1868, Religious studies
The long vacation of 1868 was, as has been seen, chiefly devoted to a yachting tour in the North Sea, and a visit to Russia, undertaken by Bute in the companionship of Lord Rosebery. The autumn months after the celebration of his majority were spent quietly at Cardiff and in Scotland, as much time as he could spare being given to a course of reading recommended to him by Mr. Capel, partly by way of preparation for his reception into the Church of his choice. He refers to this in an interesting letter to his attached friend at Oxford, written soon after his coming of age.
October 5, 1868.
You may imagine how busy I have been and am since my birthday. Still I find time every day for some serious reading, as to which I have had competent advice. I am going through some of the writings of S. Cyprian, S. Ambrose, and S. Gregory, and doing a little liturgical study. Then there are the 12th cent. lives of Ninian and Kentigern, and Adamnan's Columba, all of great interest to me; and I have sent for Boethius's lives of the Bishops of Aberdeen. Theiner's great work, not long ago published in Rome,[[8]] I find most valuable, and throwing a flood of light on the mediæval relations between Scotland and the Holy See.
For devotion I have St. Bernard (his Letters): a very simple prayer-book, such as children use; and the Latin Psalter. I wish you were able to use this;[[9]] there is a beauty and fulness of meaning in the Latin version which I think no modern language can give—except, you will say (and as to that you have a right to speak)[[10]] possibly Greek. I sometimes dream of trying my hand at a new English version of the Psalms; but that is part of a larger scheme which it is perhaps presumptuous of me even to think of.[[11]]
It was natural that when the long-anticipated time at length came for actually taking the step prepared for with such anxious deliberation, Bute should turn to the only Catholic priest with whom he was in any degree intimate. More than thirty years later Monsignor Capel, who had then been for some time resident in California, wrote in a San Francisco newspaper a short account of Bute's conversion, the steps that led up to it, and his own part in receiving him into the Church.
A course of reading was suggested, I seeing him from time to time. Newman's pathetic hymn, "Lead, kindly Light, amid th' encircling gloom," was often on his lips. In course of time he was fully convinced that the true Church is an organic body, a Divine institution, the source of all spiritual power and jurisdiction, and the channel of sacramental grace, under the Vicar of Christ, the Bishop of Rome.
Finally, after an hour of prayer before the Blessed Sacrament in the convent chapel at Harley House, London,[[12]] he determined to ask admission to the Church.
1868, Third visit to Holy Land
Bute's conditional baptism, profession of faith, and first Communion took place quite privately on December 8, 1868 (the Feast of the Immaculate Conception), in the chapel of the Sisters of Notre Dame, Southwark.[[13]] Mr. Capel officiated at all these acts, with the authorisation of the Bishop of Southwark (Dr. Grant), who himself assisted at them. The event was not generally known until the New Year, and it was generally believed, and has indeed often been stated since, that the reception took place on Christmas Eve. The young neophyte left England a few days after the event, and was well out of hearing by the time the excited comments of the public and the press on his action had begun to make themselves audible.