a lot of foreign publicans and sinners--no?" she suggested.

"Oh, of course, we're insular and we're Pharisaical," admitted
Peter.

"And as for one's indifference," she smiled, "that is most
probably due to one's youth and inexperience. One can't come
to close quarters with the realities of life--with sorrow, with
great joy, with temptation, with sin or with heroic virtue,
with death, with the birth of a new soul, with any of the
awful, wonderful realities of life--and continue to be an
indifferentist in matters of religion, do you think?"

"When one comes to close quarters with the awful, wonderful
realities of life, one has religious moments," he acknowledged.
"But they're generally rather fugitive, are n't they?"

"One can cultivate them--one can encourage them," she said.
"If you would care to know a good Catholic," she added, "my
niece, my little ward, Emilia is one. She wants to become a
Sister of Mercy, to spend her life nursing the poor."

"Oh? Would n't that be rather a pity?" Peter said. "She's so
extremely pretty. I don't know when I have seen prettier brown
eyes than hers."

"Well, in a few years, I expect we shall see those pretty brown
eyes looking out from under a sister's coif. No, I don't think
it will be a pity. Nuns and sisters, I think, are the happiest
people in the world--and priests. Have you ever met any one