DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI 1840- 1889

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

NBW YORK - BOSTON - CHICAGO DALLAS
ATLANTA - SAN FRANCISCO

MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED

LONDON - BOMBAY - CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
OF CANADA, LIMITED

TORONTO

BRONZE STATUE OF JOSEPH DE VEUSTER, FATHER DAMIEN,

in the Square outside the church of St. Jacques, rue de Bruxelles,

Louvain, Belgium.

PREFACI

* Let those who think I have said too little, or those
who think I have said too much, forgive me ; and let
those who think I have said just enough join me in
giving thanks to God/

CAUDWELL

DATES OF IMPORTANCE IN THE LIFE OF
FATHER DAMIEN

1840 (January 3rd) Birth at Tremeloo, near Lou*

vain,

1859 (January 3rd) Joined Society of Sacred

Hearts of Jesus and Mary,
Louvain.

1863 (October) Left Europe as missionary to

Hawaii,

1864 (March) Landed at Honolulu, Hawaii,
1873 (May) Left Hawaii for Molokai.
1885 Stricken with leprosy.

1889 (April 1 5th) Death at Molokai.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I. HOME INFLUENCE I

II. THE PREPARATION 15

III- A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 37

IV. THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 6l

V. THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 89

VI. THE VIA DOLOROSA 124

VII. CALVARY 149

VIII. LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 159

APPENDIX 189
Robert Louis Stevenson's Open Letter
to the Reverend Dr. Hyde of Honolulu

Lepers are the Flowers of Paradise,
Pearls in the coronet of the Eternal King.

ST. HUGH OF LINCOLN.

CHAPTER I

HOME INFLUENCE

IT was winter, the frost-bound winter of Flanders
fields, when Joseph de Veuster came into the
world. His appearance caused very little stir
in the quiet red-tiled farmhouse with its wooden
shutters, for he was the seventh child which his sturdy
Flemish mother had brought into the world, and there
was little time for sentiment in that hard-working
household. The third of January, 1840, might mark
for the world the arrival of a saint and martyr, but for
his parents it meant another mouth to feed, though
withal, for they were good and true, another little
soul to love and cherish, and for his small brothers and
sisters a real live doll to add zest to their games.

The simple village home, that little farm at Tremeloo,
six miles from Louvain, was situated between Aerschot
and Malines, towns which in the next century wefe to
weep tears of blood, wrecked and desecrated, but then
lay smiling in the rich plain, treasure cities of art and
history.

England knows little, and often seems to care less,
for Ihe smallholder, the little farmer like Francois de
Veuster, who with the aid of his wife and family toils
unceasingly in his ewn fields, often from dawn till
dusk. Yet silent, sturdy, slow in his movements and
conservative in his. mind, he can be the backbone of
his country, the harbourer of its riches, for he loves

2 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

the very soil with a deep, ingrained devotion, asking
nothing better than to labour upon it till at length his
bones, crippled with the rheumatism which is earth's
final reward to her devotees, rest in its final embrace.

Little Joseph first figured in the family history when
the hour came for him to receive his name. His
parents, Francois and Catherine de Veuster, seem to
have had no special choice, but his godfather, a deeply
pious old soldier, asked that he should be called
JOSEPH, after his own patron, the head of the Holy
Family. That settled the matter, and the tiny baby
was carried to the village church to receive the name
of that noble, gentle saint, chosen above all other men
as the guardian of his Lord's infant years.

From the first dawning of consciousness the child
Joseph showed signs of a happy disposition, merry,
yet quaint, richly endowed with the priceless gift of
laughter, that great attribute of many a saint, the most
potent medium for meeting the woes of life with
courage* The joyous smile of Joseph de Veuster was
to prove one of his greatest assets in aiding the agonised
bodies and stricken souls of those who in after years
would rise up and call him blessed.

He was only four years old, a mere toddler whose
little dark head did not reach as high as the golden
ears of corn which waved around his fathers home-
stead, when the first promise of that radiant life of the
spirit first openly showed itself, which ultimately was
to blossom to such gracious perfection. He had been
lost since morning, and, search in Tremeloo having
proved fruitless, it was remembered that the Kcrmess*
was being held in a neighbouring village - the Ker-
that gay, happy fair which in the country districts

HOME INFLUENCE 3

of Flanders so often synchronises with the feast of the
patron saint, and, attracting folk from miles round, is
even kept up with more or less enthusiasm for so long
as three days, Joseph's distracted relations rushed
frantically over the cobblestones of the old market
square, among the roundabouts, the fortune-tellers,
the stalls of fancy gingerbread, the shooting galleries,
the booths of freaks, human and otherwise, questioning
the rosy, smiling peasants in their stiff Sunday clothes,
but nowhere could the child be found. It was at this
point that his godfather, the fine old soldier who had
insisted on his baptismal name, came to the rescue,

" I will soon find our little Joseph,*' he said con-
fidently. " I can guess where he is."

Leaving the jostling, laughing crowd, the village
band with its red, perspiring faces, the booths with their
attractive wares, the old man turned aside into the
village church, where all day long solitary figures had
slipped from the noise and gaiety into the brooding
peace of that ever-abiding Presence. The building was
almost deserted now, but close up to the altar, Where
in the darkening shadows the lamp hung like some
great jewel before the Blessed Sacrament, knelt a
solitary little figure. As the child's face turned,
smiling up at his godfather, surely in the old man's
mind the cry rang down the ages :

" How is it that ye sought Me ? Wist ye not that
I must be about My Father's business ? "

As so often happens, Joseph's parents, the sturdy
Flemish farmer and his wife, though devout and God-
fearing folk, had not grasped the deeply spiritual

4 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

temperament of their little son. Truly, there was much
excuse for them, as this spirituality was extremely
precocious, yet at the same time undoubtedly sincere.
All children have a natural interest in religion ; the
Gospel illustration of the children in the market-place
playing at weddings and funerals before the eyes of the
Divine Teacher is true of every country and every age,
but in Joseph de Veuster's case it was not play, but
intense reality. For all his happy disposition and
quaint, laughing ways, his nature, so sensitive even in
childhood to the Divine Call, caused him to weep
bitterly at the least word of reproof for youthful
carelessness, though never for one moment did this
ultra-sensitiveness cause him to be unmanly either in
thought or deed.

Francois and Catherine de Veuster were worthy
specimens of that land drenched so often by the blood
of religious strife. Their Faith was in no watertight
compartment, to be used only on Sundays or when
kneeling beside their beds at night. They were son
and daughter of the soil, earning their bread in the
fields which formed their small estate, intensely
religious, though unemotional, given to the silence
which comes from solidity of character and the
necessity for unceasing labour.

An artist of the neighbouring country of France,
Jean Francois Millet, has given us their portraits again
and again, above all in the devout simplicity of his
lovely * Angelus,' where the peasant workers bow their
heads and clasp their hands as the sweet-toned bell of
the A<ve Maria steals across the fields.

That quiet home at Tremeloo makes a picture
worthy of the brush of a Vermeer or Pieter de Hooch

HOME INFLUENCE

- the old Flemish kitchen with its stone floor and
gleaming copper vessels, where the rosy, chubby faces
of the Veuster children were reflected as they clustered
round the mother's knee, the sacred prints upon the
wall, the Crucifix and holy water stoup in the far
corner. Seated in her old chair, her feet upon the
sand-strewn floor, Catherine Veuster read stories of
the saints and martyrs from the great book she held in
her toil-worn hands - hands beautiful, not with the
comeliness of shape or texture, but true mother's
hands, red and roughened, made glorious with loving
labour.

The children pressed closely to her, looking curi-
ously at the heavy volume, two feet long and a foot and
a half wide, with its quaint woodcuts and old Flemish
type in thick black lettering they could not understand,
which to their mother, daughter of an earlier genera-
tion, was perfectly plain and clear. With childhood's
insistence, they begged again and again for the self-
same stories, and seven-year-old Joseph's merry face
and deep eyes grew earnest and thoughtful. But of
all those tales of heroism and adventure, of earthly
torture and the glories of Paradise, the hermit saints,
those strange, mystical sons of the desert, appealed
most directly to their youthful imagination. It was
much the same call of brave deeds, of getting close to
primitive things, overshadowed by a high ideal, which
to-day all unconsciously pervades the mind of the
small Boy Scout as he starts on his first camp ; the
spirit of tiny St. Theresa as she planned to leave her
father's house in order to convert the Moors ; the
mind of that pathetic, noble band of youth which
inaugurated the Children's Crusade.

6 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

St. Anthony the Anchorite, who dwelt alone in the
Egyptian deserts, visited by devils and angels, spending
the scorching days and burning nights in contempla-
tion, most appealed to the de Veuster children. There
was no desert in Belgium, with its waving cornfields,
green pasture-lands, and giant windmills ; but make-
believe is second nature to the very young, so that a
charming little copse on the long walk to school was
found to be of equal service. Turning aside beneath
its leafy branches, satchels in hand, they knelt on the
soft grass, with the birds chirping above their heads,
determined to devote the rest of their lives to prayer
and contemplation. In after years, when little Joseph's
heroic life had finished its earthly course, his brother
Augustus told of the determined way in which the
seven-year-old child, youngest of them all, took to
the hermit life.

At noon, still in strict silence, they opened their
satchels, eating the frugal dinner of bread and butter,
their childish faces set in lines of whimsical gravity,
their eyes round and full of awe. The birds chirped
gaily in the branches above their heads, the brook
danced beneath sunshine and shadow beside them,
tiny furry dwellers in the wood moved stealthily
around, but the children paid no heed* Perhaps in
the intense reality of their make-believe they likened
the merry birds to the angels who visited St. Anthony,
the tiny creatures of the undergrowth to the devils who
tormented him.

The bread and butter consumed to the last crumb,
each child again knelt upon the grass, entirely devoted
to prayer and devotion until the shadows lengthened
and the gold and crimson glory of the sunset

HOME INFLUENCE 7

penetrated even the thickness of the trees. But these
things meant nothing to the young hermits ; they
had solemnly bidden farewell to all earthly ties ; home,
parents, friends, and school^ even their little white
beds, were gone for ever. It was a sublime act of
faith, for by this time they must have been extremely
hungry, and the courageous little bodies were becom-
ing as limp as the empty satchels flung on the grass
beside them.

But few are called to be hermits, and certainly the
de Veuster family were not meant to be among their
number, for at nine o'clock a passer-by, observing the
children, hurriedly acquainted their distracted parents,
so that it was not long before the youthful followers
of St. Anthony were being escorted home to supper
and to bed.

Joseph, though beloved by all who knew him, was
never fond of rough games with other boys ; his
mystical, sympathetic character delighted more in
roaming the fields with the shepherds, spending long
hours playing with the lambs* His fondness for the
sheep, especially his tender handling of the lambs, as
they gambolled on the grass with their absurdly tall,
stiff legs, caused him to be known as h Petit Btrger
the c Little Shepherd/ The prophetic symbolism of
this name must have been realised by many of his com-
panions in after years.

Love of animals and affinity with them is a beautiful
characteristic of many of the saints - the case of St.
Francis of Assisi and the wolf being an excellent ex-
ample. A remarkable story of Joseph de Veuster

8 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

when a boy shows another phase in his sympathy with
the animal world. Every day on his way to school,
laughing gaily with his comrades, he passed a tiny
cottage where there lived a widow and her family
whose livelihood depended almost entirely upon a cow,
her solitary possession. Great was Joseph's sympathy
on hearing that the precious animal was ill, so ill that
the doctor had given up all hope for its life. Joseph,
running into the cottage, spoke with kindly, gentle
words to the distracted woman, telling her he would
like to endeavour to save the cow during the coming
night. Permission being gladly given, the little school-
boy went to the shed where the suffering creature lay
in a most unhappy position, for the doctor had just
turned away in despair and the butcher stood over her,
his deadly knife gleaming in his hand.

In a few words Joseph offered his services, explain-
ing that if the animal had to be put to death the deed
could be done equally well in the morning. Both
doctor and butcher knew the Little Shepherd's love
for animals, and quickly consented to leave the sick
beast in his merciful hands. But first, with an inward
shudder, he possessed himself of the knife, prepared to
use it should his patient's sufferings become intoler-
able. Left alone, the little schoolboy watched in the
gloomy shed, with no companionship but the flicker-
ing light of the lantern and the dumb, agonised eyes
of the stricken animal. None can tell what form his
ministrations took during the long hours of that dreary
night ; it is certain he was not unmindful of One who
was born in a stable amid the humble beasts, for in the
morning, when they sought him, the cow was so far on
the road to recovery that within a very few days she

HOME INFLUENCE 9

was restored to her usual condition of bovine content-
ment.

This intense love of the animal world is also shown
by an earlier incident, though unfortunately in this
case the small Joseph's kindness of heart was much
abused. School being some way from home, Madame
de Veuster provided the children with generous help-
ings of bread and butter, which they ate during the
luncheon hour, on the premises. Let it be said at once
that, although this sounds a very frugal repast, it was
not the dry bread and margarine of modern youth, but
slices from long, crisp rolls, spread with real dairy
butter. Nevertheless, it was a great treat when occa-
sionally Madame substituted home-made cakes for the
more simple fare, and it requires no stretch of imagina-
tion to picture little Master Joseph and his companions
looking longingly into their satchels for a refreshing
glimpse of the dainties within, as they plodded along
the dusty Flanders road.

At lunchtime, as they sat in a hungry row upon the
stone bench outside the schoolhouse, a beggar-boy, Sus
van Beal, attracted by the cakes, drew near with long-
ing eyes and artful voice.

" I took a magpie for each of you to your house
after you had gone to school this morning.* '

After such magnanimity as this, it was natural that
each of the children should give the wistful beggar a
cake from the cherished store, but Joseph, the youngest
of the bunch, with his big, generous heart, cried
eagerly :

" Let us give them all to him ; the poor boy is
always in want/*

Fired by his example, the children poured their

IO DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

cakes into the beggar's outstretched hands, and
hungry, but happy, returned to afternoon school. But,
alas for their heroic act of supererogation, when, tired,
breathless, and famished, they burst in upon their
mother, demanding to see the wonderful birds, they
were quickly disillusioned. Magpies and 'Master
Sus van Beal were equally to be numbered among the
missing.

Few boys come through childhood without more or
less risk to life and limb, and, seeing how appalling
many of these risks are, it speaks well for the efficiency
of their guardian angels.

The elder de Veuster children, when in after years
their young brother had become a celebrity, loved to
tell the story of his miraculous escape from death on
an occasion when a kindly driver, seeing them trudg-
ing along in the dust, offered them a ride to school.
Joseph, climbing merrily into the cart, missed his foot-
ing, and fell sprawling on his face in front of the wheeL
The horse, startled with the children's screams of
horror, plunged forward, so that the wheel passed
over the boy's head and body.

His terrified companions, seeing him lie partly
stunned, with his little face hidden in the white road,
believed him to be dead, and ran hurriedly back to the
farmhouse, telling his mother he had been run over.
Madame de Veuster, overcome with grief, rushed to
the scene in a terrible state, only to find her beloved
child little the worse except for a bump on his head and
a dark bruise on his back. Joseph de Veuster was not
so soon to yield up his precious life.

HOME INFLUENCE II

As he grew older, and infancy gave place to early
boyhood, he began to fear that the pleasures and ex-
citements of life might prove too much for him. In
these days, when often children are satiated with
amusements before they have left school and it is
hard to find a gift or a distraction which will rouse
them from boredom, it is difficult to realise what
Joseph could have feared in the way of worldly tempta-
tions in that simple home and quiet village nearly one
hundred years ago. It is true that comforts and plain,
nourishing food existed in plenty in the little farm-
house, but there was no money for luxuries or festivi-
ties in a household where Joseph was the seventh
child, with another even younger than himself. Yet
the mother's stories of saints and martyrs still influ-
enced his consciousness, so that he tried various secret
means of mortification. Madame Veuster, good, pious
soul, had very strong notions of bringing up her family
in full health, both physical and mental, so that
Joseph was never allowed to carry out these methods
of discipline in her presence by going without the
amount of food she thought proper and necessary.
Being of an extremely obedient disposition, though
already showing signs of strength of character, Joseph
looked round for some other means of keeping his
vigorous little body in subjection.

One happy day he managed to secrete a plank be-
neath his bed in the room which he shared with his
dearly-loved brother, Augustus, another devout young
soul, two years older than himself. It is a well-known
fact, proved to many a harassed English hostess in the
days of refugees in the Great War, that no Belgian,
however young, will share his bed with another. It

12 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

simply is not done. So that evening the two brothers
each got into his bed in the usual way, but later,
Augustus, waking in the moonlight, rubbed his sleepy
eyes, trying to understand whatever had happened to
Joseph. His curiosity indeed was so great that, jump-
ing up, he pattered across the floor in his bare feet, to
discover that the youthful ascetic had quietly dragged
out the plank from under his bed, laid it on the top,
and wrapping himself in his coverlets, was slumbering
peacefully.

Augustus, somewhat alarmed, awoke him and asked
for an explanation. Joseph in giving it begged that
Madame Veuster should not be told, and for a time
he regularly slept upon his self-inflicted cross. One
inauspicious morning he forgot to remove it, and great
was the good mother's horror on its discovery, so that
she quickly decreed the offending plank must be re-
moved and her small boy sleep in the comfortable bed
she had provided. Joseph, as usual obedient to the
* powers that be,' discarded his board and found other
means of following the examples of the saints. Well
was it for his devoted mother she little guessed that in
the future the earth itself would often form her darling's
bed !

Even these very early years show that Joseph was
possessed in full measure of the troublesome gift of
an extremely active conscience, a spiritual prize
which makes a beautiful frame to the picture of a
favourite saint, but which is not always acceptable to
oneself. In the young de Veuster's case it produced
extreme sensitiveness, so that, as has been s6en, he was
even reduced to tears when reproved for any childish
act of negligence or carelessness. He must not for

HOME INFLUENCE 13

this reason be condemned of the detestable trait of
priggishness, nor for the unpleasing characteristic of
effeminacy - later events free him from any suspicion
of the latter ; he had merely inherited that attribute
of many a holy soul - a super-sensitive consciousness,
"Through what anguish of repentance, what dark
'valleys of tears, what splendours of vision, this pos-
session led him, none but those likewise endowed can
.ever realise !

It was soon evident that work on the farm was un-
suitable for his career. That he was fully acquainted
with manual labour is abundantly proved by the
practical manner in which with his own hands he acted
. as builder, sanitary engineer, carpenter, gardener, and
even grave-digger, in his far-off South Sea Island
parish. He had found the secret of success taught by
the wise old 'sage so many centuries before his own,
, ' Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy
might.' His active mind very quickly absorbed all the
instruction available in the village school, and for some
years little scope was found for his great love of study.
But during this period he was far from idle, and,
working ceaselessly on his father's farm, he learnt the
many practical lessons which were to prove so valuable
an asset in his life-work.

Although always merry and bright, everyone's
friend, and beloved by all with whom he came in
contact, young Joseph does not appear to have spent
much time in games with the lads of the village. His
favourite pastime seems to have been skating, at which
he was an expert. The canals and rivers round his

I^ DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

home, frozen over for months together, gave many
opportunities for indulging in this sport, and he often
carried out many errands for his neighbours in this
manner. It is easy to picture the sturdy Belgian boy,
his rounded cheeks rosy with the bitter wind, gliding
mile after mile along the frozen waterways, the tall,
snow-covered elms beside him, silhouetted like fairy
trees against the pale blue of the wintry sky. How
often in after years, beneath the burning sun, limp and
exhausted with tropical heat, he must have thought of
those care-free hours, as like a bird he skimmed lightly
over the glittering ice !

On one occasion, pressed for time, moving swiftly
along the frozen Dyle, he came suddenly to the
junction of the Laak, where, with a lightning stab of
horror, he perceived an abyss opening (directly beneath
his feet. With a supreme effort he managed a sharp
turn to avoid the awful danger, then, stopping cauti-
ously, returned to examine the horror he had escaped,
His skate had skirted the extreme edge of the chasm.
For a moment he gazed at the dark waters of the whirl-
pool, then, falling on his knees, thanked God and his
guardian angel who had preserved him from such
deadly peril. For long after, even his courageous soul
could not call to mind that moment without an inward
shudder.

CHAPTER II

THE PREPARATION

A he grew older, Joseph de Veuster's exceptional
gifts for learning seeming to indicate a com-
mercial career, his parents with some sacrifice
raised sufficient money to send him to college at
Braine-le-Comte, in the Province of Hainault, more
particularly for the study of French, his mother-tongue
being Flemish.

Belgium, composed of two distinct nationalities,
speaks two languages. Roughly divided, her northern
inhabitants are akin to their Dutch neighbours, whose
ancestry they share. They are a slow-moving race,
chiefly agriculturists, their language being Flemish.
Their countrymen of the south are Walloons, speaking
French, and closely allied in racial characteristics to
their kinsmen of France. In the main they are manu-
facturers, in temperament more vivid and passionate
than their northern brothers. The two have little in
common beyond the tie of patriotism, and many
problems have arisen on the question of language,
owing'not only to the difficulties of the Flemish tongue,
but also on account of its varied dialects, which make
it quite possible even in the capital city of Brussels to
find a visitor from the northern provinces who cannot
make himself understood. That Joseph de Veuster
met with this racial antipathy is proved by a letter
home mentioning that * any Walloon who laughs at

l6 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

me, I hit with a ruler.' The embryo saint was not yet
entirely regenerate !

The young man's keen intellect and retentive
memory stood him in good stead in his studies, to
which he addressed himself with remarkable vigour.
Although possessed of an exceptionally good con-
stitution, he almost overtaxed his strength by the
ardour with which he pursued the path of learning,
using even his walks and recreation for the purpose of
acquiring knowledge. Those familiar with Hobbema's
picture of the * Avenue at Middelharnis,' hanging in
the National Gallery, London, can well picture the
scenery he encountered on those solitary walks - the
long white road bordered by the tremulous, delicate
poplars, the little fairy village at the end of the vista
with its red roofs and tall church spire, on either hand
the countryside, with carefully tended fields, green
meadows, and tiny copse. In after years the calm
orderliness of it all must often have returned to his
mind as, c crowned with glories and horrors, he toiled
and rotted in that pigsty of his under the cliffs of
Kalawao/

The college evidently seemed at first a very lonely
place to the home-loving boy, separated also from his
beloved Augustus, who by this time had entered the
convent 1 of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary at
Louvain, to train for the Holy Office of Priesthood.
Many affectionate letters passed between the brothers
at this period, showing that Joseph at an age when so
many lads pass through a stage of distaste, even almost
contempt, for the old life, bore an ever deepening

* Throughout the following pages the word ' convent Ms used as meaning a mon-
astic establishment, not in its modern designation as referring to a nunnery*

THE PREPARATION 17

affection for his parents and a real sense of gratitude
for the love and care they had so generously lavished
upon him.

A letter written to his father and mother while in
the college at Braine-le-Comte is typical of these
marked traits in his character :

* I am veiry glad to get a little free time, as it gives me
this opportunity of conversing with you for a few
moments. It is to you, my dear parents, that I owe, not
only my present happiness, but also the education
which I am now receiving and which will be of profit
to me all my life. I do not know how I can prove,
as I ought, my gratitude to you for all the benefits
you have conferred upon me, from my earliest
years.'

It has been seen that Joseph had very early shown a
strong love for the things of the spirit, combined with
a deep interest in the services and ceremonial of the
Church, and it was at the impressionable age of eight-
een that he took part in his first Mission, conducted
by the Redemptorist Fathers in 1858. The beautiful
church of Braine-le-Comte, crowded with great con-
gregations full of ardour and devotion, the impassioned
singing and inspired sermons, the whole atmosphere
electric with faith and emotion, acted upon the sensitive
soul- of the young student with an irresistible force.
The first night he did not go to bed at all, but spent the
time on his knees in silent prayer and meditation. And
through those long hours of darkness it is possible the
world lost a great captain of industry, but the modern
Church found one of its greatest saints. Joseph de
Veuster had found his vocation - that greatest vocation
of all, known only to the favoured few, who, leaving all

l8 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

that life holds dear, walk with bare and bleeding feet
on the sacred Way of the Cross.

The first problem the young aspirant for the cloister
had to face was the difficulty of breaking the news to his
parents, who, having sacrificed so much for his educa-
tion, were obviously looking forward to his career as
a successful business man. An opportunity seemed
to present itself when news came from home saying
that one of his sisters had made her Profession as a
nun, so that Joseph, in reply, asked whether it would
be possible for him to follow his brother Augustus, now
known as Father Pamphile, into the Congregation of
the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary at Louvain, often
called the Picpus Fathers, from the name of their
House in the Faubourg St. Antoine in Paris, This house
in the French capital was the place in which the Com-
munity had first been established, and it still remained
the residence of the Superior-General of the Order.

Monsieur and Madame de Veuster at first withheld
their consent to their son's petition, either with a view
to testing his vocation, seeing his extreme youth, or
possibly from some other equally good reason. The
parents' consent being so important a factor in any
crisis in the life of a Belgian boy, and particularly in
the case of this special boy, whose devotion and obedi-
ence to his father and mother were so highly developed,
Joseph was obliged to possess his soul in patience.
But the Divine Call, once heard, can never be silenced ;
sleeping or waking, it urges the soul with an insistence
which cannot be ignored, even to the extent of crying
aloud :

* He that loveth father or mother more than Me is
not worthy of Me/

THE PREPARATION 19

This waiting time must have been hard for the
young man's ardent soul, yet it was necessary, for it
taught him life's stern lesson of patience, together with
the driving-force which lies in continual prayer. It
was after a particularly fervent Communion on the
Christmas Day of 1858 that he wrote again to his
parents, and this time the simple earnestness of the
appeal was so unmistakably genuine that their oppo-
sition was withdrawn. Indeed, to pious souls such as
Francois and Catherine de Veuster, this letter must
have given great spiritual joy, revealing as it did the
depth and sincerity of their son's character.

1 This great Feast has brought me the certainty that
God has called me to quit the world and embrace the
religious state, therefore, my dear parents, I ask again
for your consent, for without it I cannot venture to
enter on this career. God's commandment to obey
our parents does not apply only to childhood.'

Joseph's first thoughts had been to ally himself to
the Trappists, that stern, amazing Brotherhood whose
vow embraces perpetual silence (except for devotion
and salutation), severe abstinence, eleven hours spent
daily in prayer, and much hard manual labour, but
maturer consideration and the advice of Augustus
decided him to join his brother at the convent of the
Picpus Fathers in Louvain.

The University of * Louvain, the former capital of
the Province of Brabant, has a long history as one of
the most celebrated seats of learning, having been
founded towards the dose of the seventh century. Its
glorious library was completely destroyed during the
Great War, when many unique volumes and manu-
scripts were irrevocably lost. The University has

2O DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

held faculties of law, medicine, arts, and theology, but
the last-named has always been the most representa-
tive of Louvain. A Seminaire G&i&ale was estab-
lished in the city in 1876 for the education of youths
intended for the Priesthood.

On Joseph's nineteenth birthday, January 3rd,
1859, Monsieur de Veuster, having business in
Louvain, took the boy to interview the Father Superior
at the Picpus Convent, arranging to call for him later.
But Joseph had a different design simmering in his
active brain that the slower moving mind of his father
never suspected, this being nothing less than remain-
ing henceforth in the convent, and no sooner was the
worthy farmer's back turned away than Joseph be-
sought his brother, Father Pamphile, to obtain leave
from the Superior to allow him to stay under his roof.

The Superior, with rare insight, recognising the
boy's vocation shining in his earnest eyes, gave per-
mission for him to remain, and great was Monsieur
de Veuster's surprise when he called for him later in
the day. Joseph met him with humble apologies, beg-
ging that he might be excused from returning home,
skilfully insisting that in this way his mother would be
spared the long-drawn anguish of a more formal part-
ing. His father, whose behaviour throughout seems
to have shown utmost submission to what he must
have regarded as the Divine ordering of events, went
quietly away, and, amid the brass and copper pots and
pans of the humble Flemish kitchen, informed his
wife that her son had bade farewell to his home for
ever.

The decision of the Father Superior quickly proved
to be justified, and some time later he remarked :

THE PREPARATION 21

* From the first moment Damien lived in the
Community as if he had spent several years in it.
To witness his very deportment, the great joy which,
tempered with calmness and serenity, pictured the
happiness and peace of his soul, was to call to
mind the words of St. Aloysius uttered on entering
the cell of his novitiate, " I find my repose in this
house ; here will I live, because it is the house of
my choice.*' '

Before finally entering the convent of the Picpus
Fathers, Joseph returned home for a month. The last
evening in the old farmhouse kitchen was spent in
quiet conversation with his father and mother about
the future, and the happy prospect of meeting in
another world where partings would be unknown. As
he left next morning with his parents' blessing resting
upon him, the village turned out to wish him God-
speed, waving friendly, loving hands from their cot-
tage doors as he passed along, sorrowing that they
would rarely see his bright, joyous face, his tender
smile, again,

It is well, in this age when parents so often think
that the making of money is the one criterion, the only
ideal for which their children should work, to remem-
ber the quiet self-sacrifice of those two hard-working
Flemish peasants, Fran?ois and Catherine de Veuster.
Two of their daughters had left them and become
nuns ; one son, Pamphile, was already a monk ; and
now Joseph, the apple of their eye, was to follow the
same sacred calling. Four children given to God, and
given with that complete surrender which only the
convent walls can demand ! A magnificent example to

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

this and every generation ! It may be that, when the
great bede-roll of the saints is called, such humble,
pious souls as these may rank among the aristocracy
of heaven.

Even now that his feet were firmly set within the
convent walls Joseph met another great difficulty, for
the Father Superior found that the boy's commercial
education was not sufficient to admit him as a candi-
date for the Priesthood, and it was therefore necessary,
according to the rules of the Congregation of the
Sacred Hearts, to rank him among the choir or lay
brothers. This necessitated many laborious and even
menial duties, but the lad who a short while before
had been accustomed to work in the fields from dawn
to dusk made light of such things, and, while his strong
young arms worked willingly at many uncongenial
tasks, his mind rested upon the things of the spirit.
And ever before him, even when it seemed most im-
possible, there gleamed the great ideal of the Holy
Priesthood. Nor, in spite of his laborious days, did
he forget his early endeavours at self-mortification.

The brothers shared a room in the convent just as
in their boyhood days in the red-roofed farmhouse at
Tremeloo, and Pamphile, waking one night in the
same way as long ago, saw a strange, uncanny parcel,
with curious bumps and curves, lying beside the
younger boy's bed, which, on closer inspection, proved
to be the lad himself wrapped in his blanket, fast
asleep on the bare boards. Pamphile, knowing that
the Father Superior had forbidden this practice, wak-
ened his brother, and within a short time had the

THE PREPARATION 23

satisfaction of seeing the ever-obedient Joseph safely
tucked up in bed.

But the spirit of self-mortification was so strong, so
deeply engrained into his soul, that he soon found
other means of enforcing it. Throughout his life he
was always extremely severe on himself, though at the
same time his beautiful humility of character caused
him to endeavour by innocent artifice to conceal his
doings from those around him. In the convent it was
remarked that if for some slight reason anything were
missing from the refectory, he endeavoured to arrange
that it should be he who should suffer the little
privation, insisting on giving the meat to a hungry
comrade, while he himself dined gaily on soup and
potatoes.

A religious life, such as that followed by the Picpus
Fathers, based on the vow of poverty, of necessity en-
tailed many hardships, but Joseph, far from complain-
ing, underwent them all diligently and cheerfully, often
adding long night watches to those already enjoined,
spending hours on his knees in prayer. Much has
been written in praise of the bodies of the saints, grown
thin and ascetic with fasting, their eyes burning with
inward vision, their faces worn with watching and
devotion. But nothing has been said about their
humble knees, grown hard and calloused with many
prayers. It is left for the stones in many an old mon-
astery and ancient church, grown hollow where they
have knelt, to tell the story of these.

This same love of penance is shown in the alacrity
with which Joseph undertook any form of manual
labour, however hard or dangerous. A delightful in-
cident is recorded of an occasion when the Picpus

24 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Fathers were building the chapel of their Louvain
house, and the younger members of the Community
were assisting the workmen. In preparing the site it
was necessary to pull down a chimney so tall and rickety
that all the workmen refused the dangerous task. But
young de Veuster, quietly asking for a ladder and get-
ting someone to steady it, took down the chimney
brick by brick. The workmen, staring in astonish-
ment, cried aloud : " Mon Dieu ! Quel homme ! "

It is certain that a character such as his, aflame with
zeal and devotion, might easily have gone to extremes
if it had not been for his gift of docility, by which the
watchful guidance of the Father Superior was always
diligently obeyed.

One never-to-be-forgotten day Father Pamphile,
by way of pastime, proposed to teach him a few Latin
sentences. Joseph's retentive memory easily grasped
them, and in a few days the pastime had grown into a
serious study, so much so that in an incredibly short
time he had become equal to his master. The Superior,
on hearing of his surprising' progress, and having no
doubt a warm corner in his heart for the bright young
lad, allowed him to put off his entrance into the novi-
tiate in order that he might have the opportunity to
prepare for a Latin examination. This proved so suc-
cessful that it decided in favour of admitting him to
the habit.

It is the custom when postulants enter upon their
novitiate that they should take another name by which
henceforth they shall be known in religion, and to
Joseph de Veuster was given the name of DAMIEN,
that name which after his death was to flame across
the world in letters of gold. The choice was taken

THE PREPARATION 2$

from the heroic doctor of Cilicia who, after a
life of self-sacrifice spent in ministering to the souls
and bodies of suffering humanity, was with his brother
Cosmas unspeakably tortured and eventually beheaded
on September 27th, A.D. 303. Scenes from their
lives are found in the convent of San Marco in Flor-
ence, portrayed by the idealistic brush of Fra Angelico.
They are also known by reason of being the patrons
of the Medici family in Florence in the fifteenth cen-
tury.

