to members of the Order.  Stringent instructions had been issued from Nazareth that no bishop was to expose himself unnecessarily; each was to regard himself as the heart of his diocese to be protected at all costs save that of Christian honour, and in consequence each had surrounded himself with a group of the new Religious—­men and women—­who with extraordinary and generous obedience undertook such dangerous tasks as they were capable of performing.  It was plain enough by now that had it not been for the Order, the Church would have been little better than paralysed under these new conditions.

Extraordinary facilities were being issued in all directions.  Every priest who belonged to the Order received universal jurisdiction subject to the bishop, if any, of the diocese in which he might be; mass might be said on any day of the year of the Five Wounds, or the Resurrection, or Our Lady; and all had the privilege of the portable altar, now permitted to be wood.  Further ritual requirements were relaxed; mass might be said with any decent vessels of any material capable of destruction, such as glass or china; bread of any description might be used; and no vestments were obligatory except the thin thread that now represented the stole; lights were non-essential; none need wear the clerical habit; and rosary, even without beads, was always permissible instead of the Office.

In this manner priests were rendered capable of giving the sacraments and offering the holy sacrifice at the least possible risk to themselves; and these relaxations had already proved of enormous benefit in the European prisons, where by this time many thousands of Catholics were undergoing the penalty of refusing public worship.

* * * * *

The Pope’s private life was as simple as His room.  He had one Syrian priest for His chaplain, and two Syrian servants.  He said His mass each morning, Himself wearing vestments and His white habit beneath, and heard a mass after.  He then took His coffee, after changing into the tunic and burnous of the country, and spent the morning over business.  He dined at noon, slept, and rode out, for the country by reason of its indeterminate position was still in the simplicity of a hundred years ago.  He returned at dusk, supped, and worked again till late into the night.

That was all.  His chaplain sent what messages were necessary to Damascus; His servants, themselves ignorant of His dignity, dealt with the secular world so far as was required, and the utmost that seemed to be known to His few neighbours was that there lived in the late Sheikh’s little house on the hill an eccentric European with a telegraph office.  His servants, themselves devout Catholics, knew Him for a bishop, but no more than that.  They were told only that there was yet a Pope alive, and with that and the sacraments were content.

To sum up, therefore—­the Catholic world knew that their Pope lived under the name of Silvester; and thirteen persons of the entire human race knew that Franklin had been His name, and that the throne of Peter rested for the time in Nazareth.