THE LITTLE CHAPEL AT MONAMULLIN.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XII, Issue 10, 27 June 1884, Page 5

THE LITTLE CHAPEL AT MONAMULLIN.

■ ' J ,fj .BT NCQBNT ROBINSON. [From "Abba's Dream and other Stories": Catholic Publication Society.] Father Maurice felt as if he bad a white-robed angel by his side, and reveled in the absorbing narrative until the phaeton stopped at the cottage gate. The pony duly stabled, and, while the priest set forth to attend to a sick call, Miss Jyvecote proceeded to the chapel, where ehe encountered his artist guest. Brown started, despite himself, when Father Maurice mentioned her name. 11 A parishioner of mine, Mr. Brown." " I—l saw you in the church just now," muttered the artist It san awfully seedy— l mean it's a very quiet little place." " I could pray more fervently in a church like that than in the Madeleine," she replied, in a soft 6ilvery voice. " The Madeleine is too rowy, too many chairs creaking, too many swells, and all that sort of thing, you know." Insensibly the drawl of society had come upon him, and the slanginess of expression which passes current in Mayfair and Belgravia. " Miss Jyvecote is going to brighten me up, Mr. Brown : she is going to work me an altar-cloth," exclaimed the delighted priest. "And I am going to paint you an altar picture, a copy of Raphael's Virgin and Child— that is. if you will kindly accept it/ he added, blushing to the roots of his hair. " Oh I how charming, how generous," cried Miss Jyvecote «My dear Mr. Brown," said Father Maurice, crossing the room and- taking his guest by the hand, "I am deeply, deeply sensible of the kindly, the noble spirit which actuates you to make this offer • but you are a young man, with a grand future before you, with God's help, and by and by, when you have leisure, perhaps you will get a Btiff letter from me calling on you to fulfil your promise. You'll find me a very tough customer to deal with, I assure you." '•He thinks I cannot afford it," said Brown to himself- "and how delicately he has refused me !" The entrance of Mrs. Clancy with a smoking dish of salmon cutlets turned the tide of the conversation, and in a few moments the artist found himself with Miss Jyvecote discussing the Royal Academy pictures of the last season, glorifying Millais, extoline Holman Hunt, raving over Leslie and Herbert, and ringing the changes over the pearly grays, changeful opals, amaranths, and primrose ot Leighton. From London to the salon is easy transition, and from thence to the galleries of Dresden* Munich and Florence. She had visited all, and to a purpose. He had lingered within their enchanting walls until every canvas became more or less a friend. There was a wonderful charm in their meeting. To Brown Miss Jyvecote was a listener freshly intelligent, naively sensible To her the clever critiques of this high-bred yet humble artist savored of a romance writteu but unreal. It is scarcely necessary to say that when people drop thus upon a subject so charming, so inexhaustible, so refreshing, the old Scytheman is utterly disregarded, and the sun was already sinking towards the west when. Mies Jyvecote's phaeton came to the gate. , * " Have you any of your sketches here, Mr. Brown ?" she asked as she drew on her yellow dogskin driving«gloves. " Only a few that I dashed off on my walk hither from Castlebar. They were glorious little bits of weather-worn granite, brilliant with gray, green, and ©range lichens ; luminous green seas and black rocks basking in the sunlight ; fern-crowned inlets and cliffs glittering with bright wild flowers. She gashed over them. What girl does not gush over tbe sketches of a tall, handsome, earnest artist? "Ohl If I might dare to ask' you for one of them, Mr Brown " " Take all," he eaid. She would not hear of this. "They are your working-drawings, Mr. Brown?" selecting one, possibly the least valuable. ' " Will you not require an escort, Miss Jyvecote, on your lonely « Escort ! No. In the first place, I shall probably not meet a human being ; and, in the next, I should only meet a friend were I to encounter anyone.. I fear my prolonged visit has spoiled your work for to-day, Mr. Brown." J "My work I You will hardly guess what lam pledged to do and the work lam about to commence. It is nothing less than a copy of the picture of Daniel O'Connell which hangs over the mantelpiece. It is for Mm. Clancy, who is to adorn her kitchen walls with it* " Surely you are not in earnest ?" "ffilas! lam always in earnest, and so is Mrs. Clancy "he added, laughingly narrating that worthy lady's anxiety with reference to the artistic adornment of the back door. "May we not hope to have the pleasure of seeing you at Moynalty ? Father Maurice has promised us a visit. lam sure my father will call and—" J •• Pray do not trouble him. 1 never visit, and, as my stay here is only one of sufferance, I know not the moment I may be evicted by my ruthless landlord." J '• You should make an exception in our favor, Mr. Brown We can show you a Claude, a doubtful Murillo, and a charming Meissonier Our flowers, too, are worth coming to see— that is, they are wonderful •for Connemara. Father Maurice, you must ask Mr. Brown to como over with you on Monday." "°f course, my dear child, of course. He'll be enchanted with the castle. You 11 come, of course, Mr. Brown ?" turning to our hero who, however, remained silent, although brimming over with words he dared not speak. ( " Th ; e . I \ it ' 8 «* ™ oir > messieurs .'" gaily exclaimed Miss Jyvecote, as ahe whirled rapidly away. ' '

