all belong to one church in Heaven. You do that. Wouldn't that be nice?" 

 "Uh huh," agreed the boy with tempered enthusiasm. He smeared his tears across his face with his coat sleeve. They left white streaks.  "I couldn't believe you was a Catholic!" he said sadly.  "You're so nice, and because of the pie and all."  His face was long and his eyes melancholy. 

 "I'm sorry," said Father McGowan, "so sorry. How's Siberia to-day?"  The child reported and then vanished to do his utmost in making a convert by prayer. 

 Father McGowan opened the rest of his mail, and then reached toward the letter of foreign stamp. He always kept the best 'til last. 

 "Dearest Father McGowan-dear:—" it began in a hand characteristic of many boarding schools, and yet showing a bit of individuality—"I have wanted to write you.... So many things to do that half the time all I get accomplished is my loving of you dear people, every day a little more, though more seems impossible. I love you, and Papa and John so much. So much that when I'm away from you, and think of you, I feel quite choked. It is rather beautiful, and terrible, this caring so deeply. I do not know how I could ever say good-bye." 

 There was a page of Cecilia's large scrawl. It contained no news, but Father McGowan read it closely. His eyes were the same as when, years before, he had looked on a table Cecilia had decorated in honour of a big, fat, Roman priest. Suddenly he laughed.  "We have a small donkey," he had read, "whom we have named Clara, after the vicar's sister. Our donkey has long ears and a religious expression, too. The vicar's sister is really very nice, but our grey donkey looks so like her that we always expect her to stop in the middle of the road and talk of missionary barrels and Sunday School treats. The latter is a form of entertainment which contains much jam, tea, many pop-eyed little girls and boys, not to omit a large stickiness.  (I went to one, and poured tea down Lord Somebody's neck. It was a great condescension for him to 'stop in,' and only the fact that I am of 'mad America' saved me from a public hanging.) 

 "Marjory and I have splendid times. I am so glad I am with her. It is nice for me, and I think for her. Mamma Aliston is one of those poor ladies who enjoys suffering. If she had lived where I did in my younger days, she would have said: 'I ain't feelin' so well. The doctor's give me three kinds of medicine. It's me nerves.'  As this is not in order, she mutters of draughts, and places a pudgy and diamond-ringed 

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