"When de Cure lay him down, after he make de Sign upon him, he kiss his
face and say: 'Mathurin, now you are a priest unto God.'"

That was Angele Rouvier's story of Mathurin, the Master of the School,
for whom the women and the children pray in the parish of Pontiac, though
the school has been dismissed these hundred years and more.






THE STORY OF THE LIME-BURNER

For a man in whose life there had been tragedy he was cheerful. He had a
habit of humming vague notes in the silence of conversation, as if to put
you at your ease. His body and face were lean and arid, his eyes oblique
and small, his hair straight and dry and straw-coloured; and it flew out
crackling with electricity, to meet his cap as he put it on. He lived
alone in a little but near his lime-kiln by the river, with no near
neighbours, and few companions save his four dogs; and these he fed
sometimes at expense of his own stomach. He had just enough crude poetry
in his nature to enjoy his surroundings. For he was well placed. Behind
the lime-kiln rose knoll on knoll, and beyond these the verdant hills,
all converging to Dalgrothe Mountain. In front of it was the river, with
its banks dropping forty feet, and below, the rapids, always troubled and
sportive. On the farther side of the river lay peaceful areas of meadow
and corn land, and low-roofed, hovering farm-houses, with one larger than
the rest, having a wind-mill and a flag-staff. This building was almost
large enough for a manor, and indeed it was said that it had been built