"I wish I could believe in thy legends and thy saints' gear; it would verily be a comfortable disposition of my thoughts in all extremity to have a hope of a special interference."
"And why not?" said Bridget, who confessed thrice a-year, and knew the marvellous histories of a dozen saints by rote.
"Because," said her mistress, "I did not imbibe thy faith with my mother's milk as thou hast done. 'Tis part of thy very nature, wench; and thou couldst not but act in conformity thereto."
"There have we the better of our birthright. But, nevertheless, those who repent and turn to the true faith have the same privileges; yet it is hard, as well it may be, to bend their stubborn nature to this belief. How comfortable to have one's sins struck from the calendar, and to know that we are holy again as a little child, besides ailments of the body innumerable that are cured whenever we can bring our faith to its full exercise!"
"Well, Bridget, if I were a good Catholic as now I am an unbeliever and heretic, dost think that St Somebody, or whoever I might take a fancy to for the purpose, would be propitiated by a few prayers and genuflexions, and restore me to health and—and"——
She faltered in her speech; the banter died away on her lips; memory gave a sudden twinge, and her heart grew dark under the dim cloud that was passing over.
"I'd answer for it, if you were a good Catholic, that Father O'Leary would cure you as readily as he did Davy Dean's sow, that went mad, and bit her master."
"But seeing that I am neither a good Catholic nor even Davy Dean's sow, is there a saint in the whole calendar would think it worth while to work a miracle on such a wicked unbeliever as I am?"
"There's one way, as I've heard tell; that if ye take a sprig of St John's wort, and say three credos over it and a paternoster, and lay it under your pillow, you shall dream of the remedy by which a cure may be wrought."
Ellen did not immediately reply to this suggestion, for she thought that no special revelation was needed to point out a remedy.