eriod. Two
brethren working in the garden in these hot July days found that
permitted conversation about the immediate matter in hand, say the
whereabouts of a trowel or a hoe, was easily extended into observations
about the whereabouts of Brother So-and-So during Terce or the way
Brother Somebody-else was late with the antiphon. From the little
incidents of the Abbey's daily round the conversation was easily
extended into a discussion of the policy of the Order in general.
Speculations where the Reverend Father was preaching that evening or
that morning and whether his offertories would be as large during the
summer as they had been during the spring were easily amplified from
discussions about the general policy of the Order into discussions about
the general policy of Christendom, the pros and cons of the Roman
position, the disgraceful latitudinarianism of bishops and deans; and
still more widely amplified from remarks upon the general policy of
Christendom into arguments about the universe and the great philosophies
of humanity. Thus Mark, who was an ardent Platonist, would find himself
at odds with Brother Jerome who was an equally ardent Aristotelian,
while the weeds, taking advantage of the philosophic contest, grew
faster than ever.

Whatever may have been Brother Dunstan's faults of indulgence, they
sprang from a debonair and kindly personality which shone like a sun
upon the little family and made everybody good-humoured, even Brother
Lawrence, who was apt to be cross because he had been kept a postulant
longer than he expected. But perhaps the happiest of all was Brother
Walter, who though still a probationer was now the senior probationer, a
status which afforded him the most profound satisfaction and gave him a
kindly feeling toward Mark who was the cause of promotion.

"And the Reverend Father has promised me that I shall be clothed as a
postulant on August 10th when Brother Lawrence is to be clothed as a
novice. The thought makes me so excited that I hardly know what to do
sometimes, and I still don't know what saint's name I'm going to take.
You see, there was some mystery about my birth, and I was called Walter
because I was found by a policeman in Walter Street, and as ill-luck
would have it there's no St. Walter. Of course, I know I have a very
wide choice of names, but that is what makes it so difficult. I had
rather a fancy to be Peter, but he's such a very conspicuous saint that
it struck me as