This choice of the name of Damien for the young
novice of Louvain was prophetic for one who in after
years was to be both Priest and doctor to those whom
the world had cast off and forsaken. As he himself
said, ' It is more or less repulsive to nature always to
be surrounded by these unfortunate children, but I
find consolation in it ; for being now a bit of a doctor,
like my patron St. Damien, I try, with the help of God,
to alleviate their bodily pains and so bring them on in
the way of salvation/

Each day in after years as the young Priest at his
Altar offered the Eternal Sacrifice it must have been
an inspiration to repeat the name of his patron in that
great roll of honour in the Canon of the Roman Liturgy
beginning with * the glorious and ever-Virgin Mary/
and continuing with the * blessed Apostles Peter and
Paul ' down to * Linus, Cletus, Clement, Sixtus,
Cornelius, Cyprian, Lawrence, Chrysogonus, John
and Paul, Cosmas and Damian.' 1

In the form in use in Belgium the saint's name is

1 Not to be confused with St. Peter Damian, or of Damian, Cardinal Bishop of
Ostia, died February 23rd, 1072, and who cherished in his disciples the spirit
of solitude, charity, and humility, combined with great mortification.

2,6 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

written Damien, but in English it is spelt Damian, a
nearer reproduction of the original Latin, Damianus,
and the modern Italian, Damiano.

* Like my patron, St. Damien, I try, with the help
of God, to alleviate their bodily pains and so bring
them on in the way of salvation/ These words give
the key to Damien's handling of the flock committed
to him, the insight into the immortal soul within the
suffering body, for, although it was to the bodies he so
often ministered, yet it was for the souls of his people
that he made the supreme sacrifice, renouncing every-
thing that life holds dear. How often it has been
written across the history of Missions that by ministry
to the poor, weary body a door is opened to the secret
recesses of the soul.

But this is anticipatory. It is necessary to return to
the young brother in the Louvain convent. It is
typical of those early days that, on one occasion after
an earnest exhortation to the novices by the Father
Superior on the duties of * Silence, Recollection, and
Prayer/ Damien was found to have cut the words on
his desk to have them ever before his eyes - an interes-
ting instance of attention to the preacher which it is to
be hoped will not be followed too assiduously by
enthusiastic choirboys.

Above all the characteristics of his novitiate is shown
his wonderful capacity for prayer ; a gift which he
cultivated by every means in his power, not only by
the use of the Daily Offices, including the Night Hours
so strenuous to a novice, but by private prayer, the
outpouring of his soul, the inner mystic life of the
spirit in which God is not only the great Reality, but
the Friend, the Guide, and the Teacher. This intense

THE PREPARATION ^7

realisation of the companionship of his Lord, fostered
during those hours in the quiet convent, kneeling
before the Presence, were to prove of untold blessing
in the years to come, when in that lonely Isle of the
Pacific his sole companions would be his leper parish-
ioners, diseased both in body and soul. Youth, as it is
trained in devotion, the art of contemplation, the
memorising of Sacred Writ, little realises how these
things will be prized when sickness, distance, or
difficult occupations may cut the soul off from corporate
worship.

The superb constitution which Damien inherited
from his ancestors, sturdy sons of the soil, allowed him
to go into the chapel for Adoration so early as three in
the morning, continuing till the Brethren met for
Mattins and meditation at 4.30 a.m. If any could
have known what passed within his soul during those
silent hours of the night, his ministry at Molokai
might not have seemed so surprising, and much would
be learnt of the work of prayer. Did he kneel like the
young candidate for knighthood in John Pettie's
picture of * The Vigil,' his eyes full of steadfast faith
and devotion ; did he prostrate himself with an
adoration akin to the mysticism of the East ; or did he
just rest, hidden in the peace of the Sacred Heart, lost
in that highest communion of all ? God alone knows !
But this is certain, that in those hours when through
the dark shadows the light glowed above the Altar
where the Blessed Presence rested, the foundations on
which Damien's life-work was built were laid.

One striking characteristic of this young man's
character was the remarkable ease with which he
could pass in a moment from deep devotion to study

28 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

or recreation ; from gay conversation to complete ab-
sorption in prayer - a most enviable trait to those who
find concentration in worship one of the most difficult
achievements of daily life, only attainable by a soul
which lives very near to God.

His healthy body and love of prayer both stood him
in good stead on the occasions when the Brotherhood
made a pilgrimage to Montaigu, a celebrated shrine of
Our Lady, nine miles from Louvain, Young Damien
always made the journey both ways on foot as light-
heartedly as one of St. Francis's troubadour friars,
reciting the Rosary time and again. As it was the
custom to communicate at the 6 a.m. Mass at the
shrine, it was necessary to start from Louvain quite
by midnight, and the other pilgrims retired to bed
earlier than usual in preparation. It is always a melan-
choly procedure to start a journey at that dark, mys-
terious time when the day gives place to the first hour
of a new morning, with all its unknown perils and
possibilities. Damien., seemingly tireless, always
cheerful, rarely sought his bed on these occasions, but
spent the waiting time on his knees, where he was
found at the time of departure, quite as bright and
active as the sleepy-eyed Brothers who sought him.
Truly a man of superhuman strength !

It was during the first months he spent with the
Community in Louvain that a striking glimpse into
his humility of soul is given. Speaking to his brother,
Father Pamphile, he observed :

" When I -assist at the lectures of the University
the sight of so many clever students humbles me
exceedingly and covers me with shame."

Noble, humble Damien ! The names of those his

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Little Portion, the Portuincula, which his own hands
had erected, Damien with the utmost difficulty being
persuaded to rest upon a miserable apology for a bed
flat upon the ground, in his own little house by the
church he loved so dearly.

Lovely and pleasant in their lives, surely in death
these two are not far divided. Perhaps in the heavenly
mansions they walk even now as friends 1

For twenty-one days Damien lay in agony, while
gradually the familiar roar of the sea, the voices of the
children, the cry of the seabirds, grew faint to his
dying ears, in the same way as the dear, familiar faces
grew dim to his fading eyes. Constantly united to
his Lord by prayer and suffering, his sublime patience
and still cheery smile were a wonder to all.

Father Wendolin asked that, like Elijah, he would
leave him his mantle, that he might inherit his great
heart.

" What would you do with it ? " was the sick man's
reply. " It is full of leprosy/'

Towards the end he was continually aware of the
presence of two persons in the room, unseen to those
around him, one at the foot of his bed and one at the
head, but he never mentioned who they were.

The second Sunday after Easter was his last earthly
Sabbath, when in the Roman and Anglican Liturgies
the Gospel for the Day speaks of the Good Shepherd
who lays down His life for the sheep. In common with
Catholic Christendom, this Gospel was read in the two
churches of Molokai to the accompaniment of tears
and sobbing from the grief-stricken people.

30 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

kneeling before the stained glass window of Xavier
in the chapel, asking that the saint might intercede for
him that he too might be given the great privilege of
saving souls in heathen lands.

For many years he and his brother Pamphile had
loved to talk and think, and, when separated, to write
to each other about the glamour of the South Sea
Islands, with their sapphire seas thundering against the
reefs of coral, the lovely shores like one vast bouquet
of flowers, scented and glowing, the natives with their
laughing faces wreathed in blossoms, requiring but the
knowledge gained from Calvary to turn them into
veritable sons and daughters of the Living God. Nor
were the two young monks blind to the evil in those
sun-swept lands the innocent friendliness of the
natives to the white whalers and merchants repaid
by unspeakable cruelty and injustice, the barbarous
customs that lay behind the picturesque beauty of those
smiling lands, the foul diseases, the immorality, and
the idleness. But to an eager youth on the threshold
of life these things give but an added zest as he views
the work set before him, the trampling down of these
deeds of the Devil in the name of his Lord. And
again and again the younger lad saw his brother's eyes
sparkle as he looked forward to the time when he
himself would be a shepherd of these most attractive
sheep.

Damien, separated in Paris from the embryo mis-
sionary's influence, lost none of his own enthusiasm,
but spoke and thought much of those lovely and
alluring lands. The Father Superior, with Divine
intuition, recognised the dawning call in the young
novice's soul, and with earnest intentness several times

THE PREPARATION 31

drew his attention to St. Paul's state of mind at Athens.
The visits of a missionary Bishop from the South Seas
to the House of the Picpus Fathers set the final seal
on all these budding aspirations, so that he wrote to
his parents full of enthusiasm, * I believe this zealous
missionary will shortly return to his Mission in
Oceania, and may possibly take some of us with
him. Would you not be happy if I were to be
one ? '

Shortly afterwards, on returning to Louvain, he
found his brother's ardour for the work awaiting him
increased a thousandfold. But God does not always
call his servants to work for him in the way they choose,
and it was the Divine Purpose that Father Pamphile's
eyes should never rest on the enchanted islands of his
dreams. A few weeks before the date on which he
was to sail, typhus broke out in Louvain and the
young Priest obtained permission to go into the fever-
stricken homes of the city, taking the Last Sacraments
to those so suddenly called to pass through the gate
of death, as well as comforting the mourners and
burying the dead. It was a wonderfully heroic work,
.and it can well be imagined that Damien's eager soul
found much regret in the fact that, being as yet only
in Minor Orders, it was impossible for him to admin-
ister the Sacraments in like manner, but there is no
doubt his prayer-loving spirit poured out the riches of
its nature in continual intercession for the suffering
city.

It was but a short while before the date fixed for his
departure to Honolulu that the blow fell which was
to alter Father Pamphile's life-work. He who for
weeks had moved amidst the most virulent infection,

32 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

heard Confessions from the lips of the dying, admin-
istered the Blessed Eucharist and Holy Unction to
those in extremis, and all without any hurt, now fell
suddenly ill with the dread disease, and lay tossing
upon his bed, wasted with fever. Added to his physi-
cal sufferings, a cloud of deep depression settled down
upon his ardent soul as he realised it would be impos-
sible for him to start on his journey. Nor did it help
matters when he remembered that the Picpus Fathers
had already paid his passage. It was at this stage, when
the young Priest was fast losing his hold on life, that
his brother Damien, with that simple directness so
characteristic of his personality, went into his room
and, taking the poor, thin hand into his own, said
quietly : " Would it help you if I went in your place ? "

The sick man's eyes lit up with an eager light as,
pressing his brother's hand in return, he smiled joy-
fully, and from that very hour took on a new lease of
life.

All letters written by the Brotherhood were sup-
posed to be read before leaving the house, but Damien,
acting for once in direct disobedience to authority,
wrote to the Superior-General in Paris explaining the
situation and begging that he might take his brother's
place. A few days later, as the young students were
seated in their classroom, the Father Superior entered,
an open letter in his hand.

" Oh, you impatient boy 1 You have written this
letter and you are to go."

Damien the impulsive leapt from his seat and, run-
ning out of the room, leapt and danced like a young
colt. One is still very much the boy, even at the
mature age of twenty- three ! His fellow-students asked

THE PREPARATION 33

each other if he were crazy, but it was a Divine mad-
ness.

The letter had ordered him to bid farewell to his
parents and friends and come to Paris immediately to
join in the Retreat which his fellow-missionaries, com-
panions on the journey, were making before their
departure. Damien's first thought before going home
to Tremeloo was to run joyfully to his brother's bed-
side with the letter.

The suddenness of his departure, together with the
attendant excitement, must have done much to soften
the anguish of farewell. It is those who see the
loved one depart and themselves remain behind amid
the old familiar scenes, the daily tasks, where each
inanimate object brings back memories of the absent,
who suffer the most on these occasions. There are
many of this generation mothers, wives, sisters,
lovers who during the Great War bade farewell to
their menfolk fearing they might never meet again,
who can realise that it was Madame de Veuster who
suffered the most during those last brief hours, know-
ing full well, in those days of difficult and expensive
travel, it was probably the last time she would see her
boy again on this side of the grave. For him the acute-
ness of the agony came later, through long years of
loneliness and homesickness beneath the far-off
splendour of the southern stars.

Full of confidence in the Blessed Virgin Mary, the
Mother of Consolation, Damien asked his own beloved
mother and a sister-in-law to make a pilgrimage to the
shrine of Notre-Dame at Montaigu, where he prom-
ised to see them for the last time the following
morning.

34 DAMIENOFMOLOK.AI

Returning to Louvain, he started for Montaigu at
midnight with a few companions, as so often had been
his custom. The scene of his farewell is extremely
touching. After long and fervent prayer, the rare
tears of manhood falling fast, he folded his mother in
a tender embrace, then with a simple gesture pointed
to the statue of Our Lady, and with a heart overflowing
with grief, yet strong with hope, went forth to his life-
work and the ultimate martyr's crown, leaving his
beloved parent in the care of Him who had seen a
sword pierce through His own Mother's soul also.

Damien had prayed the Blessed Virgin to ask Our
Lord that he might have the space of twelve years to
work in His harvest. He was granted twenty-five.

On arrival in Paris, he had his photograph taken,
a quaint old-fashioned portrait staring straight out
from the picture, clasping a Crucifix, the symbol of
sacrifice, in much the same manner as his favourite
Saint, Francis Xavier. Yet the crude portraiture is
infinitely precious, for it clearly shows the open fore-
head and steadfast eyes, determined yet deeply affec-
tionate, the> essentially priestly face, so quickly trans-
formed into a smile of rare charm. It is a manly
countenance, typically Flemish, speaking of solid
worth, strong and brave - not handsome, as the world
reckons beauty, but a face commanding both love and
reverence, A slight myopia necessitated the wearing
of glasses, also causing a trifling disfigurement ; the
plain cassock and girdle accentuate the sacredness of
his calling. This portrait must have been a priceless
possession to the loved ones left behind, and not less

THE PREPARATION 35

so to those who in later years have been privileged to
see the exact likeness of a Saint of their own times.

Some words written on the eve of sailing are typical
of his character :

* Farewell, dear parents, farewell. Be careful al-
ways to lead a good Christian life, and never let the
slightest wilful sin stain your soul. Walk in the right
way. This is the last thing I ask of you ; promise it
me and I shall be without fear on your behalf ; I
shall look forward with confidence to seeing you again
in the heavenly country. Again, farewell ; may
Heaven bless your declining years - this will be my
daily prayer. FarewelL , . .

* FATHER DAMIEN/

The Picpus Fathers gave the name of Plre-
' Father * - to the members of their Order even before
their Ordination to the Priesthood. It is a delightfully
human touch, the boyish pride in his vocation, that
leads him to write * Father Damien * instead of the
more intimate * Joseph Damien de Veuster * which
characterises his later correspondence.

This letter must have brought much comfort to the
sorrowing parents, and even more so the words spoken
to Father Pamphile by one who had been with him for
several days before he sailed : " Your brother is a
saint, a St. Aloysius ; no one can see him serve Mass
without being struck by his deep devotion."

' A St. Aloysius ! * On entering the Picpus con-
vent at the time of his novitiate nearly five years before,
his Father Superior, on watching Damien, had been
reminded of the same saint, and it was a truly

36 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

prophetic instinct which likened him to the young
monk of three hundred years before, whose short life of
twenty-three years, noteworthy for its intense devotion,
was rendered up with such joyful surrender while
nursing the sick in the epidemic which swept Rome
in 1591, In the margin of the Baptismal Register
against his name are inscribed the words :

* May he be blessed, may he be pleasing to God,
may he live only for the benefit of mankind ! '

Of Joseph Damien de Veuster at his Baptism these
words might have been as truly written as of his com-
rade in the Communion of Saints, Aloysius Gonzaga.

In October 1863, the month dedicated to the
Guardian Angels, Damien looked his last on Europe,
leaving behind him the reputation voiced by his
Father Superior : " His regularity from the beginning
was such that no eye, however vigilant, could ever
detect a fault in him/'

CHAPTER III

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EBEN

THE voyage to Hawaii was terrible, and it was well
that Damien suffered little from seasickness,
that unromantic malady which has made even
a Bishop remark, on returning on furlough from his
far-off diocese, that one of the most comforting
texts in the Scriptures is that which says of St. John's
vision of the heavenly country that ' there was no
more sea/

That modern floating palace, the liner, was unknown
in 1863, and Damien's ship was only a sailing-vessel,
taking five jnonths to journey on its laborious way. A
terrible storm was encountered off Cape Horn, the
extreme point of South America, and for several days
the frail vessel was beaten unmercifully by cruel
winds and fierce currents, so that it seemed impossible
she would not founder. Many pieces of wreckage
floating past on the seething waters gave ominous
warning of the fate of other ships.

Damien and his companions, undaunted, began a
novena to the Blessed Virgin Mary, a nine days'
devotion for the safety of the ship, ending on the Feast
of the Purification, February 2nd, 1864, the day on
which in far-off Europe the snowdrops begin to lift
their little heads above the frost-bound earth in readi-
tiess for the Festival of Mother Mary and her forty-
day-old Son. Hardly was the novena concluded than

37

38 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

the roaring winds and waters abated, so that they were
able to pass out of the Straits in safety. A little later
they encountered another storm of twenty-four hours'
duration. Damien, with his usual playful humour,
wrote his brother Pamphile, remarking that the great
sea they traversed was grossly misnamed, for it was the
very reverse of * Pacific/

The little band of missionaries added much gaiety
to the ship's company, for they were always merry and
bright, so that Damien, writing at the beginning of the
journey, remarked that after being half an hour to-
gether they were quite tired with laughing and telling
funny stories* He himself was very popular with the
sailors, even occasionally lending them a hand in his
jolly, practical way. He had been appointed Sacristan
for the voyage, and spent much time each day pre-
paring the improvised Altar. At one time the supply
of Altar Breads gave out. Damien had no proper
implements for their preparation, nothing but the
necessary flour, yet after several unsuccessful attempts
he managed to produce them. As a server at Mass his
modest demeanour and recollected devotion were an
inspiration to all present.

A letter which he wrote during the voyage shows
that for all the deep joy in his vocation and outward
gaiety his tender heart still returned often in spirit to
the little white-walled, red-roofed homestead of his
childhood :

* Goodbye, dearest parents. Henceforward we shall
not have the happiness of seeing one another, but we
shall always be united by that tender love which we
bear each for the other/

On St. Joseph's Day, March I9th, 1864, the feast

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 39

of his patron saint, Damien first beheld the snow-
capped mountains of the Hawaiian Islands gleaming
with sun-kissed beauty above the banks of cloud. As
the ship drew near, a veritable feast of colour unfolded
like a gorgeous panorama - huge waves, blue and
glorious, dashing themselves to death on the coral
reefs in thunderous clouds of spray, hillsides vivid
with red volcanic ash, green with tropical vegetation,
threaded with silver waterfalls. Close to the land,
dusky swimmers floated in the blue lagoon, real water-
nymphs whose glossy hair spread round them like
some strange seaweed as they sang their native
melodies. Gathered on the shore, more smiling
natives, their dark tresses adorned by many-coloured
flowers, stood awaiting them with garlands in their
hands.

On landing at Honolulu, strange, romantic name in
keeping with the exotic loveliness of the scene, the
missionaries proceeded straight to the Cathedral,
where they heard the 9 a.m. Mass in thanksgiving for
a safe voyage.

The Picpus Fathers regarded the converting of the
heathen as one of the chief objects of their Order.
They had been working in Hawaii for thirty-eight
years, but missionary enterprise had been in pro-
gress in the island for quite seventy years, striving
to counteract with its message of love and for-
giveness the evil influence of white traders and
whalers.

The world may scoff at the missionary, criticise his
methods, tear his reputation into miserable rags, but
often it has been proved that it is he and his message
of the Cross that alone have saved the white man, the

4O DAMIENOFMOLOKAI

aristocrat of the nations, from perils that in his blind-
ness he has not even understood.

From the very first the warm-hearted islanders
welcomed Christianity into their midst. To them,
living amidst the splendour and the terror of a tropical
world, where death strikes swiftly and often unseen
from beneath his veil of flowers, the message of the
Resurrection struck home with surpassing power.

" What ! " cried an old and dusky chieftainess, as
she first heard the hope of immortality. " What !
Can my spirit never die ? Will this poor body live
again ? "

It was the same rapture of the early Christians in
Rome, who, amid all its pagan loveliness, wrote upon
their tombs, * Vale> atque vale ' ; but, having heard the
message of life everlasting, cheerfully faced the lion,
the sword, and the stake, enduring all for the hope
that was set before them. There would be little
questioning of the decay of religion in England if she
had but recently known the despairing darkness of the
heathen world.

The first American missionaries to arrive in Hawaii
were welcomed enthusiastically by the king and his
five wives, straight out of the sea, all six in a state of
nature. The missionaries hinted delicately that things
might be more in order if a little drapery were em-
ployed. The king, a real aristocrat, took the hint
gracefully, and on the occasion of his next appearance
arrived wearing a pair of silk stockings and a hat.
The royal feasts in those days were on a truly grand
scale, though perhaps not quite up to the style of a
banquet at the Mansion House. Two hundred dogs
were sometimes cooked to form one item on the menu,

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 4!

but, as the white man seemed rather unappreciative
of this delicacy, it was a favourite Hawaiian joke to
put a pig's head on a roasted dog to deceive his
fastidious palate. Certainly trying for the mission-
ary, but not so alarming as the experience of his
brother of those days working in Borneo, who, on
receiving an invitation to a banquet, might dis-
cover somebody's head acting as a table-centre for
the feast.

By the time that Damien arrived in Hawaii the
royal court had improved its sense of humour, so that
it was unlikely he had to endure such rich experiences.
Before beginning his work as a missionary it was
necessary that he should be ordained to the Priesthood,
being as yet in Deacon's Orders. With this end in
view, he had earnestly pursued his studies during the
voyage, so that on arrival it was only necessary for
him to have two months' preparation before the
Bishop's hands were laid upon him in Honolulu
Cathedral, admitting him to the sacred Order of
Priesthood on the joyous Festival of the Holy Spirit -
Whit-Sunday, 1864.

The first Mass celebrated by any young Priest after
his Ordination must always be an occasion of deep awe
and reverence, but those who were privileged to be
present when Joseph Damien for the first time per-
formed that greatest act of Christian worship relate
that his demeanour touched every heart. He himself
gives a slight glimpse into the ecstasy, the devotion,
which pervaded his whole being, saying how greatly
he was moved in administering that most Blessed
Sacrament to men and women who perhaps earlier in
life had knelt in worship before some dumb idol and

42 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

now from his young hands received the veritable Body
of God, Ever-Living.

Damien started his life-work with the strong con-
viction that a missionary should be a saint, a conviction
which never left him. * Kamiano/ as Kanaka, the
native language of Hawaii, rendered his name,
brought many natural gifts to his ministry - a robust
body and constitution, a commanding presence even
among that race, some of the finest inhabitants of the
Pacific, a bright and cheery smile, infinitely attractive
to the laughter-loving islanders, a tender and sym-
pathetic soul, completed by a sonorous voice, giving
a rich harmony to the native language, an important
asset in a dialect where vowels are all-important and
two consonants never come together.

Added to these gifts he brought a tireless activity, so
that his people likened him to a fire or tempest. So
infectious was his energy that he even inspired work
in the Kanakas, those lotus-eating children of the sun.
In appearance the islanders, with their picturesque
garlands of flowers and necklaces of coloured seeds,
were distinguished by dark brown hair, either straight,
or thick and fuzzy like their well-known grass skirts,
teeth resembling pearls from their own lagoons, large
and expressive eyes, with thick lips and somewhat
flattened noses. The modefn novel, with its comrades
the cinema and the theatre, would have us believe that
the young lady of the South Seas is a siren of the highest
order, possessed with a particular attraction for the
susceptible white man, a fascination which often has
its conclusion in heart-breaking tragedy.

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 43

For his own part, Damien found the islanders a
lovable, attractive race, hospitable, gentle and courte-
ous, tender-hearted, not given to luxury or anxious to
amass riches - a fertile soil on which to plant the seed
of the Gospel, notwithstanding the rocky ground of
superstition and idolatry, and the cruel thorns of
intemperance, licentiousness, and disease, the latter too
often introduced by foreigners. The white man has
often taken not only the very life-blood from the native
races, but has even corrupted their child-like souls,
giving nothing but vices in exchange. It is curious
that these vices, as well as the white man's ailments,
when imbibed by the native races prove so virulent
that a childish illness like measles may decimate a
whole population. To the credit of the Hawaiian
islander, he still remains smiling, dignified, friendly,
and hospitable.

The islands are volcanic in origin, but the fires have
died down on all but the principal one, Hawaii itself.
The awe-inspiring sight of these mountains, with
their fire and smoke silhouetted against the deep blue
.of the tropical night or the golden loveliness of morning,
to which the Picpus Fathers referred as symbolic of
the undying flames of hell, awoke in Damien's warm
young heart a totally different conception. To him
the fiery tongues spoke of Pentecost, and the Blessed
Spirit of God turning a missionary's soul into a living
volcano of zeal and devotion.

4 If only Providence would send us a holy Priest
like the Curt d'Ars,' he wrote, * these stray sheep would
soon be gathered in,' and in an outpouring of prayer
and intercession he asked that he also might be en-
dowed with the * pure love of God, the ardent zeal for

44 DAM.IEN OF MOLOKAI

the salvation of souls, with which that same saintly
Cur6, Blessed John Vianney, was inflamed/

To the light-hearted Kanaka, the volcanoes are
objects of peculiar terror, inhabited by supernatural
beings of unknown horror and ferocity, whose activities
keep the inner workings going. It is therefore not
surprising that Damien found devil-worship in full
swing, accompanied with its usual abuses of witch-
doctors demanding vast offerings to the spirits,
particularly in times of eruptions, as well as during the
sinister rites connected with human sacrifices. These
sacrifices of living men and women, the occasion of
many cruel and bloody ceremonies, were of frequent
occurrence, being judged necessary whenever a new
temple was dedicated, a chief down on the sick-list,
or a war to be undertaken. The awful shores of the
Pacific, with their adamant cliffs of black lava, hide
many secrets of almost unearthly loveliness combined
with scenes of wildest terror.

Damien's parish of Puna was situated in Hawaii
itself a vast expanse of land with a widely scattered
flock. His first parish is always dear to a Priest's
heart. It is the place where he works out the burning
enthusiasm of his soul, the soil in which the fiery
instincts of youth are ripened into the maturer fruits
of experience. Damien was only twenty-four, a mere
boy to be entrusted with the sole cure of souls, yet it
is a strange anomaly that the seclusion of the cloister
often brings a wonderful knowledge of the working of
human souls, and it is possible that the monk may
prove as efficient a Father Confessor as the parish
Priest.

One important rule to which Damien firmly adhered

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 45

in his ministrations was the practice of refusing to
admit catechumens to Holy Baptism until they were
really fit to be entrusted with the responsibilities and
privileges of the Christian life, for, young as he was,
he knew full well that among those careless islanders a
relapsed Christian was as dangerous to the spiritual
life of the community as a plague-infected patient
would be disastrous to their physical well-being. No
entreaties or pleadings would make him relax this rule
only in the case of a- person grievously sick and
unlikely to live did he consent to baptise as soon as he
was asked.

It was a strange, picturesque life the young Priest
led as he hacked his way through the tropical forests,
grim, silent, and terrible, where Nature produces
herself in titanic growths of huge trees wreathed with
flowers, with ferns more than twice the height of a
man, and every yard a tangle of vegetation for his
tired feet. Often Damien must have felt desperately
lonely, yet one is never less alone than when alone with
God, and those hours in the steaming heat, surrounded
by the overwhelming activities of Nature, taught him
afresh the lesson of dependence upon his Lord.

Sometimes his way led over mountains, where the
waterfalls leapt in a thousand sparkling chains of
silver amid the vivid green into the lovely sea, where
in the clear water fishes gay as rainbows, yellow and
orange, blue and red, darted amid the snow-white
coral. Close by, the groves of cocoanut and banana
with broad, fan-like leaves acted as a background for
the flowering trees, the hibiscus flaming with colour
all the year round, the gardenias, the myrtles, and the
mystic passion flowers. After a shower the whole

46 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

island gave up a fragrant incense, intense and lovely,
filled with the scent of the Japanese lily and the tall
spikes of the ginger.

It was a colossal task that Monseigneur Maigret,
the Bishop of Honolulu, had set his young Priest, and
his confidence was not abused, for Damien met every
obstacle, every difficulty, every danger, not only with
courage, but with actual joy,

It was not long before he met the Father of the
adjoining parish of Kohala, a tract of land infinitely
larger than his own, containing seven scattered
churches. Damien's sympathetic eyes quickly per-
ceived the older Priest was fast breaking down under
the weight of increasing years and labour beneath the
enervating, tropical sun. With his usual quick
decision, the young man pressed him to allow him to
exchange his smaller parish with him, a proposal to
which the Bishop agreed, but even Damien's abundant
energy found it difficult to run a parish which, as he
wrote to Father Pamphile, was * as large as the whole
diocese of Malines,' and certainly much more difficult
to manage, so that it was not long before he found it
necessary to obtain helpers. The richness of his person-
ality always attracted young men to his side, so that it
was not long before he was able to find suitable Kanaka
youths whom he trained as lay preachers ; then,
having taught them the necessary Epistles and Gospels
and initiated them into the art of singing hymns, he
sent them out as his messengers, and very earnest and
devoted they proved.

Yet even their zeal did not save him from much
hardship and heavy toil - endless riding and tramping
through the thick forests, steaming with heat like some

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 47

gigantic greenhouse, climbing rocky mountain slopes
beneath the tropical sun, wrestling with superstition,
idolatry, immorality, drunkenness, and disease, bearing
all with a cheerful spirit, daily giving thanks for the
privilege of ministering to the souls of men. Dis-
appointments, burdens, anxieties, such as few other
Priests in the island could have borne, were his daily
portion, yet he continued on his way, joyful and serene,
full of faith, eager for his Master's service.

One instance, typical of countless others, is recorded
of Damien's hearing for the first time of a little Christ-
ian settlement far away beyond the rocky slopes at the
foot of which he was riding, where the Priest had
died and no substitute found. Without a moment's
hesitation, Damien tethered his horse and began
steadily to climb the mountain-side, scrambling from
rock to rock, taking precarious hold of the ferns and
grass, moving with bated breath above fearful precipices
and deep chasms till at length he reached the top.
There, pausing for breath, he looked down into a
deep valley bounded by a second mountain. Sliding,
slipping, stumbling, he made his perilous descent, then,
crossing the valley, began his second wearisome climb.
At the top his tired, eager eyes beheld nothing but
another wide-spreading plain and a third imposing
height. With weary steps, hands and feet cut and
bleeding, boots worn to fragments, he crossed the
valley, then, pausing, well-nigh spent, looked up at the
towering rocks above him.

With parched lips he prayed for strength to carry
on, then, glancing down at his wounded hands and
feet, recalled the sufferings of his Lord on another

48 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Sorrowful Way, and swiftly the deep spirituality of
his nature triumphed over the poor, exhausted body,
as he muttered to himself :

" Courage, Joseph ! The good God also has shed
His blood for those poor souls yonder/'

* Courage, Joseph ! * It is one of the watchwords of
his career. Small wonder that the Bishop of his
diocese, a man of few words, had named this new
recruit * The Intrepid/

It is possible even to picture a faint smile upon his
face as he began that third perilous ascent, planting
his tortured feet upon the treacherous rock, clinging
with his bloodstained fingers to the shrubs and ferns.
Yet even his brave eyes must have feared what they
might meet as at length he reached the summit. But
there, at last, his faith and patience were rewarded,
for unmistakably he could see a native village nestling
amid the foliage.

Nor had he long to wait for his reward, that reward
so dear to the heart of a Priest - the welcoming delight
of souls long deprived of the Church's ministrations,
starving in spiritual destitution for need of her Sacra-
ments. With deep gratitude these lonely Christians
gave him of their best, and, showing him the pathetic
grave of their dead Priest, quickly found themselves
numbered among Damien's parishioners.

To him this was no outstanding experience, but
merely one of many, numbered among the countless
burdens, the bitter disappointments, which every
missionary Priest knows so well.

Damien's pastoral visitations did not always entail
tramping through the primeval forest or scaling preci-
pices. Sometimes his way lay across the sea, rowed

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 49

in a boat constructed of nothing more elaborate than
the hollowed-out trunk of a tree, manned by sturdy
Kanakas, whose brown skins gleamed with the rich
tints of copper in the vivid sunlight.

On one such occasion, as the boat sped rapidly
along, a frightened rower suddenly gave vent to the
age-long cry of the terrified mariner : " We perish ! "

In a fraction of time they were all in the water, the
Kanakas swimming as easily as the gorgeously tinted
fish moving beneath them, Damien equally securely -
for he had learnt the art when quite a lad -though
perhaps not quite so gracefully as his dark-skinned
companions.

The party had no idea how to right the capsized
boat, but they managed to propel it as they swam,
and thus came safely to land. The practical side of
Damien 's nature is characterised by the fact that,
before trusting himself and his goods to this very
primitive method of transport, he made suitable
preparation for any mishaps that might occur to either,
by making a good act of contrition to safeguard the
one and by firmly strapping the luggage to the canoe
to preserve the other. By this means no damage was
done, except to a little Breviary which Damien much
valued, whose pages were so saturated with water as
to be unreadable.

He had been but a short time in his new parish
when, with the aid of the Kanakas, he began with his
own hands to build churches and chapels, and much
was the amazement of his parishioners to see their
Padre carrying great planks of wood from the seashore

O DAMIENOFMOLOKAI

right up to the top of the hill, planks so heavy that
three or four of them could scarcely lift them from the
ground.

One of his professors in the, old days in Louvain
University had often affectionately called him * Mon
gros Damien ' - * My big Damien ' ; the name would
have seemed more appropriate here, when, like St.
Simon of Cyrene on another hill, he toiled up the
slopes beneath the burning sun, carrying the wood
upon his broad, willing shoulders.

Another story, illustrating his great strength, tells
that, riding one day near the coast, he saw a small boat
drifting along the shore without any guide. Hurriedly
dismounting, he waded into the sea, reached the boat,
and with his own unaided efforts brought it ashore.
Eight helpless men four Englishmen, three Ameri-
cans, and one Dutchman were lying exhausted
within it, their hands still grasping the oars they were
too feeble to use. Obliged to quit their burning ship,
they had drifted, helpless and hopeless, for eight weary
days. In after years, as Damien's strong young body
lay sleeping in its leper's grave, it is possible that some
of these men recognised the name of the young Priest
who had saved them from a terrible death.

At first the young missionary included benches in
his church furniture, but soon found it was a needless
luxury for a congregation who much preferred to sit
on mats on the floor.

