LEARNT FROM LIPU

New Zealand Tablet, 10 December 1908, Page 5

LEARNT FROM LIPU

On the wide verandah of a big house in the foreign quarter of one of the Chinese towns, a child lay in a hammock overlooking the kitchen garden, in which a Chinaman was working. The boy was English, and, judging from his small, frail body, did not appear to be more than seven or eight years old j but the prematurely aged face might have claimed more than twice that age, though he really numbered more than ten years. Books and newspapers lay on the table before him, but he did not heed them; he lay quite still, watching the gardener at work amongst the vegetables. After a time the man approached the hammock, and in passing by he smiled and saluted its little inmate. ' Come here, Lipu,' said the boy, ' please pull me up and turn me so that I can see you working on the other side of the garden.' The man put down his tools and very gently complied with the child's request. Little Hubert Hurst was a cripple ; as the man bent over him, he put his arms round his neck to help himself into the desired position. • I like you, Lipu,' he said, as he did so. ' I wish you had to carry me about instead of A-tching. He is kind, too, but there is a horrid feel about him. Why is it you are different ?' Lipu gazed down pityingly at the boy before answering, and when he spoke it was in curious 'pigeon EngHsu* 'I am always happy, little master/ he said, 'for in my heart I have a great gift.' ' Dear Lipu,' returned the child, < do tell me what your secret is. I have seen the other men point atvyou and chatter together, and I have been afraid that my father was going to send you away. You have been here a shorter time than any of them, yet I like you best of all ' ' Little master,' replied Lipu, < I am happy because I am a Christian; not a Christian like the lady your mother but a Christian of Christ.' '

By this Lipu meant that he was a Catholic. He had answered the question put to him and volunteered no more information. But the boy was not satisfied. ' Tell me more,' he cried. ' Tell me how being a Christian of Christ makes you happy. Would it make me happy, do you think?' he added longingly. Hubert had been born in. China, and although his parents were comfortably off, he had never been to England. His father's business kept him always in Hongkong, and going home was talked of as a pleasure to come, when years of money-making justified such an expenditure. There had once been a question of sending Hubert back, in the hope that some treatment in a London hospital would cure, or even relieve, him; but the doctors in the naval hospital at Hongkong and tlie newcomers who came with the fleet agreed that nothing could be done to prolong the boy's life. He could not live to manhood, and they advised his parents to keep him with them, and to make his short life happy. So Hubert had lived for ten years in this far-off Chinese town, kindly treated and well cared for. He was taught to read by his mother, but neither she nor his father had ever spoken to him about religion. Mrs. Hurst was nominally a Protestant. Her husband had once been a Catholic, but a life spent hundreds of miles from any priest who could have understood him, had he gone to confession, had led on his part also to complete indifference. The boy had been christened by a Presbyterian missionary, who had happened to pass through the town when he was about two years old; but until Lipu began to speak to him of Catholic belief, he had been absolutely ignorant of anything spiritual, except that there was a Supreme Being in heaven. He was naturally gifted with an unusually sweet disposition, and schooled himself to be brave and patient, because any pining or show of distress on his part grieved his parents. But this conversation with the Chinese gardener was the first of many, and from Lipu Hubert learned a higher, nobler reason for patience and long-suffering. At first the Chinese had spoken of the goodness of God and the mercy that His love for us made Him show. Then he told of the passion and sufferings of Jesus Christ, and it -ivas this recital that Hubert liked best of all to hear. He told his parents that Lipu had been taught beautiful things by the Catholic Sisters at Ning-Po, where he had worked before coming into Mr. Hurt's service. Seeing the boy happy with his new friend they told Lipu to look after him when he was in the garden, thus setting his own attendant A-tching, free to do other work, at the same time easing Lipu's conscience, for though he loved to speak of all the missionaries had told him, he feared to neglect the tasks he was paid to perform. All through the summer months this strange course of instruction wont on, till Hubert knew as much Christian doctrine as his teacher could impart. He had learned all the prayers that the nuns had taught in their classes and he began to repeat them morning and night, as Lipa told him he did himself. The first time that his mother saw his little wasted hands joined, his blue eyes raised to heaven, and a look of more perfect happiness on his features than she had ever seen on them before, her heart smote her at not having taught him herself; and even though the 'Hail Mary' followed « Our Father ' from his lips, she did not check or chide him for what she could see gave him so pure a joy. As the autumn drew near .the boy seemed to grow weaker. Lipu sometimes thought he saw a fore-glimpse of heaven m the innocent, patient eyes, but his parents noticed no change in him, and though they knew the flickering, feeble light must soon pass out of their sight forever it came as a shock to Mr. Hurst when Hubert spoke to him one evening of his approaching death. They had been talking of his eleventh birthday, which was soon to be celebrated, and Hubert had spoken in tones of heartfelt longing. ' Oh, I hope— l do hope I shall live till then.' Mr. Hurst turned quickly towards his son. 'Why do you say that, Hubert?' he asked. 'Do you feel ill? Worse? Why do you think of— of leaving us? ' ' Don't, father, dear! ' replied the boy, laying his little hot hand on his father's cheek as he bent over him and scanned the thin, white face on the scarcely more white

