The Story of the Mountain
Mount Saint Mary's College and Seminary

In March of the year 1840 the Archbishop ordained Mr. John McCloskey, the future President, to the subdiaconate, in the Church on the Hill. In a letter dated March 22nd, Rev. Mr. Deluol announces the death on the previous Thursday, the 19th, of the Rev. Mr. Tessier, for so many years the Superior of the Seminary of St. Sulpice in Baltimore, and, since for some time Father Dubois was but the deputy of the Baltimore house in the government of the Mountain, the actual Superior of this College also.

Mr. L. Obermeyer left the college in April on an extended tour through the Southern States in the interest of the Institution. On September 2nd he was admitted to the Corporation. Archbishop Eccleston and Bishop Fenwick of Boston attended the Commencement this year, 1840, at which there were but two graduates. Messrs. Loughlin and Conroy (both Bishops later) were ordained subdeacons on the morning of Commencement day in the chapel on the back terrace. The Prefects for the scholastic year 1840-41, were John Harley (afterwards President of Fordham College) Laurence Carroll, Richard Kein and John Hackett. There are very few letters and documents relating to this year, but the following from Bishop Purcell to the President will be of interest:

Cin., 4 Sept., 1840.

Rev. and Dear Friend: As the labors of the launch are pretty nigh at an end for you this new Collegiate year, to be blessed like its predecessor and more, I take the liberty of requesting you a favor. It is this. Just to lock your door for a couple of hours for one or two days, and to put on paper a report or statement of the system pursued in Catholic Colleges as to instruction, thorough scholarship, mental and moral training and discipline, paternal and filial, relation of teachers and pupils and any other remarks which your experience and reflecting mind will suggest. I beg you not to neglect doing this. It is called for by our College of Teachers, which is to commence its sessions on the first Monday in October. Bishop Mcllvaine of the Episcopalians is to be there this year for the first time, and Alexander Campbell, founder of the Campbellites, is invited by a mean little schoolmaster of this place, one of his sect, but who has the turning of the wheel of proceedings in his hands, to deliver the Introductory. I am rusty in the matter of college discipline by this time, am ignorant of any new improvements that might have been made in the course of Classical, Mathematical or other studies, and moreover, am constantly occupied. Come to our assistance. A. M. D. G. & B. M. V., however . . .

Rev. Mr. McCaffrey having complied with Bishop Purcell's request made in the letter given above, the bishop wrote as follows under date of September 30, 1840:

Many sincere thanks for your kind and intelligent letter of the 17th inst. You will have seen that the Jesuits have come to Cincinnati. There is growling indistinctly heard among the dens of the bigots, like that of a distant and unfeared menagerie. Rev. Thomas R. Butler, your predecessor, is superintending extensive preparations for the opening of the college. He will probably join the Society. [He did and was about six months in the novitiate.] Very Rev. E. T. Collins, another of your Mountaineers, is indefatigable. He has a great duty to perform and he takes neither wine nor anything that could inebriate, or rather sustain him in that line. He does not drink tea, nor coffee, nor eat flesh-meat, except perhaps once in three months when he cannot get anything else. Yet he is in perfect health. His monthly penitents cannot be fewer than five hundred . . .

Bishop Hughes who had just returned from Europe in August came to the Mountain, arriving on the 7th of December, 1840. On the same day Mr. Denis McNamee died. Bishop Hughes ordained Mr. John McCloskey (Father John) to the priesthood on Sunday the 13th, raised Mr. William Henry Elder to the subdiaconate and confirmed some of the students of the college.

On August 31, 1840, the College petitioned the legislature to authorize them to free William Richardson, Isabel Campbell, Susan Green, Ann Key and Betsey Butler, and on September 8th, the offer of a negro boy was declined.

