. Urquhart's many writings on political questions, will ever accuse him of Catholic tendency on any subject. He is not a bigot, indeed; nor, again, does he ever defendant the past history of Protestantism, for he is too well read to uphold what every honest man, with the knowledge of an ordinary school-boy, must condemn. In oriental matters, moreover, Mr. Urquhart has his peculiar views; but as these have nothing whatever to do with the questions of Protestant and Catholic, missionary or non-missionary, we may fairly accept what he says on the subject as the testimony of an impartial witness. Here, then, is what he writes respecting the Catholic clergy and the sectarian missionaries in Syria and Mount Lebanon:

"The Roman Catholic regular and secular clergy are established here
as in any other Roman Catholic country; that is to say, they are
pastors of flocks, and not missionaries, The Protestants have no
flocks, and _they are sent with a view to creating them_.
TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND POUNDS are yearly subscribed in the United
States for that object, and the missionaries come here having to
justify the salaries they receive."--_The Lebanon_, vol. ii. p. 78.

The italics in the above quotation are our own, and we have thus marked the words in order to draw attention to what every traveller in the East, not that with the "pure gospel" media, has borne testimony. But let us return once more to the "statement" of the five missionary "fields" occupied by the Americans in the East. Mr. Urquhart would never make an assertion like the above without chapter and verse for what he says; and when the writes that TWENTY-FIVE THOUSANDS POUNDS are yearly subscribed in the United States to support their missionaries in the East, we may very safely consider the statement to be true. We cannot, however, suppose that for this enormous sum the missions in Syria only are meant, for then each one of the two hundred "church members" with which that land is blessed would cost a small fortune in himself. But at the same time it is impossible not to allow that he must mean the American missionary establishments in the East generally--the five "fields," of which a "statement" has been copied above, and the total of whose "church members" amounts to 2,642. And even with this calculation it will be seen that every Protestant communicant costs the pretty little _annual_ sum of about £9 10_s_. for his conversion, and subsequent religious instruction. We are given to finding fault, and not unnaturally so, with the cost of the Established Church in Ireland; but what is this when compared with the price of the "Gospel in Turkey"? It is doubtful whether--apart, perhaps, from some other Protestant missionary "field" of which we are yet ignorant--the religious instruction of any people in the known world costs as much. It is as if each ten individuals had a curate entirely to themselves, and each hundred "church members" a very well-paid private Anglican rector of their own. No wonder that we are told the Syrian Protestant converts think highly of their new creed, "the Gospel of Christ," as it is modestly called. In a country where everything is more or less measured by a monetary standard, a convert for whose spiritual well-being £9 10_s_. per annum is paid must believe himself to be in a state of exaltation, considering that had he remained in his own church, his Maronite, Greek, Greek Catholic, or Armenian priest--having to say mass every day, to attend to some one or two thousand parishioners probably scattered over a large district--would consider himself very fortunate indeed if he had a stipend of two thousand piastres a year, or about £20, of which more than half would be paid in corn, oil, or fruits. {346} The fathers of the Jesuit mission in Syria are allowed a thousand francs, £40, for the travelling expenses, clothing, table, etc., of each priest when engaged on missionary work away from the house of his community; how, then, is it that the American missionaries cost so very much more? We will take up our quotation from Mr. Urquhart again, at the point where we left off:

"They (the American missionaries) have town-house and country-house,
horses to ride and an establishment and a table which speaks well
for the taste of the citizens of the United States. These are
results obtained by exertion and combination, and which, affording
enjoyment in their possession, prompt to efforts for their
retention. The persons thus raised to affluence and consideration in
a fine and luxurious climate would have to sink back to hard
conditions of life, if not to want and destitution. This relapse
presents itself as the consequence of failing in the creating of
congregations, or at least of supplying to those who subscribe the
funds plausible grounds for expecting that the consummation was
near. Looking at the country, nothing can be more painful and more
hopeless than the contest: nowhere is an ear open. As to converting
the Turks, they might just as well try to convert the Archbishop of
Canterbury.