pillow. 'You know I must die; I know it's very -wrong, but I. am frightened to go so far away from you, because 1 don't know anyone in heaven, and Lipu says when boys are eleven they make their First Communion; and then, if Jesus had come to me once I could tell Him about being frightened, and He would perhaps have an angel waiting for me, when I have to go, to take me to Him.' 1 Who told you all this ? ' asked Mr. Hurst in a choked voice. ' Lipu told me part, and I think the rest myself,' was the reply. ' Lipu has been asking and asking when a priest was coming down this way who could understand English, for me to make my first Confession and then perhaps he would let me make my First Communion, too. But there doesn't seem to be any priests who can talk English in this province at all. The nuns sent word to Lip a that they would try and find one, or if I got worse before they succeeded they would ask their own chaplain to come; and so I am learning the Chinese names for my sins from Lipu, because, although their priest knows Chinese well, he is a Frenchman.' What were Mr. Hurst's feelings as he listened to his son ? Did he think of the advantages of his own childhood and how little he had profited by them? Did he wonder how the child had learnt so much of heavenly things in spite of his father's indifference? Did he think that, unless he repented of this indifference and what it had led to, the parting that now loomed before him would le eternal? ' Father ' — the boy's voice was cager — will you try, too? If you promise to find an English priest for me it will be all right, because you always keep your promises.' And with bowed head Mr. Hurst promised that if by any possibility a priest could be heard of the boy should have his dying wish. After this, when their eyes opened to the change, every day seemed to bring some new reminder of the coming loss to Mr. and Mrs. Hurst. They spoke often and openly of his great wish, and every evening his father had to repeat to him how he had written everywhere he could think of, asking for an English-speaking priest, yet so far with no result; and it went to the man's heart to see the little son turn to the Chinese Lipu for comfort in his disappointment. At last the day came when Hubert could wait no longer. A few weeks at most would pass and then even if Jesus Christ had aiot come into his heart on earth, he would have to stand before Him in a better land. A message was sent to Ning-Po, and ten days later a travelling French priest arrived. Mr. Hurst greeted him in Chinese, but the dialects they each knew were not exactly the same, and they could understand each other only imperfectly. To Lipu, therefore, fell the task of explanation, and Hubert's eyes proved the truth of the Chinaman's story. With Lipu's help the priest learned that the child was sufficiently instructed, and with some difficulty they got through with the simple confession that the boy had prepared with his faithful attendant's help. Now that "the priest had come Hubert realised more than ever how much ho longed to hear what he had learned confirmed and filled in by one of his own people. Not that a shadow' of doubt ever crossed his mind ; it was only the natural wish of the human heart, and especially of the heart of childhood, to unburden itself. So many little things came to his mind that he would have asked a priest in English; so much help could such a one have given him by calming his fears and saying prayers that he could understand. But it was not to be. This little cripple child was to # pass away through the grim portals of deaLh without ever having heard an English tongue speak to him of what lay on the other side. He had much, much to thank God for, so he told himself in his quaint, old-fashioned way. Lipu never left his side, and the priest was to say Mass in his room on the morrow, the first and last Mass he would ever assist at; and, above all and beyond all else, he had told Lipu to tell the boy to prepare for the Divine Guest Who was coming to him, for at that Mass he was to receive his First Communion. ' All through the night his parents never left him, and Lipu, too, knelt by his bedside and prayed. Then with the earliest light of morning the priest returned, and Mr. Hurst, for the first time for years, heard the prayers of the Mass, once bo familiar but long since forgotten,