His home life in Belgium had shown him that hall-
mark of respectability, Sunday clothes, but here the
Sabbath created a more startling difference, for his
parishioners, who on week-days roamed the country-
side half-naked, in and out of the sea like so many

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 5!

brown fish, appeared in church on the first day of the
week in garments wonderful and dazzling to behold.
The Kanaka, in common with all mankind, and even
some of the more intelligent of the animal kingdom,
hates being laughed at, and it was more than the young
Padre's place was worth for his merry eyes to betray
the inward mirth they found so difficult to conceal.

St. Paul speaks of the necessity for women to be
soberly attired, but it is certain that in their wildest
extremes of fashion the ladies of Corinth were not so
distracting to the preacher as those beaming Hawaiians,
clothed in every tint of the rainbow, with probably
flowers of gorgeous hue in their fuzzy hair and gar-
landed around their necks. There was certainly no
lack of the picturesque in Father Damien's first

parishioners.

...**

Lovely, laughing, flower-strewn Hawaii, two thou-
sand miles from the nearest mainland ! Some call it
the Garden of God, and so it is ; yet, like every earthly
Paradise, the serpent lies hidden beneath its luxuriant
beauty, and all too soon Damien perceived its evil
shape.

Years before, at Braine-le-Comte, he had heard of
the dark shadow of leprosy lying over the sunny isles
of the Pacific, but, just as a catastrophic disaster at the
other end of the world moves us less than a murder in
the next street, so the young student had given but
passing interest to stories of the awful scourge, and it
was not until he beheld its victims before him that he
realised its horror.

In the early stages it is not always easy to single out
the sufferers from among their healthy brethren, but as

2 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

the disease pursues its course the victims are usually
only too obvious, with their bloated and glistening
skin, eyes glazed as though with the approaching film
of death, limbs decayed and swollen out of shape,
features scarred so as to be almost unrecognisable.

Kindly, hospitable Hawaii was a fertile soil in which
the deadly seed could plant its roots. The friendli-
ness of the natives both to each other and to strangers
even went so far as dividing the last crust, sharing the
sleeping-mat, and handing the pipe from mouth to
mouth ; while among the women, well-matured gar-
ments were lent and borrowed with a total disregard
of every law of hygiene. And not only were these
things done all day and every day, but no discrim-
ination was made between the sick and the whole.
Small wonder that leprosy spread promiscuously, as
no efforts were made to segregate the victims or give
any aid whatever to relieve their sufferings. Often
Damien found them dying by inches amid their rela-
tives without any medical help whatsoever, apparently
entirely oblivious to the contagion they were spreading.
The easy-going Hawaiian has little thought for the
future, so that the necessity for prevention of the disease
was never even considered. There is no need to say
to a Kanaka, " Take no thought for the morrow " ;
he will be very unlikely to take any even for to-day.

It was natural that under these conditions the
population of the islands decreased, and as the lepers
circulated freely, not only in their own districts, but
wherever crowds gathered together, they became a
menace to native and white man alike.

In 1865, the year after Damien's arrival, the Gov-
ernment awoke to the danger, and, after discussing the

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 53

matter, passed an Act decreeing banishment to all
victims of the disease, regardless of sex or rank, of
race or colour. The words of this decree, terse and
coldly official as they sound, are numbered among
some of the most tragic in history.

' . . , All lepers are required to report themselves
to the Government Health Office within fourteen days
from this date for inspection and final banishment to
Molokai.'

The measure, wise though it was, filled the unhappy
islanders with horror. Like all news, it spread with
lightning rapidity from shore to shore, and its import
was not long in being understood. Full well it was
realised that it meant total separation from loved ones
at a time when their sufferings called for the need of
even more than ordinary love and tenderness. To the
anguish of separation was added the knowledge that
the Government was not prepared to incur expense,
not even the provision of dwelling houses, so that
existence would be maintained in conditions of direst
misery.

No sooner was the decree published than hundreds
of lepers were seized by the messengers of the Board
of Health and transported to Molokai, the appointed
island of exile. Some of the sufferers, realising the
danger their presence presented to their dear ones, as
well as to the community at large, gave themselves up
to the authorities with noble self-sacrifice, others be-
cause there seemed no hope of concealment, one of the
victims actually being a cousin of the reigning sover-
eign. In many cases the poor creatures were hidden
by their friends among the labyrinthine depths of the
forests or in caves on the mountain-sides. Some were

4 DAMIENOFMOLOKAI

even concealed beneath the sleeping-mats in their
homes when the Government inspectors were likely to
arrive. By these means great numbers escaped being
rounded up at the annual search, and to a certain
extent the law was evaded until the year 1873, when,
a new king having come to the throne, another Board
of Health was appointed and the leper hunt carried
out more efficiently.

Damien's tender heart, so sympathetic to all who
suffered, whether in body or soul, was wrung again and
again with the constant anguish of seeing the partings
between the lepers and their relatives, scenes so
agonised that often the healthy with dreadful entreaties
begged to be allowed to go into exile with their dear
ones. The thought of those already suffering the
horrors of the leper island, doomed in this world
never again to see the faces of those they loved,
haunted the young man's mind by day and night.
And far more than the realisation of their physical
misery, greater even than their mental suffering, was
the knowledge of their spiritual destitution, for they
were utterly alone, without any Priest to administer
the Sacraments or give any kind of hope or consola-
tion. Deep down in his heart Damien began to ques-
tion his own soul : was he called upon to sacrifice
everything, even ultimately life itself, and offer him-
self as their spiritual father ; was he worthy to be
called to what must prove the martyr's crown ; was
he sufficiently experienced ?

Besides these questions, there was a great obstacle
in the way. He was under his Bishop's orders in a
large district in which few could undertake his duties
-the arduous care of seven churches and their

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 55

out-lying districts. A loyal son of the Church, a monk
under strict vows, Damien throughout his life ren-
dered perfect obedience and loyalty to the Holy See,
so that at the moment it seemed he could do nothing
but await the course of events. Knowing the scarcity
of missionaries, he reassured himself by the thought
that, if it were God's will he should go, a way would be
shown. In the meanwhile, he made the matter a
subject of continual and earnest prayer.

Although the surroundings of his work in that
romantic land were so picturesque, the means of trans-
port so difficult and so dangerous, the daily routine
was seldom interrupted. He made regular visitations
of his flock, celebrated Mass, heard Confessions, gave
instructions to catechumens and young helpers, min-
istered to thfe sick and dying. Often he must have
been weary both in body and soul, lonely not only
with the isolation from men of his own race and
colour, but lonely with that spiritual loneliness \vhich
is the lot of many a Priest, who, though the father of
his people, bearing within his heart their joys and their
sorrows, their sufferings and their sins, must often
himself walk his own road apart. His are the words
of King Henry before the Field of Agincourt :

Upon the king ! let us our lives, our souls,
Our debts, our careful wives,
Our children, and our sins lay on the king !
We must bear all !

One of Damien's few recreations was the sending

56 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

and receiving of letters from Belgium. Many touch-
ing stories of his people, mingled with the spiritual
experiences of a Priest, found their way to Tremeloo
and Louvain, delighting his parents and friends with
glimpses of his old merry character, deepened by the
maturity of his manhood and the urgency of his
mission.

His letters must have brought strange, exotic
scenes into the old farmhouse and quiet convent pic-
tures of scenery wild and lovely beneath the tropical
sun ; of surf-riding on the great Pacific rollers, with
the sound of music on sea and shore ; of torchlight
fishing beneath the opal moon ; of bathers gaily
singing in the starlight. Entrancing scenes, strange
and bewitching, pictured in those far-off Belgian
homes 1

In May 1873, ten years after his arrival in Hawaii,
there came an unusual break. On the neighbouring
island of Maui, where flourishing sugar plantations
had caused a large influx of labourers, a church had
just been completed, and the Bishop of Honolulu,
feeling it an important event, had summoned his
clergy from the various island parishes to be present
at the Dedication.

Damien, summoned from Hawaii, travelled in a
sailing vessel across the channel which divided the
island from Maui, past the lovely coral reefs and
emerald green valleys, till, rounding the coast, he
came to the settlement of Wailuku, where the new
church had been built.

Among the clergy present at the Dedication were
several young missionary Priests newly arrived, in
whom no doubt Damien was much interested. The

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 7

service over, the Bishop took the opportunity to discuss
the conditions of the various districts. In the course of
the Conference the conversation turned to Molokai, the
leper settlement, by that time known by the ominous
title of the ' Living Graveyard.' The Bishop shook his
head with deep regret. The state of things on that island
of death and corruption was enough to wring the
heart of any true father-in-God. At very rare intervals
he had been able to send a Priest there to adminster
the Sacraments to the dying, but he feared even this
would not be allowed again, as every year the Govern-
ment conditions became more stringent. To Joseph
Damien it was a distinct call, an assured answer to his
prayers. With his usual simple directness, he spoke
what was passing in his mind. " Monseigneur !
Here are your new missionaries. One of them could
take my district. If you will be kind enough to allow
it, I will go to Molokai and labour for the poor lepers,
whose wretched state of bodily and spiritual misfor-
tune has often made my heart bleed within me."

Simple words for the offer of a life's sacrifice, the
certainty of a martyr's death, and such a death not
the swift passing in the arena on some Roman holiday,
but the slow, agonising mortification of the flesh upon
the living body, perhaps in five years, possibly in only
two or three 1 And of thos.e present who heard his
offer all knew and realised with a swift horror what it
entailed.

These and many other thoughts must have passed
through the Bishop's mind as, touched and astonished,
he looked deep into his young Priest's eyes, finding
there with unerring intuition that mystic knowledge
of vocation which sent Francis of Assisi to turn the

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

world's values upside down, Joan of Arc to redeem
her country's honour, Saul of Tarsus to become Paul
the Apostle. It was the call of God, and the Bishop
dared not withhold his consent.

Swift to accept his acquiescence, Damien suggested
he should start at once for Molokai. Fifty lepers were
to leave Honolulu that evening ; there was just time
for him to get back to the harbour. The Bishop, with
his realisation of the Divine inspiration urging the
young man onwards, could but agree, and shortly
afterwards he and Damien had left the Conference
and were sailing across the blue waters of the Straits,
reaching Honolulu but half an hour before the steamer
for Molokai was due to sail.

Damien, as member of a Religious Order, had few
earthly possessions, but there was no time to collect
even these, much less to bid farewell to his beloved
parish, where in the nine years of his ministry he had
made many friends. Just before sunset, as the air
resounded with the pitiful wailings of the lepers and
their dear ones, the Bishop and Priest took their
places on the vessel almost unnoticed.

Leave-takings at Honolulu are always romantic and
emotional. To-day, as the great ocean liners put out
to sea, the strange pathos of Hawaiian voices singing
songs of farewell sounds across the waves, and even
the most hardened traveller, stajnding on deck wearing
the garlands of flowers which the islanders have flung
around his neck, feels tears of unwonted sadness come
into his eyes. But to Monseigneur Maigret and
Joseph Damien, as they left Honolulu that night in

A MINISTRY IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 59

company with that crowd of heart-broken lepers,
whose misery was not assuaged by the sight of their
coffins, which a foreseeing Government in those days
obligingly sent to accompany them, must have felt
they walked with Dante in some dreadful inferno.

It was rare indeed that among the victims sent to
feed Molokai's fierce and hungry jaws there ranked a
soul so courageous as Mr. Ragsdale, destined ulti-
mately to become Governor of the grim island and a
staunch friend of Father Damien. A distinguished
lawyer, he voluntarily gave himself up to the authori-
ties on discovering the deadly symptoms of leprosy upon
his person, and stepped upon the fatal boat amid the
other dreadful sufferers with a gardenia in his button-
hole and the jaunty air of a bridegroom going forth to
meet his bride. The son of an American father and a
Hawaiian mother, he was a striking example that the
half-caste can be made in a noble and heroic mould.
All honour be to him and to his bravery 1

But among Damien's fellow-passengers there was
nothing but misery, human anguish in its most pitiable
guise.

The boat carried another suffering cargo, a consign-
ment of cattle, probably destined for the butcher's
knife. Their plaintive cries added still more to the
horrors of the night.

For a while the mourning souls on the beach watched
the ship riding through a sunset glory of scarlet and
gold, then, with the swift overshadowing of the tropical
darkness, the vessel with its pathetic burden was seen
no more.

.

Joseph Damien was then only thirty-three, the age

60 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

at which his Lord had set His face steadfastly toward
Jerusalem, prepared for His Cross and the unknown
agonies of His most amazing Passion. The disciple
had heard the Divine call and was following humbly
in the same Way of Sorrows,

CHAPTER IV

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD

" T T NCLEAN ' Unclean 1 " The cry with its in-

I I jSnite burden of woe, echoing through the

^~s centuries, must have sounded in Damien's

heart with all its horror as his brave young eyes first

rested upon his new parishioners.

They were gathered upon the shore to meet the
ship, those endued with sufficient strength of mind
and body to get there the most pitiful collection of
suffering humanity that the eyes of a Priest could gaze
upon,

1 Suffering humanity 1 ' Scarcely human, many of
them, with their faces so distorted and repulsive with
the foul disease that they were, as Robert Louis
Stevenson wrote after his visit to the island years later,
a * blot upon the landscape, gorgons and chimseras
, dire - pantomime deformations of our common man-
hood, such a population as only now and again sur-
rounds us in the horror of a nightmare/ their limbs so
rotted and swollen that some crawled on all fours,
while others moved only on loathsome stumps of what .
had once been feet and legs.

But it was not only the sad bodies that filled the
young Priest's soul with shrinking horror ; it was the
bestiality, the debauchery, stamped upon the poor,
disfigured faces, the hopelessness and degradation of
those who had lost faith both in God and man, Only

61

62 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

such as he could still bear in mind that they were
created to be immortal, made to be an image of the
Divine eternity.

These poor creatures, whose ever-gr6wing putre-
faction was an offence to the fresh winds of the Pacific
as they swept across that desolate isle, still lived, and
breathed, and remembered. Remembered ! God of
all mercy and compassion, what added anguish, what
exquisite torture, must that remembrance have
brought !

Eagerly they pressed forward to see the boat
their only link with the outside world where once they
had laughed and danced, loved and worked like other
men ; looking eagerly at the new victims, if per-
chance there might be one amongst them whom they
had known in that life which now seemed so unreal, so
far away. Little did they know that the tall young
Priest with the courageous face and steadfast eyes was
to bring them back from a state akin to the beasts that
perish into the glorious liberty of the sons of God.

The batch of shivering, moaning lepers having
been landed, the Bishop and Damien stepped into the
little boat which alone could brave tvlolokai's cruel
rocks and surf-beaten shore and were rowed to the
beach, where, after much tossing and delay, they at
last stood among the throng of wretched, wondering
humanity upon the island. And as he scrambled on
to that inhospitable shore amid the rough, black
rocks of petrified lava, Damien said to himself :
" Now, Joseph, my boy, this is your life-work,"

Simple words, yet they hold the very essence of
Christianity.

With a voice filled with emotion, the Bishop blessed

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 63

these sad members of his flock and introduced their
new shepherd, then, with a final farewell, retraced his
steps over the rocks and re-embarked in the tossing
boat.

The young Priest was alone with his people, alone
on that island which Robert Louis Stevenson described
as * . . , a pitiful place to visit and a hell to dwell in/

But even those words, strong as they seem, were
written long afterwards, when, in comparison with
that day of 1873 when Damien landed, the island was
habitable, and all that love and skilled knowledge
could accomplish had been performed.

But at the time that Damien stood friendless and
alone, with no shelter but that which the lepers could
offer him, without even a change of linen, so hurried
had been his departure, Molokai was hell indeed -
hell with the lid completely removed.

Molokai Ahina Molokai the Grey, known also as
the * Isle of Precipices,' from the great walls of rock
rising in places absolutely perpendicular from the sea
- was a wild, weird land, volcanic in origin, with very
few trees, bearing huge rocks of dense black lava, and
not many flowers, haunted by the plaintive cries of the
sea-birds and the brooding sense of ever-present pain
and evil.

The formation of the island resembles a willow leaf,
that leaf which, shivering continually, droops its
head as though in perpetual mourning. From east
to west a formidable range of cliffs slopes gradually
from the south side of the island to a height of two to
three thousand feet above the sea, ending on the north
in a sheer, almost vertical, precipice, covered in places
with vegetation, and carrying on its surface dangerous

64 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

little zigzag paths leading to the rough, rank grass of
the plain below, where the two leper settlements are
situated - Kalaupapa, at the landing-stage, and Kala-
wao, three miles farther inland.

In this one spot on the island there * projects into
the ocean a certain triangular and rugged down,
grassy, stony, windy, and rising in the midst into a
hill with a dead crater ; the whole bearing to the cliff
that overhangs it somewhat the same relation as a
bracket to a wall.'

There was no need for man to guard the leper
settlements ; Nature had attended to that, with her
twofold barrier of precipitous rock and surf-ridden sea.
Six months before the arrival of the first batch of
lepers in 1865, the natives living on this north side of
the island sold their land to the Hawaiian Government
and fled. The low stone walls dividing their plots of
ground remained, as well as a few miserable, grass-
thatched huts, which, filthy in themselves, were soon
made unspeakably foul by the habits of their sick
inmates. The hard, volcanic earth surrounding the
rough settlement rapidly lost even the semblance of
cultivation, quickly relapsing into a wilderness. The
dying lepers were accommodated in a rough hospital
till the hour when they were thrust into their waiting
coffins and hurriedly buried in a hole painfully
scratched by the poor maimed hands of their fellow-
sufferers a foot or so below the surface.

Scanty supplies of food and clothing were sent at
intervals by the Government, but even at the best of
times these were quite inadequate, as well as often
delayed by the heavy storms which made landing on
that treacherous island quite impossible. Molokai,

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 65

beautiful in early dawn as some lovely siren hiding
behind her veil of mist, is in reality a deadly harpy,
luring men to destruction.

It was indeed a very different land from that fair
isle of the South Seas beloved of our childhood in the
pages of The Swiss Family Robinson, whose amenities
combined the advantages of Whiteley's and Selfridge's,
together with interesting replicas of the Zoo and Kew
Gardens. But none of these conveniences were a
feature of the * Living Graveyard/ where over two
thousand victims of leprosy had been landed since it
had first become a settlement, and of whom eight
hundred were still alive at the time of Father Damien's
arrival. Misery, filth, despair, vice, and degradation
were the only outstanding features of Molokai Ahina.

It is possible to imagine that even the intrepid eyes
of the young Padre gave one backward glance across
the sea ere he followed his dreadful guides over the
rough grass and hard boulders along the three miles
to Kalawao the sea, the lovely Pacific, fresh and
clean, which now divided him for ever from the land
of the living, from all that he held dear ; that sea, blue
as sapphire, brilliant as turquoise, where the deep
black albatross moved free as air between heaven and
earth. But it would only have been for a moment
that Joseph Damien looked back ; the next instant
he had turned to his people with that cheery, com-
passionate smile which was to prove their constant
joy and delight, the last thing their fading eyes beheld
ere they closed in death.

The smile of a beloved face - one of God's greatest

66 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

gifts 1 The Gospels record that the Incarnate Lord
wept never that He smiled. The reason is obvious ;
the smile must have always been near the surface, for
His eternal purpose was to bring joy to mankind, and
joy is inseparable from a smile. So to His faithful
followers He gives that lovely attribute of joyousness
from which no worldly force can ever irrevocably
separate the saints of God, that gift of which He cried
aloud upon the eve of His Passion : " Holy Father
. , . that they might have My joy fulfilled in them-
selves."

It was a tiring, dreary walk to Kalawao with that
halting, miserable crowd, but, like all earthly trials, it
came to an end at last, and Damien was able to see the
leper settlement in all its inadequacy, its filthiness, its
pitiful misery. There was no need for the words which
Dante saw inscribed above the gates of hell to be
emblazoned in that place of suffering and degradation :
* All hope abandon, ye who enter here 1 ' The very
atmosphere shouted them aloud in notes strident and
terrible.

The actual village consisted merely of a few grass-
thatched huts roughly thrown together with branches
of the castor-oil tree, in which the lepers lived huddled
together, entirely regardless of age or sex. Under the
stone walls left by the former native inhabitants help-
less women and children, unable to find room even in
the miserable shelter of the huts, had been cast out
to die. Within the foul atmosphere of the huts the
stronger lepers quarrelled and fought, played cards,
and danced with wild contortions and absolute aban-
donment, increasing their frenzied excitement by
copious draughts of the intoxicating ki-root beer,

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 67

roughly distilled from a plant which grew in abundance
along the base of the cliffs. Morality, cleanliness,
friendly feeling, even ordinary humanity, were ab-
solutely unknown, and those who fell under the
influence of the liquor forgot all sense of decency,
acting like madmen and running about nude.

The slogan of the island, dinned into the young
Padre's ears both in public and private, told much of
the state of the colony : 'dole kanawai ma keia wahi '
- * In this place there is no law,'

Small wonder that he found decency, morality,
cleanliness, and friendship almost non-existent. A
second slogan might quite easily have been added ;
it was certainly implied, if not expressed : * Each
for oneself, and the Devil take the rest/

That first night on the island the lepers would have
made room for him in one of their wretched, evil-
smelling huts, but this was more than even his courage-
ous heart could contemplate, so, with many polite
thanks, he retired from the scene of action beneath the
shelter of one of the few trees which grew upon the
island. Molokai has few redeeming features, but, in
company with other islands of the Hawaiian group it
enjoys complete freedom from snakes, that loathsome
terror of the tropics, so that in this respect Damien was
free from danger.

An artist has pictured him kneeling alone beneath
the branches, robed in his dark cassock, a Crucifix
clasped in his hands. The light of the tropical moon
shows his profile, clear-cut against the deep blue of the
star-lit sky, steadfast and courageous. His thoughts

68 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

on that first night seem almost too sacred for analysis
yet as he kneels there alone, with the flickering moon-
light playing over his young figure and clasped hands,
memory brings to mind the thought of another Figure
kneeling in the light of the same moon beneath the
olive-trees in dark Gethsemane, ere at the same age he
faced His own bitter Passion.

One thing is certain of -that long night's vigil - that
Damien's courage did not utterly fail him, even though,
with the increased weariness which the night hours
bring to a tortured soul, the horrors he had witnessed
passed through his mind, yet, noble example of that
brave little race whose country for so many centuries
has been the cockpit of Europe, he did not shrink from
his self-imposed task.

Full well he must have realised that with his gifts
of mind and body, his beautiful voice and charm of
manner, he might have stood in vast cathedrals, sway-
ing multitudes by the power of his eloquence, perhaps
even have aspired to the Triple Crown and the Seat
of St. Peter, Even to that exalted position his peasant
birth would have been no obstacle. Yet above the loss
of honours and ambitions, the praise of men and the
homage of his peers, must have been the sword pierc-
ing his affectionate heart - the knowledge that never
again would his mortal eyes behold those he loved with
such passionate ardour. Particularly on this night the
thought of his mother's grief must have overwhelmed
him, for knowingly and irrevocably to wound the heart
%f a beloved and loving mother is one of earth's most
poignant griefs. Perhaps at no time in the Passion
Play of Oberammergau is the appeal of the Christus
more touching than in that moment when He bids

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 69

farewell to His blessed Mother at Bethany, knowing
what depths of anguish He by His own actions must
cause her to endure.

Damien's affection for his home circle was a very
powerful one. His companions in the days of Louvain
relate that, while at dinner one Easter Sunday during
his novitiate, one of their number, having received a
letter from Damien's brother Pamphile, informed him
of the death of his grandmother. The news had such
an effect upon the affectionate boy that he changed
colour and could scarcely contain himself sufficiently
to remain at the table.

Yet perhaps after all for he was but human,
with humanity's natural shrinking from pain the
thought dominating every other during that lonely
night beneath the pandanus-tree was the certain
realisation of the fate that sooner or later the future
must surely bring the anguished torture of leprosy,
the putrefaction of the living flesh, the disfigurement
so loathsome that even his nearest and dearest would
shrink from him -all perhaps but his mother, that
loving, pious woman whom he would never dare to
see again. And he was only thirty-three, gifted, full of
the joy of life, sound in body and mind !

Perhaps of all the eulogy the Press awarded him after
his death the Daily News showed the most sympathetic
insight into the depths of the young Priest's sacrifice :

* Death was not the danger to be dreaded there.
Terror was the loathsome disease. Almost anyone
will risk death in pursuit of some object he . ,f>.
desires. To some men, death on the battlefield would
seem nothing to shrink from. But death from the
most loathsome malady imagination can conceive or

7O DAMIEN OF MOLOK.AI

observation describe - death as the result of long pro-
tracted corruption and decay calls for the spirit of
a martyr to volunteer for a death like that. Even of
the leper saint, St. Finian, it is not recorded that he
voluntarily became a leper for love and charity towards
lepers. . . .*

And what came forth from those hours, that night
of mental torture ? Regrets, self-pity, terror for the
future ?

Nothing but thanksgiving for his health and
strength, joy that the splendour of his young manhood
could be poured forth in the service of his Lord and
these His suffering children.

The longest life of a leper on that island of weeping
was but five years - perhaps that was all Damien had
to live five years amid sights and sounds and scents
unspeakable ; yet he came forth to live them rejoicing
and giving thanks. This is the spirit which turns the
world's values upside down ; this is the attribute
which distinguishes the saint from his fellow, the virtue
which gives to man the Vision of God, It is the echo
of those great words from Corinth which ring down
the centuries with ever-increasing beauty, as in every
age men and women show forth their truth : * We
glory in tribulations/

The following morning Damien was fully launched
into his life-work. The news of his heroism spread

1 la spite of this assertion, legend tella that St. Fmian took the malady of his
own free will. See chapter viiu

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD Jl

like wildfire through the islands, and a leading Hono-
lulu paper concluded a wonderful eulogy with these
words : * We care not what this man's theology be ;
he is surely a Christian hero. . . . If this is not a
faithful minister of the Gospel, we do not think he is
to be found in these islands. , . /

But Damien himself knew none of these things ,
the world had receded too far away ; he was occupied
in providing the primary needs of humanity for his
suffering people* And first to ease their unspeakably
diseased and agonised bodies, and thus to reach the
stifled and dying souls : * His preaching much, but
more his practice wrought/ Damien himself was the
living sermon.

They were filthy beyond description, those poor
lepers ; far more filthy than any animal in its coat of
fur. Their miserable hovels were infinitely more re-
volting than any wild beast's lair. Man, whose body
has been the vehicle of the Incarnation of God, can
sink lower than the brutes.

Water was only obtainable by carrying it from a long
distance on the poor, suffering shoulders, so that it
was small wonder the lepers used very little of the
precious liquid for cleansing their persons or the scanty
rags which covered them. Damien's first duty was
to kneel on the ground and gird himself with a towel,
even as his Lord knelt to wash the feet of peasants, and
try to bring some semblance of cleanliness to the poor,
evil-smelling bodies, the reeking, sickening sores - an
act of sublimest heroism, not performed in one gal-
lant moment of wild enthusiasm, but in cold reality
day after day, year after year, with full knowledge of
the whole loathsome procedure it entailed.

72 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Occasionally he raises the veil from those hidden
years, barricaded from the sight of the world behind
Molokai's giant cliffs and dreaded scourge, but
Damien, who, like Blessed Francis, had taken Holy
Poverty as his Bride, crowned himself with her love-
liest attribute, a gracious humility, so that it is rarely
that consciously, from his own pen, the extent of his
sacrifice is shown. It was from the lips of others that
these things were known. Even in a letter to his
dearest confidential friend and brother, Father Pam-
phile, describing the conditions prevailing upon the
island on his first arrival, there is little mention of him-
self beyond the fact that often, while exercising his
priestly duties in the lepers' miserable huts, he was
forced to run outside for a breath of fresh air. On
some of Molokai's unkind days, when an intense air-
lessness and oppression lay upon the land, the poor
young Padre's sufferings must have been terrible.

In this connection he mentions that man's ever-
ready friend and comforter, the well-seasoned pipe,
was his preservation, besides saving him from carry-
ing the nauseating odour of the sufferers in his clothes.
Robert Louis Stevenson, in speaking of his visit to
Molokai after Damien's death, describes himself as
no more timid than the average man, yet the sights
and sounds on that sorrowful island, even after all the
reforms that Damien had accomplished, caused him
to state that * life in the lazaretto is an ordeal from
which the nerves of a man's spirit shrink, even as his
eye quails under the light of the sun , . . a pitiful
place to visit and a hell to dwell in. ... I never
recall the days and nights I spent upon that island
promontory (eight days and seven nights) without

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 73

heartfelt thankfulness that I am somewhere else.

As Damien's own letter admits, often when minister-
ing to the sufferers in their little huts the effluvium was
so overpowering that for all his endurance the Priest
was obliged to retire hastily outside with a sick revul-
sion that he was physically unable to conceal.

For all his spirituality, Damien had plenty of com-
mon sense. It is a general idea that a mystic has little
knowledge of the practical necessities of everyday life.
He is credited as being merely a visionary, whose soul
dwells in heavenly places, but whose brain and fingers
are useless to cope with such ordinary things as build-
ing and sanitation, cooking and washing, mending and
making, much less the more intricate problems of
organisation and government.

But that great mystic, Paul of Tarsus, besides
bearing the care of all the Churches, laboured with his
own hands weaving the tents of black goats' hair still
used by the nomadic tribes of the desert ; Catherine
. of Siena, whose ecstasies have been the wonder of each
succeeding generation, was practical to a degree ;
Francis of Assisi, the ' glorious * St. Francis, repaired
churches with his own aristocratic, unaccustomed
hands.

So Damien, whose communion with his Lord was
such a living reality that in a moment he could pass
from light-hearted gaiety, or the most revolting task,
into complete absorption in prayer, gave himself at
first almost entirely to the work of bettering his
people's condition, knowing full well that the way to
a starved and stunted soul lies through loving ministry
to the suffering body. The most devout mind cannot
concentrate on the sermon if the feet are cold, or there

74 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

is a draught coming round from the vestry door.

Shelter for those same poor bodies seemed to be the
most crying need, and the practical side of Damien's
nature quickly realised that example was the surest
means to rouse his sufferers to action. Lethargy is a
prevailing symptom of leprosy, and, although in the
earlier stages of the disease exercise is essential, one
doctor even going so far as to say a fifteen-mile walk
every day, or its equivalent in manual labour, should
be undertaken, it is a superhuman task to make the
patient bestir himself, even in the slightest degree.
But Damien, who in his Hawaiian parish had made the
healthy, ease-loving Kanakas work with a willingness
which astounded every white man who observed it,
now set himself the task of making that same Kanaka
work when he was not only sick, but bowed to earth
with spiritual deadness, outstanding vice, and moral
corruption. With his own hands the Padre started to
build fresh huts, and, although at first he worked
alone, little by little, as he had hoped, a few of the
most able-bodied lepers, fired by his example, began
to assist him. Damien's experience caused him to
maintain that a leper who just let himself go, and
allowed the disease to do what it would, without any
attempt to exercise himself, soon wore a depressed
appearance and threatened to become a complete
wreck.

Amidst so many necessities, the water-supply seemed
the most urgent, and it caused the young reformer
much anxiety to discover a means by which the exist-
ing scarceness might be remedied. It was a matter
for very real rejoicing when he learned that at the
end of the valley of Waihanau there was a natural

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 75

reserve which, even in times of drought, had never
been known to dry up.

With his usual directness, Damien set out at once
on a journey of exploration, accompanied by two
white lepers and several of his boys. Great was his
delight when he came to a nearly circular basin of ice-
cold water at the base of the high cliff. With charac-
teristic energy he applied to the Hawaiian Government
for a set of waterpipes, which on arrival were laid by
those lepers who were sufficiently able-bodied to un-
dertake such work, thus providing a constant supply
of pure water for all purposes of drinking, washing,
and bathing. This system of pipes thus laid was
afterwards perfected under Government auspices*

In after years some of Damien's detractors accused
him of being dirty, an accusation which even Robert
Louis Stevenson's wonderful Apologia in his ' Open
Letter ' does not deny. Yet this seems somewhat
difficult to believe, considering the young missionary's
first action on the island of Molokai was to ensure an
adequate supply of water so that his parishioners might
have no excuse to neglect the washing of themselves and
their clothes. Moreover, it is inconceivable that if
Damien had not attended to this, the most elementary
law of hygiene, in his own person, he would have
escaped the virulent infection of leprosy for such a long
period, living as he did continually in actual contact
with it.

Nor in connection with this accusation should it be
forgotten that when, later on, he himself contracted
leprosy, Damien took every precaution that the very
few healthy persons with whom he came in contact
should not receive any infection from him, and even

76 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

when, perfectly whole, he on one or two rare occasions
visited Honolulu and was honoured by being a guest
at the King's palace, he insisted on sleeping on the
bare floor, that there might not be the slightest risk of
any contamination* All these things were not the
natural actions of a man with dirty habits,

It may be thought that on an island the question of
personal cleanliness ought not to have presented any
problem, sea water being always abundant. But
conditions for the inhabitant of Molokai are very
different from the merry holiday-maker at Margate
or Blankenberghe. To the maimed and ailing leper
the rough journey to the shore over rocks and pebbles
was in many cases an impossibility, and the application
of salt water to the raw wounds on his body an in-
fliction of further misery not to be tolerated* As
regards actual bathing, the amenities of Molokai do
not hold out the inducements of our own comfortable
resorts ; on calm days the adventurous can take a very
pleasant shower-bath in the high-flung spray, but
swimming is impossible owing to the fury of the waves
and the unpleasant habits of the sharks who dwell
therein.

Although he received some help in his work from
the inhabitants, Damien realised that little good could
be done in the colony until the evil of drunkenness
had been thoroughly rooted out, The man who lays
himself out to exterminate a vice runs the risk
of immediate and permanent unpopularity. But
Damien's courageous soul knew it was necessary to
take the risk, Drunkenness never comes alone, and
many of the lepers had sunk into a heathenistn which
was nothing short of devilish. Having no hope in this

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 77

world or any other, they had abandoned themselves to
vice like the ungodly in the Book of Wisdom, only,
poor, suffering souls, wedded to bodies one mass of
putrefying corruption, left to die alone in their misery,
they had more excuse than those men mentioned by
the old songster, even though they persuaded them-
selves as these men of old :

' Our name shall be forgotten in time, and no man
shall have our works in remembrance, and our life
shall pass away as the trace of a cloud and shall be
dispersed as a mist that is driven away with the beams
of the sun. . . , Come on : let us enjoy the good
things that are present, and let no flower of the spring
pass by us . . . let us crown ourselves, with rosebuds
before they be withered. ... *

Only in Molokai, devil-dancing was the only flower
of the spring ; ki-beer, which brought intoxicated
forgetfulness, the only rosebud.