* * * * * *

"As to converting the Jews, it would be much better for the United
States to send missionaries to Monmouth-street. There remain, then,
but the Maronite, the Greek, the Greek Catholic, Armenian, and
Nestorian churches, that is to say Christians, to convert. From the
pre-existing animosities among the Christians, the missionaries
could not so much as open their mouths to any of the members of
these communities on the subject of religion, and therefore it is a
totally different course that they have adopted. They have offered
themselves as schoolmasters; not as persons depending for
remuneration on their claims to the confidence of parents, and on
their proficiency; but supplying instruction gratuitously, and
adding thereto remuneration to the scholars in various shapes. Their
admission in this form has been forced upon the people by the
Turkish government. The condition, however, has been appended to it,
that they should not attempt to interfere with the religious belief
of the pupils. This has been going on for years; the money
continuing to be supplied on the grounds that Protestant
congregations are being created, and the proceeds enjoyed by the
missionaries on their undertaking that they shall not create them.

"The statistical under-current is, however, veiled or disguised from
the men (the missionaries) themselves. The one generation has, so to
say, succeeded the other. The new men come out occupied with their
zeal, not caring critically to examine the position in which they
stand, in entering at once on a contest already engaged. They are
filled with contempt for everything around them; and to religious
zeal, itself a sufficiently active impulse, is superadded the
necessity of furnishing reports for public meetings and periodicals
in America--reports which, failing to contain statements proselytes
secured, have at last to supply narratives of contests undertaken
and martyrdom endured."--_The Lebanon_, vol. ii. pp. 79, 80.

Our author has, in the foregoing paragraph, certainly touch most of the weak points of Protestant missionary working. Even a cursory analysis of the reports before thus confirm every word of this quotation from his book. Like every Protestant account of missionary work, the Turkish Missions-Aid Society's Reports are interlarded with scriptural quotations, having always the same significance--that the time for seeing the results of the labor has not yet come, but soon will be; or, as Mr. Urquhart puts it, they supply to those who subscribe the funds, plausible grounds for expecting that the consummation is near.

Some years ago, a grand case of _quasi_ martyrdom was reported that Exeter Hall, and must have been worth much money to the societies who furnish missionary funds for the East, both in England and America. It was the cause of many questions being asked, and much correspondence being furnished, in both Houses of Parliament. Dispatches were written, the Turkish Government threatened, and the life of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, who was then our representative at the Porte, made a burden to him for a time with extra work. The story was that some American Protestant missionaries, when "preaching the Gospel" on Mount Lebanon, were stoned and otherwise ill-treated, being finally turned out of the village in which they resided; some of them being badly wounded. The tale was well told, but, like other histories of the kind, was allowed to the forgotten {347} as soon as it had served its purpose. Here is Mr. Urquhart's version of the affair, gathered as it was in the country itself, is not unlikely to prove the true version of the story:

"The missionaries arriving at Eden (a village not far from the
celebrated cedars of Lebanon, the inhabitants consisting entirely of
Maronite Catholics) entered a house, and disposed themselves to
occupy it. The master of the house told them that he would not and
could not receive them. They persisted, threatening him in the name
of the Turkish authorities. A great commotion ensued, and the
people, with the fear of the Turkish authorities before their eyes,
devised a plan for dislodging the missionaries by unroofing the
house. A roof in the Lebanon is not composed of tiles and rafters;
to touch a roof is a very serious affair, not to be undertaken in
wantonness. The people had the satisfaction of seeing the
missionaries mount and depart without any act on their part which
would expose them to after-retribution."--_The Lebanon_, vol ii. p.
82.

I said before, Mr. Urquhart is one of the very last men who could be accused of any leaning toward Catholicism, still less of any affection toward the native Christian population of Syria and Lebanon. Of this his volumes bear witness in every chapter. But in a dozen instances he proves what we have so often heard asserted by travellers returned from these regions, that the people do not want, and do not wish for, the American missionaries, and would far rather be without them. Also that wherever these Protestant apostles are located, their presence is a continual source of trouble and annoyance, by causing quarrels among the people, and that their sojourn in the land is most certainly not conducive either to the glory of God on high, or of peace on earth to men of good will. That their so-called mission has been a most complete religious _fiasco_, is pretty well proved by the returns which at page 308 we copy from these reports. If the reader will but turn back to it, he will find that with twenty-four missionaries and thirty-seven native assistants, the number of "church members" in the Syrian "field" amounts to no more than two hundred, and this after the Americans have worked as missionaries in this "field" for the last quarter of a century or more. Surely no clearer proof than this is wanting for endorsing what Mr. Urquhart has said above respecting the way and the reason why these religious undertakings are puffed up, and "plausible grounds" given for expecting that the consummation of "gospel" triumph is at hand.

