services, slowly down the aisle, the close-packed rows of
worshippers parting to right and left to let him through, all looking
up eagerly for his blessing, women giving him offerings of fruit or
flowers, and holding up their babies that he might lay his hands on
their heads. No one but Father Salvierderra had ever officiated in
the Moreno chapel, or heard the confession of a Moreno. He was a
Franciscan, one of the few now left in the country; so revered and
beloved by all who had come under his influence, that they would
wait long months without the offices of the Church, rather than
confess their sins or confide their perplexities to any one else.
From this deep-seated attachment on the part of the Indians and
the older Mexican families in the country to the Franciscan Order,
there had grown up, not unnaturally, some jealousy of them in the
minds of the later-come secular priests, and the position of the few
monks left was not wholly a pleasant one. It had even been
rumored that they were to be forbidden to continue longer their
practice of going up and down the country, ministering
everywhere; were to be compelled to restrict their labors to their
own colleges at Santa Barbara and Santa Inez. When something to
this effect was one day said in the Senora Moreno's presence, two
scarlet spots sprang on her cheeks, and before she bethought
herself, she exclaimed, "That day, I burn down my chapel!"

Luckily, nobody but Felipe heard the rash threat, and his
exclamation of unbounded astonishment recalled the Senora to
herself.

"I spoke rashly, my son," she said. "The Church is to be obeyed
always; but the Franciscan Fathers are responsible to no one but
the Superior of their own order; and there is no one in this land