Sacrament. The other day when the "King
Harry" was sunk by the "Trafalgar," the people here subscribed I
forget how many pounds for the widows and children of the
bluejackets and marines of the Mission who were drowned, and when
it was finished and the subscription list was closed, they
subscribed all over again to erect an altar at which to say Masses
for the dead. And the old women living in Father Rowley's free
houses that were once brothels gave up their summer outing so that
the money spent on them might be added to the fund. When the Bishop
of Silchester came here last week for Confirmation he asked Father
Rowley what that altar was.

"That is the ugliest thing I've ever seen," he said. But when
Father Rowley told him about the poor people and the old women who
had no money of their own, he said: "That is the most beautiful
thing I've ever heard."

I am beginning to write as if it was necessary to convince you of
the necessity of making the Blessed Sacrament the central feature
of the religious life to-day and for ever until the end of the
world. But, I know you won't think I'm doing anything of the kind,
for really I am only trying to show you how much my faith has been
strengthened and how much my outlook has deepened and how much more
than ever I long to be a priest to be able to give poor people
Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament.

Your ever affectionate

Mark.

CHAPTER XVII

THE DRUNKEN PRIEST

Gradually, Mark found to his pleasure and his pride that he was
becoming, if not indispensable to Father Rowley (the Missioner found no
human being indispensable) at any rate quite evidently useful. Perhaps
Father Rowley though that in allowing himself to rely considerably upon
Mark's secretarial talent he was indulging himself in a luxury to which
he was not entitled. That was Father Rowley's way. The moment he
discovered himself enjoying anything too much, whether it was a cigar or
a secretary, he cut himself off from it, and this not in any spirit of
mortification for mortification's sake, but because he dreaded the
possibility of putting the slightest drag upon his freedom to criticize
others. He had no doubt at all in his own mind that he was perfectly
justified in making use of Mark's intelligence and energy. But in a
place like the Mission House, where everybody from lay hel