Story of Chester Lawrence

CHAPTER X.

Twen­ty miles out of Lon­don. The sun is shin­ing, and the train glides along by green fields, hedges of hawthorn, and blos­som­ing trees. Eng­land looks to be the huge, well-​cared-​for farm of a very rich man. This may be ex­plained by the fact that Eng­land is an old coun­try, hav­ing been plowed and plant­ed and har­rowed for close on to a thou­sand years be­fore Amer­ica was dis­cov­ered. This long pe­ri­od of cul­ti­va­tion gives the coun­try-​side a mel­low­ness and well-​groomed look. The va­porous sun­light soft­ens all the out­lines, hides the harsh fea­tures, and gives the land­scape its dreamy, far-​away, misty love­li­ness. There seems to be no an­gles in the scene; field melts in­to field, and hedge in­to hedge, with here and there a rib­bon of a road which seems to join them rather than to sep­arate them. The hous­es are of brick or of stone, many part­ly hid­den un­der the climb­ing ivy or ros­es.

Chester Lawrence is ac­com­pa­ny­ing El­der Mal­by east­ward from Lon­don through Kent to Mar­gate and Rams­gate on the coast. El­der Mal­by is to at­tend to some Church du­ties, and Chester, by in­vi­ta­tion, was glad to ac­com­pa­ny him. It was the young man's pol­icy to keep in touch as much as pos­si­ble with the el­ders and their work, and he was get­ting some­what of the mis­sion­ary spir­it him­self. He was great­ly en­joy­ing this ride through the beau­ti­ful coun­try.

“It's re­al­ly won­der­ful,” said Chester, look­ing out of the car win­dow, “this com­ing from Lon­don in­to the coun­try. Where are all the peo­ple? Are they all in town? Some cows are brows­ing in the pas­tures, and sheep scur­ry about as the train flies by, but where are the peo­ple who have made this great gar­den?”

“You must re­mem­ber,” ex­plained Chester's com­pan­ion, “all this has not been done hur­ried­ly by many peo­ple with­in a short time. What the En­glish­man doesn't do to­day he can do to­mor­row; and so cen­turies of work by a few men has pro­duced what we see.”

“Well, I do oc­ca­sion­al­ly see a few slow-​mov­ing men and wom­en, somber­ly clad in grays and browns. These, I sup­pose, are the stur­dy sup­port­ers of their coun­try.”

“Here is some­thing I clipped from an Amer­ican mag­azine,” said El­der Mal­by, “which im­pressed me with its pe­cu­liar truth.” He read:

"'Eng­land is Lon­don says one, Eng­land is Par­lia­ment says an­oth­er, Eng­land is the Em­pire says still an­oth­er; but if I be not much mis­tak­en, this stretch of green fields, these hills and val­leys, these hedges and fruit trees, this soft land­scape, is the Eng­land men love. In In­dia and Cana­da, in their ships at sea, in their knots of sol­diery all over the world, En­glish­men must close their eyes at times, and when they do, they see these fields green and brown, these hedges dust­ed with the soft snow of blos­soms, these hous­es hung with ros­es and ivy, and when the eyes open, they are moist with these mem­ories. The pi­oneer, the sailor, the sol­dier, the colonist may fight, and strug­gle and suf­fer, and pro­claim his pride in his new home and pos­ses­sions, but these are the love of a wife, of chil­dren, of friends; that oth­er is the love, with its touch of ado­ra­tion, that is not less nor more, but still dif­fer­ent, that mys­te­ri­ous min­gling of care for, and awe of, the one who brought you in­to the world.

“'This is the Eng­land, I take it, that makes one feel his du­ty to be his re­li­gion, and the Eng­land that ev­ery Amer­ican comes to as to a shrine. When this is sunk in the sea, or tram­pled over by a host of in­vad­ing Ger­mans, or mauled in­to bankrupt­cy by pan­der­ing politi­cians and sour so­cial­ists, one of the most de­light­ful spots in the whole world will have been lost, and no artist ev­er be able to paint such a pic­ture again, for nowhere else is there just this tex­ture of can­vas, just this qual­ity if pig­ment, just these fif­teen cen­turies of at­mo­sphere.' I think this sums it up nice­ly,” com­ment­ed El­der Mal­by.

“Ire­land is a pret­ty fine coun­try, too,” said Chester, with far-​away tone, still gaz­ing out of the win­dow.

El­der Mal­by laughed hearti­ly, in which his com­pan­ion joined. Chester had told him his Irish ex­pe­ri­ences.

Rams­gate is a pret­ty town on the east coast. It be­ing Sun­day, the shops were closed and the streets qui­et. Af­ter some en­quiries and search­ing, the lo­cal el­der was found in the out­skirts of the town. The two vis­itors were warm­ly re­ceived. A good old-​fash­ioned En­glish din­ner was served, af­ter which the few Saints liv­ing in the vicin­ity gath­ered for meet­ing. Nev­er be­fore had Chester Lawrence ex­pe­ri­enced the com­fort­ing Spir­it of the Lord as in that ser­vice when he par­took with those sim­ple, open-​mind­ed peo­ple the sacra­ment, and lis­tened to their tes­ti­monies, in which he min­gled his own.