It would hare surprised some of the artist's London friends conld they have peeped behind the scenes of histhoughts and gazed ftt them as naturalists do at working bees. It would have astonished them to hear him matter as he watched the receding vehicle : " This is just the one fresh, fair, unspotted and perfect girl it has been my lot to meet. Such a girl as this would ciuse the worst of us to turn virtuous and eschew cakes and ale." Mr. Brown had confided in one man ere dropping out of Vanity Fair. To this individual he now addressed himself, requesting of him to drop down to O'Connor's, the swell ecclesiastical stainedglass man in Berners place, Oxford street, and order a set of Stations of the Cross. You don't know what they mean, old fellow, but the O Connors will understand you. Let them be drat class and glowing in the reds, yellows, blues and greens of the new French school of colors. I don't mind the price. Above all things let them have especially handsome frames of the: Via Bolorota pattern." The letter went on to tell Mr. Dudley Poynter of his doings and the calm throb of the heart of his daily life. •• There is not much champagne in it, Dudley, but there is a body that ne'er vras dreamed of in your philosophy, or in that of the wild, mad wags of the smoking room ehgne." s Mr. Brown completed his copy of the Liberator, to the intense admiration of Father Maurice and the ecstasy of Mrs. Clancy. The worthy priest would notfper mit of its being hung in th<3 kitchen.though , but gave it the place of honor in the snug little sitting-room. It is needless to say that the entire population of Monamnllin, including the cabin curs — who were now on" terms of the closest intimacy with the artist—turned in after last Mass to have a look at the •• picther o1o 1 Dan." * "Be me conscience! but it's Dan himself— sorra wan else," cried one. "I was at Tara, an' it's just as if he was givin' Drizzleyeye [ Disraeli J that welt about his notorious ancesthor, the impinitent thief on the crass," observed another. " Fair, it's alive, it is. Look at the mouth, reddy for to say * Repale.' " « J " There's an eye 1" " Throe for ye ; there's more fire in it than in ould Finnegan's chimbly this minit." " Troth, it's as dhroll as a pet pup's " " Stan' out o' that, Mr. O'Leary, or yell get a orack ay his fist." " I hree cheers for the painther, boya ! " These and kindred comments flung a radiated pleasure into the inner heart of the artist— that sanctum which as yet was green and fresh and limpid— while the eulogies, however quaintly and coarsely served up. bore the delicious fragrance which praise ever carries with it like a subtle perfume. Mr. Biown was enamoured of his new existence— possibly with the child passion for toyland, but the passioa endured, nevertheless, strengthening with each successive sunrise and maturing with every gloaming. An invitation, accompanied by a card, had arrived by special messenger for the artist, requesting the favour of his company, et eastern, et catera, to which that gentleman responded in a polite negative, assigning no particular reason, but indulging in vague generalities. He had thought a good deal of Miss Jyvecote, and sat dreaming about her at the sea, his hands clasped around his knees and his beloved meerschaum stuck in his mouth— sat dreaming, and %hting against his dreams— fights in which fancy ever got the uppermost of the rade and real. A longing crept up out of the depths of his heart to see her once again, and to travel in the sunlighted path of her thoughts. One thing he was firmly resolved upon— not to leave Monamullin without another interview ; though how this was to be brougut about he did not very well see. Yes, he would see her. just once more, and then 6tamp the whole thing out of his mind He had been hit before, and h*d come smilingly bat of the valley of desolation, and co he should again, although this was so utterly unlike his former experiences. Father Maurice was charmed with his guest. He had never encountered anything like him— so bright, sj genial, so cultured, so humble and submissive, and so anxious to oblige. " Imagine," said he, in cataloguing his virtues to Larry Muldoon — " imagine bis asking me to let him ring the bell fjr five o'clock Mass, and he a Protestant ! " The priest and his guest had long talks together, the latter drawing out his host— digging for the golden ore of a charming erudition which lay so deep, but which "was all there." Night after night did Father Maurice unfold from germ to bud, from bud to flower, from flower to fruit the grand truths of the unerring Faith in which he wbb a day-labourer, the young artist drinking in the sublime teachings with that sublime attention which descends like an aureole. Father Maurice was, as it were, but engaged in thinking aloud, yet his thoughts fell like rain-dropa, refreshing, grateful and abiding. The good priest, although burning with curiosity with regard to the antecedents of his guest, was too thorough a gentleman, had too great respect for the laws of broken bread and tasted salt, to ask bo much as a single question. A waif from tbe great ocean of humanity had drifted into this little haven, and it should be protected until the ruthless current would again seize it to whirl it outwards and onwards. Miss Jyvecote betraye-i her disappointment in various artless ways when Father Maurice arrived at the castle without the artist. I'm sorry you didn't fetch him along lon gri mat gre, father," said Mrs. Jyvecote, "as papa goes to Yorkshire next week, and Juey can talk o£ no person but Mr. Brown." Miss Jyvecote blushed rosy red as she exclaimed : •' What nonsesense, mamma 1 You have been speaking a good deal more about than I have. You rave over his sketch." '• I think it immense." Mrs. Jyvecote affected art, and talked from the pages of the Art Journal by the yard. •' His aerial perspective is full of filmy tone, and his near foreground is admirably run in, while his sense of colour would appear to me to be supreme." (2b "be continued.')