It must have called forth every atom of courage
which Damien possessed to deal with this question,
but he bravely set to work by going round the settle-
ment with * threats and persuasions/ until in the end
the power of his personality prevailed upon the culprits
to deliver up the utensils they used for the purpose of
distilling. This process having been declared illegal
by the Government, some of the most guilty were
convicted, but were pardoned on giving a promise
never to offend again.

Unfortunately, reforms are never popular with
evildoers, and Damien encountered fierce opposition,
so that in bitter loneliness of mind and spirit he learnt
to be hated for righteousness' sake by those for whom
he was yielding up his very life-blood. It is a tragic

78 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

example of the sin of ingratitude to know that this
hatred did not cease for many years, but lay like some
hidden serpent, venomous with poison, always ready
to strike when most unexpected, until the hour when
the news spread through Molokai - Molokai Ahina
indeed that Damien himself was numbered among
the lepers. Then in sorrow and contrition those who
had been his adversaries became his friends, anxious
for willing and loving service.

Yet, in spite of the fierce opposition it aroused, the
possession of the distilling instruments was a real
landmark in Damien's ministry. At first he was able
to accomplish little else of influence ; the Kanaka
temperament, combined with the natural lethargy of
leprosy, was content to be idle. As usual, he himself
worked unceasingly night and day, doing everything
for his people, even to the sad task of burying them,
and through all they watched him, unconsciously
imbibing his example. * That best portion of a good
man's life, his little, nameless, unremembered acts of
kindness and of love,'

Often, when ministering to the dying, bending over
them with eyes full of pitiful tenderness, his beautiful
voice speaking words of comfort and consolation, others
lying sick in the hut would hear and perhaps take heed,
so that gradually the power of his character took effect
and a few began to gather together to hear him speak
in the open, air, the place where Christianity first was
preached to the sons of men abiding with their flocks
by night beneath the open grandeur of the sky.

One night during the year after Damien's arrival a

1 Wordsworth.

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 79

fierce storm broke over the island - the south wind, the
cona, so much dreaded on that terrible shore. In a
very short while the miserable grass huts were soaked
and wrecked, leaving their wretched inmates, in all
stages of the disease, covered only with their scanty
clothing and drenched to the skin, moaning and
shivering upon their mats* It is not surprising that in
a very few days the grass beneath these sleeping-mats
emitted a most unpleasant vapour. Yet this seeming
disaster was a blessing in disguise, for it provided
Damien with an excellent reason for urging the Hawai-
ian Government to send building materials to the
island without delay. The Government, which was to
prove itself always open to advice or requests from
Damien, responded by sending several shiploads of
wooden framework and boards.

Men of all trades were among the sufferers, includ-
ing several carpenters. Some had a little money, and
were thus able to do their share by buying the services
of their poorer brethren. Others, inspired by the
example of their Padre, found ingenious, pathetic
ways of supplementing each other's loss of limbs.
Already the island's slogan of * Each for himself '
was being broken down. The sweet scent of raw wood,
the pleasant, homely sounds of carpentering, made a
tiny oasis of wholesomeness in that desert of putre-
faction and misery, and with the untiring assistance of
Damien's strong young arms, and under his guidance,
houses grew up and were whitewashed, ground was
cleared and dug, taro and sweet potato were planted,
and even little flower-gardens began to make their
appearance.

To the Hawaiian, flowers are the very salt of life,

8o DAMJEN OF MOLOKAI

and they use them unstintingly for their personal
adornment, even old women of ninety being known to
crown their hoary locks with wreaths of blue blossoms
and vivid green leaves. The making of the tightly
packed garlands which, among other purposes, are
used for throwing round the necks of coming and
departing guests, constitutes quite an industry. Molo-
kai's barrenness must have been an added affliction
to the inmates' beauty-loving eyes. A few wild
flowers grew among the rank tropical vegetation and
amid the great black rocks of lava which strewed the
ground the coarse wild ginger, with its handsome
spikes of blossom ; a major convolvulus, lilac in
hue ; a handsome white poppy, and a bright orange-
coloured bloom with a milky stem. On the hills,
generally too far off for the lepers' halting steps, the
crimson-blossomed lehua were to be found, together
with various prettily coloured berries, white, black,
yellow, purple, and red, some of them quite good to
eat. There were also magnificent ferns in various
parts of the island, but on the whole it was a dreary
place, devoid of the rich colouring to which the eyes of
the South Sea islanders had always been accustomed.
Modern treatment of the moral effects of leprosy,
so much more soul-destroying than the average disease,
has shown that Damien's psychology of making the
sufferer work so far as his physical strength would
allow is the best remedy for the prevention of degener-
ation, and gardening is much encouraged in leper
settlements as a very useful means of directing the
patients' interest, being an employment by which the
creative energies are used to a good purpose, producing
results evident to their own eyes.

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 8l

Having dealt with the immediate problems of hous-
ing and water supply, Damien next turned his attention
to the question of provisions. Previous to his arrival,
a small sailing-ship had been sent at varying intervals
to the island, bringing food for the settlement. Un-
fortunately, this supply was always inadequate, and
often on arrival the heavy seas prevented the frail little
boat from landing, or even remaining near the island,
so that the miserable and often starving inhabitants
had the anguish of seeing it depart without disembark-
ing its cargo.

Damien quickly petitioned the Government to send
a steamer at regular intervals instead of using the
obsolete method of a sailing-ship, so entirely at the
caprices of the elements. The Government im-
mediately responded, not only to his request for a
steamer, but also for more adequate supplies. That
these supplies were for some time confined only to
common necessaries is evidenced by the fact that in
1886, thirteen years after his arrival, Damien was still
appealing for food. In this latter case he was asking
for small luxuries - luxuries which in these days would
count for urgent necessities - one being fresh milk,
not one-tenth of the lepers outside the hospital having
tasted it for years.

Houses, water, food, and then clothing ! The
sufferings of leprosy are much increased if the patient
is cold or insufficiently clad, scanty clothing being
responsible for feverish symptoms, bad coughs, swelling
in the face and limbs, and even lung trouble. To a
person in full health, cold caused by being underclad

82 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

is a menace, but to a leper it spells certain disaster.
On Damien's arrival he found that each sufferer had
been receiving a few garments annually, but these were
so insufficient that the whole colony was clothed in
nothing but rags, entirely inadequate to meet the
demands of the climate. Many of the hideous ulcers
were neglected and uncovered simply from the lack of
a bit of material to protect them and a morsel of salve
to dress them. Small wonder that the simplest ailment
carried off the victim ! At Damien's earnest request
the Government provided him with materials to set
up a little clothes store in each of the two villages,
provided with warm cloth and flannel, also giving a
money grant of six dollars a year to each leper that he
might make his own purchases.

Having been thus far successful in catering for the
most elementary needs of his flock, Damien set to work
to remedy the appalling state of the sick. There was
neither hospital, doctor, nor nurse. Bandages and
lint were non-existent ; medicine, except for a few
native remedies, was unknown. The only provision
made for the desperately ill and dying was a shed going
under the name of hospital, absolutely empty, without
beds or any conveniences whatever merely four walls
and a roof. The dying leper was conveyed from his
miserable hut on a cart, with his coffin beside him, and
placed on the bare floor, there to await the end. The
account of the horrors within those barren walls baffles
all description ; it was a hell worse than the imagina-
tion of man could possibly picture.

One writer lifts the curtain for a brief instant,
showing a leper child too far gone for food or drink,
curled up in an awful heap of breathing corruption.

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 83

On raising the corner of the blanket, a little face is
seen on which can be traced but the smallest resemb-
lance to humanity - dark skin puffed and blackened,
covered with a kind of moss, gummy and glistening,
the mouth, the sweet, innocent mouth of childhood,
contracted so that the teeth grin out like a skeleton,
the poor little tongue between them like a thickened
fig, the eyelids curled tightly back so that the inner
surface and awful eyeballs, shapeless and broken like
burst grapes, are exposed. . . .

Yet this picture is but an overture to the scenes of
unparalleled horror which that charnel-house contained.
And to such misery as this young Damien's pitying
eyes had to grow accustomed during sixteen long years.
Sixteen years, with nothing but lepers ! Lepers,
morning, noon, and night, week in and week out,
nothing but lepers 1 The only reason that soul and
spirit did not break down under the strain must be
that, in common with other saints before him, he saw
in his people the suffering form of his Lord, hearing
within in his heart the Divine whisper : * Ye did
it unto Me.'

It is possible that for his own comfort he may have
remembered the sweet story of St. Elizabeth of
Hungary, who, seeing a leprous child cast out and
forsaken in the streets, took it home and put it to bed
in one of the gorgeous rooms of her own palace. Her
husband, naturally a little peevish at his young wife's
action, visited the child, and found, not the scarred
and repulsive form of a leper lying upon the bed, but
the Incarnate loveliness of the Babe of Bethlehem.
And, even as the Prince bent the knee before the
wondrous vision, an angelic voice cried aloud ;

84 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

" Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of
these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me."

In season and out of season, with desperate energy
Damien worked to improve the conditions of the
dying, and at last was rewarded by the installation of a
resident doctor and a public dispensary.

It must not be thought that the history of those early
years in the leper settlement proves that the Hawaiian
Government was indifferent to the needs of its suffering
sons and daughters sent to rot and die in their living
graveyard amid that wild waste of waters. Rather
they had simply let things slide for lack of public
funds, and the absence of any kind of leader in Molokai
itself, who could not only stand up and boldly state
what was required, but also see that funds and goods,
if forthcoming, were properly distributed.

The twofold need of leadership and organisation
was supplied by Damien, and the Government, quick
to appreciate his usefulness, henceforth supported him.
Indeed, after the accession of King Kalakaua their care
and generosity for the poor exiles of Molokai were most
praiseworthy. But it must never be forgotten that it
was Damien who originated and inspired all their
reforms.

One of the saddest features of that dread island was
the large number of friendless children - poor little
leper waifs for whom it was nobody's business to care.
But in the joyous, youthful Padre these little outcasts
found a real father, one who not only attended to their
needs, but played with them, talked to them, and
withal loved them. Molokai Ahina had indeed taken

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 85

on a new aspect when her surf-beaten shores echoed to
the voices of children raised in games and laughter.

Small wonder that as he moved about his work the
young man was surrounded by a bodyguard of lads of
all ages, like many a slum Priest. ' My boys,' as he
always called them, were one of the few bright spots
in his dreary life. And when these children, often so
pitifully young, lay in their last agony, the playful,
loving ' father ' became the most tender of nurses,
and their last earthly vision was the sight of his pitying
face bending over them.

His most cherished plan was to build orphanages,
one for the boys and another for the girls, and in course
of time his dream came true. The two white houses
grew up close to his own little cottage, so that he could
still be the orphans' father and mother, teacher, Priest,
and playmate. Here they were instructed in useful
arts, the girls being taught needlework and similar
useful employments, the boys tasks more suited to
their hands.

With regard to children still living with their
parents, Damien held classes in the open air until it
was possible to erect a school. It is certain that under
his regime these poor little ones were not unhappy.
The children of leprous parents, who themselves
showed no sign of the disease, were also well cared for
in the Kapiolani Home at Honolulu.

The most urgent of his reforms having been carried
out, Damien called upon his helpers to assist him in
building two churches, one at Kalawao and the other
at Kalaupapa. It is safe to say that the greater part of
the building was carried out by his own hands.

86 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

It is in the building of these two churches that one
of many comparisons may be drawn between the lives
and circumstances of Damien of Molokai and Francis
of Assisi.

It was in the little wayside chapel of San Damiano
(the saint from whom the leper Priest took his name
in religion), nestling broken and forlorn among the
silvery olives above the white roofs of Assisi, that
Francis, as he knelt before the stone Altar, gazing at
the flat, gilded Crucifix roughly painted above it,
beheld the ugly, austere Figure break into the gracious
form of youth and life, speaking with tender tones,
bidding him set to work to build his church, which
was nearly falling down, Francis, with the quick
impetuosity so characteristic of himself, and of Damien
also in his generation, took the Divine Call literally,
and, standing in the market-place of Assisi, singing his
gay troubadour songs, begged for stones to carry out
the work, afterwards bearing them in a hod on his
frail, aristocratic shoulders up the mountain-side,
week after week, and month after month, until his
hands, torn and blistered by the unaccustomed toil,
had painfully built up the little shrine, and St. Damian's
Altar was once more sheltered by worthy surroundings.

This work completed, the young enthusiast repaired
a little chapel dedicated to St Peter, the exact site of
which is unknown, finishing his arduous task by the
building up of the Portuincula, or the Chapel of St.
Mary of the Little Portion, one of the holiest places
in Christendom. Here, as in the chapel of San
Damiano, the pilgrim can touch the veritable fabric
placed in position by St. Francis's hands, those toil-
worn hands which in earlier years had known nothing

THE LIVING GRAVEYARD 87

harder than the tuning of a lute or the penning of a
sonnet to some fair lady, yet were destined to bear the
sacred Stigmata, the veritable marks of the Passion.

Of these two shrines, that of San Damiano seems to
the devout lover of the saint the more nearly to speak
of his presence, bringing to life the joyous enthusiasm
df his amazing personality.

Damien also built churches with his own hands,
both during his early ministry in Hawaii and later in
Molokai, labouring with the same toil and devotion
as Francis before him, save that in the latter's case he
worked alone, while Damien, though undoubtedly
taking the lion's share himself, was aided by his * boys/
His hands also were destined to bear the marks of the
Passion - the hideous wounds of leprosy, a Stigmata
indeed.

The first church at Kalawao, built almpst entirely
by his own labour, was later incorporated into the larger
church, so that it is possible for visitors literally to
touch Damien's work in the same way that the devout
pilgrim to Assisi can place his fingers upon the actual
stones laid by St. Francis.

The two churches on the island of Molokai were
brilliantly tinted inside to please the colour-loving
islanders, the exterior being surrounded by grave-
yards, which filled at the average rate of a funeral
each day. Few Priests have the heart-rending task of
not only ministering continuously to the dying, but of
burying one of their parishioners every day, often
digging their graves, and even making the actual
coffins. It is estimated that Damien made at least one
thousand coffins on Molokai with his own hands.
And this constantly, in addition to his many far more

88 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

repulsive duties, without any break or holiday what-
soever, except on the few rare occasions when he went
to a neighbouring island for the purpose of making
his Confession.

Nobly and completely he interpreted the words of
Dr. Pusey, to an extent which that saintly man had
never even visualised : ' Think nothing too little,
nothing too low, to do lovingly for the sake of God.*

He buried the dead side by side, Roman Catholics
and other Creeds alike, without any question. But,
although within the sheds close by the graveyards the
dread sound of nails being driven into the waiting
coffins was constantly heard, he had taken away the
sting of death.

Molokai Ahina ~ Grey Molokai - the Living Grave-
yard 1 Yes 1 But a graveyard where the spirit of peace,
forerunner of the Angel of the Resurrection, was
already spreading his enveloping wings.

CHAPTER V

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION

THE greatest needon that islandof misery was for
a spiritual leader. Lack of the Gospel's refin-
ing influence had enabled vice to triumph over
virtue, and those most sunk in debauchery to act as
heads of the community.

It is always difficult to separate the secular from the
spiritual, the ministry to the body from that of the soul,
and more and more it is proved that the services of
Priest and doctor are akin. To the Christian, the
sending for a Priest to come to the sick-bed should be
as natural as calling in the physician, and the idea that
the ministry of the former is only required when the
patient is apparently at death's door is a complete
misunderstanding of the powers with which Christ
has endowed His Church.

It is almost impossible to differentiate between the
two sides of Damien's work on Molokai, but an en-
deavour must be made to realise his use of his priestly
office, for it was as a Priest, whose heart was stirred
with a deep longing to bring the Bread of Life to these
lost and starving sheep, that he had sailed out from
Hawaii in the crimson and gold of that tropical sunset,
out into the menacing darkness, untried and unknown.

His was above all a ministry to the sick and dying,
so that first and foremost he put the necessity for re-
conciling liis people to God. He was essentially a

89

90 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

mediator ; one who, bearing in his own heart the con-
tinual knowledge of the Presence of God, strove always
to bring all souls entrusted to him into the stream of
that Divine Love. Moreover, he bore in his character
three of the most precious of priestly attributes - a
beautiful humility, a firm belief in the good inherent
in every human soul, however deeply submerged in
sin or despair, and the compelling power to bring men
back to God. Browning's words might have been
written of him in his ministerial character :

Would I fain, with my impotent yearning

, Do all for this man,

And dare doubt he alone shall not help him
Who yet alone can ?

One of his letters gives an interesting insight into
this part of his labours. He relates that every morn-
ing after Mass he. gave instruction in the Faith, fol-
lowed by a round of visits to the sick. On entering
each of the huts, he offered to hear the Confessions of
the sufferers. Damien, who was such a true father to
all, did not refuse temporal assistance to those who
rejected his spiritual ministrations, but his big, loving
heart must have grieved over those few who refused to
accept his services. That he was prepared to go to the
utmost limits for his people is revealfed by his own
words : * I make myself a leper among the lepers, to
gain all for Jesus Christ/

With regard to those few who rejected his services,
it was a repetition of the history of St. Catherine of
Siena, who, after nursing a leprous old woman named
Tecca at the lazar-house of the city, was rewarded by
having her honour slandered by the patient in the

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 9!

most villainous manner. True, the approach of death
brought the hoary old sinner to repentance, but
Catherine suffered much from her maliciousness before
this came to pass, besides enduring the outbreak of a
suspicious eruption on her hands, which, however,
entirely disappeared after the girl saint had performed
the last offices for the dead leper and even buried the
horrible corpse herself. Many and varied are the
gifts which the saints bring into the city of God.
Damien's offering was to be a life given for his friends
in all the lingering horrors of a leper's death ; Cath-
erine's sacrifice had been rendered up in another form
of self-abnegation and mental anguish.

Damien speaks with conscious pride, not in himself,
but in his office, giving an example of the missionary's
power. Several of the younger people, all except two
being Mormons or Calvinists, in common with sec-
tions of youth in every generation since the days of
Cain, became discontented with their lot, feeling they
were being unjustly treated by the ' powers that be,'
and so attempted a revolt. The Padre merely had to
show himself and make a very short speech, and the
embryo rioters hung their heads and became as
docile as Tommy discovered with his fingers in the
jam.

In this same letter to Father Pamphile, Damien
mentions that since his arrival on the island he had
baptised more than two hundred persons, of whom a
goodly number had passed to their rest with their
white robes of Baptismal grace still fresh and beautiful.
A distressing glimpse of the destitution of these poor
creatures is afforded by the young Priest's remark
that many were too poor even to defray any of their

92 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

funeral expenses, so that he was obliged to bury them
merely wrapped in a blanket.

It is certainly beyond our imagination to visualise
the horrors upon which Damien was daily obliged to
gaze. No other proof is needed of his powers of endur-
ance, both mental and physical. Only on very rare
occasions does he raise for a moment the veil with
Which he hid his shuddering soul. * ... I have had
opportunities of touching human misery with my
hand under its most terrible aspect. Half the people
are like living corpses, which the worms have already
begun to devour ; at first internally, afterwards ex-
ternally, until they make most loathsome wounds
which very rarely heal. To form an idea of the
effluvium, imagine what the stench of Lazarus's tomb
must have been. . . .'

And this was the man whom a Protestant minister,
presumably set apart to teach the Gospel of Christian
love, living in comfort, even luxury, in lovely Honolulu,
dared to criticise, to slander, and to abuse !

The author of this outrage was a Protestant min-
ister, a certain Presbyterian named C. M. Hyde, who
had never set foot in Molokai, and probably never even
exchanged a word with Father Damien, although it is
possible he may have just seen him pass by in the
street on one of the Padre's rare visits to Honolulu.
A man of petty mind and narrow vision, there lurked
at the bottom of his colossal conceit a lingering spark
of conscience which in the midst of his easy-going
and comfortable existence let in horrid little draughts
through his enveloping mantle of self-righteousness.

The knowledge of the Roman Priest's superb sacri-
fice fanned this spark to flame, but, as is so often the

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 93

case with little tin gods like Mr. Hyde, the contem-
plation of another's man's heroism filled his mean
little soul, not with the desire of imitation, but with the
consuming fires of jealousy. In his luxurious manse,
which was a by-word even among the cab-drivers of
Honolulu, he shuddered as he pictured himself on
Damien's loathsome island, possibly wondering - oh,
awful thought whether the members of his congre-
gation were drawing odious comparisons between
himself and that low-born Popish fellow whose body
lay in its leper's grave on Molokai's terrible shore.

With a pen dipped in gall, he wrote his infamous
letter to his brother minister in Australia, the Rev.
H. B. Gage of Sydney, accusing the dead Priest of
having contracted his disease through vice and careless
living, of having had no hand in the reforms which
had been accomplished on the leper island, and even
of taking up his Work without the necessary orders
from authority.

History knows no more cruel and iniquitous libel
than this. But a great champion was to arise to defend
the honour of Joseph Damien by means of the finest
apologia known to literature. To the everlasting glory
of England, to which country the departed Padre had
shown such touching gratitude, this champion was a
Britisher - none other than the famous author, Robert
Louis Stevenson.

Picking up a newspaper some months after Mr.
Hyde's letter had been written, Stevenson found that
Mr. Gage had sent his ' dear ' brother's epistle to the
Sydney Presbyterian, which organ had published it in
full. Once before the great English writer had heard
a rumour of a slander on Damien's virtue, but the

94 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

speaker, a drunken scoundrel in a low bar on the island
of Samoa, had been hounded down even by the crowd
of dissolute beachcombers around him as a person
entirely outside the pale. But here in black and white
before Stevenson's very eyes was the full disgusting
libel, and he, a man of action, who himself had visited
Molokai a short while after Damien's death, im-
mediately penned his * Open Letter to the Rev. Dr.
Hyde of Honolulu/ in which for all time he vindicated
him from the accusations brought against him.

Although Stevenson had received several courtesies
from Mr. Hyde for which until that moment he had
been proportionately grateful, the opening words of
his letter 1 give an index to the righteous anger which
burned within his soul as he read the minister's in-
famous words.

* Your letter to the Rev. H. B. Gage is a document
which in my sight, if you had filled me with bread
when I was starving, if you had sat up to nurse my
father when he lay a-dying, would yet absolve me from
the bonds of gratitude. . . . *

One by one Stevenson treats the charges made
against Damien, with that lucidity and balanced
judgment which reveal his early legal training, show-
ing their baseness, their cruelty, and their falsehood
with that mastery of language of which he was so
capable.

Recollecting all that had been told him on his visit to
Molokai, he endeavours to be perfectly just, so that he
acknowledges the faults in this * plain, noble, human
brother and father of ours ; whose imperfections are
the traits of his face, by which we know him for our

1 February 25th, 1890.

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 95

fellow, and whose martyrdom and example nothing can
lessen or annul*

Officious, he calls him, shrewd, ignorant, bigoted,
rough in his ways, with no authority, domineering and
indiscreet, yet possessed of great good humour, cer-
tainly of the peasant type, yet with the wonderful
generosity of his caste, which, often putting to shame
the wealthy, will give away its last shirt, though not
without a certain amount of perfectly human grumb-
ling.

Stevenson further refers to the bad state of the boys'
home, which Damien's brother-officials called his
* Chinatown/ a name which had only brought forth
the father's genial laugh. He who had been doctor,
nurse, wardmaid, and dispenser for so many years
alone even ventured to set himself up against the
remedies of his regular rivals. Just like a naughty
boy who would have his own way 1 But if obstinacy
were one of his failings, then it is not surprising he
found it hard to submit to authority, even the doctor's
authority for which he himself had asked, after so
long a time being his own master.

It may be thought that the above criticisms belittle
Damien's work and character, seeming to bring the
saint down to a very human level. But it is this very
humanity which makes him so lovable, so much a
man among men, a personality of our own time and
generation.

And, in considering these failings as set in the midst
of Robert Louis .Stevenson's otherwise powerful
eulogy, several points must be borne in mind. First
of all, Damien was dead, and much of the author's
information came from the lips of those very officials

96 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

whose little minds had been offended by the father's
greatness, men who exemplify the truth of Shakes-
peare's sarcastic couplet :

The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interred with their bones.

Secondly, the writer had never seen Damien at
work - he had no personal knowledge of the love his
people bore him, the qualities which outshone his
weaknesses. Further, Robert Louis Stevenson was
not a Catholic, and his mind, though it contained a far
more beautiful and exalted conception of Christ than
many might suspect, could never realise the intense
devotion, the earnest zeal, the sublime faith that
Dainien kept alive by sacramental worship, and which
Edward Clifford, a member of the Anglican Church,
was more able to realise and record. Moreover,
Stevenson's Protestant conscience shrank from much
intercourse with the Roman Priests and Sisters, feeling
more at home with the officials, whose religion, if they
had any, did not bring terrifying thoughts of the Scarlet
Woman and the Seven Hills. Indeed, he himself
admits that he was a little suspicious of Catholic
testimony, so that all his facts were collected from the
lips of those very Protestants who had defied the father
all his life. Thus he missed hearing of Damien from
those who knew him best. Yet in spite of this he states
that even the very story of the dead Priest's failings
* builds up the image of a man, with all his weaknesses
essentially heroic, and alive with rugged honesty,
generosity, and mirth.'

Damien had great difficulty in getting used to the

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 97

foul atmosphere which surrounds a leper, more partic-
ularly when several were gathered together, this being
most marked when in church. One Sunday, while at
Mass, the effluvium was so overpowering he felt im-
pelled to leave the Altar in order to be able to breathe.
But swiftly to him who lived ever in the Presence of his
Lord came the thought of that same Christ when the
grave of Lazarus was opened, so that he was able to
endure until the end. Only those who possess an acute
sense of smell will realise the extent of sacrifice this
demanded. After a time he grew more acclimatised, or
perhaps, mercifully, his nasal faculties were dulled by
continual exposure to the tainted atmosphere. Often
he scarcely knew how to administer Extreme Unction
to those poor sufferers whose hands and feet were
nothing but raw and open wounds.

Perhaps hearing Confessions was the most trying of
all, for leprosy so weakens the throat that the voice
becomes almost inaudible, causing the Priest to have
to bend very close to the sufferer's lips, inhaling not
only the foetid breath, but also the whole atmosphere of
corruption surrounding the poor decaying body. Nor
is this the worst feature, for often the disease brings a
sudden haemorrhage from the mouth, of a particularly
offensive nature, for which the Priest must be fully
prepared. The strain of concentration necessary for a
Priest when hearing the Confession of an ordinary
person is increased tenfold when accompanied by
these terrible physical drawbacks.

It is true these details are horrible, in fact revolting,
yet to understand Damien's daily life it is necessary
to walk with him at least figuratively upon his sorrowful
way.

98 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Ruysbroeck, that heroic Priest of Brussels, a com-
patriot of Damien, of whom it was said that he went to
and fro in the streets of the city * with his mind per-
petually lifted up into God/ describes in his Book of
the Twelve Beguines the life of one who * ministered to
the world without in love and mercy : whilst inwardly
abiding in simplicity, in stillness, and in utter peace.'
It was only by the nearness with which he lived to his
Lord that Damien was able to preserve a sane mind and
a serene spirit.

Another letter, written to his beloved brother
Pamphile in the far-off convent at Louvain, nearly
seven years after his landing on Molokai's desolate
shore, gives a slight insight into his powers of endur-
ance and the undaunted courage with which he carried
on his task. An unusually large number of his Chris-
tian parishioners had succumbed to their malady
during the previous year, so that the Padre's kind eyes
sorrowfully noted the empty places in the church,
knowing that his own hands had been obliged to help
fill the cemetery outside, where there was now barely
room to dig the graves. He had buried 190 to 200
victims every year, and still there were always upwards
of 700 on the island. It is possible to glimpse a little
weariness, almost a trace of petulance, in the brave
words of the letter as he remarks on his vexation on
finding that a grave had been dug close by the large
Cross in the cemetery in the exact place he had chosen
for himself, and which he was able to insist should be
kept for him.

Surrounded all day by sights and sounds of such
unspeakable horror, at night he was quite alone in his
little cottage, sole guardian of these beloved dead - the

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 99

church, cemetery, and presbytery forming one single
enclosure.

Under conditions such as these it seems that a
man's heart and brain must harden or break. But
Damien's did neither. And yet he was so entirely
alone for, apart from the barrier which their disease
and degradation must of necessity erect between them,
his parishioners were not of his own race, and, with
but few exceptions, not even of his own colour.

Race, colour, poverty, sickness - they are no barriers
in the great Brotherhood of Christ ; but to a man
labouring as Damien was labouring there must at
times have come the overpowering longing to clasp the
hand of one who could really understand, and who
thought in the same terms as himself. Friendship and
love he received from his people, but not the under-
standing which forms the only true companionship.
That is the thing which the isolated missionary most
lacks, and which, if he is not careful, may wreck his
life and his work the need of companionship of one
who understands. It is this spiritual loneliness, this
loneliness in a crowd, which is the greatest desolation
of all.

But Damien held the key which unlocked for him
a companionship, a complete understanding, which
alone prevented him from fleeing in horror and despair
from that island of misery. From his own lips we
learn the secret :

* Without the Blessed Sacrament a position like
mine would be unbearable. But as I have Our Lord
always with me, I am happy, and work with ardour to
procure the happiness of my dear lepers/

His Lord always with him ! The simple faith of a

IOO DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

child, yet sublimest wisdom of the ages ! The know-
ledge of the continual indwelling Presence of the
Lord in the Blessed Sacrament - immanent and tran-
scendent ! A letter to a loved one at home in sore
distress gives the same thought -even across the
world the Blessed Presence is ever the same :

4 Here in your midst is One who can turn your
sorrow into joy. Go to Him, then, who dwells in
the Tabernacle. Go to Him ! He will console
you.'

That was Damien's secret -the continual walking
with his Lord, finding Him first in his own appointed
means of grace, then seeing Him again in his suffering
* little ones/ It is the philosophy of the saints, nobly
expressed in this generation by a missionary bishop 1
ere he returned to die in his far-off African diocese :

* You must walk with Christ, mystically present
in you, through the streets of this country, and find
the same Christ in the people of your cities and
your villages. You cannot claim to worship Jesus
in the Tabernacle if you do not pity Jesus in the
slums/

The student of hagiology must often have been
struck with the affinity in the lives of the saints. Some-
times this spiritual relationship is worked out by
mystical friendship of two who in the world lived cen-
turies apart. The tie which existed between St. Joan
and her patrons, Catherine, the martyred princess of

1 Frank Wcston, Bishop of Zanzibar.

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION IOI

Alexandria, and Margaret, the maid of Antioch, is a
well-known example ; the inspiration of the Cur
d'Ars bestowed by his beloved little friend Philomena
of Rome is another case in point.

An aspect of this spiritual affinity is found in the
likeness of character and even certain similarity of cir-
cumstances by which saints of different centuries are
bound together. In this connection it is no pretty
fancy which links the life and work of Joseph Damien
with that of St. Francis of Assisi in the bonds of
similarity of character and achievement. Both were
joyous and adventurous. Each embraced Poverty,
that holy, mystic Bride, with utmost fervour, Francis
entering on his life-work with literally no possession
but the hair shirt which covered his nakedness, Damien
without even a roof over his head.

St. Francis, the 'seraphic saint of humility,' whose
lovers have ranked him next to Our Lady and St. Paul
in the hierarchy of saints, took the first step in his
amazing career by loving ministry to the lepers of
Assisi, and perhaps of all his works of self-abnegation
this should be numbered amongst the greatest, inas-
much as the mere thought of leprosy caused him to
shudder with the sick repulsion only fully understood
by the ultra-sensitive, a repulsion which amounted to
genuine terror.

Psychologists maintain that each soul has its secret
fear, a skeleton hiding in the underground recesses of
the mind, prepared to spring forth and rattle its bones
without any rhyme or reason. With some it may be
brought forth by a thing so trivial as the soft and
sinuous presence of a cat ; with others it may be the
less concrete * ghoulies and ghosties, long leggetty

IO2 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

beasties, and things that go bump in the night* ; or
it may be the terror of great heights or crowded assem-
blies which brings forth this nightmare feeling of
unreasoning horror.

With Francis it was quite simple, direct, concrete
- the terror of any contact with a leper. This was not
so much the fear of contracting the disease, but the
sheer physical shrinking from the sufferer and his
loathsome malady.

Italy in St. Francis's day, as indeed all parts of
Europe, was infested with leprosy, fostered by neglect
of the most elemental laws of hygiene and the insuffi-
ciency of personal cleanliness a far cry from the days
of heathendom, when the Roman baths were the
wonder of the world. The leper hospital, or lazaretto,
of Assisi stood outside the gate of San Salvatore on a
road which the elegant young Francis Bernardone
avoided like the very plague, and his nervous horror
of those who dwelt within its walls rose ever higher
and higher like the tide of some inflowing sea. The
crisis came with lightning-like rapidity during that
period when the young noble's soul, torn hither and
thither like some helpless craft at the mercy of the
storm-tossed waves, was on the verge of complete
collapse between the world he loved and the God he
feared.

Riding one day towards Assisi after an expedititfn,
he came to a place where the road forked. A single
figure only was in sight, a leper, making his painful
way along one of the two white roads. Francis's recoil
was so violent that his horse reared back on its
haunches, then, swerving, dashed down the other road.
It was the crisis of the young man's life, and by the

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION ICVJ

grace of God he met it with startling heroism. Rein-
ing in the terrified animal, he swung him round, gal-
loping swiftly towards the leper. Springing from the
saddle, he placed an alms in the poor, dreadful hand,
then, drawing himself up, looked firmly into the face
eaten away with disease, and, folding the sufferer in
his arms, kissed him tenderly. A strong, superhuman
impulse, dictated, it might be said, by the urge of the
moment ; but with Francis a thing was never done by
halves, so that on the morrow he carried his heroism
to a higher plane. Dressed in his richest robes, strong,
graceful, young, and ardent, he went through the
dreaded gateway to San Salvatore delle Pareti, the
leper hospital, and, though actually shivering with
horror and distaste, rang the bell.

