The Pied Brothers' Pensioner

...Sacraments, he was allowed to slip back and enjoy Toward the end of his days he was more than a his half-wittedness to the end...

...tician...

...and could "Father Caffyn would never have fetched me grapes, he have thought it out, he would have been quite of eh, Father...

...and he was not much more scrupulous as to how But when he had done this, and received the Last he obtained it...

...College entrance examinations have been of class...

...To begin with, he was highly popular This, at any rate, was how it worked with the only at the Priory...

...Vigne of Cope in the County of Wessex, but a few unchastened spirits loved John Theodore the pensioner of the Pied Brothers...

...In thus establishing their half-witted nephew sional lunatic among hard-bitten professionals...

...stage was looked forward to and prepared for by A thousand sources of interest newly opened up or the authors read...

...The million who After the composition stage of art comes the criti- study Latin are bound to profit in interest, in art, in cal stage of appraisal...

...teenth century had its way, should be the power of The last stage in the study of the classics, which thinking and of expressing thought...

...As for madmen Beauce, the De la Vignes certainly thought they were with no or reluctant families, why not attach them to doing their best for themselves, religion, and the object religious communities as jesters were attached to royal of their solicitude...

...While to the boys Father Caffyn...

...with the place began...

...And the a fit concomitant to the bliss of heaven...

...Literature is the creabe were correlated with the native tongue in the tion of man, and its beauty, if revealed and practised, fist models of verse and prose literature, producing will educate our Latinists and hold them fascinated...

...Whatever be the teacher's dent be awakened from the passivity of listener and belief about the objectives in teaching Latin, he can be made to furnish meaning rather than words, to find free scope to realize his faith in the fine suggestranslate with imagination rather than vocal memory...

...last speech of the pensioner of the Pied Brothers...

...Father Caffyn would never have brought Saint Thomas's opinion that the presence of friends is me milk 1" he babbled over and over again...

...He was so cats, and idiots-the three chief objectives of his radiantly happy in either case...

...Moreover, being an expert at ritual himself, enthusiast for either...

...the same unholy satisfaction...

...Sometimes he strayed off to his conspicuous heedlessness...

...The retrospective trifle blind...

...In the nature of things scorn-used to flee at the sound of his voice like rooks he was more often alone, for a monastery school is at the crack of a rifle...

...the first step with his foot, his half-sightless eyes raised "Father Caffyn would never have brought Him to appealingly to heaven...

...he said with serene exultation, as outsider, with or without an indignant glance at the the bell which had escorted the Blessed Sacrament to callous scholars (who never failed to enjoy the little his bedside died away down the corridor...

...and standing amazed every spring shorn of half its malice, and accuse his enemy of subbefore the wintergreens in the kitchen garden, when stituting "Beatus vir" for "Memores estate" on the the April rains suddenly shot them up into tropical Feast of Saint Silverius-or some such piece of inyellow flowers...

...and yet another signal frustrawould hang behind the rest and fumble dismally for tion of the malice of his ancient foe...

...And the imbecile, unlike I first knew him and sixty-six when he died, and I the average religious, could lap himself round with never heard that he had a day's unhappiness...

...Under- or critics, but historians, grammarians, archaeologists, standing of English words, derivations, spelling, tech- philologists, and other scientists are produced or at nical terms of science, Latin quotations, ability to read least lavishly catered to in learned lectures...

...for his own sake...

...I never knew the precise ins and outs of the Priory school-for Cope was the house of of the feud myself, because the good Father had been studies for the province-he provided a not only good- happily transferred from Cope before my acquaintance tempered but positively appreciative butt for jests...

...more purposeful than his usual erratic change of The last two John, Theodore punctually regarded, course, whenever Father Caffyn appeared in the always turning up at Mass and meat before any other avenue...

...stopping out, as late as he dared, in the interpolation out of the Litany...

...To ensure unity and to make The primary purpose of Latin literature, if the six- artists, one teacher should be responsible...

...Greek was correlated with Latin, and later again through his enthusiasm...

...They help to make literary com- gation to prevent the realization of the sixteenth-cenposers...

...He will already completed furnished examples in every kind not dwarf the human and personal attractiveness of of poetry: narrative, descriptive, epic, lyric, dramatic...

...But if there was a high feast extorted from the soft-hearted prior by the piteouskept and strangers were present, John Theodore ness of John Theodore...

...Helpful and sec- will be only for few, is the scientific stage, where ondary will be grammatical drill, whose general prin- facts become predominant...

...THE PIED BROTHERS' PENSIONER By HELEN PARRY EDEN I F EVER I become a trifle eccentric, I shall take at the age of sixteen by his highly respectable (some it very ill of my friends and relatives if they shut say inconspicuously noble) French relatives to the n up with- anyone more demented than them- guardianship of the Pied Brothers : and in particular selves...

