CHAPTER XIII
BEAUTY FOR ASHES
"You have added a new word to the French language," said M. Sarcey, the famous critic, to the Maréchale; "I mean the word 'Salutiste.'" In 1881 there was not a single Salvationist in France or Switzerland. After fifteen years there were 220 stations and outposts, over 400 officers, headquarters in five cities, and four weekly papers.
But these bare facts only feebly indicate what the Maréchale did for France. In a moment of depression at the thought of French infidelity, the Princess Malzoff once remarked to her—
"The French have no soul."
"How dare you," asked the Maréchale, "say such a thing?"
Her friend replied with charming inconsistency, "But you have found the soul of France!"
That was perhaps the highest tribute ever paid to her.
If one asks some Frenchman who knew the Maréchale in those days how she won the heart of France, one gets the answer, "But it is natural—she has the French temperament; and, besides, elle aime la France." If one asks some convert of hers how she found the soul of France, the reply is, "Ah! she brought us the Christ, who is victorious everywhere." Both questions were answered together by one who, speaking for many, said, "She bought us at the price of tears and sacrifice."
When she was at the zenith of her power in France, an admirable appreciation of her was written[1] by one of the saints of the modern calendar, Miss Frances E. Willard. We extract a few sentences. "She inherits, it is said, beyond any other of the endowed and consecrated eight children of the General and Mrs. Booth, their special gifts, graces, and grace.... The Maréchale's career already fulfils her father's prophecy that women will, if once left free in their action, develop administrative powers fully equal and oftentimes superior to those of men.... 'I love France,' she said to me, with sparkling eyes: 'it is a great and wonderful country, and I love its people every bit as much as ever I loved my own. I have become familiar with its peasants in the provinces; have sat down with the French women who clatter about in sabots; have shared their chestnuts with them, heard of their sorrows as well as their joys, and, believe me, the human heart is just the same in France as it is everywhere; and if you classify the saints whose histories have come down to us, France would occupy the front rank. The nation that has produced a Lacodaire, a Pascal, a Fénelon, and a Madame Guyon, does not lack the germs of spiritual life.'"