 | Saratoga in 1901 |  |
ELI CONFESSES HIS SINS.
I have joined the Ritualists. I belong to Dr. Ewer. We have
seceded from the 5th Avenue church, and now we've got a little
Catholic-Protestant church on 7th Avenue. Bishop Potter is
with us on the sly, and we are going to take our whole congregation
straight over to Rome.
O, what a time we did have in our little 7th Avenue church
last Sunday—the candles we lighted, the way we all confessed
our sins, and the way we abused the old church on 5th Avenue.
We haven't got much money nor much religion, but we have
got more pluck than you can imagine. We are bound to do just
what we have a mind to whether we want to or not.
Gracious! how it would have bothered those poky people over
on Fifth Avenue if they had seen the lights we put up. We
darkened the windows, blinded every ray of God's miserable
sunlight, and burned two magnificent tallow candles and forty-four
gas jets.
On the altar we had a
blazing cross, four feet long,
made of seventy-five blazing
streams of gas. It was
glorious. It was hot and
uncomfortable, to be sure,
and made Dr. Ewer's face
red; but it was grand—
yes, sublime—except when
some blundering Christian
opened the door and let in
the miserable sunlight.
We are going to build a
church with no windows
and a double door, so that
God's miserable sunlight
use of sunlight when it is pretty light enough in the day time
without it?
“What did we do?”
It is easier to tell what we didn't do.
Why, in the early morning, at 8:30 A.M.—think of it, lazy
Fifth Avenue Low Churchmen—we all got up and went to mass
and confessional. The ladies had more talking than confessing
to do, and I began to think that Dr. Ewer was holding a reception.
We would confess a little, then we would abuse the old
church on Fifth Avenue. One lady confessed that Miss—
was fixed out by the committee to dance with the Grand Duke,
but that she got hold of Catacazy, who introduced her to Alexis,
and she stole a dance. She said she was sorry, but she did want
to dance with the Grand Duke so much. Dr. Ewer said that
was very bad, and that if Miss — hadn't been a Low Church
lady, he would never have forgiven it.
“What will you confess this morning, Mr. Perkins?” asked
the Doctor, turning to me.
“Well, your Worshipful,” I said, “I confess that I went to the
Navy Yard ball, that a miserable Low Churchman stole my
overcoat and hat, and that when my driver got drunk, and I was
compelled to get up on the box and drive home in the wind bareheaded,
and in my swallow-tail coat, that I forgot myself and
swore like the devil.”
“And you are sorry for it now, Mr. Perkins?”
“Yes, I'm sorry that I swore; but when I think of my lost
hat and overcoat, I think if I had the Low Church scoundrel
who stole them I'd cut his da—darned ears off!”
| Saratoga in 1901 | |