As he stepped inside the building, the sufferers ran
towards him, wild with excitement and delight. Their
onrush, their nauseous presence, their revolting ap-
pearance, made the luxurious young nobleman faint
with revulsion, but with a strong effort he bravely gave
them of his best - his merry talk, his quick, infectious
laughter, his charming smile. Handing gifts all
round, he completed his visit by kissing each poor,
sad hand, and from that day one of his chief labours of
love was to comfort and minister to these wretched
outcasts of society. A little later on, after renouncing
his father's house, he went to the lazaretto at Gubbio,
laughing and singing as he dressed the hideous sores
of the inmates. And in due time he reaped his reward,
for in future years, when all men seemed against him,
one ray of light brightened the darkness of his soul, as
in his inner consciousness he beheld the faces of the
lepers he had befriended, and heard their voices

IO4 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

asserting with threefold iteration : " But we love you,
we love you, we love you."

They are the confirmation of the words of St.
Vincent de Paul, four centuries later : 'We may do
what we will, but we shall never win the faith of any-
one whom we want to convince unless we have shown
him our love and compassion/

Damien, though apparently possessed of no secret
terror, nevertheless recoiled with all the strength of
his manly health and vigour from the proximity of
such loathsome suffering, yet pursued his chosen course
with the same gay courage as Francis the merry
laugh, the musical voice, the tender sympathy
bridging the centuries between Assisi and Molokai,
and he, equally with Francis, in this respect might be
named the Jongleur de Dieu c God's Troubadour/

Both were called upon to build up Christ's Church
on earth ; Francis in a world-wide sense as a new
apostle of the Cross, the Apostle of Poverty ; Damien
as the saviour of the afflicted whom all others had re-
jected and forgotten.

A difficulty in Damien's own spiritual life was the
obstacles which lay in his fulfilment of the obligation
of Confession. No brother Priest being available, it
was necessary for him to go to another island. He was
in perfect health ; there was no reason why he should
not leave Molokai for a few hours. On the first suit-
able occasion, when the steamer brought a fresh batch
of lepers to the settlement, Damien returned to Hono-
lulu, and to his surprise received a very cold welcome
at the office of the Board of Trade. On explaining that

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 105

every Priest was bound to make his Confession, he was
told that if he returned to Molokai he must never again
visit Honolulu.

With a touch of spirit, Damien replied that his one
desire was to return to his people as quickly as pos-
sible, but, being a monk, he was under a vow of obedi-
ence to spiritual authorities and he could not allow the
civil law to interfere with the higher law of the Church.
He then suggested that if, instead of coming to Hono-
lulu, he rowed across from Molokai to the Priest in
charge of the neighbouring island of Maui, this would
meet all requirements. But, in spite of the testimony
to the Board of Trade of well-known doctors in the
island that Priests and physicians were exempt from
the rule that was binding on other men, the President
would not agree to the proposal.

Damien had only returned a short while to Molokai
when he received a notice stating that he must never
leave it again. His life's work was there, chosen and
accepted ; nothing but duty would ever call him
away, even for an hour ; but he replied with righteous
indignation that he must be left free to do what was
right, and in course of time he received another official
notice giving him permission to go where he chose at
any time, so that occasionally when he desired to make
his Confession he was able to cross over to Maui.

But in the meanwhile, before this order came
through, Damien was compelled to undergo a spiritual
ordeal, as great as befel any saint or martyr obliged to
profess his Faith before a sceptical, hostile world.
Monseigneur Maigret, his Bishop, on one of his tours
through his island diocese, wished the captain of his
steamer to put him ashore at Molokai. The captain

IO6 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

refused, saying such a proceeding was forbidden by
Government. Disappointed, doubtless annoyed, but
nothing daunted, the Bishop persuaded him to lie off
the shore and signal to Damien.

Within a short while the young Priest had entered a
boat and was rowed by his leper crew close to the
steamer. * The passengers standing by the rail watched
with much interest as he drew near. In all probability
their curiosity was inspired by a friendly feeling, even
admiration, but for Damien it was an ordeal as search-
ing as by fire, for the captain, still persisting in his
refusal to allow the missionary on board, protested
that no one on the steamer spoke French, so that
Damien could make his Confession in that language
and none but the Bishop would understand its import.
Whether his statement were true was never known ;
if any person on board that boat understood the lang-
uage in which Damien spoke he mercifully kept it to
himself as a sacred trust.

Only those in the habit of making their Confession
can fully realise the desire for privacy in that most
intimate transaction of the soul, stripped naked before
its God as in the Day of Judgment, when the penitent,
enumerating each transgression, confesses to God the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and before the
whole company of Heaven, that he has sinned exceed-
ingly in, thought, word, and deed, by his fault, his
own fault, his own most grievous fault. These alone
can appreciate the young Priest's deep humiliation as
he knelt in the canoe amidst his Kanaka crew, with that
row of strange, curious eyes closely watching from the
steamer's side. It was a piece of refined cruelty,
worthy of the most barbarous age. Truly, when the

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION IO7

Bishop, leaning over the side, still speaking in French,
pronounced the words of Absolution, few Absolutions
were more gladly given or more gratefully received.

There is no record that Damien himself ever men-
tioned this experience, but it is certain that he looked
upon it as only another incident in his faithful bearing
of the Cross, His attitude towards life in general is
ably summed up in the sympathy he expressed later to
a brother in bereavement :

* You have had * a great trial. Dorothea's death
must have been a sore loss to you. But what would
you have ? Almighty God intends to teach you not
to attach yourself to the things of this world. Let us
remember that it is a place of exile, and that those who
die in the Lord are far happier than you or I who are
left here below. Sometimes I am inclined to envy my
poor sick Christians when I administer the Last
Sacraments to them and bury them/

* What Would you have ? * Damien, so like an
Englishman in many of his characteristics, so much
so that in later years he used the language continually,
betrays here his Belgian origin. It is possible to
visualise the Continental gesture which would have
accompanied it, so humorous, so fatalistic the shrug
of the shoulders, the stiffly-upthrown hands ; only in
Damien's case the fatalism is replaced by complete
and loving surrender to the will of God.

It was no easy task getting those drink-sodden,
disease-ridden Kanakas to believe in the love of God,
and surely psychology has rarely seen a greater miracle
than this that in their wretchedness and misery they

IO8 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

learnt to love him in return. But Damien, the peasant
Priest, accomplished even this.

Some of his detractors accused him of having the
mind and character of a Kanaka. Quite likely ! It
is scarcely possible to live and work almost entirely
alone amid an alien race for twenty-five years without
absorbing some of their characteristics. But it is not
necessary these characteristics should be of an evil
tendency or have a degrading influence.

' A man of the peasant class 1 ' they scoffingly
called him. So, according to our lights and in spite of
His descent from the royal house of David, was JESUS
of Nazareth, together with many of His apostles ; so
to-day are the villagers of Oberammergau, who
represent His Passion with such royal and touching
dignity. And what of Abraham Lincoln and Musso-
lini, of Joan of Arc and Martin Luther ?

Much is said in these days of the evils of a Priest-
hood recruited from any class which is lower in the
scale of society than that which, for want of a better
term, is styled * gentleman.' Damien was not a
* gentleman ' as the world understands the title, but
he was one of that company which, including car-
penters, fishermen, slave-girls, and harlots, ranks
among the highest aristocracy of Heaven.

Doubtless there is much to be said in support of
heredity - noblesse oblige certainly counts for something,
and can be an important aid in the building of the
Christian character, and it is also sadly true that
courtesy is not always the attribute of a Priest. Yet,
looking at Damien, son of the soil and the plough,
it seems that the crux of the whole matter lies in this ;
that where there is a true vocation, inspired by the

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION IO9

Holy Spirit of God, there is the faithful Priest, and
there only, whether he be prince or ploughboy.

St. John Berchmans, the young Belgian mystic,
native of Diest, near Louvain, but a few miles from
Tremeloo, Damien's birthplace three centuries later,
was the son of a shoemaker. From infancy his
vocation was unmistakable. The story of his early
years in that quiet Flemish home is very similar to
that of the hero of Molokai - the love of his Church,
the gradual dawning of the knowledge that he was
called to the religious life, the opposition this decision
aroused, the, breaking down of all barriers. Even the
characters of these two sons of the people, so nearly
related in early circumstances, are very similar -the
great devotion combined with exceeding joyousness of
heart, the purity of outlook, the robust health, both of
body and soul, the simplicity, the frank and high-
spirited manner.

In passing, it is interesting to note that two incidents
in St. John Berchmans's life link him with Damien.
It was on the River Dyle that the latter, while skating,
came close to death as an abyss suddenly opened
beneath his feet. Beside the same river the young St.
John Berchmans, while teaching a dog to swim and
retrieve for his master - one of the Canons of Malines
and watching the animal's untiring obedience, took
the lesson to heart by realising that his soul should be
equally attentive, responsive, and eager to every call
from God.

Damien, when studying at Louvain, was very
zealous in making pilgrimages to Our Lady of Mont-
aigu, and it was here that he bade his last farewell to
his mother and friends before setting forth for Hawaii.

HO DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

St. John Berchmans had been an equally earnest lovej
of this shrine, to which he made devout pilgrimage
and at one time, having given a third part of his
pocket-money to the poor, he gave the other two-
thirds for Masses to be said at Our Lady of Montaigi
and also at St. Peter's, Louvain, now, alas, destroyed,
but which must have been equally familiar to Damien,

It has been seen that Damien's congregation,
beginning with those who overheard his ministrations
to their dying relations, gradually extended to increas-
ing numbers, who gathered to hear him in the open air,
till eventually two churches were built where the
Sacraments were administered and other services held

On first arriving on the island, Damien had found 2
tiny wooden oratory dedicated to St. Philomena, the
child martyr of Rome whose memory proved such an
inspiration to the Cur d'Ars that he named her the
' Princess of Heaven/ It is interesting to note that in
his turn the saintly Cur was to prove patron and
example to Damien. The tomb in the Catacomb oi
St. Priscilla where little Philomena's body lay, a
phial of its own life-blood beside it, bore the touching
words :

Pax Tecum^ Filumena.
(Peace to thee, dearly beloved.)

This little wooden oratory to her memory on
Molokai was succeeded a little later by a hut sixteen
feet long and ten wide built with materials supplied
by subscriptions from the white population of Honolulu.

With infinite pains Damien trained his choir and

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION III

little band of servers, a task requiring endless patience
and continual renewals, as one by one the members of
the little group disappeared and were laid to rest in
the ever-hungry churchyard outside. It is pathetic to
record that, although many of these children learnt to
sing really beautifully, yet, in consequence of the
continual deaths and outbreaks of chest and throat
troubles, Damien very soon lost them, so that it was
with considerable difficulty he kept the choir going,

He even managed to institute a band, a tremendous
joy to that music-loving race, composed mainly of
flutes formed from old oilcans by Damien's own nimble
fingers, accompanied by drums, and capable of per-
forming quite stirring melodies, even aspiring to the
romantic heights of serenading the very few visitors
whom Government business forced to dare Molokai's
sinister shores.

As regards the congregation in church, it was a great
delight to those poor souls who, cradled in melodies,
found their haunting folk-songs of happier days so
difficult to sing with their poor husky throats, to hear
the clear, musical voice of their young Priest chanting
at the Altar, surrounded by his servers in their simple
white cottas, with the light lingering on the vividly
tinted walls and richly wrought golden vessels sent to
Kalawao by the Superior of St. Roch in Paris. Paris
and Molokai ! It was a far-oflf cry 1 But it was the
same Eucharist, the same Blessed Presence 1

To Damien it was not only a joy, but a privilege, to
be allowed to lead the worship of these sorely afflicted
ones - dying men and women, boys and girls - a
congregation with infinite pathos and wonderful
possibilities. And these lepers were fervent in their

112 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

worship, fervent in spite of all their previous degra-
dation, The Kanaka, when faithfully instructed, makes
an excellent churchman, and the leper of all men is the
most .ready and willing to receive the Word of Christ.
These poor souls needed but to have their physical
conditions made endurable and a leader whose life,
as well as his teaching, would show the better way, and
the majority gladly and willingly followed.

The procession of the Blessed Sacrament was
specially touching, with children scattering flowers on
the way, the Sacred Host borne under its canopy, the
mutilated bodies and poor afflicted limbs dragging and
crawling along, sometimes on all fours, over the
coloured blossoms in the dust of the road, joining
with all the strength and devotion they possessed in
the act of adoration. It was a scene which filled
Damien's heart with mingled joy and sorrow, as, still
healthy and vigorous himself, he bore the Blessed
Sacrament in his hands, passing in royal triumph
through that crowd of anguished worshippers.

Regular and devout in their Communions, these
poor afflicted souls endeavoured to carry out in their
daily life the teaching they received at the Altar, trying
to serve one another in return for the benefits they had
received. One touching fruit of their devotion was
the establishment in 1 8 79, only six years after Damien's
arrival among them, of a Guild of perpetual Adoration,
a chain of praise and intercession in expiation of their
own sins and those of the world outside. Especially
dear to the Sacred Heart of their Lord must have been
this guild of such * brave poor things/ Damien says
of them with affectionate pride, * My lepers are very
fervent. They fill the churches from morning till

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 113

night, and pour forth their prayers to God with an
ardour that would make some religious blush/

Another fruit of this revival of religion was shown
by increased reverence to the dead. No longer were
they thrown into a shallow grave like some unwanted
dog whose carcase polluted the air, but every funeral
bell sounded the joyous release of a soul from the
miserable earthly tabernacle, so that the chanting of
the Burial Office became a song of triumph. Damien
loved to tell his beads in the cemetery, meditating mean-
while on the happiness his one-time suffering children
were now enjoying.

It was very seldom the father was found alone.
Young and old alike continually surrounded him. On
the rare occasions when he had a little leisure, he
devoted himself to his two hobbies, the growing of a
few flowers and the feeding of his fowls. The leper
children loved to watch him scatter the corn, calling
the birds with a special cry which they recognised
immediately. Fluttering round him, with the queer
little gurgles of delight peculiar to their kind, they
would settle on his arms, his shoulders, even his head,
eating from his hands. The Priest who had played
with the lambs in his childhood and healed the widow's
sick cow in his early boyhood was still passionately
attached to all dumb creatures, so that his fowls were
particularly dear to him. Yet he who shared every-
thing with his suffering people even gave up his pets
to feed the sick when their need was urgent.

Those who smile indulgently over the story of St.
Francis preaching to the birds in the woods around.
Assisi can well picture this second St. Francis with his
feathered friends about him, his dress old and shabby,

114 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

his hair tumbled like a playful boy, his hands, those
faithful hands, that had toiled unceasingly for his
people, stained and hardened, and on his face the clear
colour of health and wholesomeness, the soft curves of
youth giving place to the fine, beautiful lines cut by
the ever-ready sympathy, the infectious, ringing laugh,
the loving, uplifting smile. His was a character which,
while acquiring the manly virtues, possessed the
buoyant secret of perpetual youth.

There were few scenic attractions on the island of
Molokai, with the exception of the great cliffs with
their thunderous cataracts and sundered tops where
the rainbows played amid the high-flung spray. But,
even if the hard-worked Padre had had any time or
energy for walking tours, the going in that boulder-
strewn, precipitous land would have taken away all
pleasure from the adventure. Moreover, danger
lurked beside the great black rocks of lava-
yawning pitfalls covered by tall, delicate grass, grow-
ing so closely it was impossible to see the hidden
peril.

One weird and sinister spot existed half-way be-
tween the two leper villages - a veritable witches' en-
campment* Situated on a low hill, the crater of an
extinct volcano, it consisted of a perfect cup-like hole,
130 feet wide, said to be unfathomable in depth. Its
turgid green waters, guarded by half-skeleton trees
and the uncanny forms of big cacti, fittingly symbol-
ised the horrors of that island of which it might have
been the crown.

For six weeks from his arrival on Molokai Damien

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION

lived beneath his palm-tree, sleeping each night under
its friendly branches. At the end of that time he was
able to put together a small shelter, and eventually
was the proud possessor of a little house, two-storied,
with a small verandah round which he delighted to
train a sweet-scented honeysuckle.

Meanwhile, in sunny, smiling Honolulu many kind
thoughts were turned towards him, and he was much
cheered to receive a letter (signed chiefly by Protestant
residents) accompanying a purse of money for his
work. The sympathetic Mother of the Honolulu
Sisters, who had charge of the hospital to which doubt-
ful cases ^were sent on probation before being doomed
to banishment to Molokai, was also most helpful in
raising contributions for his charities.

Gifts and kindnesses for his people Damien always
welcomed with touching gratitude, but any publicity
with regard to himself he deprecated with the humility
of the truly great, so that he was seriously distressed,
three years after his arrival in Molokai, to discover
that one of his letters had been printed in the Annales.
With much earnestness he begged that this should not
happen again, as the effect of the letter had been that
he had been talked about on all sides, even in America,
and it was his express wish to be quite unknown to the
world.

Damien lived with the utmost simplicity, taking but
two meals a day, at morning and evening -the first
consisting of rice, meat, coffee, and biscuits, the second
composed of anything left over from the morning,
with the addition of a cup of tea and possibly eggs
from his poultry yard. It was a monotonous diet,
apart from its frugality, and Damien enjoyed, with the

H6 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

relish of a schoolboy sampling mother's tuck-box, the
packet of raisins brought to the island by his English
friend, Edward Clifford, on his one memorable visit.

Towards the end of his ministry the colony's food-
supply was in complete working order, each leper re-
ceiving five pounds of fresh beef every week, together
with milk, poi, and biscuits. In addition, a general
shop supplied tinned fruits and similar delicacies.

Poi, the favourite food of the Kanaka, is made from
the root of the taro, a member of the arum family,
which grows in rich profusion in the Hawaiian islands.
The food is prepared by being ground, mixed with
paste, and allowed to ferment. Europeans, finding it
too fearful and wonderful for their liking, decide that
it demands an acquired taste to be appreciated.

In spite of Damien's simplicity of life and dislike of
publicity, his light was not one that could be altogether
hidden under a bushel, although in his lifetime he him-
self knew little recognition of his labours, but in 1878,
five years after his landing, he was visited by a Com-
mittee from Honolulu, being honoured three years
later with a visit from the reigning house of Hawaii
in the persons of the Queen Regent and the heiress
apparent, Princess Liliuokilani. The latter was so
impressed with all she saw that she afterwards wrote
long accounts of her experiences. These visits cer-
tainly did good in improving the food-supplies to the
island, although for some time provisions still re-
mained scanty, and no doctor, nurse, or hospital was
provided ; Damien's only helper in any medical at-
tentions to his sick being a European doctor, himself
a leper. Some time was still to elapse before their
heroic efforts were to be supplemented by a resident

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION

physician and the benefit of a properly equipped
hospital.

Damien had been eight years on Molokai when
news came from Honolulu that, by order of the King,
the Bishop was making a formal visit to the settlement.
It was a wild, gusty day, with the spray beating high
upon the rocks and the seabirds screaming with weird
notes above the tempest. But if Nature were in an
unkind mood, the lepers determined to be festive.
With joyful anticipation they prepared wreaths and
garlands, those charming ropes of flowers possibly
grown in their own little plots under Damien's super-
vision, which they had learned to weave and love in
that old life now gone from them for ever.

On this day at least they wasted no time in use-
less regrets, and all who could walk, or even crawl,
turned out to greet their father-in-God. The band
waited in the foreground, watching for the procession
to make its way down the precipitous zigzag path from
the south side of the island. This was a very much
longer route than from Kalaupapa, but, owing to the
tempestuous seas, it was found to be much safer for the
Bishop's landing.

As the figures, dwarfed by distance, appeared on
the skyline, hoarse cheers and cries of welcome mingled
with songs went up from the poor, afflicted throats,
continuing all through the precipitous descent and the
moving of the procession through the plain, the
Bishop leading, bursting into wild delight as, reaching
Kalawao, he stretched out his hands to Damien, hang-
ing round his neck the glittering Cross of Knight
Commander of the King. A deep and moving silence
followed as he said with suitable impressiveness : " I

Il8 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

am commanded by his Majesty to place upon your
neck this testimonial of his esteem."

It is reported that Damien tried to remove the
handsome ornament, and only the Bishop's express
command prevailed upon him to wear it throughout
the day. It is typical of his character that some time
later the decoration was discovered in his room with
the dust thick upon its case. On being gently repri-
manded- for valuing it so little, he answered with quick
decisiveness : " I did not come to Molokai for this/'

Yet, in spite of his aversion to any outward demon-
stration of his popularity, the cheers of the lepers as
the jewel was hung upon his breast must have been
very dear to his heart, showing that these poor souls
for whom he was giving his life were as happy as
circumstances permitted.

It is suitable here to remark that in thinking of
Damien's heroism many noble souls work unknown
and comparatively unrewarded amid the horrid sights
and sounds of cancer hospitals and mental homes, and
all honour should be accorded to their sacrifices. Yet
these have their hours and days off duty, and the way
of entire escape is always open, but Damien with his
own hands, those toil-worn hands which some were
wont to deplore, direct inheritance of the Man of
Galilee, shut irrevocably the doors of his own sepulchre.

His idealism was too lofty, his strength of will,
which imposed upon the lepers a standard of conduct
higher than his fellow-workers, too powerful for some
of his brother officials who in course of time acted on
the island for the Government. Men of petty minds,
narrow in vision and in outlook, are always prepared to
criticise those greater than themselves, seeming to see

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 119

in their fellows the very faults which blaze forth in
their own characters. These men, when, after Damien's
death, Robert Louis Stevenson visited Molokai,
condemned the departed Priest, his social methods, his
character, even his orphanages, saying of the latter that
they were ill-managed, overcrowded, and badly kept.
It would be interesting to know whether, if these
officials had landed on the. island in Damien's place
over sixteen years before, they would have done any
better, or whether, as is far more" likely, they would
have rapidly taken their sensitive souls and refined
persons as far from that living graveyard as it was
possible to flee.

In speaking of the character of Father Damien, the
biographer is tempted to fall into the snare which so
easily besets the feet of those who set out to write -the
lives of the saints - the tendency to depict them as
superhuman, without stain or blemish. Yet, though
such spiritual giants, they are still mortal, and their
very sanctity depends upon the overcoming of those
passions .to which all men are subject. Damien would
have been the first to declare himself, in company with
St. Paul, the chief of sinners. But it is those very
faults who among us can bear to point the finger of
scorn and call them sins? which make him so human,
so lovable. Here was no solitary mystic, cold and aus-
tere, dwelling apart from humanity and its needs, but a
man, like unto other men, warm-hearted and passionate.

Some found his manner brusque, with the curt,
matter-of-fact dealing of the peasant ; others even
named him ignorant, as the world accounts knowledge,
in spite of his studies in the University of Lpuvain ;
but, however this may have been, his was the wisdom

I2O DAMIENOFMOLOKAI

of the childlike heart, the sublime faith which removes
mountains of sin and error. The student of sociology
may decry his methods, but in reviewing the work he
accomplished on Molokai in the ten years he laboured
single-handed and the six years which followed, even
the most critical cannot fail to be impressed by its
amazing extent. And added to his own personal
achievements, his power of organisation, and his
religious enthusiasm were the added gifts of the
strength for heavy toil and the power of compelling
others to do their share. Those years on the grey
shores of Molokai fully justified his earlier name of
* Damien the Intrepid.' It must also be borne in
mind that for the greater part of his ministry he worked
alone. True, as he says himself, he * had his Lord
always with him,' but his spirit, with its human limit-
ations, must have often longed for the companionship
of a brother Priest in whom to confide and from whom
to receive counsel and advice, together with the
Absolution for which he longed, and which under
existing circumstances was so difficult to obtain.

As time went on it became almost too great a strain
even for his abundant energy and magnificent physique
to travel each Sunday to and fro over the rough plain
between the settlements in order to conduct the services
in both churches morning and evening, in addition
to catechising the children and the daily ministrations
to the sick and dying. It came as a welcome relief
when in 1878 Father Andr arrived upon the island to
assist him at Kalaupapa. There is no record how long
he stayed, but Damien was again working quite alone
in the spring 'of 1881.

Another Priest, Father Montiton, made his appearance

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 121

in 1882. During the last years of Damien's life
his labours were cheered by a full staff, all zealous,
heroic, and devoted -two priests. Father Conradi
and Father Wendolin ; two lay workers, Brother
James, a tall, powerfully built Irishman who was to
prove the sick Padre's devoted nurse, and Brother
Joseph, an American ; and three Franciscan Sisters,
the Superior being Mother Marianne, a woman of
great charm and ability, whose love of art and beauty
must have been offended on that island of horror every
passing hour. Brother Joseph, the American, had an
interesting history. An ex-army officer, he had been
converted to the Roman Catholic Faith, and, in
gratitude for the spiritual solace he received, had
devoted his life to the service of lepers. A fitting
personality later to stand beside the deathbed of the
dying Priest of Molokai 1

All three of the Fathers were on affectionate, even
playful, terms with their people, bearing with them the
atmosphere of joyousness and laughter so typical of
Damien's ministry. There was also the sorely needed
resident doctor, besides one other missionary, a
Protestant native whose wife was a leper.

Damien, ever zealous for the Faith, serving his
Church with unquestioning loyalty and obedience,
naturally sought diligently to bring his flock into that
Fold of which he was so devoted a shepherd, but,
though often successful, he always showed true charity
when dealing with those whose views he considered
erroneous, another proof of the large-heartedness of his
nature. He was father to them all, irrespective of age
or rank, of sex or Creed.

122 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Dr. S. R. Gardiner, the historian, wrote of St.
Francis of Assisi that it was not so much his humility
which distinguished him, but that * not only all human
beings but all created things were dear to him,' The
same might be said of Damien, and it has been seen
that even St. Francis's love of the birds has its counter-
part in the story of the Padre of Molokai St. Francis
as art loves to portray him, with birds clustering at his
feet, resting on his hands and shoulders, hovering
over his head ; Damien with his pet chickens hurry-
ing at his call, alighting on his person, clucking glee-
fully around him. St. Francis taming the fierce
wolf, and gathering all th$ little furry inmates of the
forest around him, has his echo in the * Little Shep-
herd ' who in his boyhood spent a whole night alone
in the cattle-shed tending a neighbour's ailing cow.

The joyousness of the Franciscan Gospel has its
natural complement in Damien's constant gaiety a
spontaneous happiness which is so lacking in many
Christian souls, whose gloom repels men from their
Faith, instead of acting as a magnet to draw the inmates
of this world into the Kingdom of God. The attitude
of a * miserable sinner * so * enjoyed ' by many 'a truly
devout person would not have saved the Middle Ages
from disaster, arty more than it would have brought
one leper on Molokai to repentance.

Among other gifts which the refined Francis
Bernardone shared with the bourgeois Joseph de
Veuster was that of song. Accounts of the rich young
voice of Francis, rivalling the song of the birds in the
olive-clad hillsides of Assisi, the chanting of Damien
as he led his people in worship on the wind-swept isle
of the Pacific create the wish that a record might have

THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION 123

been kept of the sounds, as is possible in these days of
scientific wonders, that this generation might have
heard the veritable voices of the saints. Yet perhaps
it is as well this is not possible, The voices to this
generation might even prove disappointing, for there
are fashions in music as in everything else, and it
would have been a sad story indeed if these had proved
as unsatisfactory as the portraits of many popular
authors, It is fitting that a certain mystery should
surround the personalities of the saints.

CHAPTER VI

THE VIA DOLOROSA

TWELVE years had passed since Father Damien first
set foot on the desolate shores of Molokai, that
living graveyard where the wailing cries of
the seabirds formed the melancholy orchestra, ere
the curtain was lifted from that island of mystery, and
the young Priest's heroic eyes beheld the leper colony
in all its mournful corruption, its awful destitution.

They had been twelve wonderful years, months and
days in which that desolate land had literally been made
to blossom like the rose and the hearts of men and
women, to whom formerly God and humanity alike
had seemed to turn a deaf ear, now rested in compar-
ative happiness, secure in the knowledge that love and
tenderness would be theirs while life should last, and
that beyond the grave and gate of death there awaited
the certainty of a joyful resurrection.

Often as Father Damien stood on the verandah of his
tiny house, where the sweet-scented honeysuckle hung
around him in a lovely frame of leaf and blossom, he
must have wondered deep in his soul how long his
work would continue before he too would be laid to
rest in the little graveyard beneath the palm-tree,
which had been his only shelter during his first six
weeks on that island of misery.

Five years is the usual limit of time in which the
dreaded scpurge of leprosy shows itself, and the fact

124

THE VIA DOLOROSA 125

that Father Damien had gone unscathed for twelve
years of constant ministrations both to the souls and
bodies of these stricken people, in closest contact with
every foul and revolting aspect of the disease, led many
to believe he would escape altogether. But it was not
to be so, for God had called this His faithful servant to
the supremest point of sacrifice, the giving up even of
life itself Joseph Damien was destined to wear the
martyr's crown. In the year 1884 he suspected that
the disease had begun its dread work in him, but the
doctor, perhaps bearing the general belief that he
would escape, or, even more likely, blinded by his
love for him, refused to believe it.

The following year the thing was a certainty. Re-
turning from one of his rare visits to his old parish in
Hawaii, he felt ill and tired, sensations which to his
healthy body and superb constitution were practically
unknown.,

Lovely, laughing Hawaii, flower-strewn, sweet-
scented land, set like a jewel of Heaven in its sapphire
seas t It was the last time that Damien's eyes would
ever kindle .at its beauty or his soul rejoice in its light
and colour. Sic transit gloria mundi.

On reaching Molokai, while preparing a bath,
thinking to ease his weariness, the boiling water ran
suddenly over his' foot. The Priest sprang back, then
stood staring at his naked limb, a quick throb of horror
at his heart he could not feel the slightest pain from
the scalding liquid 1 Too well he knew what it meant
he was a leper, doomed to certain death. He had
entered the long Way of Sorrows, and from hence-
forth would bear his cross, following his Crucified
Lord to the Hill of Calvary.

126 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

The doctor's voice trembled with emotion as, a few
hours later, he was forced to give the verdict : " I
cannot bear to tell you, but what you say is true."

The Priest's answer came calm and serene : " It is
no shock to me, for I have long felt sure of it."

To some minds the fact that as a reward for all his
heroism and self-sacrifice Damien fell a victim to
leprosy, and that he who meant so much to his afflicted
flock was allowed to contract their foul disease, suffer-
ing through four long and agonising years, raises the
whole problem of pain and disease. It is the old
poignant cry, echoing through the centuries : " Why,
oh, why, should this man suffer ? "

Surely one explanation is that Damien might be an
even more efficient example of the suffering Christ,
that in his own body he could point to the wounds of
the Cross, teaching his fellow-sufferers to unite their
pain with the supreme sacrifice of Calvary, showing
that the highest earthly privilege, and one which the
world least understands, is that of being conformed
into the Passion of Christ, in sharing with Him in that
mystery that the human mind cannot yet comprehend
- the wonder of the world's redemption, won through
supreme and awful sacrifice.

Christianity, the one true and final revelation of God,
is the only religion in which the Deity suffers. In other
faiths, the gods are said to have come to earth in the
likeness of men even the babe on his mother's knee
is not unknown in heathen worship. Sometimes these
gods have been claimed to appear for the good of
humanity, more often for its ill, or the mere gratification

THE VIA DOLOROSA 127

of their very human passions. Nowhere is there
to be found the nakedness, the shame, the self-abnega-
tion of a Cross. The gods when on earth move more
in the select atmospheres of Courts and the opulence
of Wall Street. Not one of them is known as the Man
of Sorrows and acquainted with grief ; a Via Dolorosa
is entirely unfamiliar. Again and again the educated
Indian urges that it is impossible for Christ to
have been the Son of God, as He did not save Him-
self.

' Our Krishna/ writes one Hindu student, * is
greater than your Christ, for he killed his enemies,
whilst Christ was killed by His.*

It is for Christ, and Christ alone, to show His fol-
lowers that only by the Cross and Passion is it possible
to attain unto the glory of the Resurrection.

Ignatius, that grand old saint of over four score
years, as he was dragged on his way from Antioch to
the Colosseum, there to be thrown to the lions to make
a spectacle for the glutted eyes of Rome, cried aloud
with joyous voice : " Now at last I begin to be a dis-
ciple ! "

This is the key to the mysterious words of St.
Paul :

* Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and
fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of
Christ in my flesh for His body's sake, which is the
Church/

It is the glorious promise that all pain, if united to
the sacrifice of Calvary, has its part in the redemption
of mankind.

128 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

With regard to Damien's suffering, it may further
be said that it was for the good of posterity. His death,
far more than even his life, caused a world-wide in-
terest in the curse of leprosy ; it was a beginning of
that wonderful ministry to these outcast and afflicted
ones which is such an important part of medical mis-
sion work to-day. The power of Joseph Damien is
greater in death than in life, a proof that pain and
suffering must be viewed, not by our little knowledge
of finite things, but in the broad expanse of God's
immortality and His eternal purpose. A surgical
operation in one of our great London hospitals, viewed
by the eyes of a raw African native, would appear
barbarous in the extreme, but to our more enlightened
intelligence it is a necessary and merciful stage in the
process of healing disease, and often the only means of
saving a precious life. So perhaps all pain, which seen
by us appears so horrible and uncalled for, when viewed
in the perspective of God's infinite love and purpose is
a necessary, merciful stage in man's regeneration.

And of Damien, stricken, suffering Damien, it is
written in the Book of Life : ' Well done, thou good
and faithful servant . . . thy name liveth for .ever-
more.'

Never in all his devoted life did the beauty of
Damien's character shine forth more radiantly than
during the years of anguish that fpllowed. He spoke
no longer of ' my brethren,' but ' we lepers,' now
nearer and dearer even than before, seeing they had
been bought with such a price, and that constantly he
perceived in them the picture of his suffering Lord.

