slave, just a bit unreasonable--a veritable housedog who in the zeal of
guardianship barks more than is necessary at the stranger who passes. She
was like the negress in the Arab houses to-day, who is often a better
Muslem, more hostile to the Christian, than her employers. The old woman
in Monnica's family had witnessed the last persecutions; she had perhaps
visited the confessors in prison; perhaps she had seen flow the blood of
the martyrs. These exciting and terrible scenes would have been graven on
her memory. What inflamed stories the old servant must have told her young
mistresses, what vital lessons of constancy and heroism! Monnica listened
to them eagerly.

Because of her great faith, this simple slave was revered as a saint by
her owners, who entrusted her with the supervision of their daughters. She
proved a stern governess, who would stand no trifling with her rules. She
prevented these girls from drinking even water except at meals. Cruel
suffering for little Africans! Thagaste is not far from the country of
thirst. But the old woman said to them:

"You drink water now because you can't get at the wine. In time to come,
when you are married and have bins and cellars of your own, you'll turn up
your nose at water, and your habit of drinking will be too much for you."

Monnica came near fulfilling the prophecy of the honest woman. It was
before she was married. As she was very well-behaved and very temperate,
she used to be sent to the cellar to draw the wine from the cask. Before
pouring it into the flagon she would sip just a little. Being unaccustomed
to wine, she was not able to drink more; it was too strong for her gullet.
She did this, not because she liked the wine, but from naughtiness, to play
a trick on her parents who trusted her, and also, of course, because it was
prohibited. Each time she swallowed a little more, and so it went on till