...but not so blind but that he could find his marvel of his Communion (which he had never been way down the sanctuary steps with the rest of the encouraged to make before save on high feasts and school when it filed into church from the sacristy door holidays) became yet another triumph of compassion for Mass or meditation...

...1926 THE COMMONWEAL 99 ture, and then the mind made capable of expression by the coordination of three languages perfect mastery by literary creation is ready for university work...

...but they say he used to tack, with something tions, of never-ending class-bells and refectory-bells...

...drama as far as its sacred setting permitted) would They will tell you if you ever go to Cope-the prior hasten up the shallow flight of marble inside the altar with a smile and the community with a sigh-that this rails and lead John Theodore, radiant as a prima monstrous and entirely unfounded accusation was the donna,'safely down the steps and into his place...

...The precepts of beauty in style and made instantly available are now beside the Latin of force in style had each a year in which the course teacher to put life and novelty into his class...

...until, ten to one, some humane me, eh, Father...

...But there was a rumor that he It would be hard to say which John Theodore loved had a very cutting way with him, and that women, best, to be noticed or to be left alone...

...Devout stray smiles that crossed his quiet face as he lay speechstrangers he particularly affected on account of the less for hours on his bed, were probably referable to extra measure of compassion they bestowed on him...

...prayers in the little church alongside the avenue...

...literature to any specialty, but aided by the philologist's and in all types of prose : letters, narration, descrip- acute analysis and by the historian's careful sifting and tiony essay, history, speeches...

...es- When John Theodore came to die-which he did, pecially if a strain of music from the choir put him as I said, at the age of sixty-six-the memory of in mind of the claims of heaven...

...tions of the Classical Investigation...

...and cousin in virtuous and dignified surroundings, at Mild madmen are better with their families and a sufficient distance from the hereditary estate in La their families are better with them...

...The principles of criti- by the spade of the archaeologist, the classical teacher cism for prose and poetry and for oratory were ex- can make bright and beautiful that past which lives pounded...

...The prior could not hear John Theodore ushering himself with indistin- bring him in a glass of milk or a bunch of grapes withguishable murmurs of devotion into his humble place out the invalid pluming himself between every sip and at the end of the nave...

...John Theodore drank in life at its fullest...

...This would be an ex- John Theodore came to Cope in the wake of an celltmt plan all around...

...I never saw it...

...they give variety and interest to the dull drill tury ideals...

...berry on the anguish it would have caused his old Yet I think it was with his fellow Christians that traducer to see him so pampered...

...of the art of expression...

...households, in the middle-ages...

...He was sixty when now exercise on each other...

...The community could con- old French prior, and in charge of a young English centrate on one official imbecile the forbearance they lay brother, at the age of sixteen...

...And many a Pied Father Caffyn whom he had not set eyes on for at Brother has paused at the organ, with the stops out least eight years, was the staple amusement of his and his hands hovering hawk-like over a chord, to painless and leisurely decline...

...It has always seemed to me both extravagant to the prior, for the time being, of the Priory of and unkind to put a more or less amateur and occa- Cope...

...foreign languages, these are subordinate objectives on There is, however, nothing in the Classical Investithe language side...

...But the boys' long study hours he lay in wait for little slips whenever the good Father he spent all alone out-of-doors the whole year round: said Mass or gave Benediction...

...He would hasten to mild winter dusk to listen to the distilled rime dripping the prior of the day, with a zest so undisguised as to be through the elms...

...John Theodore never exactly (or should be) a place of fixed hours and settled func- fled...

...In this stage not writers cipless apply to English and to all languages...

...A liberal and flexible scheme many other like qualities will be developed if the stu- of authors is proposed...

...For the compassion of the devout was to John Theo- On the day he died he asked pardon of all he had dore what the confidence of the vulgar is to a poli- ever offended with extraordinary meekness and dignity...

...His status with the Fathers in general lunatic I. ever met in such circumstances-John Theo- I have already defined in my allocution on forbearance, dore de la...

...To the lay brothers he was acceptJohn Theodore, you must understand, was consigned able because the care of his little room and some slight 100 THE COMMONWEAL June 2, 1926 assistance with the inaccessible buttons of his toilet There was only one person in the world with whom were a change from scrubbing the refectory flags and John Theodore was not on good terms, and that was polishing the church candlesticks...

...The general habits of mind: attention, modified and will be more modified to meet the recomorder, accuracy, imaginative realization, these and mendation of the report...

...Certainly forbearance as with a garment and hug the warmth...

...In the sixteenth century this science, in culture from this remarkable document...

...And who so happy as dozing under the acacia on the lawn in the summer...

...John Theodore when he caught the unfortunate priest drifting down the avenue with the dead leaves in the reading the wrong Epistle or leaving some recent papal autumn...