ese flowers?"

"Miss Campion. She calls them lilies of the valley. Is it a sin to smell
them, Daddy Dan?"

"No, child, it is no sin. Nay, 't is a prayer if you glorify God for the
wonders He has wrought in these tiny leaves."

"But they'll fade away and die in a day or two, Daddy Dan!"

"So shall all beautiful things, my child, only to be transplanted where
there is no rust or fading."

"Thank you, Daddy Dan. That's just what I said to Mr. Ormsby. 'Do you
really believe,' he said, 'that it is the love of God that has smitten
you?' 'Yes,' I said firmly. 'Do you believe that you are all the dearer
to Him for that He has smitten you?' 'Yes,' I said, 'I'm sure of it.'
'And do you believe that God will take you out of the grave and build
you up far fairer than you have been?' 'I believe it most certainly,' I
replied. 'It's the sublime and the impossible,' he cried. And then he
said,--but I shouldn't repeat this, Daddy Dan,--'Mind, little one, if I
become a Catholic, it's you have made me one.' But it would be so nice,
if only to repay Miss Campion for all her goodness."

Then I began to think of some holy man that said: There should be an
invalid and an incurable one in every religious community, if only to
bring God nearer to them in His great love.

As I was leaving, Mrs. Moylan pulled me aside.

"Is there any chance at all, your reverence, of her recovery?"

She looked with a mother's wistfulness at me.

"For I do be praying to the Lord morning, noon, and night, that if it be
His Blessed and Holy Will, He would take her out of suffering, or
restore her to me."

I made no answer.

"You could do it, your reverence, if you liked. Sure, I don't want you
to do any harm to yourself, God forbid; but you could cure her and
restore her to me, if you plazed."

"I couldn't, Mrs. Moylan," I replied; "and what is more, I wouldn't
now take her away from God if I could. I was as bitter as you about it;
but now I see that God has His own designs upon your child, and who am I
that I should thwart Him?"

"Perhaps your reverence is right," she replied; "but the mother's heart
will spake up sometimes whin it ought to be silent."

I passed by my little chapel as I went home, and knelt down for a
prayer. I thought the Blessed Virgin looked queer at me, as if to say:--

"Well, are you satisfied now? Who was right--you or my Son?" And I went
home very humbled.

* * * * *

The great day at las