THE VIA DOLOROSA 129

His appeal to them must have had an added force of
intense pathos each time he numbered himself among
them, yet with splendid courage he declared that, if the
price of a cure meant leaving the island and his work,
he preferred to remain among his people - ' Almighty
God knows what is best for my sanctification, and with
that conviction I say daily a good " Thy will be
done." . . . People pity me and think me unfortunate,
but I think myself the happiest of missionaries/

The sad news could not be concealed, so that, as
his suffering people saw his beloved face with its con-
tinual humorous, tender smile, they knew they must
watch his gradual decline and death. Yet, though
with St. Paul, the greatest of all missionaries, he was
able to say, " I die daily/ 'he never lost his sunny cheer-
fulness, nor did he cease his works of mercy.

With heroic surrender he summed up the purpose
for which he believed he had been called upon to suffer :
' . . . The sacrifice of my health, which our good God
has deigned to accept that He may render my ministry
among the lepers more fruitful, appears after all very
insignificant and even pleasant for me who dares to
say with St. Paul : " I am dead, and my life is hidden
with Christ in God." '

It was natural that his bodily strength should fail,
and he whose activity had been so wonderful now had
to choose what was in his power to do and leave the
rest, one of the hardest tasks that can be imposed on
an active mind and body. A new church was in course
of erection, and he toiled bravely among the other
lepers, as pathetically and nobly as any there, but the
loving eyes which watched him saw the once splendid
limbs failing, the dear, bright face changing.

I3O DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

During the early stages of the disease he found some
relief from the Japanese treatment and baths which
by that time were being utilised for the public good in
the excellent bathrooms now provided by Govern-
ment, but it was powerless to check the general in-
sidious progress of the malady. Just at this time the
Hawaiian authorities commissioned him to build a
large hospital for seven hundred lepers to be treated
entirely under his direction. For the last time he was
to be architect, Priest, and doctor.

Two Priests had lately come to aid him. One,
Father Conradi, lived on the ground floor of Damien's
own little house, he himself taking the upper floor,
and, as an added precaution, having his meals in a
separate room. There was no fear that the sick Priest
would injure his people, for he, like his Lord, knew
in his own body the fellowship of their sufferings, so
that he mixed in their daily life as fearlessly as ever.

Towards the end of 1886 he was much cheered by
a message of help and goodwill from Engknd, to-
gether with a cheque for nearly ^1,000, sent by the
Rev. H. H. Chapman* Vicar of St. Luke's, Camber-
well, London, contributed by people of various Creeds,
a large amount being given by the very poor. The
analogy may seem a little fanciful, but it is neverthe-
less of passing interest to note that this gift came from
a parish dedicated to St. Luke, the ' beloved physi-
cian/ whose tender, generous heart would have been
so intensely moved with compassion for Damien and
his work. In the present generation St. Luke's, Cam-
berwell, is noteworthy for its work in the cause of the

THE VIA DOLOROSA

unity of Christendom, particularly in connection with
the Orthodox Church of the East.

Damien, though a loyal and faithful son of Rome,
did not feel that the gifts bought by the money sent
by the Rev. H. H. Chapman should be enjoyed only
by members of his own Church, so that, although at
first intending to lay it out for the benefit of those of
his own Faith, after talking the matter over he revised
his list, distributing the good things equally among
all^ those on the island, independent of their beliefs.
It is characteristic of Damien that he sat long into the
night listening with ' perfect good nature and perfect
obstinacy' to his colleague's arguments that the gifts
should not be distributed among Roman Catholics
only, ending the interview by honestly declaring him-
self to have been in the wrong, saying openly : " Yes !
I am very much obliged to you ; you have done me a
service ; it would have been a theft."

He wrote in return to the Vicar of St. Luke's with
deep and touching gratitude, saying that doubtless the
majority of the poor sufferers would express their
thanks to their kind and unknown friends, besides
remembering them in their prayers. The warm-
heartedness of Damien's nature is shown in the sig-
nature : ' I remain for ever your affectionate friend in
our Divine Lord.'

His friend Edward Clifford later remarks on the
scrupulous and business-like manner in which he kept
his accounts - an example which many saintly Priests
might well bear in mind with profit both to themselves
and their churchwardens. He was particularly anxious
that his English friend should see how he kept his
books, and note that the present which had been sent

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

him had been dispensed among Roman Catholics and
others with equal impartiality.

That same year, 1886, in far-off Belgium, as his
mother lay upon her deathbed, the newspapers
announced that her heroic son had developed leprosy,
unfortunately horribly exaggerating his condition.
But Madame de Veuster did not falter, only saying
bravely : " Well, well, we shall go to Heaven to-
gether."

We can imagine that, as the end drew near, she must
have often remembered that other Mother, Blessed
Mary, standing beneath the Cross, watching her
beloved Son rendering up His life with joyful and
willing surrender for sad and suffering humanity.
Truly the sword must have pierced her own soul also
as from her sick-bed she pictured her boy, whom she
had last seen in the full vigour of his young manhood,
his face now marred and disfigured with disease, his
splendid limbs decayed and failing. Perhaps it was
with this thought in her mind that she turned to the
picture of the Blessed Virgin Mary in her bedroom and
inclined her head, then, looking at the portrait of her
son, gave him the same graceful salutation, before she
gradually slipped down into the bed and peacefully
passed away, in the eighty-fourth year of her age.

The news of her death must have been a sad blow
to Damien, for, although separated from his home both
by long years and many weary miles of land and sea,
his intensely loving heart always kept alive its interest
and affection for his dear ones. It had been a great
grief when his father, Franois de Veuster, that man

THE VIA DOLOROSA 133

of sterling worth and solid piety, passed away in 1873,
shortly after his arrival on Molokai. Little homely
touches in his letters both to Tremeloo and to Louvain
$how how strong were the links of love and interest
which still held him fast across that great ocean of
waters and the dreary length of years.

An example of the thoughtfulness of this loving
son, the nearness with which his heart and imagination
followed the lives of those still so dear to him, is
exemplified by the remark in one of his letters in which
he expressed a wonder as to whether his mother had
yet had to take to a stick to walk to church. It was
with an intense joy, not unmixed with tears, that his
family from time to time received his letters. The
following, written in March 1865, two years after he
left home, when he was toiling in his huge Hawaiian
parish, is a particularly delightful example :

' In the midst of the waters of the Pacific Ocean, on
this island, you have a son who loves you and a Priest
who daily prays for you. I am in the habit of paying
you daily a short visit in spirit.'

Few in this luxury-loving age can appreciate the full
sacrifice of this heroic missionary, to whom the least
of his many burdens must have been the life-long
separation from those, he most dearly loved. On
hearing of his illness, his brother, Father Pamphile,
had wished to join him, but the ecclesiastical authorities
thought it wiser for him not to come, so that in this
life the two were never again united.

The Christmas of 1888, four months before he was
to die, brought Damien a great happiness. Mr.

134 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Edward Clifford, an English artist, came to the island,
bringing fresh tokens of sympathy, and many expres-
sions of grief for his illness.

The journey from Hawaii to Molokai in fair weather
is full of interest - the intense blue of the Pacific, with
the rising and setting sun, form a glory of colour
straight from the creative hands of God. In daylight,
dark albatrosses, black as night and ever on the wing,
hover over the glittering waves ; regiments of the
fairy-like nautilus, like tiny blue dishes with transparent
sails, rock delicately on the face of the waters, and on
the approach of land the gulls scream their welcome
like some wild witches' orchestra. Mr. Clifford
reached Molokai in a terrible storm, when the towering
cliffs, the little whitewashed houses, the two churches,
the silvery cataracts leaping down the precipices, were
lost in showers of spray. Through the wildness of
wind and water the artist saw a figure wearing a broad
straw hat painfully making his way along the beach to
greet the newcomers, and great was his pleasure when,
as with difficulty he was landed on that treacherous
shore, Damien welcomed him in his own tongue,
explaining that English was now the language which
seemed to him the most natural.

As they climbed the hill from the landing-stage the
Padre pointed out the chicken farm on the left, and
immediately on arrival at Kalawao he took his visitor
to the half-finished church, the joy and pride of his
heart. The small building, mainly the work of
Damien' s own hands, in use hitherto, had been incor-
porated as a transept. Close by in the graveyard out-
side was the tree under which Damien had spent his
early nights on the island, destined to be his last

THE VIA DOLOROSA 135

resting-place, as it had been his first. Not far off was
an orange-tree, with the golden fruit gleaming amid
the glossy leaves.

The missionary's own four-roomed house almost
joined the church. Here they were met by Father
Conradi, who lived on the ground floor of the little
establishment. In the tiny refectory they were joined
by Brother James, Damien taking his meal at a
separate table. After dinner the guest was taken up a
little flight of steps to see the father's own apartments
-a little balcony, beautiful with blossoming honey-
suckle, a business-like sitting-room completed by a
large map of the world, with another door leading into
the bedroom.

Some of Edward Clifford's happiest hours on the
island were spent on the sweet-scented balcony with his
sketching materials, listening to Damien's experiences.
Often an admiring audience of lepers came around
them, their faces, in spite of sad disfigurement, bright
and happy, and there were generally little ones playing
in the garden below, their voices and childish laughter
ringing out on the air.

A guest-house had been built for the accommodation
of visiting physicians and those few friends brave
enough to face the horrors of the island, that they might
be safe from touching furniture or utensils in common
use. Isolated by its garden from all possible contamin-
ation, it consisted of a whitewashed wooden cottage, its
pleasant verandah wreathed with climbing roses. Of
those who received hospitality within its walls it would
be difficult to find a more sympathetic guest than the
English artist, Edward Clifford. At the time of his
visit the house contained another guest, Mr. Alexander

1^6 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Sproull, under whose skilled hands the Government work
of perfecting the water-supply was being carried out.

There were few birds except the gulls, with their
greedy eyes and unhallowed screaming, on Molokai's
precipitous shore, but by the time of Mr. Clifford's
visit a small number of foreigners had been imported,
including an own brother to the Londoner's constant
friend, the impudent, jolly little sparrow. Sometimes
the honey-bird, with its curved beak and plumage like
scarlet velvet, was seen to hover above the tropical
ferns and coarse wild ginger, and there were also a big
yellow daylight owl, a lovely golden plover, and a
snow-white creature with a long tail.

Mr. Clifford, in recounting his experiences, gives a
proof of the wild weather which often prevailed for
days together, even though the skies were studded with
stars or brilliant with sunshine - heavy gusts of wind,
warm, yet so violent that one evening the roof of the
guest-house was partly torn off, causing the wet to
enter in twelve different places. The dreaded cona,
the south wind, which had wrecked the miserable
leper huts soon after Damien's first arrival, rushing
through the gorges to the plain below, tore the climb-
ing roses into bruised, pathetic shreds, beating down
the rain so that it fell like heavy drops of gravel.

There were also many lovely days on the island,
balmy and delicious, though too often succeeded by
heat and stillness so oppressive that everyon$ became
' as limp as a wet collar,' a state of affairs that mis-
sionaries and settlers know so well a land where it is
always afternoon, and the weary nerves are tried to the
uttermost.

THE VIA DOLOROSA 137

It was a gay, bright Christinas, in spite of the deep
shadow of death and suffering which of necessity always
rested over the leper colony, with the added knowledge
that, although his cheerfulness was as great as ever of
yore, their beloved Priest's vigour had gone, never to
return.

Edward Clifford had brought many gifts from
England - beautiful pictures, including an engraving
of the ' Good Shepherd,* so appropriate to him whose
childhood's name of ' Le Petit Berger * - the * Little
Shepherd * had been so amazingly fulfilled ; a
magic lantern with many slides ; some fine silver, and
a wonderful musical instrument turned by a handle.
Within half an hour Damien was surrounded by his
boys, teaching them the way to play its forty tunes,
the biggest boy among them all.

Like the celebrated lady of Banbury Cross, with
rings on her fingers and bells on her toes, the Hawaiian
native also likes to have music wherever he goes. Two
or three Kanakas meet together, and sooner or later
will be heard a chant, half nasal, half guttural, re-
lieved by the boom of a shaken calabash, the romantic
tinkle of a guitar, or the soft notes of a lute. Drums,
gourds, bamboo flutes, all are pressed into service,
mingling with the everlasting song of the Pacific as it
thunders upon the coral reef, or dashes its fury against
some precipitous shore.

The sea had been so rough when Edward Clifford's
boat approached the land that it was feared it would
be impossible to land the big wooden case in which the
precious gifts from England were packed, and it was
on the point of being taken back to the steamer when
Clifford, seeing the bitter disappointment of

138 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

pathetic watchers on the shore, decided to have it
forced open in the boat and the contents handed out.
Great was the rejoicing as the treasures were passed
one by one over the heads of the hungry, vicious
waves, safe to shore.

The excitement of the visit reached its climax on
Christmas night, when the lepers presented a select
entertainment entitled BeMazzar's Feast. To English
eyes it would have seemed dreary in the extreme, but
to these poor folk it possessed all the thrills of Drury
Lane or the Com&lie Frangaise. It was a truly won-
derful programme, although the stage was very dark
and no one seemed to know exactly who was meant to
be Daniel. Belshazzar, with his face hidden comfort-
ably in his arms on a table, appeared to be indulging
in something more reposeful than even the proverbial
forty winks. A little boy took the part of the queen-
mother, and every leper in the place had a part, if it
were nothing more than walking on and off the stage,
and everyone was immensely happy and excited. After
all, what more could be required from a theatrical
performance ?

The services on Christmas morning were conducted
in Kanaka (a language not understood by Edward
Clifford), English being used by educated Hawaiians
only. Damien pressed his visitor to help in the choir,
and was much delighted when he joined with the boys
in the singing of * Adeste Fideles ' (' O come, all ye
faithful '), that loveliest of all the Nativity hymns,
which would retain the full wealth of its devotional
beauty if local bands and profiteering carol singers

THE VIA DOLOROSA 139

would kindly omit it from their repertoires, leaving it
to be sung only before the Altar at the Christmas
Eucharist, to which it so nobly belongs.

Damien had gathered together quite a good choir
of youthful singers, considering how often leprosy at-
tacked the throats of his people, causing the voices to
become husky and harsh. One man still possessed
quite a full sweet baritone, and a refined-looking
woman, who had formerly been a well-known musician
in Honolulu, played the harmonium, despite the fact
that her poor, disfigured hands looked quite dis-
abled.

On Sunday morning Damien celebrated his own
Mass, followed by a general service at which about
eighty lepers were present. The magic lantern which
Mr. Clifford had brought, with its many beautiful
slides of the Life of Our Lord, proved a great joy in the
evening, the artist himself acting as operator, the while
Damien explained the pictures. It was a moving and
pathetic sight to see that congregation, of which every
member was doomed to an early and painful death,
hearing from the lips of their dying Priest the blessed
story of the Cross and Passion.

Molokai Ahina was a very different place at the time
of Edward Clifford's visit from the day when Damien
the Deliverer first stepped upon its desolate shore. It
is true that the amalgamation of suffering in its most
loathsome form, the repulsiveness of the living cor-
ruption from which its victims could not escape, the
sickening odour which is the natural accompaniment
of such a disease, were still there in all their horror.
Not all the love and skill in the world could obliterate
these, but the faces of the sufferers had changed from

140 DAMIEK OF MOLOKAI

the likeness of beasts into the joyous liberty of the sons
of God. Yes, even joyous !

In the daytime the villagers could be seen chatting
at their cottage doors, those whose affliction had not
affected the fingers busily engaged in weaving mats or
baskets, or pounding the taro root in preparation for
the native poi, welcoming all passers-by with a cour-
teous greeting and ready smile, their faces, with few
exceptions, quite happy. Men and women, both
riding astride, galloped freely across the plain between
the two villages on game little ponies, showing that
all parts .of the settlement were in touch with one
another.

So much for individual improvements ; the com-
munity life had also been raised beyond recognition -
the awful charnel-house, bare of everything but its
burden of human misery, had been replaced by a hos-
pital, complete with a resident doctor and nurses, the
faithful Franciscan Sisters, flowers, music, and all
necessary comforts ; neat and convenient cottages,
raised on trestles to avoid contact with the damp earth,
so injurious to sufferers from leprosy, replaced the
miserable grass huts of earlier years ; services were
held in two well-built churches, instead of the open
air ; an efficient water-supply provided means for all
the demands of hygiene. There had been eight
hundred lepers on the island at the time of Damien's
first arrival ; Mr. Clifford found 1,030 ; of these,
nearly half were Roman Catholics, but Damien was the
beloved father of them all.

Apart from the great alleviation of suffering which
all these improvements, with the addition of warm
clothing and sufficient food, had brought about, the

THE VIA DOLOROSA

enjoyment of these everyday requirements of civilisa-
tion, together with proper medical attention and re-
quisites, had actually caused the disease to take a
slightly milder form. The average length of life on
Molokai was about four years, when, some vital organ
being attacked, the sufferer slowly collapsed and died.

The days after Christmas were full of added pain
and weariness for the sick Priest. Edward Clifford
had brought with him some of the newly discovered
gurjum oil To please this kind English friend,
Damien tried its effects, finding certainly a little relief,
but the dread disease had gone too far for any hope of
a cure. At the same time, after a fortnight's treatment
the good effects were evident to all, the face looked
greatly better ; sleep was very good indeed, instead
of being very bad, as he was only able to sleep with
the mouth open ; his hands improved, and he was
even able to sing Orisons for the first time for months.

It is a picture, pathetic, yet full of beauty, which
Mr. Clifford shows of the dying Priest seated upon the
steps of the guest-house, within which, for fear of
infection, he refused to set his feet, the great southern
stars shining like a halo round his head, the golden
moonlight flooding the valley's beneath him in a radi-
ance of subdued glory. The soft light hid the suffer-
ing on the Priest's tired face - the swollen, ridged fore-
head, the lost eyebrows, the sunken nose, showing
only the well-curved mouth with its tender, humorous
smile, the deep, kind eyes, the dark, curling hair.

There were long friendly talks beneath that tropical
moon, full of mutual understanding, Edward Clifford

142 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

being intensely interested in the Priest's tales of his
people and his early days ; Damien, whose once beau-
tiful voice had been such an asset to his' work, being
equally delighted to listen to the English hymns, ask-
ing again and again for special favourites, particularly
those so appropriate to himself ' Brief life is here
our portion/ and ' Art thou weary ? Art thou lan-
guid ? ' together with the mission hymn, * Safe home
in port/

The Church of Rome, with all her rich store of devo-
tion, uses few hymns in her worship, a loss which is
only realised by simple souls like Damien. His friend
Edward speaks with special emphasis of the beautiful
expression on the suffering missionary's face as he
repeated the hymns for his benefit and on Christmas
Day the artist presented him with a copy of Faber's
hymns which had been sent by Lady Grosvenor's three
little ones. Damien, such a devoted lover of children,
read the laboriously written words on the title-page,
' Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy,'
picturing the small heads bent over the writing, the
chubby hands toiling so carefully over each of the
round, characters. It was with a very sweet smile that
he remarked, he would read and value the book.

The circumstances of the father's own labours
caused him to take a special interest in the work of the
Church Army in its ministry to the down-and-outs of
society, and he never tired of listening to Mr. Clifford's
descriptions of its activities.

He also asked many affectionate questions about the
Rev. H. H. Chapman, the Camberwell Vicar who had
shown such warm and practical friendship by the gift of
nearly ,1,000 for his poor. He was much interested

THE VIA DOLOROSA 143

in hearing the names of all friends who had sent
presents by Mr. Clifford's hands, being greatly touched
and most happily surprised that English people, and
those not even members of his own Creed, should
show such love for him. Like many invalids, Damien
much enjoyed looking at pictures, not only in books,
but loose ones that, having no weight, could easily be
turned over by his frail, tired fingers. A special
favourite was a print of the * Praying Hands * by
Albrecht Purer.

Sometimes, when Damien was able to find time
from his work, the intimate talks with his artist friend
took place by day, perhaps down by the shore as the
foam rose from the bases of the black lava rocks in
swirling mists, and snowy long-tailed birds wheeled
above the heights where the sun cast deep shafts of
golden light through the sundered cliffs. A few of the
things they said have been recorded. One day Edward
Clifford asked if Damien would care to send a message
to Cardinal Manning. The reply was typical of his
host's great humility, that beautiful priestly attribute :
" It is not for such an one as I to send a message to
such a dignitary as he." Hesitating for a moment, he
added quietly : " I send him my humble respects and
thanks."

Mr. Clifford relates that weeks later, when he deliv-
ered the message, the Cardinal smiled in answer,
saying gently : " I had rather he had sent me his
love."

On another occasion Damien was reading a letter
from Miss Mary Stuart, a sympathetic English lady :

' You have given up all earthly things to serve God
and help others, and I believe you must now have

144 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

that joy that nothing can take from you, and a great
reward hereafter/

The Priest looked up from the written page, smil-
ing brightly : " Tell her that I do have that joy now."

His friend Edward relates, in writing the memoirs
of his visit, that never had he met a man more endowed
with the virtue of humility. The Bishop of Peter-
borough (the Right Rev. C. Magee) had sent a
message : " He won't accept the blessing of a heretic
Bishop, but tell him that he has my prayers and ask
him to give me his.'*

Damien smiled modestly and deprecatingly. " Does
he call himself a heretic Bishop ? " he asked doubt-
fully.

Mr. Clifford explained that probably his Lordship
had only used the term playfully.

One evening towards the end of his visit the artist
showed him a sketch he had made while they had been
talking.

Damien examined it with keen interest mirrors
were a luxury in Molokai. He spoke with unconscious
pathos : " What an ugly face ! I did not know the
disease had made such progress."

Mr. Clifford offered to give a copy of the portrait
to Father Pamphile, but Damien feared that his
devoted brother might be pained to see the, disfigure-
ment that had taken place. There was little his friend
could say in reply. Perhaps his mind went to the
picture of St. Francis of Assisi which Burne- Jones had
painted with his own hand and sent as a gift to the
heroic missionary - St. Francis with the sacred, mys-
terious Stigmata in hands and feet and side, the verit-
able wounds of the Passion of his Lord, the possession

THE VIA DOLOROSA

of which neither doctor nor scientist has ever been
able to explain. Surely the marks" of the leprosy in
Father Damien's noble face and splendid body were
another Stigmata, the showing forth to this modern
world the symbols of the wounds of Christ !

A portrait of Damien taken after he was stricken by
the disease being shown in a London photographer's
window, the passers-by shrank from the repulsiveness
of the sight, but no sooner was it known that it was a
picture of the heroic Priest than all drew near to admire,
and the shop was thronged with the thousands desiring
to possess a copy. In Birmingham, where a similar
photograph was exhibited, the police had to be called
to regulate the crowds, so that the ordinary circulation
of the traffic might be re-established.

The life and work of Damien made a special appeal
to Englishmen, with their deeply rooted love of
adventure and admiration of everything that constitutes
heroism. Here was no half-legendary figure lost in
the misty avenues of centuries, encrusted with doings
of more or less veracity, but a saint of their own
generation, with like passions, impulses, and, to a
certain degree, circumstances to their own. Moire-
over, Damien was a practical saint, no mystic dwelling
in a world apart from others, merely cultivating his own
soul, but a man whose spirituality was the channel
through which flowed works easy to be understood
and appreciated by the matter-of-fact mind of an
ordinary man.

A slight glimpse of the nearness of this faithful
disciple to his Lord is shown by Edward Clifford, who
tells that, while he was bathing, Damien would sit
upon the shore reading and praying, retiring at once

146 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

into that hidden life which was so real to him. It is
only a very great saint, joyous, yet devout as he, who
can turn immediately from the distractions of this
present world to complete absorption in the world of
spirit.

On the last day of the old year, 1888, Edward
Clifford's visit terminated with the arrival by steamer
of a batch of two hundred friends of the lepers, coming
to spend a few hours on the island, a treat generously
provided by Mr. Samuel Damon of Honolulu. Un-
fortunately, on this occasion the sea was in one of its
unkind moods, the great breakers being so formidable
that only the men were allowed to land, the women
being taken close enough to shore in the boats to be
able to see and converse with their dear ones. One
girl, in her ardent love for one of the sufferers, defied
all rules and boldly leapt on land. The scenes of
meeting and parting were affecting in the extreme,
accompanied with the terrible native wailing floating
across the waves like a funeral dirge. Yet even this,
poignant though it seemed, was better than the entire
separation which the lepers and their dear ones had
previously been forced to endure.

Damien, who, as a monk, had stripped himself of
earthly possessions, had little to offer his visitor in his
memory but those most priceless gifts of friendship
his prayers and his loving gratitude. One tiny gift
was all he could offer him - a little card of pressed
flowers from Jerusalem, on which he wrote ; * To
Edward Clifford from his leprous friend, Joseph
Damien/ He inscribed in his friend's Bible the

THE VIA DOLOROSA 147

touching words : * I was sick and ye visited me/
From one so devoid of sentimentality as Damien these
little tokens were precious indeed.

The final scene as the artist stood on the steamer's

deck, surrounded by that sorrowful, wailing crowd

whose handkerchiefs fluttered in the evening breeze

- two hundred signals of distress is best told in his

own words.

Father Damien was with his people on the dark
rocks,- and behind him the * sombre purple cliffs
crowned with white clouds. Down their sides leaped
the cataracts. The sun was getting low in the heavens.
. . . I saw the last of Molokai in a golden veil of mist/

With Mr. Clifford's departure an increase of pain
and suffering came upon the invalid, the last agonising
steps upon that road which would lead to his final
Calvary. Yet, as might have been expected, he
bore his Cross nobly, resolutely, and without com-
plaint.

One great consolation remained with him the
insides of his hands were untouched by the disease, so
that almost until the end he was able to celebrate the
Holy Communion and rejoice in the Presence of his
Lord. On Molokai the dread malady often caused all
the fingers and toes of the sufferers literally to rot
away ; indeed, some of the victims even went so far as
to chop off their dead fingers and toes as if they were
made of wood. But in Damien's case the inside of his
hands, anointed with the Holy Oils on the day of his
Ordination, remained unharmed. Readers of Ben
Hur will remember that in that dreadful dungeon in
which the hero's mother and sister were imprisoned
a leper had been the previous occupant, and it was in

148 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

their hands that the unhappy captives were first aware
that they had been attacked by the disease.

Springtime, with its promise of life and youth, drew
near, but on the leper island of Molokai, behind its
dark barrier of rocks and high-flung spray, the devoted
missionary prepared for the final bearing of the Cross
which should lead him to the gateway of his joyful
resurrection,

Tea, I will follow Thee, dear Lord and Master ;

Will follow Thee through fasting and temptation,
Through all Thine agony and bloody sweat.

Thy Cross and Passion, even unto death. 1

'Longfellow.

CHAPTER VII

CALVARY

THE shepherd was giving his life for his sheep,
slowly, with bitter anguish, but with joyous
and willing surrender. Stretching himself
upon his Cross, he was entering into the final majesty
of his passion. He who had endured so much, such
crucifixion of body, soul, and spirit, was not called
upon to endure that strange and awful outer darkness
experienced by so many of the saints, when in agonised
despair the soul cries aloud, " My God, my God,
why hast Thou forsaken me ? " Damien's faith was
perhaps too simple for this, his nature too childlike.

Yet, though not tormented with this deepest woe of
the human spirit, one form of mental suffering was his
- the feeling of so little accomplished. His character
had been assailed, his motives misjudged, his actions
misinterpreted. Many of whom he had hoped much
had disappointed him ; enemies had lurked around,
among them those with whom he had walked in the
House of God as friends - even his dear ones at home
seem to have misunderstood him. It is true that the
affection and sympathy from England had cheered
him, but England was so far away, and very little
praise from the outer world ever reached him. And
he was only forty-nine, in the prime of life, and dying
by inches.

One is irresistibly reminded at this stage in his

149

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

history of St. Paul alone and weary in his Roman
prison, writing those words of supreme pathos, * Only
Luke is with me ' ; of the girl St. Joan deserted by all,
dying amidst the flames as her scorched lips breathed
the name of her Divine Lover ; of Bishop Patteson
lying in the majesty of death far from his own race, with
the five mystic wounds upon his body and the strange
knotted palm-branch upon his breast. In common
with these saints and martyrs before him, possessed
with that humility which showed his greatness, Damien
would doubtless have written * Failure ' across the page
of his life, but posterity has emblazoned it instead in
letters of gold.

Some of those who from jealousy or narrowness of
vision lifted up their voices against Damien dared to
say that the father needlessly exposed himself to
infection. That he exposed himself to infection night
and day every hour he passed on that island was
splendidly true, but that this exposure was ever careless
or unnecessary was the Devil's own lie. Damien
took up his life-work on Molokai's dreadful shore
primarily to bring souls to Christ, knowing full well
that ultimately he must die in the attempt. No half-
measures would have won the bestial inhabitants of
that horrible charnel-house. It was only by becoming,
as he himself says, a leper among lepers, that he was
able to bring, them into the glorious liberty of the sons
of God. Through what physical sickness and revulsion,
what mental torture, what loneliness and spiritual
anguish this led him, not even those who loved him
best could ever realise 1 That was a secret, hidden
deep in the sacred, compassionate heart of God.
\ In reference to the fact that even his dear ones at

CALVARY

home seem to have failed him, it must be remembered
that the soul's greatest agonies come, often unwittingly,
from the nearest and dearest. Other folk may be
angry, depressed, vindictive, may misconstrue one's
actions, take away ohe's character, libel one's motives,
and it is hard, very hard, but should any of these things
come from a dear one, a beloved friend-or relation,
then it is a cross indeed. In Damien's case it was those
he loved with such passionate ardour, for whom he
prayed with such deep devotion - his brother Pamphile
and his nieces who appear to have been treating him
as though they were ashamed of his having contracted
the disease which was to prove the brightest jewel in
his martyr's crown. With touching words he writes :
' . . . Whilst tending the lepers I have become a
leper myself, and I try to bear as best I can the heavy
burden which it has pleased God to lay upon me * . .
pray for me.'

The above, written on February 4th, 1889, just ten
weeks before he was to die, breathes the same spirit
of resignation of which blessed Catherine of Siena
wrote five hundred years previously :

* ... The more pain we suffer down here with
Christ crucified, the more glory shall we receive :
and no pain will be so much rewarded as mental
pain and labour of the heart, for these are the great-
est pains of all, and therefore worthy of the greatest
fruit.'

Yet withal, in spite of disillusionment, disappoint-
ment, and ceaseless pain, his heart of irrepressible
gaiety made him present a cheerful face and demeanour

DAMIENOFMOLOKAI

to those around him. The dark, curling hair and short
beard were turning grey, the eyebrows were gone, the
short, straight nose had sunken in, the forehead was
swollen and ridged, the ears were greatly enlarged.
The hands and face were covered with incipient boils,
the splendidly built body marred by many signs of
disease. Yet, in spite of all, it was still a pleasure to
those around him to look at his bright, sensitive face,
the tender, humorous eyes, and it is easy to picture his
still beautiful smile as he uttered his Nunc dimittis :
"Well, God's will be done 1 He knows best. My
work, with all its faults and failures, is in His hands,
and before Easter I shall see my Saviour/*

On February i8th, 1889, he wrote his last letter to
his brother Pamphile, assuring him that he was still
happy and contented, desiring nothing but the com-
plete fulfilment of God's holy will. At that date he
was still able to go each morning to the Altar, though,
poor, faithful soul, with much difficulty, and not a
day passed that he omitted to remember each one of his
dear ones in prayer, as had been his unfailing custom
from the very beginning of his ministry.

Two days later he sent a message to his English
visitor, whom he called his ' good friend Edward,' and
who, with the Rev. H. H. Chapman, whom in life
he had never seen, were seldom far from his thoughts,
ranking among his most beloved friends : * . . . My
love and good wishes. I try to make slowly my Way
of the Cross and hope to be soon on the top of my
Golgotha.'

* I try to make slowly my Way of the Cross and hope
to be soon on the top of my Golgotha.' Beautiful,
appropriate words 1 His was a veritable Via Dolorosa^

CALVARY 153

a true Way of Sorrows, and he had been walking in it
for sixteen weary years. Perhaps with his love of
pictures, when writing these words he had in mind the
set of the ' Stations of the Cross ' which Mr. Clifford
had brought with him from England for his church,
and which he had received with such touching gratitude.

On March 28th he took to his bed, which he never
left again. Having set his earthly affairs in order, on
the 3Oth he made his preparation for death. Though
suffering intensely in the mouth and throat, he never
complained, and Brother James, his faithful nurse
both day and night, afterwards wrote that he had never
seen a happier death. The earlier feelings of failure
and disappointment had been appeased ; he was able
to rejoice in the churches, the schools, the orphanages,
and the hospital which he had founded, and not least
in his faithful band of helpers, who, inspired by his
example, had given up everything they held dear to
labour on this island of death.

Father Wendolin heard his general Confession,
then made his own, after which together they renewed
the vows which bound them together in their Brother-
hood, the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus
and Mary ; for it must not be forgotten that, although
he had worked so much alone, and quite apart from the
life of his Community, Damien was a monk, devoted to
his Order and a faithful follower of its rules and
ordinances.

On April ist he received the Sacred Viaticum, that
Holy Food in whose strength the Christian traverses
the dark Valley of the Shadow unafraid. During the

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

day he was bright and cheerful as usual, drawing
attention almost merrily to the unmistakable symptoms
which foretold the end.

" Look at my hands ; all the wounds are healing
and the crust is becoming black -that is a sign of
death, as you know very well. Look at my eyes ! I
have seen so many lepers die that I cannot be mistaken.
Death is not far off. I should have liked to have seen
the Bishop again, but God is calling me to celebrate
Easter with Himself. May He be blessed for it ! "

The following day, thinking the end was near,
Father Conradi administered Extreme Unction, but
Damien rallied a little, still showing admirable patience
in his enforced inactivity after a life of such super-
abundant energy.

With characteristic humility and self-abnegation,
he lay on the ground on a miserable mattress like the
poorest of his people. He who had given his all for
his flock had so far forgotten his own needs that he
was found to have neither change of linen nor sheets
for his bed/ In fact, it was with the greatest difficulty
he was persuaded to lie in a bed at all.

" How good God is," he said, speaking with
difficulty from his agonised throat, " to have pre-
served me long enough to have two Priests by my side
at my last moments, and also to have the good Sisters
of Charity at the Leproserie [hospital]. That has been
my Nunc dimittis. The work of the lepers is assured,
and so I am no longer necessary and will go up yonder."