Death was very near. It was as though some more powerful hand were holding back the angel's sword until the child had received his heart's desire". The room was still. ' The priest concluded Mass almost in a whisper.. That which was passing in the heart of the dying child was too sacred a thing for any earthly sound to disturb. The little face from which the parents could not turn their eyes was already the face of an angel. Strangely enough, even whilst learning the truths of the Catholic Faith, Hubert had never wondered at his parents' want of religion. Perhaps he thought they said their own prayers just as Lipu did, and that it was only an accidental thing that they had not spoken to him of them; children are often curiously unquestioning, and the possibility of anyone knowing God without loving Him and wishing to serve Him never struck the boy. Now, however, a deeper understanding had come to him. Jesus, Who loves sinners even as He loves the innocent hearts (if children, showed the child that there was something great, impassable, that divided him from his parents. Lipu, who had also received Holy Communion with joy and thanksgiving at so unexpected an opportunity, was nearer, far nearer, to the dying boy and his Divine Guest than his own father and mother. ' Father ' — his voice -was low and weak — ' I am not frightened now. Jesus will take care of me! lam sad because no English priest has come.' ' But, darling, you have Father Pierre ! See, he is coming to you now,' for the priest, after unvesting, was returning to give anotlier sacrament, that of Extreme Unction, to the child. ' He is kind and good,' whispered Hubert, 'and he has made me happier than I ever was before. I know it is ungrateful of me to wish for a priest I could talk to, only it's not for myself I want him now, because I have Jesus. Oh, father ! oh, mother dear ! it is for you .' The little voice faltered and then ceased, but the parents imderstood. They saw the yawning chasm that divided them from their child, and it was the most bitter moment of their lives. Mrs. Hurst reproached herself for having drifted away from God and from the forms which in her youth she had been taught to follow; but what were her feelings compared with those of her husband, who had abandoned a religion that he knew to be true, who liad thrown aside the gift of faith that God had given him. He knelt beside the priest who had heard his son's confession in Chinese but he was as far from a possibility of obtaining the declaration of forgiveness for his sins as though the whole of that gigantic country stretched between them. Feebly the child stretched out his hand, but it was toward Lipu that it strayed. It was only an instinctive movement, yet to his 1 parents it was the seal upon eternal parting. Hubert, Lipu, and the priest were one in the fold of Christ. The day grew on, the sunshine brightened the room; but the shadow of death was on the innocent young features. Hubert's eyes had long been closed, though now and again his lips moved in prayer. Then all at once he looked at his parents, and his gaze lingered for a moment on his father's face. 'You promised!' he said, quite distinctly, and Mr. Hurst understood what the words meant. He had promised to look for an English-speaking priest for his son, and though the boy needed one no longer, he- claimed the promise still; but now it was for his parents that he asked for the fulfilment. And knowing this, reading what was written under the anguish of his wife's face, Mr. Hurst answered the boy in firm tones, 'We promise, Hubert !' — The Magnificat.