Bill Richardson and his wife Anne were, when the chronicler knew them, two old slaves of the College who lived in their latter days down at the Dry-bridge. When their cabin became uninhabitable a woman named Magraw took them into her house nearby, and they lived with her for three years, while the neighbors were accumulating the wherewithal to rebuild their hut. No one unacquainted with the feeling towards the negro that exists below Mason and Dixon' s line can fully appreciate the natural heroism and sublime Christian charity shown by Mrs. Magraw. Bill and his wife lived in their domicile many years thereafter, enjoying the good will and respect of all that knew them, and though the house was but a cellarless hut in a swamp, they received their visitors with a simple grace and dignity that would sit well on the President and the Mistress of the White House. Bill was a captive of rheumatism in his latter days, but we never heard him com­plain, and once when we brought him up for Christmas Mass and invited him to dine at the College, we were deeply impressed with the simplicity and piety with which he said grace. The seminarians admitted that he was a model in making the Sign of the Cross. In old times he had been a teamster at the College, and used to make a brave show with his horses and mules and their brilliant tassels and his cracking whip, but his great display was made in 1875 when he drove Cardinal McCloskey from Thurmont, then called Mechanicstown, to his Alma Mater. Bill was very much attached to his namesake, Bishop William McCloskey, of Louisville, whom he used always to speak of as "Father William," and the gentle, polite, respectful way in which he recalled old times and persons was charming to observe. Bill died at last (in 1902) in his ninetieth year, and his wife very soon followed him. The College clergy did honor to the remains of those excellent servitors.

In the records of the year 1840 we note among other things the piety of those days, which some attribute, as they do the literary taste and achievement, to the rarity of newspapers, especially of newspapers with sporting columns, and also of cheap novels.

The Sodality of the Queen of Apostles used to meet on Sundays. It had speakers on holy subjects at each meeting; four members were chosen by lot to make a retreat on each Sunday, certain ones to go to Communion on Saturday, and monthly monitors determined by lot, two and two, to admonish each other, and "Mr. Keveny will be his own monitor." The Secretary was to correspond twice a year with members on the mission. No self-accusations are noted in the minutes. Every month also a patron saint was selected by lot. Names found in the Gregorian Society are to be met with here also.

The Gregorian Society composed of seminarians and referred to in the last chapter, met regularly from 1840 to 1843 and existed down to 1880. It was an excellent association. The members were punished for dereliction of duty by being obliged to read essays of so many minutes or declaim lines. Sides in debate were decided by lot. Things were then much as they are now; for March 14, 1841, "At the opening of the meeting all were present except the prefects," while on May 28, 1843, "the president left to say beads for the boys." The same month it was "moved that we hold our meetings henceforth in the Teachers' Dormitory; carried." Oct. 19th, same year "Mr. Francis P. McFarland moved that the president be fined 25 lines of declamation for disorder on the last evening; Mr. James Clark (they were both West Pointers) seconded the motion; carried."

Oct. 25,1840, a father wrote in reference to and apology for some rule broken by "Orlando": "A very painful position he had placed himself in by disobedience.... I know your strong aversion to corporal punishment, as you remarked in your letter, for I remember that after your return to the college and becoming its president such chastisement, I might say, ceased, and I believe for the manifest advantage of all the students who were actuated by an honorable spirit." Dr. McCaffrey, to whom this letter was addressed, did not afterwards show very positive "aversion to corporal punishment."

Dec. 17, 1840, an appeal for books as well as specimens for the cabinet was sent out from the College, Bishop Brute’ having transferred his books to his diocese, and they having formed a considerable portion of our library.

The fewness of priests, and their consequent frequent transfer from place to place so often recorded, must have caused serious injury to religion, but especially to education, and this was more hurtful to the College than perhaps the debt itself. Rev. Mr. Corry resigned the Vice-Presidency and left the College after New Year's, 1841. On the 21st of March, 1841, Rev. Richard V. Whelan, a former professor, whose name has been so frequent in our pages, was consecrated in the Cathedral of Baltimore to the See of Richmond, having jurisdiction over all Virginia. In April of this year Rev. Mr. Obermeyer left the College for the mission at Cumberland, Maryland.

