A Book of Quaker Saints

by L. V. Hodgkin

Stephen was in the grip of this mood now. Happily he had wrestled with the same sort of temptation many times before. He knew it of old; he knew, too, that the best way to meet it is to face this giant Reaction boldly, as Christian faced Apollyon, to wrestle with it and so to overcome. He went straight out of the door to where the mug was lying, and took up that mug, that cracked mug, in his hands, more reverently than if it had been a vase of the most precious and fragile porcelain. He took it up, and accepted it, this thing he hated worst of all. If life had led him only to a cracked mug, at least he would accept that mug and use it as best he could. Carrying it in his hands, he walked to the little stream whose gentle murmur came through the tall grasses close at hand. There he knelt down, cleansed the mug carefully, filled it with water, and putting it to his lips, he drank a long refreshing draught. In his pocket he found a crust of bread. He took it out, broke it in two pieces, and then drank again. Only a piece of dry bread! Only a drink of cold water in a cracked cup! No meal could be simpler. Yet Stephen ate and drank with a kind of awe, enfolded in a sustaining, life-giving Presence. He knew that he was not alone; he knew that Another was with him, feeding and refreshing his inmost soul, as he drank of the clear, cold water and ate the broken bread.

A wonderful peace and gladness fell upon his spirit as he knelt in the sunny air. The silence of the great forest was itself a song of praise. He rode homewards like a man in a dream. Day after day as he journeyed, the brooding peace grew and deepened. Even the forest pathways looked different as he travelled through them on his homeward way. They had been full of trustful obedience before. They were filled with thankfulness now. But the deepest thankfulness was in Stephen's own heart.

Is that the end of the story? For many years that was the end. Stephen never forgot his mysterious journey into the backwoods. He often wondered why the Voice had sent him there. Nevertheless he knew, for certain and past all doubting, that he had done right to go. Perhaps gradually the memory faded a little and became dim....

Anyway nothing was further from his thoughts than the lonely backwoods of America one afternoon, years after, when on one of his journeys in Europe his business led him across London Bridge. The Bridge was crowded with traffic. Everyone was bustling to and fro, intent on his own business or pleasure. Not many people had leisure to notice one slight figure distinguished by a foreign air of courtliness and grace, in spite of the stiff, severe lines of its Quaker hat and coat. Not many people, even if they had noticed the earnest face under the broad-brimmed hat, would have stopped to gaze a second time upon it that busy afternoon. Not many people. But one man did.

As Stephen was hastening across the crowded Bridge, suddenly he felt himself seized roughly by the shoulders, and he heard a gruff voice exclaiming: 'There you are! I have found you at last, have I?'

Deep down inside Stephen Grellet, the Quaker preacher, there still remained a few traces of the fastidious French noble, Etienne de Grellet. The traces had been buried deep down by this time, but there they still were. They leapt suddenly to light, that busy afternoon on London Bridge. Neither French nobleman nor Quaker preacher liked to be seized in such unceremonious fashion. 'Friend,' he remonstrated, drawing himself gently away, 'I think that thou art mistaken.'

'No, I am not,' rejoined the other, his grip tighter than ever. 'When you have sought a man over the face of the globe year after year, you don't make a mistake when you find him at last. Not you! Not me either! I'm not mistaken, and I don't let you go now I've found you after all these years, with your same little dapper, black, cut-away coat, that I thought so queer; and your broad-brimmed hat that I well remember. Never heard a man preach with his hat on before!'

'Hast thou heard me preach, Friend? Why then didst thou not speak to me afterwards if thou wished?'

'But I didn't wish!' answered the stranger, 'nothing I wished for less!'

'Where was it?' enquired Stephen.