to the mastery of his
religion. He wrestled with the liturgical colours; he tried to grasp the
difference between Transubstantiation, Consubstantiation and the Real
Presence; and he congratulated himself upon being under the immediate
patronage of an Archangel. Also with Charles as his first name he felt
he could fairly claim the protection of St. Charles the Martyr, though
later on Mr. Prout suggested St. Charles Borromeo as a less ordinary
patron. However, there was more than ritualism in Michael's new
attitude, more than the passion to collect new rites and liturgies and
ornaments as once he had collected the portraits of famous cricketers or
silkworms or silver-paper. To be sure, it soon came to seem to him a
terribly important matter whether according to the Roman sequence red
were worn at Whitsuntide or whether according to Old English use white
were the liturgical colour. Soon he would experience a shock of dismay
on hearing that some reputed Catholic had taken the Ablutions at the
wrong moment, just as once he had been irritated by ignorant people
confusing Mr. W. W. Read of Surrey with Read (M.) of the same county.
Beyond all this Michael sincerely tried to correct his morals and
manners in the light of aspiration and faith. He experienced a revolt
against impurity of any kind and was simultaneously seized with a
determination to suffer Stella's conceit gladly. He really felt a
deep-seated avarice for being good. He may not have distinguished
between morality due to emotion and morality wrung out of intellectual
assent: but he did know that the Magnificat's incense took him to a
higher elation than Dora's curly head upon his shoulder, or even than
Alan's bewitching company. Under the influence of faith, Michael found
himself bursting with an affection for his mother such as he had not
felt for a long time. Indeed Michael was in a state of love. He loved
the candles on the altar, he loved his mother's beauty, he loved Stella,
he loved the people on the beach and the August mornings and the zest
for acquiring and devouring information upon every detail connected with
the Catholic religion; and out of his love he gratified Mr. Prout by
consenting to bear a torch at the Solemn High Mass on the Sunday within
the octave of St. Bartholomew, Apostle and Martyr and Patron of St.
Bartholomew's Church, Bournemouth.

Michael's first High Mass was an emotional experience deeper even than
that windy Evensong. The church was