Archbishop Eccleston wrote to Rev. Mr. McCaffrey on April 30th that, "Should I have the physical strength to walk in procession to Emmitsburg and lay the corner-stone of the new church after my six hours ceremony at the sisterhood, I assure you that I shall not be deficient in good will to comply with the engagement which you had a well-implied right to make in my name. May God bless you all, my little and great children of the Mountain!"

Bishop Hughes was endeavoring at this time to establish a diocesan seminary in the State of New York, and for this purpose was obliged to withdraw Bishop Dubois' subjects from the Mountain; he writes May 6, 1841:

Rev. dear Sir: ... I hardly think it fair to put our question on the ground of "generosity and sentiment," or if it be, I am free to occupy that ground also, and say that in this case the appeal will stand in my favor. An old pupil of the "Mountain" wishes to multiply its benefits to religion and establish a similar institution where it is so much needed. Will not the Mountain, then, aid him?

In fact it is thus that I would expect you to reason. However, I must return to points sufficiently intimated in my first letter on the subject about two years ago. I persevere in the sentiments then expressed by me. They were twofold: 1st, that to the best of my power, I would yield to the wish of any subjects of this diocese who might be disposed to attach themselves to the Mountain. 2nd, That in withdrawing subjects, which I intimated I should do, I should take care to do it in a manner not to affect injuriously, if possible, the Institution from which they are to be called, and to which religion is so much indebted. In the full spirit of this declaration, I wish to recall two or three of those subjects, after two years from the time it was made. Neither is this done from any other cause than that which necessity produces. Had I not been disappointed in receiving the aid I expected from Europe, it is probable that I should not have to call on the Mountain at all. But as it is, this is unavoidable. I shall be content with two, whom I natter myself you can spare without anything like serious injury to the house. The two that would suit are Rev. Mr. McCloskey [Father John] and Mr. Harley. But you have your mind set on them and I shall not disturb the arrangement for the present, if I can provide otherwise. I have understood that Rev. Mr. Corry was about to leave, and if he were to come, and Mr. Conroy, I should make out, till the arrival of our reinforcement from Europe. We must commence next month. And the commencement under the eyes, you may gay, of this city, must be such as not to fall far short of the anticipations that have been created. How can this be it you claim all for the Mountain and leave us to struggle unaided with the difficulties incident to the commencement of such an undertaking ? If you could spare me Messrs. McCloskey and Harley even for six months, I do not say but at the expiration of that time I might allow them to return.

Try, then, my dear friend, and make such a disposition of your resources as will leave me at liberty to write to these parties on the receipt of your letter. Bishop Dubois would have recalled them at once, but I wish to do it only after you will have had time to foresee the contingency and provide for it. We must in these matters that are undertaken for a common cause be prepared to help each other, and he who is most in need has the best claim.

Our school question progresses beautifully in Albany. It is impossible to predict the issue with certainty, but our side looks by far the brightest. ..."

[This was an endeavor to get State support for Catholic Public Schools or to have religion taught in schools for Catholics maintained by the State].

The next letter is a continuation of the subject.

New York, June 2D, 1841.

Rev. dear Sir: I received your letter of the 19th ulto., but had not time to reply to it immediately. Indeed, at present I am hurried as usual, and this must plead for me if, instead of replying to the details, I merely extract the substance as the grounds of my remarks at the present time.

For convenience, then, I shall divide it into two parts: the first, in which you propose to give me two teachers who are of little use to you, and would be of none at all to me; and the second, by far the most interesting portion of your letter, in which you prove at length how generous you are and what sacrifices you are willing to make in order to aid my commencement. Fie! fie!

Mr. Dougherty I recommended because I thought that at all times he would be worth his expenses, and because I thought the "coming-forward system" of the Mountain would qualify him to take the place left vacant by the recall of others now advanced and most needed here. I have not written to any of the subjects of this diocese as yet. Now I must begin. I wish to observe all the proprieties which a regard for good order, for the interests of Mt. St. Mary's, and old unabated friendship for yourself require. Indeed, I know that Bishop Dubois, at least, would have begun where I must conclude, in writing to the subject himself.