Af­ter the ser­vices, there was the usu­al lin­ger­ing to shake hands and ex­change good words. In the midst of the con­fu­sion of voic­es and laugh­ter, a large man ap­peared in the open door­way, and im­me­di­ate­ly there was a hush. It was the parish priest, round and sleek, yet stern of coun­te­nance. He looked about the room and found a good many of his neigh­bors present.

“Well, good peo­ple,” said he, “what are you do­ing here?”

The lo­cal el­der ex­plained civil­ly the pur­pose of the gath­er­ing.

“But these men who are hold­ing these ser­vices are 'Mor­mons,' and I come to warn you that they are wolves in sheep's cloth­ing. Be­ware of them, let them alone,” said the priest in ris­ing ac­cents.

The peo­ple stood about the room, qui­et­ly lis­ten­ing. El­der Mal­by and Chester were yet by the ta­ble which had served as a pul­pit, and to them the priest ad­vanced.

“Are you the 'Mor­mon' el­ders?” he de­mand­ed.

“We have that hon­or,” serene­ly replied El­der Mal­by.

“You ought to be ashamed to come here to a Chris­tian com­mu­ni­ty with your vile doc­trine. I warn you to keep away.”

“Will you be seat­ed, sir?” asked El­der Mal­by, who took charge of the sit­ua­tion. A num­ber of peo­ple, who had ev­ident­ly fol­lowed the priest to see the “fun,” came in and gath­ered round.

“I'll not sit down. I'll de­liv­er my mes­sage to you all,” he de­clared as he turned to the peo­ple. "You may not be­lieve what I say about these men, that they are not what they pre­tend; but let me read to you from an Amer­ican pa­per--print­ed in their own land. Lis­ten:

“'So ful­ly ap­par­ent is the per­ni­cious ac­tiv­ity of ”Mor­monism“ of late, that a gen­er­al cam­paign of op­po­si­tion is be­ing urged against them in var­ious parts of the coun­try. It has been con­clu­sive­ly shown, by stu­dents of the ques­tion, that the ”Mor­mon“ Church is sim­ply a great se­cret so­ci­ety, en­gag­ing in crim­inal prac­tices un­der the cloak of their re­li­gion--”

There was a hum of protest in the room. El­der Mal­by raised a hand of warn­ing to let the in­trud­er pro­ceed.

“'The at­ti­tude of ”Mor­monism“ to­wards moral ques­tions and its dis­re­gard for the laws, have been shown again and again. ”Mor­mon“ mis­sion­ar­ies are now mak­ing a sys­tem­at­ic can­vas of ev­ery state in the Union, as well as in Great Britain and oth­er for­eign coun­tries. Ev­ery home, es­pe­cial­ly of the poor and un­ed­ucat­ed is to be vis­it­ed. It would there­fore be the part of wis­dom to give a time­ly word of warn­ing. This is a time to cry aloud and spare not, lest many be led astray by these per­ni­cious teach­ings.'”

The min­is­ter fol­lowed up this read­ing by a stream of per­son­al abuse against “Mor­mons” in gen­er­al and El­der Mal­by--whose name he knew--in par­tic­ular. Chester watched with keen in­ter­est the pro­ceed­ings. El­der Mal­by's face was a study. The an­gry priest paused, then stopped.

“Are you through, sir?” asked El­der Mal­by qui­et­ly. There was no re­ply, so he con­tin­ued. “If you are, I wish to say a word. You are en­tire­ly mis­tak­en, my dear sir. I have not come here to mis­lead or to teach any such doc­trine as you claim. True, I am now an Amer­ican cit­izen, but I was born an En­glish­man. This is my na­tive coun­try, and I have as much right to be here as you have; and, thank God, this coun­try pro­vides for free speech and al­lows ev­ery man to wor­ship God ac­cord­ing to the dic­tates of his con­science. I love this, my na­tive land--I love these, my peo­ple. That's why I am here to preach to them the gospel of Je­sus Christ.”

“You're a farmer, and not a min­is­ter,” sneered the priest.

“Pe­ter was a fish­er­man and Paul was a tent-​mak­er,” replied the El­der calm­ly. “I sup­pose, sir, that if ei­ther of these men came here to preach, you would look up­on their oc­cu­pa­tion as a re­proach.”

There was no re­ply, so the “Mor­mon” con­tin­ued. “It is true I am a farmer. Some of my friends here know that, be­cause some­times I as­sist them in the fields. And I have giv­en them some help­ful Amer­ican hints too, have I not, Broth­er Nay­lor?”

“Aye, that you have.”