Father Wendolin, who gives the account of these
last precious days, bending over him, asked earnestly :
" When you are up above, father, you will not forget
those you leave orphans ? "

CALVARY

The dying Priest's delightful humour bubbled up
in answer : " Oh, no, if I have any credit with God,
I will intercede for all in the Leproserie."

The two fathers, Conradi and Wendolin, with
Brother Joseph, were much in his company - Brother
James, the tall young Irishman, was his constant nurse,
tender and compassionate as any woman, as only a
strong man can be. The three Sisters from Kalaupapa,
those devoted daughters of St. Francis, visited him
often, and the sweet face and gentle voice of the
Mother Superior must have brought back fragrant
memories of childhood's days and the loving care of
his mother, Catherine de Veuster.

The closing scenes of Damien's life bring with
them a certain similarity of suffering, both mental and
physical, to those of St. Francis of Assisi. Both were
misjudged, misunderstood. Each was called to a
Calvary of pain ; Francis to the creeping horror of a
particularly agonising form of blindness, Damien to
all the tortures of leprosy.

Both were nursed at the last by devoted companions
and sons in the Faith ; Francis by Brother Leo and
his comrades, Damien by Brother James and the other
members of his staff. Even the tender ministry of
St. Clare, when for a short while the suffering Francis
rested in the garden of San Damiano, has its counter-
part in the spiritual solace which it has been seen the
Rev. Mother Marianne, herself a Franciscan Sister,
was able to give to the dying Priest of Molokai.

Each died on the scene of his labours, Francis lying
upon the bare earth of the Chapel of St. Mary of the

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Little Portion, the Portuincula, which his own hands
had erected, Damien with the utmost difficulty being
persuaded to rest upon a miserable apology for a bed
flat upon the ground, in his own little house by the
church he loved so dearly.

Lovely and pleasant in their lives, surely in death
these two are not far divided. Perhaps in the heavenly
mansions they walk even now as friends 1

For twenty-one days Damien lay in agony, while
gradually the familiar roar of the sea, the voices of the
children, the cry of the seabirds, grew faint to his
dying ears, in the same way as the dear, familiar faces
grew dim to his fading eyes. Constantly united to
his Lord by prayer and suffering, his sublime patience
and still cheery smile were a wonder to all.

Father Wendolin asked that, like Elijah, he would
leave him his mantle, that he might inherit his great
heart.

" What would you do with it ? " was the sick man's
reply. " It is full of leprosy/'

Towards the end he was continually aware of the
presence of two persons in the room, unseen to those
around him, one at the foot of his bed and one at the
head, but he never mentioned who they were.

The second Sunday after Easter was his last earthly
Sabbath, when in the Roman and Anglican Liturgies
the Gospel for the Day speaks of the Good Shepherd
who lays down His life for the sheep. In common with
Catholic Christendom, this Gospel was read in the two
churches of Molokai to the accompaniment of tears
and sobbing from the grief-stricken people.

CALVARY

On April 1 3th he became much worse, and received
the Holy Eucharist shortly after midnight. The next
day he still saw some of his visitors, and, although
unable to speak, affectionately pressed the hands of
those standing sorrowfully around him. From time
to time he lost consciousness, and on April I5th
(i 8 8 9) the final agony began. To the joy of those who
loved him so dearly it was soon over, and he passed
without a struggle into the nearer Presence of his
Lord, lying as though asleep in the devoted arms of
Brother James.

How well he fell asleep !

Like some proud river, widening towards the sea ;
Calmly and grandly ', silently and deep.

Life joined eternity.

The ' Little Shepherd ' had laid down his life for
his sheep.

The dread sound of the passing bell was the signal
for the agonised wailing of the bereaved lepers to pierce
the air in unavailing sorrow. Robed in his cassock,
the beloved Priest lay in the calm majesty of death, all
traces of the disease gone from his face, the wounds in
his hands quite dry. Having been carried to the
church at Kalawao, he lay all night before the Altar he
had erected and served so faithfully, surrounded by
praying groups of his mourning people. His coffin
had been lined with white silk by the three Franciscan
Sisters, and was covered by a black cloth, emblazoned
with a large white Cross.

With the dawn of morning the Holy Sacrifice was

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

offered, and his poor body, with its noble, faithful
scars, was laid to rest deep down in the golden sand,
sealed by a thick layer of cement, looking towards
the Altar where he gained all his strength and courage,
his true and lasting joy. The site of the grave under
the pandanus-tree, chosen long before by Damien
himself, had been prepared with loving care under the
direction of Father Wendolin. His first resting-place
on the island had become his last.

Faithful unto death, he had won the crown of life -
the diadem of thorns, bloodstained and woeful, had
become the crown of martyrdom, glorious and eternal.

1 Rest eternal grant unto him, Lord, and let
light perpetual shine upon him,'

CHAPTER VIII

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES

IN ancient Merrie England the leper was an outcast
indeed -dead to all legal and political rights,
without any privilege of citizenship, classed
with lunatics and outlaws, incapable of inheriting either
land or property. Even Holy Mother Church no
longer counted him as being in the land of the living,
actually performing the burial rites over him before
he entered the lazar-house.

The ceremonial for this terrible office was calculated
to sound the utmost note of unalterable doom which
the soul of man could be called upon -to endure*
Sprinkled with holy water and preceded by a Priest
with Cross borne before him, the unhappy victim was
conducted to the church, the awful mental torture of
that Via DoJorosa being augmented by the words of the
Burial Office recited in his ears. Well indeed was it
that the Cross was uplifted before his agonised eyes,
for truly a life-long Calvary lay before him.

Upon reaching the church, his garments were taken
from him, and, shrouded in a funeral pall, he was
placed before the Altar between two coffin trestles
shrouded in black cloth, the while Mass for the Dead
was said over him, with one word only of comfort :

" If in weakness of body thou art made like unto
Christ by m,eans of suffering, thou mayst surely hope
that thou wilt rejoice in spirit with God/'

159

l6o DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

In conclusion, after being led to the lazar-house he
was to occupy, he was provided with a stick, some
clothing, and a pair of clappers with which to warn
people of his approach. After having commended him
to the prayers of the people, the Priest warned him
against entering any house or building where men con-
gregated, adding various injunctions to prevent him
from mixing in any way with other than lepers. A
handful of earth was then thrown over his feet, with
the words, " Be thou dead to the world, but alive
again unto God," in completion of that poignant cere-
monial of the Burial Office which, once seen, can
never be forgotten, " . . . earth to earth and ashes
to ashes." Finally he was told to have patience and
say his prayers, for Christ would be with him. He
was then left to work out his own salvation, despised,
rejected, and feared of men, until at length he was
laid to rest in the cemetery adjoining the lazar-house
of his internment.

One of these cemeteries, containing thousands of
the victims of this terrible scourge, lies somewhere
in the neighbourhood of Oxford Street, close to High
Street, Bloomsbury, where the feet of London's hurry-
ing millions pass continually to and fro. These leper
cemeteries were indicated by one huge plain Cross,
with the word ' Pax ' cut deeply upon the steps.
* Pax I ' Peace indeed to the agonised, corrupted
body, the tortured, suffering soul 1

The terminology of this disease is somewhat con-
fused ; it was called by the ancients elephantiasis and
also lefra, but the latter term at least was also used of

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES l6l

other maladies ; for example, the skin trouble now
known as psoriasis. In modern times, both these
names have been applied to other diseases as well,
Elephantiasis Arabum being distinct from leprosy,
which is distinguished as Elephantiasis Gr<ecorum or
Lepra Arabum> sometimes also called Leontiasis.
Black leprosy is by some supposed to have received its
current medical name, Elephantiasis^ from the Greek
word meaning ' elephant/ on account of its rendering
the skin like that of the giant animal, scabrous, dark-
coloured, and furrowed all over with tubercles.

The name lazar-house, or lazaretto, comes from the
word lazar, a leper, so-called from Lazarus, the
beggar full of sores, traditionally the sores of leprosy,
who lay at the gate of Dives in the parable recorded by
St. Luke. The word is derived from the Hebrew,
Efazar, * He whom God helps.'

A favourite and merciful form of piety was the en-
dowment of these leper hospitals. The Prior was gen-
erally one who, having devoted himself to the care of
these stricken brethren, had himself contracted the
disease. A particular Order of monks, called the
Knights of St. Lazarus, founded in Syria A.D. 1119,
afterwards spreading over Europe, specially gave
their lives to this service, the Master of their Order
being always a leper, that perfect sympathy for the
sufferers, for whom he was responsible might be
ensured.

Jean Paul Richter remarks that * the noblest deeds
of heroism are done within four walls, not before the
public gaze.' It is difficult even so much as to visualise
the daily life of these saintly Knights of Lazarus, a life
which was perpetuated by Damien on Molokai, and,

l62 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

fired by his example, is followed in many corners of
the mission field to-day.

The account of the food supplied to the lazar-house
of St. Julian at St. Albans, A.D. 1335-1349, makes
interesting reading :

* Let every leprous brother receive from the pro-
perty of the hospital for his living and all necessaries
whatever he has been accustomed to receive by the
custom observed of old in the said hospital namely,
every week seven loaves, five white and two brown,
made from grain as thrashed : every seventh month
fourteen gallons of beer, or eightpence for the same.
Let him have in addition on certain feast days, for
every feast, one loaf, one jar of beer (or one penny for
the same), and one obolus (a halfpenny), which is called
the charity of the said hospital. And let every leprous
brother receive at the Feast of Christmas forty gallons
of good beer (or forty pence for the same), two quarters
of pure and clean corn, which is called the great
charity ; also at the Feast of St. Martin each leper
shall receive one pig from the common stall, or the
value in money if he prefer it.' On various other
specified times the inmates of this hospital were also
given more pennies, an obolus for buying herbs, four
shillings for clothes, and fourteen shillings for fuel,
* as has been ordained of old for the sake of peace and
concord.' It will be recollected that the leper has a
great predisposition to cold, by which his sufferings
are greatly augmented, for which reason the last
sentence is pregnant with much meaning.

At Sherburn, in Durham, the diet was more varied,
including a mess of flesh three days in the week, and
fish, with cheese and butter on the remaining four,

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 163

the cooking being done in a common kitchen by one
cook. High festivals were celebrated by a double
portion, calculated to give the leper a love of Mother
Church. Lent provided fresh salmon and other fish ;
Michaelmas the good old English dish of roast goose ;
history does not relate whether the * apple sass ' was
supplied as well. One goose was provided for every
four lepers, a generous ration, although perhaps not
sufficiently generous for the gentleman who remarked
that the goose was a silly bird, as it was too much for
one person and not enough for two. Each of these
lepers also received every year for clothing three yards
of white or russet woollen cloth, six yards of linen, and
six of canvas. In addition to the ordinary supply of
firewood, four Yule logs were provided at Christmas.
A cartload and four trusses of straw and rushes were
also supplied fpr bedding and floor-covering two or
three tiihes a year. Obviously if one were afflicted
with leprosy it was as well to find oneself in the neigh-
bourhood of Sherburn or its like, for all the richer and
larger hospitals were remembered by generous bene-
factors.

The sufferer in these houses of refuge was not idle.
He attended the services in the chapel attached to the
lazaretto, including the Seven Hours, He worked at
his trade or in the fields and gardens attached to the
institution, taking regular hours for meals and recrea-
tion. Yet, in spite of -all the kindness the monks
showed their poor pensioners, the nature of their
malady cast a gloom over both their own souls and the
general atmosphere of the Community.

An excellent example of one of these leper hospitals,
still in use as an almshouse, is to be found in St.

164 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

Nicholas's Lazar-House, Harbledown, lying on the
hillside one mile outside Canterbury, at the spot from
which mediaeval pilgrims to the * holy, blissful martyr's
shrine ' (St. Thomas k Becket, Archbishop, martyred
within the Cathedral, December 29th, A.D. 1170)
caught their first glimpse of the Angel Steeple and the
fair walled city at their feet. The lazaretto, with its
adjacent church of St. Nicholas, patron saint of all way-
faring men, was founded by Archbishop Lanfranc,
and provided accommodation on separate sides of the
building for both leprous men and women, while in
addition an extra burden of hospitality was imposed
upon its Prior and Brethren by the constant stream of
pilgrims that for something like three centuries flowed
through the little town. There being no State aid for
the relief of distress, the lazar-house seldom confined
its ministrations to the lepers alone, but as a side-line
assisted any sick poor who presented themselves at
its gates.

The wooden leper hospital of Harbledown has twice
been rebuilt. The present Jacobean structure dates
from 1 674, but the church, with its Norman tower and
doorway, its time-stained walls, and twelfth-century
benches, is little changed since the days of Lanfranc.
One curious feature, not unknown in churches fre-
quented by the mediaeval pilgrim, is the slope of the
chancel down to the west door, so arranged that the
building can be cleansed by a plentiful flushing out
with water, not unnecessary after its night-long occupa-
tion by a mixed - very mixed - company of the devout,
including many whose pilgrimage was being made for
the healing of very grievous bodily ailments. Espec-
ially was this purification necessary in the case of St*

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES l6$

Nicholas of Harbledown, of which a portion of the
building, formerly partitioned off by a wooden screen,
was apportioned to the lepers.

An interesting relic of those pilgrims immortalised
by Chaucer as they journeyed to the venerated city
is held by the present foundation of St. Nicholas, in
the shape of the actual crystal from the shoe of St.
Thomas k Becket, the upper leather of which, being
the most venerated possession of the hospital, was
exhibited by the Brethren for the adoration and alms of
the pilgrims. The charming blue throat-wort, or
campanula trachelium, known to us as the Canterbury
bell, and accounted a sovereign remedy by the ancient
herbalists for affections of the throat and neck, for-
merly grew in wild profusion in the lovely countryside
which surrounded this lepers' home.

Not every leper had the security of being housed in
the safety of the lazaretto. Many wandered about
the countryside like forlorn ghosts, shunned and hated
by all, driven away with violence from every human
habitation, set on by savage dogs, supporting their
wretched existence on berries or any other rough food
the fields and woods afforded, augmented by the
scanty charity given by the more tender-hearted, A
large number wended their way to the lepers' wells, of
which a famous example existed at Brewood, in Staf-
fordshire, whose healing waters were accounted of
special efficacy.

Numerous churches show what is termed leper or
low-side windows, of which a typical specimen is to
be seen in St. Mary's, Guildford, Surrey. They are

l66 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

generally found in the south wall of the chancel,
nearer to the ground than the other windows, the
popular idea being that by this means the lepers,
although not permitted to enter the church, were able
to assist at Mass and observe the moment of Con-
secration, just as worshippers in the Lady Chapel were
given a view of the High Altar by means of the oblique
opening in the chancel wall entitled the hagioscope.
Unfortunately for this theory of the leper window,
there are two serious objections to its veracity, one
being that lepers were not allowed to enter the church-
yard, the other that in most cases the window is in such
a position that it is impossible to see the Altar, How-
ever that may be, the name given to these windows
reminds us of those homeless wanderers to whom in the
hour of their greatest need even the consolations of
Holy Church were denied.

In the reign of Edward III (A.D. 1327-77) all lepers
were excluded from the City of London, the porters
stationed at the gates being liable to punishment
should they allow them to pass. A just and sensible
decree, but spoilt by the cruel wording of the document
in which the lepers are accused of * endeavouring to
contaminate others with their abominable blemish,
that so, to their own wretched solace, they may have
the more fellows in suffering/

The wickedness of this accusation was easily sur-
passed in A.D. 1351 by King Philip of France, who,
greedy of the riches of the lazar-houses, and in order
that he might seize their lands and wealth, was so
inhumane as to cause many poor lepers to be burnt

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES l6j

alive, giving out as an excuse that they had poisoned
the wells of the people - a repetition of Nero's infamous
plea for the extermination of the Christians, using them
as scapegoats for the burning of the city of Rome which
his own folly and love of masquerade had caused.
Small wonder that such deeds as these caused mediaeval
artists to depict kings as permanently residing here-
after in that place where the fire is never quenched 1

Leprosy, primarily a disease of tropical and semi-
tropical countries, was said to have been first brought
to England by Crusaders returning from the Holy
Land. But as lepers existed in England in the days
of our Saxon ancestors, and the succeeding Normans
built many lazar-houses for their accommodation, the
Crusaders can be freely exonerated from all blame.
The mere fact that Harbledown alone was sheltering
its leper colony nine years before Peter the Hermit
roused Europe to arms in the First Crusade in A,D.
1095 is a proof that it was not the return of these
warriors which was responsible for the appearance of
the disease in England.

In Ireland, St. Finian, the leper saint to whom an
English newspaper made reference when speaking of
Father Damien, flourished as early as the middle of
the sixth century. His story is a curious one. Bishop
and Abbot, surnamed Lobhar, or the Leper, St.
Finian, whose feast is celebrated on March i6th, was
a descendant of the Kings of Munster and a disciple
of St. Brendan. He imitated the patience of Job under
a loathsome and tedious distemper for which his
surname was given him. Legend states that there

l68 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

burned within his soul the longing for a martyr's
crown, a desire which was fulfilled by a mother bring-
ing to him her son, dumb, blind, and leprous, beseech-
ing that he would heal the child. Finian prayed
earnestly, and it was revealed to him that only by taking
the child's leprosy upon himself could the little one be
cured. On Finian giving consent, the child was made
whole and the saint became covered with ulcers from
head to foot. The ruins of the first monastery he
founded, set in a fairy-like scene of wild beauty, can
be seen on the island of Innisfallen, on romantic Lake
Killarney.

A charming story of the mythical founder of Bath,
Prince Bladud, states that he was a victim of the malady,
and, in consequence, being driven from his Court,
followed the example of the Prodigal Son by becoming
a swineherd. Unfortunately, his pigs caught the
infection from him, but cured themselves by wallowing
in the hot springs, the famous aqu<e solis. The Prince,
copying their lead, rejoiced in the same happy experi-
ence, and, on finding himself cured, founded the city
of Bath, where, in accordance with the proper ending
to such a story, he lived happy ever after. If any truth
underlies the legend, then leprosy was known in
Britain nine hundred years before the Birth of Christ,
two thousand years before the First Crusade.

That the malady was once extremely prevalent in
these islands is proved by the fact that at a time when
the population of the whole of England was only in
the neighbourhood of two millions, about a quarter
of that of the present metropolitan area of London,
there were two hundred leper hospitals scattered about
the country providingaccommodation for something like

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 169

four thousand victims, exclusive of those who wandered
homeless through the land. After about A.D. 1250
every large town, as well as many villages, possessed a
lazar-house, but many of these were poorly endowed
and life within them was harsh and wretched, although
they were privileged in possessing their own chapels
and chaplains.

Legend, that charming flowery garment which
clings to the memories of the great, tells that the
Emperor Constantine, being stricken with leprosy,
was cured by receiving Baptism at the hands of St.
Sylvester, Bishop of Rome. As in every legend there
lies a germ of truth, in this case the Emperor's malady
was probably the leprosy of sin, rumour having it that
the noble gentleman had murdered both his wife
Fausta and his son Crispus. Fortunately for his
ultimate destiny, his conscience was in good working
order, and after terrible remorse, succeeded by the
genuine repentance of a contrite heart, his soul was
cleansed from its awful guilt by the regenerating
stream flowing from the holy Font.

The Bible speaks much of lepers, but it must be
borne in mind that in all probability sufferers from
other forms of revolting skin diseases were included
under the term - this being particularly implied in the
Book of Leviticus, where directions are given for
distinguishing between * clean ' and * unclean ' leprosy,
the former being apparently curable. The predomin-
ant and characteristic form of the disease in Scripture
is a white variety, covering either the entire body or a
large tract of its surface, which has obtained the name

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

of lefra Mosaica. Such were the cases of Moses,
Miriam, Naaman, and Gehazi (Exod. iv. 6 ; Num.
xii. 10 ; 2 Kings v. i and 27 ; compare Lev. xiii. 13).

The disease is not mentioned in the Scriptures prior
to the residence of Israel in Egypt. The Egyptian
and Syrian climates, and especially the rainless atmos-
phere of the former, are very prolific in skin diseases,
including in an exaggerated form some which are
common in the cooler regions of Western Europe.
The heat and drought acting for long periods upon the
skin, and the exposure of a large surface of the latter
to their influence, combine to predispose it to such
affections. Even the modified forms known to our
hospitals show a perplexing variety, and at times a
wide departure from the. best-known and recorded
types ; much more, then, may we expect departure
from any routine of symptoms in this class of disorders
amidst the fatal fecundity of the Levant. It seems
likely that diseases also tend to exhaust their old types,
and to reappear under new modifications. Influenza
and measles, a few years ago considered quite mild and
amiable, requiring only simple nursing and a little
humouring of the patient, are now capable of assuming
the alarming features of a modern plague.

With regard to leprosy not being mentioned by
Biblical writers until the exile in Egypt, Ma$etho,
the Egyptian Priest and historian of the third century
B.C., asserts that the Egyptians drove out the Israelites
as infected with leprosy a strange reflex, perhaps, of
the Mosaic narrative of the plagues of Egypt, yet
probably also containing a germ of truth. The
Egyptian bondage, with its studied degradations and
privations, and especially the work of the kiln under an

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES Ijl

Egyptian sun, must have had a frightful tendency to
generate this class of disorder, particularly as the
disease is aggravated by unwholesome or innutritious
diet, want of personal cleanliness, and hard labour in a
heated atmosphere amongst dry or powdery substances.
The ' baker's ' and ' bricklayer's itch ' are a distant
relation to the leprosy endured by the Israelites as
they worked in the brick kilns beneath Egypt's
burning sky.

The severity of the Levitical code of conduct drawn
up during the forty years' wandering in the wilder-
ness is not surprising when the circumstances are con-
sidered. The sudden and total change of food, air,
dwelling, and mode of life caused by the Exodus from
Egypt to this nation of newly emancipated slaves, may
possibly have given rise to a further tendency to skin-
disorders, and novel and severe repressive measures
may have been required in the desert-moving camp to
secure the public health, or to allay the panic of in-
fection.

By Jewish Law, as set forth in the thirteenth and
fourteenth chapters of the Book of Leviticus, the leper
was forced to make his dwelling without the camp (in
Our Lord's day many of these wretched beings lived
among the tombs out on the hillsides), cut off from all
dealings with his brother men, and obliged to cover
his mouth with his hand, crying, " Unclean, un-
clean 1 " whenever by accident anyone approached his
vicinity. No wonder to the Jew leprosy was the
symbol of sin, for one corrupts and kills the body, the
other destroys the immortal soul. In the Middle
Ages the leper who was not confined to a lazar-house
was furnished with a grey gown and a wooden clapper

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

to announce his obnoxious presence he also being
obliged to cry " Unclean, unclean," and to cover his
mouth.

Our Lord's infinite compassion was stirred by the
sad plight of sufferers from this malady, and one of the
most touching instances of his power is shown in the
healing of the ten lepers, only one of whom returned
to express his gratitude, and he was a member of the
despised race of Samaritans.

But although among the Jews victims of the disease
were accounted unclean, and forced to live separated
from their fellows, the leprosy of that period may in
many cases have been nothing more than a particu-
larly obnoxious and obstinate skin disease, apparently
not producing in its victims the loss of members or the
dreadful corruption of the flesh experienced in Eng-
land during the Middle Ages, or in the Hawaiian
Islands and elsewhere to-day. Naaman the Syrian,
though a leper, was still the captain of his hosts, lead-
ing his armies to battle, and even conducting his master
the king, leaning upon his arm, to worship in the
temple of Rimmon.

Leprosy can be divided into three classes, the first
being characterised by the whole body becoming
white and of a scaly texture, but with little effect on
the general health of the sufferer. This is the disease
of Bible days, now extremely rare, the story of Gehazi,
Elisha's servant, being an instance of the curious
snowy pallor which the victim's skin assumed.

The second variety is entitled anaesthetic, owing
to the extremities becoming insensible to pain and

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 173

gradually sloughing away with sores, the body mean-
while becoming weak and crippled, an easy prey to
dysentery and diarrhoea.

The third variety, named tubercular, is distin-
guished by swellings and discolourations, most painful
to behold, Damien, as is so often the case, suffered
from both these aspects of the disease, anaesthetic and
tubercular. It will be recollected with regard to the
anaesthetic condition of Damien that, although he had
previously been a little suspicious he had contracted
the malady, he was given unmistakable proof when he
found that his foot was entirely insensible to pain
resulting from boiling water being poured over it.
Lepers often scald and burn themselves without being
aware of having done so.

The disease is first recognisable by a reddish colour
in the face, hoarseness of voice, loss of hair, terrible
dreams and nightmare, spots or eruptions on the skin.
The worst form, and also the most frequent, is that in
which the blood is corrupted and the whole system
poisoned. Sores break out in various parts of the
body, more particularly in the hands and feet* The
body literally rots to pieces, fingers and toes slough off
bit by bit, frequently followed by the disappearance
of the whole hand or foot concerned. In this connec-
tion a pathetic story is told by a Priest ministering to
a leper settlement in South Africa. The gradual dis-
appearance of their fingers caused his servers to be
unable to fasten their cassocks, so that he was obliged
to perform this little office for them himself, until one
happy day friends from England sent out a truly
noble buttonhook of giant dimensions, which to their
joy the sufferers were able to manipulate themselves.

174 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAJ

Each fresh sore is attended by intense pain, but,
once the horrid ulcer has come to its head, there is
little more trouble, and the victim may pass some weeks
or even months without actual pain, though dying
steadily and surely inch by inch and hour by hour.

The face becomes particularly repellent as gradually
the eyebrows lose their hair, the nostrils swell, and the
ulcers eating into the flesh cause the skin to bear the
appearance of a honeycomb. In the latter stages, as
the blood thickens, the nose falls in, the lips become
enlarged, the pulse scarcely beats. Pictures of Father
Damien, taken after he was attacked by the disease,
show very noticeably this thickening of the lips and
the curious honeycombed appearance of the skin.

It is sad to see that in some cases both face and body
become so repellent that they gradually have to be
swathed from sight, even from the eyes of fellow
sufferers. Perhaps the worst feature of the disease,
particularly to those of a refined and sensitive nature,
is that the unhappy victim becomes an offence, not
only to himself, but to all who find themselves in his
vicinity. Damien gives the explanation, * The flesh
being eaten away gives a foetid odour ; even the
breath of the leper becomes so foul that the air around
is poisoned with it.'

The disease varies very much in duration, some
being released at the end of twelve months, others
enduring their living death for ten to fifteen years.

Investigation seems to prove that the malady can
be propagated by heredity, inoculation, inhalation, and,
in certain conditions, contagion. Undoubtedly in the
past- segregation has proved the best preventative,
although experts are hoping that in a few years* time

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 175

compulsory segregation will be superseded by the
voluntary treatment of early cases in clinics, a method
which is in use at the present time in India and in
parts of Africa under British rule. It is estimated that
if in the early stages of the disease a leper's household
and all other close contacts are examined for any sign
of the disease, this examination being repeated every
six months for five years, it ought to be possible to
detect 80 per cent, of infections from him in the early,
curable stage, and to treat them so that they are cured
before they become infective. By this method,
theoretically, the foci of infection would be reduced in
five years to only 20 per cent. By repeating this for
another five years the infection would be only 4 per
cent. The method is already being tried in various
parts of the world, and it is surprising to find how
familiar the people of these districts are becoming with
the early symptoms of the disease, so that it is probable
that as soon as experience shows them the hopefulness
of treatment in the first stages they will come forward
in ever-increasing numbers.

It has been stated that the Asiatic form of leprosy
is less resistant than the African. This may partly
account for a doctor in Kashmir stating that in his
judgment the disease is not hereditary, although un-
doubtedly, as in the case of tubercular parents, the
children of lepers are more prone to the malady than
others. Nor do some experts consider that contagion
in adults is a very serious factor, except when a healthy
person has an open wound upon the body. In the
case of children, they agree that the risk of contagion
is extremely real, particularly during the period of
teething, when everything is put into the mouth.

176 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

A doctor working in China declares that leprosy is
an ordinary germ disease whose bacillus was discovered
over half a century ago, and that the germs enter the
body through abrasions in the skin coming from such
causes as insect bites and scratching. Unfortunately,
the Chinese victim is generally in an advanced state of
the disease before he applies for aid, and the danger in
that country lies not so much in the beggar lying by
the wayside in all the horror of his sores and degradation,
but in the sufferers hidden away in the homes, from
the luxurious mansion down to the poverty-stricken
grass hut.

A missionary working among Japanese lepers writes :
' It is not unusual for a man to develop leprosy after
his marriage, and, though the wife does not become
leprous, she transmits the disease to her children.'

In England the dread disease seems to have spent
its fury by the end of the sixteenth century, having
begun to abate by the fourteenth, although it lingered
long in Cornwall and the Shetland Isles. The lazar-
houses became empty and the kind-hearted no longer
beheld the weary sufferers dragging their wretched
bodies from village to village, despised and rejected
of men.

The few cases that exist in our present time are
devotedly cared for at St. Giles's Home for British
Lepers at Bricknacre, near Chelmsford.

The white man overseas is liable to infection not
only the devoted doctor, nurse, or Priest, engaged in
the work of alleviation, but also the ordinary civilian,
if he does not take proper precautions.

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 177

As the malady died down in England and Europe,
chiefly through segregation, the charity of the lazar-
houses was no longer required, and people's minds
quickly forgot the victims who still suffered untended
in other parts of the world. Damien's death was a
veritable trumpet-call on behalf of these souls so
grievously afflicted.

It is true that a little work among lepers overseas
had been accomplished before his passing drew such
general attention to the cause, the labours carried out
by the Venerable P. Donders in Dutch Guiana being
a splendid example (1809-71). In Great Britain the
Mission to Lepers, started in 1874, had been running
for fifteen years, but Damien's death gave the neces-
sary impetus to the work ; it was the torch which
made the smouldering fires of endeavour blaze into a
flame of loving service which has never died out.

Medical science has made many advances in the
treatment of leprosy since Damien's day. Never
hopeless about the ultimate discovery of a cure, his
own experience caused him to say, ' To my knowledge
a cure has not yet been found. Perchance, in the near
future, through the untiring perseverance of physicians
it may be found/

To-day a cure is known, but unfortunately several
factors militate against its efficiency, the first being that
it is essential it should be undertaken in the early
stages of the disease. The treatment is a long and
often very painful process, and in the present condition
of native life, where the cases chiefly occur, very dif-
ficult to administer. A complete cure is practically

178 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

guaranteed if the patient's condition is discovered at
the onset of the disease and it is possible for him to
remain in hospital for the treatment.

The difficulties of the situation can be more fully
realised when it is remembered that, unlike our own
* particulars ' of chicken-pox, measles, scarlet fever,
and the like, when the incubation period varies from a
few days to no more than four weeks at the outside
limit, the incubation period of leprosy extends to so
much as five years. In the case of out-patients,
particularly in India, where the hospital serves such
vast areas, the difficulties of transport are very great,
and the patient is extremely apt, perhaps through no
fault of his own, to allow the stated interval between
the treatments to extend indefinitely, so that when at
last he comes from his distant village to present himself
at the hospital the time between his last appearance is
so prolonged that the whole process has to start again.
Naturally this is not encouraging either to the patient
or his physician. Nor are matters improved when the
latter discovers that the invalid has eaten the ointment
that was given him to rub on the outside of his person,
including the paper wrapping.

Native customs are another great stumbling-block
in the path of the would-be healer. In the Hawaiian
Islands the family pipe passed from the leper's mouth
to the person sitting next to him has been shown to
be an extremely fruitful method of propagating the
disease. Feeding from the communal calabash has
also had its due share in spreading the malady.

The extremely elementary, and often non-existent,
knowledge of the laws of hygiene and sanitation is an
almost insuperable barrier to the treatment of leprosy

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 179

in the native home, whether in India, Africa, or the
South Seas. The mud floor of an African kraal or an
Indian house, teeming with germs, often coming from
discharges from leprous feet, is a hotbed of the
disease, particularly in the case of the children, who,
in the manner of babies from John o 1 Groats to Sydney,
crawl happily on the ground, sucking their dirty,
chubby little fingers as they go. Imagination supplies
all further details, opening out a horrifying vista of
the long road of reform which must be travelled before
the skill of the doctors and nurses can have the oppor-
tunity to effect cures on anything but a small scale,
particularly when it is remembered that some of the
primary causes of the disease are insanitary conditions,
filthy habits, and unwholesome food, although persons
in comfortable circumstances are by no means exempt.
Even with cases which, after long treatment in hospital,
have been discharged as completely restored to health,
renewed residence in the native home often brings
back a recurrence of the disease, a state of affairs which
is heartbreaking to both doctor and patient. Added to
these difficulties in tropical lands are the multitudes of
creatures, particularly the jigger, whose bites un-
doubtedly act as an inoculation.

In some parts of Africa, particularly the Sudan,
where leprosy is an ever-increasing peril, mice and
crickets are great offenders, and the natives of these
districts being heavy sleepers, a limb which has
escaped from the covering blanket may have a nasty
little wound inflicted upon it before the victim is
aware that he has been bitten. The mouse of the
Sudan is a very far-off relation of the * puir wee
timorous beastie * of Burns's description, and the grass

DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

huts of the district form a perfect home, as well as a
happy hunting-ground, both for these creatures and
the crickets, who devour whatever they happen to
alight upon when they jump gaily and promiscuously
from the walls. An exposed bit of the sleeper, a
mosquito net, a blanket, all are food for their accom-
modating larder, and the difficulties of not figuring
in their menu are considerable.

Apart from inoculation, some authorities maintain
that in some way fish food, and especially when salted
or decomposed, is a primary cause of the disease.

The African form of leprosy seems more resistant
to treatment than the Asiatic, the latter responding
far more readily to efforts of alleviation. The Sudan,
with its heavy toll of victims, has even been blamed for
producing the first victim, and the earlier Greek and
Roman writers refer to the malady as an Egyptian
disease, although it certainly existed in India and
China in very remote periods.

