She remembered an old cottage in the shadow of the forest-covered mountains.  She remembered one who died there suddenly, and without remedy,—­her father, unabsolved and unanointed, dying in fear and torment, in a moment when none anticipated death.  She remembered a strong-hearted woman who seemed to die with him,—­who died to all the interests of this life, and was buried by her husband ere a twelvemonth had passed,—­her mother, who was buried by her father’s side.

Burdened with a solemn care they left their child.  The priest of Domremy, and none beside him, knew the weight of this burden.  How had he helped her bear it? since it is the business of the shepherd to look after the younglings of the flock.  Her hard earnings paid him for the prayers he offered for the deliverance of her father from his purgatorial woes.  Burdened with a dire debt of filial love, the priest had let her depart from Domremy; his influence followed her as an oppression and a care,—­a degradation also.

Her life of labor was a slavish life.  All she did, and all she left undone, she looked at with sad-hearted reference to the great object of her life.  Far away she put all allurement to tempting, youthful joy.  What had she to do with merriment and jollity, while a sin remained unexpiated, or a moment of her father’s suffering and sorrow could be anticipated?

How, probably, would these new doctrines, held fast by some through persecution and danger, these doctrines which brought liberty to light, be received by one so fast a prisoner of Hope as she?  She had pledged herself, with solemn vows had promised, to complete the work her mother left unfinished when she died.

Some of the laborers in the field, Elsie among them, had hoped, they said, that the wool-comber would retract from his dangerous position.  Recalling their words, Jacqueline asked herself would she choose to have him retract?  She reminded herself of the only martyr whose memory she loved, the glorious girl from Domremy, and a lofty and stern spirit seemed to rouse within her as she answered that question.  She believed that John had found and taught the truth; and was Truth to be sacrificed to Power that hated it?  Not by a suicidal act, at least.

She took the tracts, so judging, from underneath the stone, wistfully looked them over, and, as she did so, recalled these words:  “You cannot buy your pardon of a priest; he has no power to sell it; he cannot even give it.  Ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally, upbraiding not.  ’If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Heavenly Father give his Holy Spirit to them that ask him!’”

She could never forget these words.  She could never forget the preacher’s look when he used them; nor the solemnity of the assenting faith, as attested by the countenances of those around her in that “upper room.”

But her father!  What would this faith do for the departed?