I have just written in answer to Rev. Mr. Corry's letter. Should he come as he proposes. I shall take away besides, at present, only Mr. Harley. Should he not come you will have to spare Mr. Harley and Mr. Carroll. But even with these, I shall be obliged to engage at a salary a teacher to supply the place of others. . . . I do not mean to call these young men away until after your Commencement. I trust their place can be supplied at the Mountain, but to me they are indispensable. Should you favor us with a visit in vacation you will have an opportunity of convincing yourself of this fact, viz., that I cannot do without them. Your sincere friend, John Hughes, Up., tie.

When it is borne in mind that the diocese of New York had not in all probability paid one dollar toward the maintenance and tuition of those young men, one is better able to picture to himself the feelings of the College Council on receipt of these letters. However, as President Egan wrote to Bishop Hughes, May 28, 1827, when the latter was still a pastor in Philadelphia, "our views change with our situations." Bishop-elect Dubois made an agreement with the authorities of the Mountain which he felt unable afterward to carry out, for, as Egan says in the same place, "Dubois President and Dubois Bishop are two very different personages," and so now his successors discover that Father Hughes pastor and Bishop Hughes take quite different views of things and find conditions so changed that treaties cease to hold. "Pro doma sua," and "necessitas non habet legem," seem to be the principles of action. Doubtless were Dr. McCaffrey in Bishop Hughes' place he would act similarly, but with more peremptoriness than Hughes or even Dubois himself.

Mr. Hassard tells us that this college at Fordham (transferred from Lafargeville, N. Y.) was opened in June, 1841, with the following officers, four of whom we have already made acquaintance with at the Mountain:

President and Professor of Rhetoric and Belles Letters, Rev. John McCloskey (afterwards Cardinal); Vice-President and Professor of Greek and Mathematics, Rev. Ambrose Manahan, D. D.; Professor of Moral Philosophy and Hebrew, Rev. Felix Vilanis, D. D.; Treasurer and Professor of Natural Philosophy and Chemistry, Rev. Edward O'Neill; Professor of Spanish, Rev. Bernard A. Claneza; Professor of Latin, Mr. John J. Conroy (afterwards Bishop of Albany); Prefect of Discipline and Professor of Bookkeeping, Mr. John Harley (afterwards its President); Professor of German, Mr. Oertel; Professor of French, Mr. McDonald; besides six tutors.

These are the generations of the New York Seminary:

In 1834 the Seminary at Nyack above referred to was opened under Father McGerry as president and Father McCloskey (Cardinal) as professor, with five students who lived in the old farmhouse adjoining. Before the students occupied the new building, it and its new chapel were destroyed by fire.

Bishop Dubois next thought to build in Brooklyn, but Bishop Hughes opened Sept. 20, 1838, St. Vincent de Paul's Seminary at Lafargeville, a couple of hundred miles away. Father Guth was Superior, assisted by Fathers Moran and Haes. A few seminarians and a few pupils for the collegiate department entered, but in a year it was abandoned (Shea's History), as they saw it would not take. The charges at this institution were one hundred twelve a year for board and tuition, eight dollars for washing, ten dollars each for modern languages. This attempt was followed by that at Rose Hill, Fordham, just referred to, but to Cardinal McCloskey, '34, is to be credited the great advance made when in 1864 the Provincial Seminary of Troy was founded, and to Archbishop Corrigan, '59, thirty-three years later, the diocesan Seminary of Dunwoodie.

The New York Seminary was in 1843 in charge of Vincentians, who also directed that at Philadelphia. The Seminary at Troy was conducted by Louvain Doctors, and that at Dunwoodie by Sulpicians. In 1907 most of the Sulpicians at Dunwoodie withdrew from the Congregation, but were engaged by the Archbp. to continue in charge of the institution, which thus ceased to be under St. Sulpice. Our friends of St. Sulpice had no seminaries outside of Baltimore till their Centenary, 1891, after which they took charge in San Francisco, New York and Boston, as well as, to a certain extent, of the discipline in the Divinity school of the Catholic University at Washington.

