sick and the aged, he was like a woman, or a mother. He would
make their fires, warm drinks for them, see that they had sufficient
covering. Though they all doated on "Father Mac," they must not thank
him, or even pretend they saw what he was doing for them, so well did
they know that he worked solely _for Him who seeth in secret_. Monday,
August 24, 1885, this holy man was stricken with paralysis of the brain,
and died two days later, while the bishop and the Sisters of Mercy were
praying for his soul. It is almost certain that he had some presentiment
of his death, as he selected the Gregorian Requiem Mass for his
obsequies, and asked the choir to practise it. August 28, his sacred
remains were committed to the earth, the funeral sermon being preached
by the bishop, who had been as a son to the venerable patriarch. In
real, personal holiness, Father MacDonald possessed the only power that
makes the knee bend. Over twenty years ago, his sexton said to the
writer: "I never opened the church in the morning that I did not find
Father MacDonald kneeling before the Blessed Sacrament." What time he
entered it, no one knew. How edifying this must have been to the poor
factory hands, who were wont to beg God's blessing on their daily labor,
in the short, scorching summer, and the bitter cold of the long winter,
for at that time the church was not heated. Never did these children of
toil miss that bent and venerable form, absorbed in prayer before the
hidden Jesus, of whose august presence he had such a vivid realization.

Before such a life of toil and prayer, no bigotry could stand. By sheer
force of virtue alone, this holy man wrought a complete change in the
sentiments of his adversaries. Hence the extraordinary respect shown to
his memory. The non-Catholic press says that no man ever exercised so
much influence in Manchester for forty years as Father MacDonald, and
that he was the man whom Manchester could least afford to lose. The
mayor and the city government attended his obsequies in a body, and the
governor of New Hampshire wrote to express his regret that absence
hindered his paying the last tribute of respect to a priest he so highly
revered. Business was suspended and all the factories closed, that the
whole city might follow his remains to the tomb. On Sunday, August 30,
the non-Catholic pulpits of the thrifty city resounded with the praises
of this humble priest, whose chief characteristics were stainless
integrit