own for it that he never confided to anyone save his nearest crony.
They were all here now to witness the resurrection of Alta--the
poorest parish in a not too rich Diocese, hopeless three years ago,
but now--well, there it is across the lot, that symphony in stone,
every line of its chaste gothic a "Te Deum" that even an agnostic
could understand and appreciate; every bit of carving the paragraph of
a sermon that passers-by, perforce, must hear. To-day it is to be
consecrated, the cap-stone is to be set on Father Broidy's Arch of
Triumph and the real life of Alta parish to begin.

"I thought you had but sixteen families here," said the Bishop as he
watched the crowd stream into the church.

"There were but eighteen, Bishop," the young priest answered, with a
happy smile that had considerable self-satisfaction in it. "There are
seventy-five now."

"And how did it come about, my lad?" questioned the Bishop.

"Mostly through my mission bringing back some of the 'ought-to-be's,'
but I suppose principally because my friend McDermott opened his
factory to Catholics. You know, Bishop, that though he was born one of
us he had somehow acquired a bitter hatred of the Church, and he never
employed Catholics until I brought him around."

There was a shadow of a smile that had meaning to it on the Bishop's
face, as he patted the ardent young pastor on the arm, and said:

"Well, God bless him! God bless him! but I suppose we must begin to
vest now. Is it not near ten o'clock?"