On the 21st of July, 1841, the Rev. Mr. McCaffrey was made a member of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

The prefects of the Scholastic year '41-42 were Messrs. L. Carroll, Richard Kein, Fr. P. McFarland and Patrick Murphy Mr. McFarland had taught for a while at Waynesboro, Penn. He became Bishop of Hartford, Connecticut.

St. Joseph's Church at the Convent, Emmitsburg, was consecrated by the Archbishop of Baltimore, May 6, 1841. The ceremony began at six in the morning and at 11 o'clock Bishop Whelan of Wheeling sang Mass, Dr. Moriarity 0. S. A. preached, and Father Borgna of the Mountain marshaled the procession. In addition to the bishops, clergymen from New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore were present, besides priests and seminarians of the College and these with one hundred and sixty girl-pupils, a band of music, a banner of the Blessed Virgin, accompanying the beautiful bier on which was the urn containing the relics, made a most vivid and holy impression.

In the afternoon of the same day the Archbishop laid the cornerstone of the new church at Emmitsburg. where this year also, the pioneer journal of the village, the Emmitsburg Banner, waved for three months, drooped and was furled.

We saw how Father Obermeyer had gone to Cumberland, Maryland, and we rejoice to record that he founded a Temperance Society there. We have an account of one of its meetings held June 27, 1841. "At a meeting of the Temperance Society of Cumberland held in the old Catholic Church on the 27th of June, 1841, Mr. B. Mattingly was called to the chair and Mr. John Swann appointed Secretary. Whereupon the following preamble and resolutions were adopted.

"'Whereas the organization of the Total Abstinence Society lately formed in Cumberland thro' the praiseworthy exertions of the Rev. J. L. Obermeyer is eminently calculated to alleviate distress and misery and repress vice and immorality, the certain consequences of intemperance, and thereby promote peace, industry, happiness and virtue and richly merits the warmest approbation of all persons who love good order and morals etc., etc.'"

The Temperance wave at that period overran the whole country and the inhabitants thereof, from the President along to all the sailors of American ships. It began in Baltimore and was called the Washingtonian Movement. Its influence extended to Ireland where on April 10, 1838, Father Mathew started his immortal crusade.

The Catholic Herald July 22, '41, says, giving an account of our Commencement: " This College is noted not only in the United States, but has yearly pupils from France, Spain, the West Indies and South America, a reputation earned for it by the talents of its learned president, the Rev. John McCaffrey, as well as of the other scientific gentlemen who preside over its different departments."

Dec. 15th, '41. Dr. McCaffrey writes to a Pittsburg priest: "Only four cases of personal chastisement occurred this year. It might be supposed that our ordinary punishments, tasks of memory, were multiplied; they have been diminished. I have reduced their average number by at least 80 per cent, since I became president, and we have fewer this year than ever. . . . There was some disturbance and several boys were dismissed. The whole truth is this ; every College in the country but ours has an occasional outbreak of the national spirit of independence, a riot, insurrection or something of the kind. . . . There was an idea of introducing a little more of liberty and equality. . . . and if that were resisted a disposition to repel force by force. , . ."

The new bishop of Richmond, Richard Whelan, writes under date of Jan. 10, 1842, to Rev. Mr. McCaffrey:

Rev. and dear Sir: . . . Remember me kindly to all and do not imagine that I have lost sight of them because of the birth of " The Young Mountain " [a college he had opened]. It appeared to me of the utmost utility to commence immediately the foundation of something permanent, and hence I plunged boldly forward, assuming all risks and fitting my already wearied shoulders to the discharge of the combined duties of the factotum of a seminary, a Pastor and a Bishop. Thus far I have not had reason to regret the effort. Strange to say, my health has improved, and I have collected around me seven students of theology and two young lads, besides Mr. Heurth of St. Mary's, who was on Epiphany promoted to the priesthood. In the Spring I shall put up a large building, for now we are crowded, and I shall endeavor gradually to establish a college, to put the Mountain in the shade. Therefore hasten to get out of debt.