The first great advance in the treatment of leprosy
was made in the year 1874, when Hanson discovered
the bacillus associated with leprosy lesions, thus
opening up the avenue for a scientific diagnosis of
the disease. The gurjum, or gurjun, balsam, also
called the wood oil, brought by Mr. Clifford to
Molokai, which afforded temporary relief to Father
Damien, is the product of a fir-tree grown in the
Andaman Islands, off the coast of Burmah. In
its raw condition it is a brown, sticky substance, but
when shaken up with three parts of lime-water it
becomes as soft and smooth as butter.

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES l8l

The treatment consisted of rubbing the ointment
all over the body, and taking a small dose of equal
quantities of the lime-water and oil internally.

The tree from which the gurjum oil is obtained is so
large that houses and canoes are built from it. The
balsam itself has been used in the East as a substitute
for the South American copaiba as a varnish for boats,
and for preventing the attacks of ants on timber. It
was at the request of Mr. Manley Hopkins, the
Hawaiian consul, that the English Government in
1888 purchased large quantities of this oil from the
Indian Government for the purpose of checking or
alleviating leprosy in Hawaii.

The chief obstacle to the efficacy of the treat-
ment was the lepers' inherent callousness and
hatred of exertion, so that the energy required in
the daily rubbing of the body was seldom forth-
coming.

In the middle of 1915, Sir Leonard Rogers made
his important investigations with soluble sodium salts
or soaps, of the lower melting-point fatty acids of
chaulmoogra oil, using them by both subcutaneous
and intra-muscular injection in leprosy. The world-
wide issues at stake in that terrible war year of 1915
prevented the discovery making the stir it merited,
but it is gratifying to know that, while tens of thousands
of the flower of the nations' youth were laying down
their lives on that far-flung battle-line, Sir Leonard's
research marked the dawn of a new era in the alleviation
of the agonies of an untold number of sufferers. He
has recently been able to improve his discovery by the
manufacture of a new non-irritating sodium hydno-
carpate entitled Alepol, which is being used extensively

l82 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

in British Colonies* It is especially valuable as it
dispenses with the painful vein trouble often caused
by the earlier treatment.

The more chronic cases are also showing hopeful
prospects by treatment with iodide of potassium,
which, though extremely expensive and in some
instances apt to involve much suffering, is already said
to work wonders. This drug also holds possibilities
that it may prove efficacious as a means of diagnosis
in early doubtful cases.

Tobacco smoke is believed to act as a disinfectant
against the germ of leprosy, so that in some settlements
the pipe or cigarette is encouraged both among the
patients and those who minister to them. It will be
remembered that Damien found his pipe of great
assistance in overcoming the nauseating odour of the
lepers and preventing it being carried in his own
clothes.

It is not surprising that leprosy produces a great
depression in its victim, an abyss of darkness and
despair which is a veritable shadow of death. The
very appearance of the leper, with the thickened skin
of the face puckered and nodulated, gives a * peculiar,
heavy, morose expression/

In certain parts of the world, and more particularly
in China, the popular idea maintains that the sufferer
is afflicted because of some sin he has committed, a
belief which was apparently held by the old Levitical
Law. He is the social pariah of the world, and his
doleful cry of * Unclean ' refers not only to his
corrupted body, but also to his supposedly criminal

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 183

soul. In China the * walking corpse/ as many thou-
sands of centuries have named him, is not only ostra-
cised and most cruelly treated, but popular thought
assigns to him the belief that even in the hereafter he
will be excluded from the society of his fellow-spirits.
To a people whose worship of their ancestors is such a
beautiful and important national characteristic, this
belief in the utter damnation of lepers is fraught with a
terrible significance, and perhaps nowhere in the world
are missions to lepers more urgently needed.

It is no matter for surprise that the leper in his
physical and spiritual desolation finds amazing comfort
in the religion of the * Man of Sorrows/ seeing in the
Crucified Lord, wounded in hands and head, in feet
and side, a glorified example of his own most bitter
sufferings. From every mission hospital in the world
comes the same story, and no more striking example of
its truth can be found than the response of Molokai's
bestial sufferers to the teaching of Father Damien.
Not only in almost every case did the actual counten-
ances of the victims come to show inward peace and
even happiness, but one old man, lying blinded in
hospital from the effects of the disease, went so far as
to tell a visitor that he was thankful for the malady,
as it had saved him from much evil. It would seem
that the leper, an outcast from his fellow-men, becomes
a special object of the Divine compassion.

Damien, in the fulfilment of his priestly duties,
observed the bad effect on a married victim of enforced
separation from wife or husband, the oppression of
mind thus resulting being even more unbearable than

184 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

the physical suffering. Those so separated only
seemed to gain relief by throwing themselves into the
pursuit of reckless and immoral habits, a state of
affairs truly deplorable. On the other hand, the vic-
tim who arrived with wife or husband appeared always
more resigned, and was naturally aided by the loving
nursing and companionship of the other, A curious
sidelight on these conditions is the fact that men are
far more prone to leprosy than women, as is the case
with various other diseases, as though going to prove
that woman, with her burden of motherhood and its
attendant disabilities, has sufficient to bear.

Another strange circumstance mentioned by a
present-day worker in a leper hospital in China is that
it is very rare for both husband and wife to be affected
by the disease. One healthy woman accompanied her
leper husband to Molokai, and when eventually he
died, she married three more leper husbands before
* last of all she died also ' without having contracted
the disease. Her matrimonial activities are an irresis-
tible reminder of that lady whose alluring attributes
caused her to be the bride of seven brothers in succes-
sion. A dangerous precedent for the lepers to have
followed !

With regard to the children of lepers, it is possible
for them to be quite free from actual infection at birth,
but they are naturally susceptible to the disease, and it
is advisable, in spite of the violation of the sanctity of
the home and the rights of parents, to remove them
as early as possible. These little ones often have
greatly impaired vitality, and one missionary Priest

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 185

working in a South African leper hospital gives it as
his experience that when they leave the nursery of the
asylum they rarely survive. He gives a pathetic pic-
ture of the little body in its coffin, hastily contrived
from a starch-box, being laid to rest beneath Africa's
burning sun, the while the few mourners sing in their
native dialect, ' There's a Friend for little chil-
dren. . . .' Poor little creatures 1 There is no need
for weeping as they are laid to rest, but rather for
rejoicing that they are spared further suffering.

Most people felt that twelve years on the island of
Molokai had rendered Damien immune from infec-
tion, yet he himself always expected that he would
find himself a victim. Determined in all things to give
no cause to his people to feel that he feared them in
their sufferings, except that he lived strictly apart
and attended carefully to the ordinary laws of health
and hygiene, the young Padre entered into every cir-
cumstance of their lives.

It is even stated that he accepted his turn of the
horrible communal pipe, though with much inward
revulsion. Whether or no this latter is true, it is cer-
tain that he lived constantly in a polluted atmosphere,
dressing the sufferers' sores with his own hands,
washing their dreadful bodies, visiting their death-
beds, bending close to catch their husky voices, even
digging their graves. It was a foregone conclusion
that sooner or later he must rank among them.

The supreme sacrifice of his life had been offered,
and Damien had won the martyr's crown. He who
on earth had received little reward, in death became a

l86 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

world-hero. It was fitting that England, which had
shown him the greatest friendship, should have been the
first to receive trustworthy information of his passing.

The sad news coming to Honolulu flashed across
the world, appearing on the posters of every European
and American capital. A few days after his death a
Solemn Requiem was held in the cathedral at Hono-
lulu, where twenty-five years before he had celebrated
his first Mass. On this latter occasion all the principal
persons on the island were present.

Emotion without precedent was caused by the news.
All classes united in mourning his loss, the papers,
rivalling in praise of his name, gave him the title of
the * Hero of Charity.' Such sympathy in what was
felt to be a common loss had never before been ex-
perienced between Roman Catholics and other
denominations, and in proclaiming his honour all
barriers of class and creed were broken down. The
Church Times stated that it rejoiced in being able to
anticipate the Roman Curia by adding Damien's name
to the Church's bede-roll of the saints.

England arose immediately to action, and the Prince
of Wales - afterwards King Edward VI I -with his
generous heart, presided at a public meeting at which
three resolutions were passed :

1. That a suitable monument should be erected at
Molokai.

2. That a Damien Institute should be established,
where the study of leprosy might be the leading
feature.

3. That a detailed enquiry should be made into
the conditions and betterment of lepers residing in
India and the other British Dominions.

LEPROSY THROUGH THE CENTURIES 187

Unlike many resolutions passed at public meetings,
ill three of the above were faithfully carried out.

With regard to the first - the erection of a suitable
nonument - Damien's English friends sent out to
Molokai a beautiful Cross composed of finest British
granite, fitting symbol of the heroic Priest's character,
\ white marble tablet attached to the Cross was en-
jraved with his -sculptured profile and the words so
ippropriate to his faithful ministry :

* Greater love hath no man than this, that a man
lay down his life for his friends/

FATHER DAMIEN *

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE REVEREND
DR. HYDE OF HONOLULU

Sydney, February 25, 1890.

SIR, It may probably occur to you that we have met, and
visited, and conversed; on my side, with interest. You may
remember that you have done me several courtesies, for which
I was prepared to be grateful. But there are duties which
come before gratitude, and offences which justly divide
friends, far more acquaintances. Your letter to the Reverend
H. B. Gage is a document, which, in my sight, if you had
filled me with bread when I was starving, if you had sat up
to nurse my father when he lay a-dying, would yet absolve
me from the bonds of gratitude. You know enough, doubt-
less, of the process of canonisation to be aware that, a hun-
dred years after the death of Damien, there will appear a
man charged with the painful office of the devil* s advocate.
After that noble brother of mine, and of all frail clay, shall
have lain a century at rest, one shall accuse, one defend him.
The circumstance is unusual that the devil's advocate should
be a volunteer, should be a member of a sect immediately
rival, and should make haste to take upon himself his ugly
office ere the bones are cold; unusual, and of a taste which
I shall leave my readers free to qualify; unusual, and to me
inspiring. If I have at all learned the trade of using words
to convey truth and to arouse emotion, you have at last fur-
nished me with a subject. For it is in the interest of all
mankind and the cause of public decency in every quarter of

1 From "Lay Morals and Other Papers," by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Copyright 1898, 1911, by Charles Scribner's Sons.

189

190 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

the world, not only that Damien should be righted, but that
you and your letter should be displayed at length, in their true
colours, to the public eye.

To do this properly, I must begin by quoting you at large:
I shall then proceed to criticise your utterance from several
points of view, divine and human, in the course of which I
shall attempt to draw again and with more specification the
character of the dead saint whom it has pleased you to vilify:
so much being done, I shall say farewell to you for ever.

"Honolulu, August 2, 1889.
"REV. H. B. GAGE.

"Dear Brother, In answer to your inquiries about Father
Damien, I can only reply that we who knew the man are
surprised at the extravagant newspaper laudations, as if he
was a most saintly philanthropist. The simple truth is, he
was a coarse, dirty man, headstrong and bigoted. He was not
sent to Molokai, but went there without orders; did not stay
at the leper settlement (before he became one himself), but
circulated freely over the whole island (less than half the
island is devoted to the lepers), and he came often to Hono-
lulu. He had no hand in the reforms and improvements inaug-
urated, which were the work of our Board of Health, as
occasion required and means were provided. He was not a
pure man in his relations with women, and the leprosy of
which he died should be attributed to his vices and careless-
ness. Others have done much for the lepers, our own min-
isters, the government physicians, and so forth, but never
with the Catholic idea of meriting eternal life. Yours, etc.,

"C. M. HYDE." x

To deal fitly with a letter so extraordinary, I must draw
at the outset on my private knowledge of the signatory and
his sect. It may offend others; scarcely you, who have been
so busy to collect, so bold to publish, gossip on your rivals*
And this is perhaps the moment when I may best explain to
you the character of what you are to read: I conceive you as

1 From the Sydney Presbyterian, October 26, 1889.

A LETTER TO THE REV. DR. HYDE

a man quite beyond and below the reticences of civility: with
what measure you mete, with that shall it be measured you
again; with you, at last, I rejoice to feel the button off the
foil and to plunge home. And if in aught that I shall say I
should offend others, your colleagues, whom I respect and
remember with affection, I can but offer them my regret; I
am not free, I am inspired by the consideration of interests
far more large; and such pain as can be inflicted by any-
thing from me must be indeed trifling when compared with
the pain with which they read your letter. It is not the hang-
man, but the criminal, that brings dishonour on the house.
You belong, sir, to a sect I believe my sect, and that in
which my ancestors laboured which has enjoyed, and partly
failed to utilise, an exceptional advantage in the islands of
Hawaii. The first missionaries came; they found the land
already self -purged of its old and bloody faith; they were
embraced, almost on their arrival, with enthusiasm; what
troubles they supported came far more from whites than
from Hawaiians; and to these last they stood (in a rough
figure) in the shoes of God. This is riot the place to enter
into the degree or causes of their failure, such as it is. One
element alone is pertinent, and must here be plainly dealt with.
In the course of their evangelical calling, they or too many
of them grew rich. It may be news to you that the houses
of missionaries are a cause of mocking on the streets of Hono-
lulu. It will at least be news to you, that when I returned
your civil visit, the driver of my cab commented on the size,
the taste, and the comfort of your home. It would have been
news certainly to myself, had any one told me that afternoon
that I should live to drag such matter into print. But you
see, sir, how you degrade better men to your own level; and
it is needful that those who are to judge betwixt you and me,
betwixt Damien and the devil's advocate, should understand
your letter to have been penned in a house which could raise,
and that very justly, the envy and the comments of the
passers-by. I think (to employ a phrase of yours which I
admire) it "should be attributed" to you that you have never
visited the scene of Damien's life and death. If you hnd, and

192 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

had recalled it, and looked about your pleasant rooms, even
your pen perhaps would have been stayed.

Your sect (and remember, as far as any sect avows me,
it is mine) has not done ill in a worldly sense in the Hawaiian
Kingdom. When calamity befell their innocent parishioners,
when leprosy descended and took root in the Eight Islands, a
quid p-o quo was to be looked for. To that prosperous mis-
sion, and to you as one of its adornments, God had sent at
last an opportunity. I know I am touching here upon a nerve
acutely sensitive. I know that others of your colleagues look
back on the inertia of your Church, and the intrusive and
decisive heroism of Damien, with something almost to be
called remorse. I am sure it is so with yourself; I am per-
suaded your letter was inspired by a certain envy, not essen-
tially ignoble, and the one human trait to be espied in that
performance. You were thinking of the lost chance, the past
day; of that which should have been conceived and was not;
of the service due and not rendered. Time wa$ y said the voice
in your ear, in your pleasant room, as you sat raging and
writing; and if the words written were base beyond parallel,
the rage, I am happy to repeat it is the only compliment I
shall pay you the rage was almost virtuous. But, sir, when
we have failed, and another has succeeded; when we have
Stood by, and another has stepped in; when we sit and grow
bulky in our charming mansions, and a plain, uncouth peasant
steps into the battle, under the eyes of God, and succours the
afflicted, and consoles the dying, and is himself afflicted in
his turn, and dies upon the field of honour the battle cannot
be retrieved as your unhappy irritation has suggested. It is a
lost battle, and lost for ever. One thing remained to you in
your defeat some rags of common honour; and these you
have made haste to cast away.

Common honour; not the honour of having done anything
right, but the honour of not having done aught conspicuously
foul; the honour of the inert: that was what remained to you.
We are not all expected to be Damiens; a man may conceive
his duty more narrowly, he may love his comforts better;
and none will cast a stone at him for that. But will a gentle-

A LETTER TO THE REV. DR. HYDE 193

man of your reverend profession allow me an example from
the fields of gallantry? When two gentlemen compete for
the favour of a lady, and the one succeeds and the other is
rejected, and (as will sometimes happen) matter damaging
to the successful rival's credit reaches the ear of the defeated,
it is held by plain men of no pretensions that his mouth is, in
the circumstance, almost necessarily closed. Your Church and
Damien's were in Hawaii upon a rivalry to do well: to help,
to edify, to set divine examples. You having (in one huge
instance) failed, and Damien succeeded, I marvel it should
not have occurred to you that you were doomed to silence;
that when you had been outstripped in that high rivalry, and
sat inglorious in the midst of your well-being, in your pleasant
room arid Damien, crowned with glories and horrors, toiled
and rotted in that pigstye of his under the cliffs of Kalawao
you, the elect who would not, were the last man on earth
to collect and propagate gossip on the volunteer who would
and did.

I think I see you for I try to see you in the flesh as I
write these sentences I think I see you leap at the word
pigstye, a hyperbolical expression at the best. "He had no
hand in the reforms," he was "a coarse, dirty man"; these
were your own words; and you may think it possible that I
am come to support you with fresh evidence. In a sense, it is
even so. Damien has been too much depicted with a conven-
tional halo and conventional features; so drawn by men who
perhaps had not the eye to remark or the pen to express the
individual ; or who perhaps were only blinded and silenced by
generous admiration, such as I partly envy for myself such
as you, if your soul were enlightened, would envy on your
bended knees* It is the least defect of such a method of por-
traiture that it makes the path easy for the devil's advocate,
and leaves for the misuse of the slanderer a considerable field
of truth. For the truth that is suppressed by friends is the
readiest weapon of the enemy. The world, in your despite,
may perhaps owe you something, if your letter be the means
of substituting once for all a credible likeness for a wax ab-
straction. For, if that world at all remember you, on the day

194 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

when Damien of Molokai shall be named Saint, it will be in
virtue of one work: your letter to the Reverend H. B. Gage.

You may ask on what authority I speak. It was my in-
clement destiny to become acquainted, not with Damien, but
with Dr. Hyde. When I visited the lazaretto Damien was
already in his resting grave. But such information as I have,
I gathered on the spot in conversation with those who knew
him well and long: some indeed who revered his memory;
but others who had sparred and wrangled with him, who
beheld him with no halo, who perhaps regarded him with
small respect, and through whose unprepared and scarcely
partial communications the plain, human features of the man
shone on me convincingly. These gave me what knowledge
I possess; and I learnt it in that scene where it could be
most completely and sensitively understood Kalawao, which
you have never visited, about which you have never so much
as endeavoured to inform yourself: for, brief as your letter
is, you have found the means to stumble into that confes-
sion. "Less than one-half of the island," you say, "is devoted
to the lepers." Molokai "Molokai ahina" the "grey, "-lofty,
and most desolate island along all its northern side plunges
a front of precipice into a sea of unusual profundity. This
range of cliff is, from east to west, the true end and fron-
tier of the island. Only in one spot there projects into the
ocean a certain triangular and rugged down, grassy, stony,
windy, and rising in the midst into a hill with a dead crater:
the whole bearing to the cliff that overhangs it somewhat the
same relation as a bracket to a wall. With this hint you will
now be able to pick out the leper station on a map; you will
be able to judge how much of Molokai is thus cut off between
the surf and precipice, whether less than a half, or less than
a quarter, or a fifth, or a tenth or say, a twentieth; and the
next time you burst into print you will be in a position to
share with us the issue of your calculations.

I imagine you to be one of those persons who talk with
cheerfulness of that place which oxen and wain-ropes could
not drag you to behold. You, who do not even know its situa-
tion on the map, probably denounce sensational descriptions,

A LETTER TO THE REV. DR. HYDE 195

stretching your limbs the while in your pleasant parlour on
Beretania Street. When I was pulled ashore there one early
morning, there sat with me in the boat two sisters, bidding
farewell (in humble imitation of Damien) to the lights and
joys of human life. One of these wept silently; I could not
withhold myself from joining her. Had you been there, it is
my belief that nature would have triumphed even in you; and
as the boat drew but a little nearer, and you beheld the stairs
crowded with abominable deformations of our common man-
hood, and saw yourself landing in the midst of such a popu-
lation as only now and then surrounds us in the horror of a
nightmare what a haggard eye you would have rolled over
your reluctant shoulder towards the house on Beretania
Street! Had you gone on; had you found every fourth face
a blot upon the landscape; had you visited the hospital and
seen the butt-ends of human beings lying there almost unrec-
ognisable, but still breathing, still thinking, still remember-
ing; you would have understood that life in the lazaretto is
an ordeal from which the nerves of a man's spirit shrink, even
as his eye quails under the brightness of the sun; you would
have felt it was (even to-day) a pitiful place to visit and a
hell to dwell in. It is not the fear of possible infection. That
seems a little thing when compared with the pain, the pity,
and the disgust of the visitor's surroundings, and the atmos-
phere of affliction, disease, and physical disgrace in which he
breathes. I do not think I am a man more than usually timid;
but I never recall the days and nights I spent upon that island
promontory (eight days and seven nights), without heartfelt
thankfulness that I am somewhere else. I find in my diary
that I speak of my stay as a "grinding experience": I have
once jotted in the margin "Harrowing is the word"; and
when the Mokolii bore me at last towards the outer world,
I kept repeating to myself, with a new conception of their
pregnancy, those simple words of the song

" 5 Tis the most distressful country that ever yet was seen."

And observe: that which I saw and suffered from was a set-
tlement purged, bettered, beautified; the new village built,

196 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

the hospital and the Bishop-Home excellently arranged; the
sisters, the 'doctor, and the missionaries, all indefatigable in
their noble tasks. It was a different place when Damien came
there, and made his great renunciation, and slept that first
night under a tree amidst his rotting brethren: alone with
pestilence; and looking forward (with what courage, with
what pitiful sinkings of dread, God only knows) to a life-
time of dressing sores and stumps.

You will say, perhaps, I am too sensitive, that sights as
painful abound in cancer hospitals and are confronted daily
by doctors and nurses. I have long learned to admire and
envy the doctors and the nurses. But there is no cancer hos-
pital so large and populous as Kalawao and Kalaupapa; and
in such a matter every fresh case, like every inch of length
in the pipe of an organ, deepens the note of the impression;
for what daunts the onlooker is that monstrous sum of human
suffering by which he stands surrounded. Lastly, no doctor
or nurse is called upon to enter once for all the doors of that
gehenna; they do not say farewell, they need not abandon
hope, on its sad threshold; they but go for a time to their
high calling, and can look forward as they go to relief, to
recreation, and to rest. But Damien shut to with his own hand
the doors of his own sepulchre.

I shall now extract three passages from my diary at Kala-
wao.

A. "Damien is dead and already somewhat ungratefully
remembered in the field of his labours and sufferings. 'He
was a good man, but very officious/ says one. Another tells
me he had fallen (as other priests so easily do) into something
of the ways and habits of thought of a Kanaka; but he had
the wit to recognise the fact, and the good sense to laugh at"
[over] "it. A plain man it seems he was; I cannot find he
was a popular."

B. "After Ragsdale's death" [Ragsdale was a famous
Luna, or overseer, of the unruly settlement] "there followed
a brief term of office by Father Damien which served only
to publish the weakness of that noble man. He was rough
in his ways, and he had no control. Authority was relaxed;

A LETTER TO THE REV. DR. HYDE 197

Damien's life was threatened, and he was soon eager to
resign."

<?. "Of Damien I begin to have an idea. He seems to
have been a man of the peasant class, certainly of the peasant
type: shrewd; ignorant and bigoted, yet with an open mind,
and capable of receiving and digesting a reproof if it were
bluntly administered; superbly generous in the least thing as
well as in the greatest, and as ready to give his last shirt
(although not without human grumbling) as he had been to
sacrifice his life; essentially indiscreet and officious, which
made him a troublesome colleague; domineering in all his
ways, which made him incurably unpopular with the Kanakas,
but yet destitute of real authority, so that his boys laughed
at him and he must carry out his wishes by the means of
bribes. He learned to have a mania for doctoring; and set
up the Kanakas against the remedies of his regular rivals:
perhaps (if anything matter at all in the treatment of such
a disease) the worst thing that he did, and certainly the
easiest. The best and worst of the man appear very plainly
in his dealings with Mr. Chapman's money; he had originally
laid it out" [intended to lay it out] "entirely for the benefit
of Catholics, and even so not wisely, but after a long, plain
talk, he admitted his error fully and revised the list. The
sad state of the boys' home is in part the result of his lack of
control; in part, of his own slovenly ways and false ideas of
hygiene. Brother officials used to call it 'Damien's China-
town.' 'Well/ they would say, 'your Chinatown keeps grow-
ing.' And he would laugh with perfect good-nature, and
adhere to his errors with perfect obstinacy. So much I have
gathered of truth about this plain, noble human brother and
father of ours; his imperfections are the traits of his face, by
which we know him for our fellow; his martyrdom and his
example nothing can lessen or annul ; and only a person here
on the spot can properly appreciate their greatness."

I have set down these private passages, as you perceive, with-
out correction; thanks to you, the public has them in their
bluntness. They are almost a list of the man's faults, for it
is rather these that I was seeking: with his virtues, with the

198 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

heroic profile of his life, I and the world were already
sufficiently acquainted. I was besides a little suspicious of
Catholic testimony; in no ill sense, but merely because
Damien's admirers and disciples were the least likely to be
critical. I know you will be more suspicious still; and the
facts set down above were one and all collected from the
lips of Protestants who had opposed the father in his life.
Yet I am strangely deceived, or they build up the image of
a man, with all his weaknesses, essentially heroic, and alive
with rugged honesty, generosity and mirth.

Take it for what it is, rough private jottings of the worst
sides of Damien's character, collected from the lips of those
who had laboured with and (in your own phrase) "knew
the man"; though I question whether Damien would have
said that he knew you. Take it, and observe with wonder
how well you were served by your gossips, how ill by your
intelligence and sympathy; in how many points of fact we are
at one, and how widely our appreciations vary. There is some-
thing wrong here; either with you or me. It is possible, for
instance, that you, who seem to have so many ears in Kalawao,
had heard of the affair of Mr. Chapman's money, and were
singly struck by Damieri's intended wrong-doing. I was struck
with that also, and set it fairly down; but I was struck much
more by the fact that he had the honesty of mind to be con-
vinced. I may here tell you that it was a long business; that
one of his colleagues sat with him late into the night, multi-
plying arguments and accusations; that the father listened as
usual with "perfect good-nature and perfect obstinacy"; but
at the last, when he was persuaded "Yes," said he, "I am
very much obliged to you; you have done me a service; it
would have been a theft." There are many (not Catholics
merely) who require their heroes and saints to be infallible;
to these the story will be painful; not to the true lovers,
patrons, and servants of mankind.

And I take it, this is a type of our division; that you are
one of those who have an eye for faults and failures; that you
take a pleasure to find and publish them; and that, having
found them, you make haste to forget the overvailing virtues

A LETTER TO THE REV. DR. HYDE 199

and the real success which had alone introduced them to your
knowledge. It is a dangerous frame of mind. That you may
understand how dangerous, and into what a situation it has
already brought you, we will (if you please) go hand-in-hand
through the different phrases of your letter, and candidly
examine each from the point of view of its truth, its apposite-
ness, and its charity.

Damien was coarse.

It is very possible. You make us sorry for the lepers who
had only a coarse old peasant for their friend and father.
But you, who were so refined, why were you not there, to
cheer them with the lights of culture? Or may I remind you
that we have some reason to doubt if John the Baptist were
genteel ; and in the case of Peter, on whose career you doubt-
less dwell approvingly in the pulpit, no doubt at all he was a
"coarse, headstrong" fisherman! Yet even in our Protestant
Bibles Peter is called Saint.

Damien was dirty.

He was. Think of the poor lepers annoyed with this dirty
comrade! But the clean Dr. Hyde was at his food in a fine
house.

Damien was headstrong.

I believe you are right again; and I thank God for his
strong head and heart.

Damien was bigoted.

I am not fond of bigots myself, because they are not fond
of me. But what is meant by bigotry, that we should regard
it as a blemish in a priest? Damien believed his own religion
with the simplicity of a peasant or a child; as I would I could
suppose that you do. For this, I wonder at him some way
oft; and had that been his only character, should have avoided
him in life. But the point of interest in Damien, which has
caused him to be so much talked about and made him at last
the subject of your pen and mine, was that, in him, his bigotry,
his intense and narrow faith, wrought potently for good, and

2OO DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

strengthened him to be one of the world's heroes and exem-
plars.

Damien was not sent to Molokai y but went there without
orders.

Is this a misreading? or do you really mean the words for
blame? I have heard Christ, in the pulpits of our Church,
held up for imitation on the ground that His sacrifice was
voluntary. Does Dr. Hyde think otherwise?

Damien did not stay at the settlement, etc.

It is true he was allowed many indulgences. Am I to
understand that you blame the father for profiting by these,
or the officers for granting them? In either case, it is a mighty
Spartan standard to issue from the house on Beretania Street;
and I am convinced you will find yourself with few sup-
porters.

Damien had no hand in the reforms^ etc.

I think even you will admit that I have already been frank
in my description of the man I am defending; but before I
take you up upon this head, I will be franker still, and tell
you that perhaps nowhere in the world can a man taste a
more pleasurable sense of contrast than when he passes from
Damien's "Chinatown" at Kalawao to the beautiful Bishop-
Home at Kalaupapa. At this point, in my desire to make all
fair for you, I will break my rule and adduce Catholic testi-
mony. Here is a passage from my diary about my visit to
the Chinatown, from which you will see how it is (even
now) regarded by its own officials: "We went round all the
dormitories, refectories, etc. dark and dingy enough, with a
superficial cleanliness, which he" [Mr. Dutton, the lay
brother] "did not seek to defend. 'It is almost decent/ said
he; 'the sisters will make that all right when we get them
here.' " And yet I gathered it was already better since
Damien was dead, and far Better than when he was there
alone and had his own (not always excellent) way. I have
now come far enough to meet you on a common ground of
fact; and I tell you that, to a mind not prejudiced by jealousy,

A LETTER TO THE REV. DR. HYDE 2OI

all the reforms of the lazaretto, and even those which he
most vigorously opposed, are properly the work of Damien.
They are the evidence of his success; they are what his hero-
ism provoked from the reluctant and the careless. Many
were before him in the field; Mr. Meyer, for instance, of
whose faithful work we hear too little: there have been many
since; and some had more worldly wisdom, though none had
more devotion, than our saint. Before his day, even you will
confess, they had effected little. It was his part, by one strik-
ing act of martyrdom, to direct all men's eyes on that dis-
tressful country. At a blow, and with the price of his life, he
made the place illustrious and public. And that, if you will
consider largely, was the one reform needful; pregnant of
all that should succeed. It brought money; it brought (best
individual addition of them all) the sisters; it brought super-
vision, for public opinion and public interest landed with the
man at Kalawao. If ever any man brought reforms, and
died to bring them, it was he. There is not a clean cup or
towel in the Bishop-Home, but dirty Damien washed it.

Damien was not a fare man in his relations with women,
etc.

How do you know that? Is this the nature of the conver-
sation in that house on Beretania Street which the cabman
envied, driving past? racy details of the misconduct of the
poor peasant priest, toiling under the cliffs of Molokai?

Many have visited the station before me; they seem not
to have heard the rumour. When I was there I heard many
shocking tales, for my informants were men speaking with
the plainness of the laity; and I heard plenty of complaints
of Damien. Why was this never mentioned? and how came
it to you in the retirement of your clerical parlour?

But I must not even seem to deceive you. This scandal,
when I read it in your letter, was not new to me. I had
heard it once before; and I must tell you how. There $ame
to Samoa a man from Honolulu; he, in a public-house on the
beach, volunteered the statement that Damien had "contracted
the disease from having connection with the female lepers";

202 DAMIEN OF MOLOKAI

and I find a joy in telling you how the report was welcomed
in a public-house. A man sprang to his feet; I am not at
liberty to give his name, but from what I heard I doubt if
you would care to have him to dinner in Beretania Street.

"You miserable little " (here is a word I dare not print,

it would so shock your ears). "You miserable little ,"

he cried, "if the story were a thousand times true, can't you

see you are a million times a lower for daring to repeat

it?" I wish it could be told of you that when the report
reached you in your house, perhaps after family worship, you
had found in your soul enough holy anger to receive it with
the same expressions: ay, even with that one which I dare not
print ; it would not need to have been blotted away, like
Uncle Toby's oath, by the tears of the recording angel; it
would have been counted to you for your brightest righteous-
ness. But you have deliberately chosen the part of the man
from Honolulu, and 'you have played it with improvements
of your own. The man from Honolulu miserable, leering
creature communicated the tale to a rude knot of beach-
combing drinkers in a public-house, where (I will so far
agree with your temperance opinions) man is not always at
his noblest; and the man from Honolulu had himself been
drinking drinking, we may charitably fancy, to excess. It
was to your "Dear Brother, the Reverend H. B. Gage," that
you chose to communicate the sickening story; and the blue
ribbon which adorns your portly bosom forbids me to allow
you the extenuating plea that you were drunk when it was
done. Your "dear brother" a brother indeed made haste
to deliver up your letter (as a means of grace, perhaps) to
the religious papers; where, after many months, I found and
read and wondered at it; and whence I have now reproduced
it for the wonder of others. And you and your dear brother
have, by this cycle of operations, built up a contrast very
edifying to examine in detail. The man whom you would
not care to have to dinner, on the one side ; on the other, the
Reverend Dr. Hyde and the Reverend H. B. Gage: the Apia
bar-room, the Honolulu manse.

But I fear you scarce appreciate how you appear to your

A LETTER TO THE REV. DR. HYDE 203

fellow-men; and to bring it home to you, I will suppose your
story to be true. I will suppose and God forgive me for
supposing it that Damien faltered and stumbled in his nar-
row path of duty; I will suppose that, in the horror of his
isolation, perhaps in the fever of incipient disease, he, who was
doing so much more than he had sworn, failed in the letter
of his priestly oath he, who was so much a better man than
either you or me, who did what we have never dreamed of
daring he too tasted of our common frailty. "0, lago, the
pity of it!" The least tender should be moved to tears; the
most incredulous to prayer. And all that you could do was
to pen your letter to the Reverend H. B. Gage!

Is it growing at all clear to you what a picture you have

drawn of your own heart? I will try yet once again to make

it clearer. You had a father: suppose this tale were about him,

and some informant brought it to you, proof in hand: I am

not making too high an estimate of your emotional nature

when I suppose you would regret the circumstance? that you

would feel the tale of frailty the more keenly since it shamed

the author of your days? and that the last thing you would

do would be to publish it in the religious press? Well, the man

who tried to do what Damien did, is my father, and the father

of the man in the Apia bar, and the father

of all who love goodness; and he was

your father too, if God had

given you grace to see it*