A GLANCE FROM MR. SCHÖNINGER.
None but people of routine ever used their prayer-books while F. Chevreuse was reading or singing Mass, and it was seldom that even such people used them the first time they heard him; for it was not enough that those who assisted should unite their intention with that of the priest, and then pray their own prayers, recalled now and then to the altar by the sound of the bell: their whole attention was riveted there from the first.
That penetrating voice, which enunciated every word with such exquisite clearness, speaking rapidly only because so earnest, was heard throughout the church, and its vivid emphasis gave new life to every prayer of the service. When F. Chevreuse said Dominus vobiscum! one replied as a matter of course—would as soon, indeed, have neglected to answer his face-to-face greeting on the street as this from the altar; the Orate, fratres, compelled the listener to pray; and, at the Domine, non sum dignus, one felt confounded and abashed.
Was it, then, you asked yourself, the first time this priest had said Mass, that he should stand so like a man who sees a vision? No; F. Chevreuse had been fifteen years a priest. Had he, perhaps, an intellect more high than the ordinary, or a superior sanctity? No, again; though a clearer mind or a nobler Christian soul one would scarcely wish to see. The peculiarity lay chiefly, we should guess, in a large, impassioned, and generous heart, which, like a strong fountain for ever tossing up its freshening tide, overflowed his being, and made even the driest facts bud and blossom perennially. In that heart, nothing worthy of life ever faded or grew old. Its possessions were dowered with the freshness of immortal youth.
Still, these gifts might have been partially ineffectual if nature had not added to them a sanguine temperament, and the priceless blessing of a body capable of enduring severe and prolonged labor. F. Chevreuse was spared that misery of a bright intelligence and an active will for ever pent and thwarted by physical incompetence, the soul by its nature constantly compelled to issue mandates to the body, which the body by its weakness is as inevitably compelled to disobey. In that wide brain of his, thoughts had ample elbow-room, and could range themselves without crowding or confusion; and the broad shoulders and deep chest showed with what full breathing the flame of life was fanned. His mind was always working, yet there was no sign of a feverish head; the eyes were steady, and the close-cut gray hair grew so thick as to form a crown.
For the rest, let his life speak. We respect the privacy of such a soul; and, though we would fain show him real and admirable, we sketch F. Chevreuse with a shy pencil.
The church of S. John was a new and unfinished one on Church Street. This street ran east and west, parallel with the Cocheco, and half-way up the South Hill, which here sloped so abruptly that the buildings on the lower side had one more story at the rear than in front, and those on the upper side one more story in front than at the rear. In consequence of this deceptive appearance, those who liked to put the best foot forward preferred to live on the upper side, though it doomed them to a north light in their houses, while those who thought more of comfort than of display chose the other side with a southward frontage.
The church was set back so as to leave a square in front, and its entrance was but four or five steps above the street; but at the back a large and well-lighted basement was visible. The priest’s house stood close to the street, on the eastern side of this square, and so near that between the back corner of its main part and the front corner of the church there was scarcely space for two persons to stand abreast. This narrow passage, screened by a yard or so of iron railing, gave access to a long flight of stairs that led to the basements of the church and of the house.
Seen from the front, this house was a little, melancholy, rain-streaked, wooden cottage, which might be regarded as a blot upon the grandeur of the church, or an admirable foil for it, as one had a mind to think. The door opened almost on the sidewalk, and beside the door were two dismal windows with the curtains down. In the space above, another curtained window was set between the two sharp slants of the roof. On the side opposite the church, where a lane ran down to the next street, the prospect was more cheering. You saw there an L as wide as the main building, though not so deep, and projecting from it so as to give another street door at the end of a veranda, and allow space for two windows at the rear of the house. This L was Mrs. Chevreuse’s peculiar domain, as the house was that of the priest. Her sitting-room and bedroom were here; and no one acquainted with the customs of the place ever came to the veranda door unless they could claim an intimate friendship with the priest’s mother.