his First Communion and he has sent me
some of his recollections:

It certainly did not take long to prepare him for he evidently knew
as much as I could tell him. Nevertheless, he said I was to treat him
as I would any child whom I was teaching. This, knowing the man whom
I was instructing, for I had at the time carefully waded through his
Orthodoxy twice, was, indeed, an undertaking of magnitude. However, I
went through the catechism (he was importunate that I should use it
as he said all the children made use of it), very meticulously
explaining all the details, to which he lent a most vigilant and
unswerving attention. For instance, he wanted me to explain the
reason of the drop of water being put into the wine at the preparing
of the chalice for the Holy Sacrifice.

Father Walker describes Gilbert opening a bazaar and spending
lavishly at every stall, afterwards being photographed in his
company. Father Walker himself weighed 245 lbs., and the caption was
"Giants in the Faith." On his departure, Gilbert presided at the
farewell meeting and made a speech which, says Father Walker, "gave
me no end of delight." Father (now Monsignor) Smith became the first
rector of Beaconsfield as a separate parish. The Chestertons loved
the little church there which later became Gilbert's memorial and to
which, among other things, they gave a very beautiful statue of Our
Lady. But when it had first been dedicated there had been for both
Frances and Gilbert a deep disappointment. Curiously enough, neither
of them had any devotion to the Little Flower who was chosen as
Patron: they had hoped for a dedication to the English Martyrs. Later
Gilbert used to tell Dorothy, who loved St. Therese, that he could
not care for her, "with all apologies to you, Dorothy."

He did not go often to Confession, Dorothy says, but when he did go
you could hear him all over the church. Getting up in the morning was
always a fearful effort to him, and starting for early Mass he would
say to her, "what but religion would bring us to such an evil pass!"

Meanwhile the books went on. In 1926 appeared _The Outline of Sanity,
The Catholic Church and Conversion_, chiefly concerned with his own
mental history, _The Incredulity of Father Brown_ and _The Queen of
Seven Swords_. In 1927 for the first time his scattered poems were
brought into the volume of _Collected Poems_.

St. Augustine asks whether we can praise God before