They did not ask again.  Yet, could the veil of the future have been lifted, their heavy hearts would, of a surety, have been comforted.  A child was to be vouchsafed them who would be a herald of Divine love, not to China alone, but to all the ends of the earth.

Nay, they themselves were destined to shine as apostles, and we read on one of the first pages of the Portuguese edition of the Autobiography, these significant words of an eminent Jesuit: 

“To the Sacred Memory of Louis Joseph Stanislaus Martin and of Zelie Guerin, the blessed parents of Sister Teresa of the Child Jesus, for an example to all Christian parents.”

They little dreamed of this future apostolate, nevertheless they made ready their souls day by day to be God’s own instruments in God’s good time.  With most loving resignation they greeted the many crosses which the Lord laid upon them—­the Lord whose tender name of Father is truest in the dark hour of trial.

Every morning saw them at Mass; together they knelt at the Holy Table.  They strictly observed the fasts and abstinences of the Church, kept Sunday as a day of complete rest from work in spite of the remonstrance of friends, and found in pious reading their most delightful recreation.  They prayed in common—­after the touching example of Captain Martin, whose devout way of repeating the Our Father brought tears to all eyes.  Thus the great Christian virtues flourished in their home.  Wealth did not bring luxury in its train, and a strict simplicity was invariably observed.

“How mistaken are the great majority of men!” Madame Martin used often to say.  “If they are rich, they at once desire honours; and if these are obtained, they are still unhappy; for never can that heart be satisfied which seeks anything but God.”

Her whole ambition as a mother was directed to Heaven.  “Four of my children are already well settled in life,” she once wrote; “and the others will go likewise to that Heavenly Kingdom—­enriched with greater merit because the combat will have been more prolonged.”

Charity in all its forms was a natural outlet to the piety of these simple hearts.  Husband and wife set aside each year a considerable portion of their earnings for the Propagation of the Faith; they relieved poor persons in distress, and ministered to them with their own hands.  On one occasion Monsieur Martin, like a good Samaritan, was seen to raise a drunken man from the ground in a busy thoroughfare, take his bag of tools, support him on his arm, and lead him home.  Another time when he saw, in a railway station, a poor and starving epileptic without the means to return to his distant home, he was so touched with pity that he took off his hat and, placing in it an alms, proceeded to beg from the passengers on behalf of the sufferer.  Money poured in, and it was with a heart brimming over with gratitude that the sick man blessed his benefactor.