People We Hear About

New Zealand Tablet, Volume 08, 8 October 1908, Page 28

People We Hear About

The Hon. Edward Blake, who resigned his seat for Longford on account of ill-health, has made steady recovery since his return to Canada. - , 7 An exchange is responsible for the following story :— During the summer of 1865, when the Pope was yet a simple priest at Tombolo, near Padua, the Austrian Army was manoeuvring in -the neighborhood. One day, in the course of the manoeuvres, a soldier, overcome by faintness, fell from the ranks, and was left behind in charge of a comrade. The young priest, Father Sarto— the present Pope— who was passing at the time, at once hastened to the presbytery, and returned shortly with bread and wine, and with the greatest solicitude succeeded in restoring the soldier, to whom, before" leaving, he <gave a medal which had been blessed. Boyer.(that was the . soldier's name) at the termination of his military service, returned to his native village, where to-day he^ is the proud proprietor of a small tobacco shop. Not being a -reader of the papers, ,it was not until some few months ago that he learned that the gopeVname was- Sarto, and that he was formerly- a priest at/ Tombolo. He at once addressed a letter to the . Pope reminding him of the incident .which had occurred more than forty-,,years_ ago, and renewing his thanks. Pius X.,.who remembered perfectly well the circumstances, has just sent to the old soldier, through Cardinal ..Merry del Val, his apostolic benediction and an order for 200 lire." • In a notice of Mr. John- E. Redmond, M.P., who recently attended the Convention, of the United Irish League of America' in Boston, Harper's Weekly said: 'There would be nothing unseemly in Mr. Redmond"standing to-day, with those landlords of Ireland who, he says, will - not -sell their lands, but who will be made to sell. But that John Redmond is what he is, the star of the mighty drama now unfolding itself in the House of Commons, is one proof of his " genius. . The son of AVilliam Archer Redmond, of Wexford, of a family of -blue-blooded .Norman Catholics, he was sent for his education to Clongowes Wood College, a historical Jesuit institution of Ireland. He finished in the equally exclusive and aristocratic surroundings of Trinity College, Dublin. His family connection*? 1 his friends, his associations _ofall his class should have produced a different kind of young mkn~tfian John Redmond when he stepped out to enter upon a career. At Trinity the history- of his country had proved an enthralling study. He found himself face to face" with the world at a time when Ireland was Jn the throes of a' __ struggle that needed new blood, and- when the brilliant attain- ■ ments of Charles Stewart Parnell were dazzling nations. Redmond opened his ears to the voices of the times ; his conscience was touched by what he heard, and he went to Parnell, who lived in the neighboring county of'Wicklow, and asked to be permitted to follow him. ' Cardinal Gibbons, who attended the Eucharistic Congress in London last month,, was born of" Irish parents in Baltimore on ■ July 23, 1834, ordained priest in 1 86 1, , appointed Vicar Apostolic of North Carolina in 1868, Bishop of Richmond in 1872, and Archbishop of Baltimore in 1877. He was created a Cardinal in 1886. Putnam's Monthly has an interesting sketch of his days as Vicar Apostolic, from which we learn-that when he went to .Carolina, 'the Catholic Church .was represented by a -mere handful of humanity, so few that a Catholic was looked -upon as a curiosity ; more than this, as one uncanny, to be suspected, shunned. The rites of the Church were regarded as a sort' of sorcery. In Wilmington, where -the 'only church .of this belief existed, between Charleston and far-away Petersburg, in Virginia, the feeling towards .those who worshipped in it was anything but kindly. Little' girls whose parents attended it had their aprons "torn off in the street and suffered other abuses. Catholic .children .were forced to leave the one school in the place, because the Protestant fathers and mothers threatened to - close its doors if they were not excluded.' But ? within a year .the clouds had- broken^.. _ The broadmindedness, and -especially the Americanism; of the Bishop gradually changed 'the feeling " towards Jiim and his followers. From being distrusted at first he became esteemed. -Through his influence the -spirit of "the town towards the Catholics was transformed from hostility to goodwill. -The example set, by their head was emulated by his parishioners, until finally the gap between Catholic and P/otestant was closed apparently for" ever.*