It is my desire to obtain henceforth as many young American students as possible, and perhaps in this you may aid me. ... To Mr. Ingoldsby I have stated my willingness to receive him, altho' very much crowded. Pay us a visit; I shall be delighted to see you, and promise you in evidence thereof that you shall have a snug bed upon the floor. Again my best wishes and farewell. ..."

The church in Emmitsburg was nearing completion and Rev. Mr. McCaffrey its builder began to arrange for its consecration. Bishop Hughes writes on March 6, 1842:

I just now have received yours of the 28^th ult. and hasten to reply. It will be out of my power to assist at the consecration of the new church in Emmitsburg during the coming summer. Duties are thickening on me so fast that I have no prospect time for enjoying the pleasure of visiting my friends out of the diocese until the time shall have arrived when my presence will not be so necessary at the cathedral. We shall have the consecration of four new churches here in a few weeks, three in this city and one in Brooklyn. Also during the season, about a dozen in other parts of the diocese. Then our Convent. Rose Hill (St. John’s College, Fordham) Church debt and school question will require my constant and immediate attention till they are confirmed and settled.

The P.S. (Public School) Society are going down and our side is going up but whether enough yet. to secure the conscientious rights of the children, I cannot say. A few weeks will tell.

My best respects 10 your Rev. colleagues and all friends. The memory of former days becomes more and more endeared, the more they recede in the past and the fewer that time has left for it to cling around. You are among the most prominent in place and in the affection of your ever devoted and sincere friend John Hughes, Bp. etc.

And the Archbishop of Baltimore writes regarding the new church and also the celebration, then held for the first time, of the Landing of the Maryland Pilgrims:

Baltimore, March 29^th, 1842.

Rev and dear Sir: I should feel some reluctance to consecrate the new church in Emmitsburg, unless there was some visible means of reducing the debt to an amount that would place the church beyond all danger of being sold or desecrated. Your idea of a procession meets my cordial approbation. Could it not take place even in case the church should only be blessed?

Very large sums of money have been taken away from Baltimore within the last twelve months by beggars that have far less claims on our Catholics than you have. Do you not intend to make a. descent upon us before the opening of the church? I know no other sources of information relative to the first landing of the Catholics at St. Mary's than McMahon's and Bozeman's Histories of Maryland and a letter of Father White's at Georgetown College. Extracts from that letter may be found in one of the late Catholic Almanacs. Rev. Mr. Heyden informs me that he knows no other authority than O' Connell himself for the assertion that a Jesuit Father was the author of the clause in the first Charter in favor of religious liberty . . .

We have had a most consoling retreat in the Cathedral. There were from twelve to fourteen priests engaged in hearing confessions, and there was ample work for ten more. Hundreds who for years had been estranged from the Sacraments have edified the community by their fervent conversion. Wishing you and yours every blessing of these Paschal times, I am your most faithful servant in Xto. Samuel, Abp. Balt.

The landing of the Pilgrims was celebrated on the 10th of May, upon which occasion Rev. John McCaffrey delivered the address. The military companies of the College with bands and a large crowd marched to Emmitsburg where this oration was delivered, and a poem of his own composition was recited by George H. Miles.

In May of this year Bishop Dubois accompanied by Rev. Dr. Power visited his old home for the last time. The venerable man was nearing the term of his earthly pilgrimage. Mrs. Charles Wilson of Emmitsburg told us how, as a little-girl, she was taken to see him at St. Joseph's, where he made a visit of several days; he was bent over and very tremulous with age, so she had to kneel down in order that he would see her. He recognized her at once. [Her daughter became the wife of Professor Mitchell of the College, along in the 90's].

