He misunderstood this too at first; but when month after month passed, and he heard no more of her marriage, and she came to Gouda comparatively cheerful, and was even civil to Father Ambrose, a mild benevolent monk from the Dominican convent hard by—then he understood her; and one day he invited her to walk alone with him in the sacred paddock: and before I relate what passed between them, I must give its history. When Gerard had been four or five days at the manse looking out of window, he uttered an exclamation of joy. "Mother, Margaret, here is one of my birds: another, another; four, six, nine. A miracle! a miracle!"
"Why, how can you tell your birds from their fellows?" said Catherine.
"I know every feather in their wings. And see: there is the little darling whose beak I gilt, bless it!"
And presently his rapture took a serious turn, and he saw Heaven's approbation in this conduct of the birds as he did in the fall of the cave. This wonderfully kept alive his friendship for animals: and he enclosed a paddock, and drove all the sons of Cain from it with threats of excommunication. "On this little spot of earth we'll have no murder," said he. He tamed leverets and partridges, and little birds, and hares, and roe-deer. He found a squirrel with a broken leg; he set it with infinite difficulty and patience: and during the cure showed it repositories of acorns, nuts, chestnuts, &c. And this squirrel got well and went off, but visited him in hard weather, and brought a mate, and next year little squirrels were found to have imbibed their parents' sentiments: and of all these animals each generation was tamer than the last. This set the good parson thinking, and gave him the true clue to the great successes of mediæval hermits in taming wild animals.
He kept the key of this paddock, and never let any man but himself enter it: nor would he even let little Gerard go there without him or Margaret. "Children are all little Cains," said he.
In this oasis then he spoke to Margaret, and said, "Dear Margaret, I have thought more than ever of thee of late, and have asked myself why I am content, and thou unhappy."
"Because thou art better, wiser, holier, than I; that is all," said Margaret, promptly.
"Our lives tell another tale," said Gerard, thoughtfully. "I know thy goodness and thy wisdom too well to reason thus perversely. Also I know that I love thee as dear as thou, I think, lovest me. Yet am I happier than thou. Why is this so?"
"Dear Gerard, I am as happy as a woman can hope to be this side the grave."
"Not so happy as I. Now for the reason. First then I am a priest, and this, the one great trial and disappointment God giveth me along with so many joys, why I share it with a multitude. For alas! I am not the only priest by thousands that must never hope for entire earthly happiness. Here then thy lot is harder than mine."