Father Nugent, though immensely popular with all classes, was not, I think, a persona grata, any more than myself, with Canon Fisher, the Vicar-General of the diocese, who was very anti-Irish, and, so far as he could, prevented anyone connected with the “Catholic Times” coming into personal contact with Bishop Goss, who was a typical Englishman of the best kind.  The bishop had a blunt, hitting-out-from-the-shoulder style of speaking in his sermons that compelled attention.  But you could hardly call them sermons at all; they were rather powerful discourses upon social topics, which, from a newspaper point of view, made splendid “copy.”  Accordingly, during the year before his death, I followed him all over the diocese to get his sermon for each week’s paper.  There is no doubt that Dr. Goss’s sermons helped materially to put a backbone into the “Catholic Times” and greatly to increase its circulation.

In one of the rural districts the bishop was giving an illustration of the meaning of “Tradition,” and, very much to my embarrassment, I found him taking me for his text.  He said—­“So far as I know, there were no newspapers in Our Lord’s days; there was nobody taking down His sermons, as there is to-day taking mine; so that His teaching had to be by word of mouth, and much of it has come down to us as Tradition.”

In the interest of the paper, Father Nugent was anxious that I should be introduced to the Bishop.  But he knew, as well as I did, that the difficulty in the way of this was what might be called the Grand Vizier, Canon Fisher.  “You should push forward, Denvir,” Father Nugent would say, “after Mass is over, and ask to see the Bishop.”  Over and over again I did so, but was always met at the vestry door by Canon Fisher, with his suave smile.  “Well, Mr. Denvir, what can I do for you?” “I would like to see his lordship,” I would say.  No use.  The Canon would say—­“No, no; don’t trouble the Bishop; I can give you all the information you want;” and so it went on, and I was baffled in my attempts.

I ought to say that, though Canon Fisher was able to keep me from coming into personal contact with Bishop Goss, Father Nugent was too strong for him in the end; for, eventually, we got into communication with the Bishop regularly every week on the subject of his sermons.  Each Monday as soon as my copy was set up, we sent him a proof, which he would read and correct and return.  But his “corrections” often included the addition of altogether new matter, which made the sermon the more interesting and valuable to us.  Indeed, on several occasions, we used his new matter, with slight alterations, as leaders.  The very week he died we had one of these leaders in type, and it appeared in the same issue which announced his death.