“Re­li­gion is not a thing apart from dai­ly life,” said El­der Mal­by, speak­ing more to the lis­ten­ing peo­ple than to the priest. “A tru­ly re­li­gious per­son works with hands and brains as well as prays with lips and heart. Let me tell you, good peo­ple, the 'Mor­mons' have shown to the world that heart and hand, faith and works must go to­geth­er. A re­li­gion which with­draws it­self apart from the com­mon peo­ple in­to seclu­sions of prayer and con­tem­pla­tion alone is of no val­ue in this world. The ac­tiv­ities of this life and this world is the prop­er field for re­li­gion, for it is here that we pre­pare for a fu­ture life. The ”Mor­mon“ min­is­ter can plow, if he is a farmer, as well as preach. He digs canals, makes roads through the wilder­ness, pro­vides work and play for those who look to him for guid­ance. Again, let me call your at­ten­tion to some­thing the ”_Mor­mon_“ preach­er does: he preach­es for the love of the souls of men, and not for a salary.”

“You're a tramp,” said the priest.

“Not ex­act­ly, my friend,” replied the El­der, look­ing in­to the priest's face. “I pay my way, from mon­ey earned at home on my farm. Most of the peo­ple here know me, but some are strangers. Let me tell you, briefly, my sto­ry.”

“Go on,” some one near the door shout­ed.

“I was born a few miles from here. My par­ents were very poor, but hon­est and re­spectable. I had a long­ing to go to Amer­ica, so by dint of long, hard work and sav­ing, I ob­tained the pas­sage mon­ey. On the way I be­came ac­quaint­ed with the Mor­mons.' I knew they were the peo­ple of God, and I went with them to the West, which was a new coun­try then. I was a pi­oneer. I took up wild, un­bro­ken land, built me a cab­in and made me a farm. It was hard work, but, the ex­hil­ara­tion of work­ing for one's self gives courage and strength. Now I have a good farm, and a good house. I am not rich in world­ly wealth. We must still econ­omize care­ful­ly. Here--would you like to see my home in Amer­ica?”

He took from his pock­et a pho­to­graph and hand­ed it to the near­est per­son, who passed it on. “That house I built with my own hands, most of it. Those trees I plant­ed. I made the fence and dug the wa­ter ditch. That's my wife stand­ing by the gate--yes, the on­ly one I have, or ev­er had--that's my youngest child on the porch, the on­ly one at home now. The oth­ers have mar­ried and have homes of their own. Here, I re­mem­ber, I re­ceived a let­ter from my wife yes­ter­day. Would you like to read it, sir?” ad­dress­ing the priest who was now prepar­ing to leave.

“The let­ter will prove that I am not a tramp, sir. Read it aloud to these peo­ple.” The El­der held the let­ter in his ex­tend­ed hand.

“I'll have noth­ing fur­ther to do with you. I don't want to read your let­ter,” re­tort­ed the priest.

“Read it, read it,” came from a num­ber; but the priest, un­heed­ing­ly passed out of the door and down the path. The gate clicked.

“I'll read it,” vol­un­teered a man, one of the strangers who had come in lat­er. He took the let­ter, and read so that all might hear, which was not dif­fi­cult in that qui­et­ed room:

"'Dear George: By this time I sup­pose you are in Old Eng­land again, and have fair­ly start­ed in your mis­sion­ary work. We re­ceived your card from Chica­go and your let­ter from New York. I hope you had a pleas­ant voy­age across the ocean, and were not sea­sick.

“'We are all well at home, on­ly a bit lone­some, of course. Janie miss­es you very much. She hard­ly knows what to do with her­self in the evening. I was over to George's last night, and when I came in the door the ba­by cried ”grand­pa" be­fore she saw who it was. The lit­tle thing looks all around and can't un­der­stand why you don't come. Lizzie's ba­by has the measles, but is get­ting along nice­ly.

"I drove around by the field from meet­ing last Sun­day. The wheat is grow­ing fine. The Bish­op said it was the finest stand he had ev­er seen. George and Hen­ry are now work­ing on the ditch, and they said they'd work out your as­sess­ment while they were about it. We have had a good deal of rain late­ly.

“'I spoke to Broth­er Jen­son about those two steers. He said prices were low at present and ad­vised me to wait a lit­tle while be­fore sell­ing them. If you need the mon­ey very soon, of course I'll tell him to take them next time he calls. My eggs and but­ter help us out won­der­ful­ly, as we two don't re­quire much. The Sun­day eggs, you know, go to­wards the meet­ing house fund, and Janie claims the ”Sat­ur­day crop." She needs a new school dress which Lizzie has promised to make.

"'Now, that's about all the news. I hope your health will con­tin­ue good and that you are en­joy­ing your mis­sion. Don't wor­ry about us. The Lord will pro­vide. We want to do our part in send­ing the gospel to those who have it not. Our faith and prayers are al­ways with you.

“'Your lov­ing wife, ”'JANE MAL­BY.

“'P.S. I for­got to tell you that the Jer­sey cow you bought from Broth­er Jones has had twin calves, both heifers. Isn't that fine? J.M.'”

The read­er fold­ed the let­ter and hand­ed it back to its own­er. The postscript saved the sit­ua­tion, for the wet eyes found re­lief in the mer­ry laugh which it brought forth.