ith an artistic border representing objects of
interest in the locality.
Late in the afternoon the steamer landed me at Crosbyside, on the east
shore, about a mile from the head of the lake, resting beneath the shady
groves of which I beheld one of the most charming views of Lake George.
Early the following morning I took up my abode with a farmer, one
William Lockhart, a genial and eccentric gentleman, and a relation of
Sir Walter Scott's son-in-law. Mr. Lockhart's little cottage is half a
mile north of Crosbyside, and near the high bluff which Mr. Charles
O'Conor, the distinguished lawyer of New York city, presented to the
Paulist Fathers, whose establishment is on Fifty-ninth Street in that
metropolis. Here the members of the new Order come to pass their summer
vacations, bringing with them their theological students. The Paulists
are hard workers, visiting and holding "missions" in Minnesota,
California, and other parts of the United States. They seem to feel
forcibly the truth expressed in these lines, which are to be found in
"Aspirations of Nature," a work written by the founder of their order,
Father Hecker: "Existence is not a dream, but a solemn reality. Life was
not given to be thrown away on miserable sophisms, but to be employed in
earnest search after truth."
Mr. Lockhart kindly offered to escort me to the convent of St. Mary's of
the Lake; and after following the mountain road for a quarter of a mile
to the north of the cottage of my companion, we entered the shady
grounds of the convent and were kindly received on the long piazza by
the Father Superior, Rev. A. F. Hewit, who introduced me to several of
his co-laborers, a party of them having just returned from an excursion
to the Harbor Islands at the northern end of the Narrows, which property
is owned by the Order. I was told that the members of this new religious
establishment numbered about thirty, and that all but four were converts
from our Protestant faith. Their property in New York city is probably
worth half a million of dollars, and the Sunday schools under their
charge contain about fifteen hundred scholars. Here, among others, I saw
Father D----, who gave up his distinguished position as instructor of
the art of war at the Military Academy of West Point, to become a
soldier of the Cross, preferring to serve his Master by preaching the
gospel of peace to mankind. Under an overhanging rock at a little
distance were conversing, most happily,
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