She failed not to notice to her grandson these marks of honour and
respect which from time to time she received. "You see," she said, "my
son, that the enemies have been unable altogether to suppress the good
spirit, or to root out the true seed. Amid heretics and schismatics,
spoilers of the church's lands, and scoffers at saints and sacraments,
there is left a remnant."
"It is true, my mother," said Roland Graeme; "but methinks they are of
a quality which can help us but little. See you not all those who wear
steel at their side, and bear marks of better quality, ruffle past us
as they would past the meanest beggars? for those who give us any
marks of sympathy, are the poorest of the poor, and most outcast of
the needy, who have neither bread to share with us, nor swords to
defend us, nor skill to use them if they had. That poor wretch that
last kneeled to you with such deep devotion, and who seemed emaciated
by the touch of some wasting disease within, and the grasp of poverty
without--that pale, shivering, miserable caitiff, how can he aid the
great schemes you meditate?"
"Much, my son," said the Matron, with more mildness than the page
perhaps expected. "When that pious son of the church returns from the
shrine of Saint Ringan, whither he now travels by my counsel, and by
the aid of good Catholics,--when he returns, healed, of his wasting
malady, high in health, and strong in limb, will not the glory of his
faithfulness, and its miraculous reward, speak louder in the ears of
this besotted people of Scotland, than the din which is weekly made in
a thousand heretical pulpits?"
"Ay, but, mother, I fear the Saint's hand is out.
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