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On receiving this letter the Superioress conferred not with flesh and blood, but sent for Mrs. Ginx. That worthy woman was not

enchanted with her child's position. I have hinted that her faith was simple, but in proportion to its simplicity it was strongly-rooted in her nature. 'Tis not infrequent to find it so. Lengthy creeds and confessions of faith are apt to extend the strength and fervor of belief over too wide a surface. In the close frame of some single article will be concentrated the whole energy of the soul. The first formula, "Repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ,'' was maintained with a heat that became less intense, though more distributed, in the insertion of an Athanasian creed. Mrs. Ginx's creed was succinct.

MRS. GINX'S PRIMARY CREED.

• I believe in God, giver of bread, meat, money, and health.

This she maintained, with indifferent ritual

and devotional observances. But there was to Mrs. Ginx's faith a corollary or secondary creed, only needed to meet special emergencies.

MRS. GINX'S SECONDARY CREED.

• 1. I believe in the Church of England.
• 2. I believe in Heaven and Hell.
• 3. (A negative article) I hate Popery, priests, and the Devil.

When her husband made his fatal gift to the nun, this third article of his wife's belief, or unbelief, stirred up and waxed aggressive.

Said the Lady Superior, "My good woman, your child thrives under the care of Holy Mother Church.''

"Yes'm, he thrives well,'' replies Mrs. Ginx, repeating no more of Sister Suspiciosa's sentence,

"an' I've 'ad more milk than ever for the darlin' this time, thank God.''

"And the Holy Virgin.''

"I dunno about her,'' cries Mrs. Ginx emphatically, perhaps not seeing congruity between a virgin and the subject of thankfulness.

"And the Holy Virgin,'' repeated the nun, "who interests herself in all mothers. She has thus blessed you that your child may be made strong for the work of the Church. Do you not see a miracle is worked within you to prove Her goodness? This, no doubt, is an evidence to you of Her wish to bless you and take you for Her own. I beseech you listen to Her voice, and come and enter Her fold.''

"If you mean the Virgin Mary, mum, I ain't a idolater, beggin' yer parding,'' says Mrs. Ginx; "an' tho' I wouldn't for the world

offend them as has been so kind to my child, an' saved it from that deer little creetur bein' thrown over Wauxhall Bridge—an' Ginx ought to be ashamed of hisself, so he ought— I ain't Papish, mum, and I ain't dispoged, with twelve on 'em there at home all Protestant to the back bone, to turn Papish now, an' so I 'ope an' pray, mum,'' says Mrs. Ginx, roaring and crying, "you ain't agoin' to make Papish of my flesh an' blood. O dear! O dear!''

The Lady Superior shut her ears; she had raised a familiar spirit and could not lay it. She temporized.

"You know your husband has given the child to us. It will be called the infant Ambrosius.''

"Dear, dear!'' sighed Mrs. Ginx, "what a name! ''

"We wish him to be kept from any worldly taint, and by-and-by his saintliness may gain you forgiveness in spite of your heretical perversity. I cannot permit you to give him unconsecrated milk, and as we wish to treat you kindly, the holy Father Certificatus has allowed me to make an arrangement with you, to which you can have no objection—I mean, that you should let me make the sign of the cross upon your breasts morning and evening before you suckle your infant. You will permit me to do that, won't you?''

Conceive of Mrs. Ginx's reply, clothed in choice Westminster English: it asserted her readiness to cut off her right hand, her feet, to be hanged, drowned, burned, torn to pieces, in fact to withstand all the torments ascribed by vulgar tradition to Roman Catholic ingenuity, and to see her baby "a dead corpse''

into the bargain, before she would submit her Protestant bosom to such an indignity.

"No, mum!'' she said; "I couldn't sleep with that on my breast;'' and cried hysterically.

This lower class heretic was "brutally refractory.'' So thought the Superioress, and so gave Mrs. Ginx notice to come no more. She went home rather jubilant—she was a martyr.