“I am a little doubtful of the promises of Apostles and Elders,” I said; “and I remember, Mary, when you used to agree with me.”
“I know I did,” she answered; “but Brother Shrewsbury has shown me how wrong I was—I never doubt now. But I think you have a wrong notion about this hand-cart scheme. It is not an ordinary plan such as any man might have made. God Himself revealed this plan to Brigham, and in fact we call it ‘the divine plan’ in our songs. Oh, you should hear our songs! They’re a little rough, but the singing is so earnest and the voices of the men and girls blend so well together, that I know you’d like them. There’s only one thing that I don’t like about this plan, and that I daresay is all right if only I knew it.”
“I think, Mary,” I said, “I could tell you a good deal that you wouldn’t like if you knew it.”
“No, dear,” she replied hastily, as if afraid to hear me, “don’t tell me unpleasant matters. I’ll tell you all I meant. The Prophet and Heber C. Kimball, and Jedediah Grant, counselled the richer emigrants to give as much as they could—all their property, if they had faith enough—to help the poor brethren to emigrate; but the American Elders had private instructions—so Brother Shrewsbury told me—to use the money to help out all the unmarried girls who are willing to go. I confess that this troubled me not a little; but my husband says that when we get to Zion we shall find all will be right, and of course I believe him.”
Mary’s conversation puzzled me a good deal at the time. She had formerly been so clear-sighted and so unbiassed by prejudice, and now she seemed ready to believe anything. All her husband’s enthusiasm was now her own; she saw with his eyes, and in the intensity of her love for him she believed all that he accepted as true. Long after, when I thought of that short interview, I called to mind her impulsive earnestness, and I felt that a secret misgiving, unconsciously to herself, was partly the cause of it. Unknown to herself her excess of zeal was the offspring of doubt.
Life in the future was in anticipation to my poor friend one long day of hope and happiness. She could not see the shadow of a cloud—no coming sorrow darkened her way. Zion, to her excited imagination, was the abode of peace, and sanctity, and unchanging joy.
I asked her whether the Saints in England had heard any of those strange reports about Brigham Young defying the Government, which had attracted so much attention in this country.
“Certainly,” she said; “it is because the day is so very near when all intercourse between God’s people and the Gentile world shall be cut off for ever that these great efforts are being made to gather the Saints to Zion. Of course you know this, but I don’t think you know all. Why, at the last general conference in Liverpool, the president had instructions from Salt Lake to propose Brigham Young as ‘prophet, seer, revelator, and King!’”
“King?” I said. “How can President Young ever be ‘king’? Utah is part of the territory of the States, and under their jurisdiction; it is not even a State itself yet, and Congress has refused to sanction the name of Deseret. This country will never suffer a kingdom to be set up in Utah; you must be misinformed, Sister Mary.”
“No, Sister Stenhouse,” she exclaimed, “I am under no mistake. My husband assured me that the conference accepted the proposition, and that it was received unanimously. The Saints are gathering in from all parts of the world, and when war is declared they will not be found unprepared. Why, here on board with us, the American Elders are all provided with swords and revolvers of the very best make that could be got for love or money, and I myself have heard them say that Brigham Young intends shortly to declare his independence of the United States. We didn’t know this before we left England, but we felt sure that he had some great purpose in view which had been revealed to him.”