There is, perhaps, no Christian population in the world more united as a body, more attached to their clergy, more faithful in their holding to the See of Peter, or more orthodox in every particle of their faith, than the Maronites of Mount Lebanon. To illustrate, even in the most superficial manner, the history and ritual of this singular people would extend this paper far beyond our limits. Suffice it to say that upward of ONE THOUSAND years before the discovery of America, the holy sacrifice of the mass was offered up in their churches, and matins, lauds, vespers, and complins sung every morning and evening in their sanctuaries, just as at the present day. Their name is derived from that of St. Maroun, a holy hermit, who, in the fourth century, when the heresies of Eutyches and the errors of Monothelism were so common throughout the East, preserved the inhabitants of Lebanon and the adjacent parts from those influences. "The Maronites," says Mgr. Patterson, in his work, which is the third on our list at the head of this paper,--

"The Maronites maintain that they have never swerved from the
Catholic faith, and love to assert that their Patriarch is the only
one whose spiritual lineage from St. Peter, in the see of Antioch,
has been unbroken by the taint of heresy or schism." (P. 389.)

Their secular clergy number about 1,200, and the regulars, inhabiting sixty-seven monasteries, comprise some 1,400 monks, priests, and lay brothers. They have besides fifteen convents, in which there are about 300 nuns.

{348}

"The blessings of education (continues the same author) are widely
diffused among the Maronites. Almost all are able to read and write;
and though few even of the clergy can be called learned, they are
all sufficiently instructed in the most necessary things, and
especially in the practical knowledge of their faith. Offences are
rare among them, crimes almost unknown. The number of the Maronites
of Lebanon appears to be about 250,000. In 1180, William of Tyre
estimated them at more than 40,000; in 1784 Volney placed them at
115,000; and Perrier, in 1840, at 220,000. Elsewhere they are hardly
to be found; the largest number I know of is at Cyprus, where there
are about 1,500. A few also are found at Aleppo and Damascus, and
some at Cyprus.

* * * * *

"There are (among the Maronites of Lebanon) four principal colleges
for the education of the clergy. The most ancient is that of Ain
Warka, in which between thirty and forty pupils are educated. They
are taught Arabic (their vernacular), Syriac, which is the
liturgical language of this rite; logic, moral theology, Italian,
and Latin. Six exhibitions for the maintenance of as many scholars
at the College of Propaganda were attached to this college. At the
time of the first French occupation of Rome, the funds which
provided for them were seized, and have never been restored; but the
pupils still go to Rome, and many of them are to be met with in the
higher ranks of the Maronite clergy." (P. 388.)

It is then to turn this people, and these priests, from the faith which they have so long and so honestly held, and from the spiritual paths in which they have walked for at least fifteen hundred years, that respectable black-coated American gentlemen, whose experience of life has been confined to Boston or New York, are sent over and maintained by the funds furnished by the zealous evangelicals of England and the United States. No wonder if those to whom they come would rather be without them. With the people whom they are sent to "convert" they have not a single idea in common. The very vernacular of the country has to be studied and learnt by them (an undertaking of at least two or three years, as Arabic is perhaps the most difficult language in the world for an adult to acquire a proficiency in), before they can preach or even converse with those whom they wish to teach what they themselves deem, the truths of eternal life. Without the most remote approach to a thing like a ritual, and without even the barest liturgy to recommend them, they come among a people who from very very infancy are perhaps more familiar with the meaning and teaching of earnest ritualism than any nation on earth. Mr. Urquhart, in the quotation we have given elsewhere, says of the American missionaries, that "as to converting the Turks, they might just as well try to convert the Archbishop of Canterbury;" might he not have said the same as to the converting of the Maronites? From the 200 "church members," which the returns of the Turkish Missions-Aid Society state as the result of the "missionary" labor on the Syrian "field" during the quarter of a century and more which the work has been going on, if we deduct the personal servants of the twenty-four missionaries, and of thirty-seven native assistants, how many will then be left as real, true, and earnest converts from their own faith to that which the American missionaries would teach them? "It has to be observed," says Mr. Urquhart, "that the proselytism carried on is not, as is supposed in Europe, against unbelievers, but between Christians;" [Footnote 105] and surely here is proselytism of the kind forced upon a people against their will, by the inhabitants of another far-off country, who would do very much better if they spent their yearly £25,000 among themselves, in "converting" the thousands of worse than pagans to be seen daily in the streets of every great town of England and America, and whose "faith" is from time to time shown in their "works."

[Footnote 105: The Lebanon, vol ii. p.79.]