Mr. McCaffrey tells us in his journal that the Bishop remained until July, occupying the chair at the last Commencement (June 20, 1842) which in the flesh at least he was to behold, as he had presided at the first of the long series which the College was to know.

In the list of those deserving premiums this year are found the names besides the graduates of George H. Miles, Wm. Geo. Read, Daniel Beltzhoover, William C. Sappington, John F. Ennis, Ambrose Mullen, William Tehan, Louis LeBourgeois, Joseph O'Donnell, Fred Beelan, F. Byerly, Theo. Mosher, Hilary Williams, Thos. Bevans, Edward Casamajor, Cuthbert Roberts, Julius Lajonchere, Charles Madden and Frank Clark.

The speeches, etc., were, except one, in English. George Miles recited a poem, "The Triumph of Innocence"; Louis LeBourgeois, the "Monologue de Napoleon" in French; Richard D. Krider spoke on the "Naval Glory of our Country; " John LeConte on the "Progress of Astronomy," and was Valedictorian.

The College lost many of its staff this summer. Bishop Hughes recalled five seminarians ; Fathers Borgna also went to New York and William Henry Elder departed for Rome. Fathers Corry and Obermeyer had left the year before. However F. P. and Theo. Giraud returned from Paris, and Father James Miller came back and was for a while in charge of Emmitsburg, being also a member of the College Faculty.

One advantage of this constant change of teachers as well as of the variety of their race and training, is that it prevents monotony or even stagnation and ensures a certain freshness and vigor and freedom of opinion and expression which is not always found in places seemingly more fortunately circumstanced.

Thomas McCaffrey, the President's brother, was made first prefect in June of 1842. The same summer the new Church at the village, built by Dr. McCaffrey was dedicated, and after the ceremony the "Fair" ladies of Emmitsburg invited Dr. McCaffrey, the Archbishop and others to a dinner. They referred to " our noble and magnificent temple" for which " future ages will remember your name with gratitude and many prayers will ascend in your behalf." . . . The "noble and magnificent temple " in fact stands a monument to Very Rev. John McCaffrey, himself a native of the village which it adorns.

Rev. Mr. Obermeyer to Rev. John McCaffrey.

Cumberland, Oct. 18^th, 1842.

Rev. and dear friend: Although it was our understanding when I had the pleasure of seeing you last that you should write to me when the then gloomy prospect of affairs should give way to more cheering ones still I cannot willingly repress my desire to congratulate you on the bright prospects of the institution opened by events which I am informed recently occurred. I rejoice that the fear entertained lest the place would be wrested out of the hands of the Mountaineers and put into those of strangers has passed away. . . .

And now the hurrying feet and exultant voices of youth must be restrained and stilled; as they had been once before for the angelic Brute, so now for him to whose labors and energetic combativeness in the past they owed all. Bishop Dubois died on December 20, 1842.

The strong imperious spirit had worn out the frail body and the holy soul had

"Past, To where beyond these voices there is peace."

Bishop Hughes being Coadjutor cum jure succeeded to the vacant see. As soon as possible, namely on the 24th of January, 1843, a Requiem was sung in the Mountain church for the dead prelate and President McCaffrey delivered the eulogy.

Winter's snowy mantle covered mountain and valley, the one spot of earth dearer than all others to the now pulseless heart, when those of his children who could, gathered in that plain old church to honor the memory and pray for the soul of Father Dubois. What sentiments must have welled in their breasts as they gazed upon the walls which the now powerless hands had helped to raise when they knelt before that altar from which he had voiced, in broken tongue but in no uncertain accents, his Master's message, remembering that never, never more would they clasp that hand or hear those tones again in this world.

On the east front of St. Patrick's Church (the old cathedral) Mott Street, Manhattan, New York City, we read:

Here lie the remains of the Rt. Rev. John Dubois, D. D. Third Bishop of New York who departed this life December 20^th, 1842. In the 79^th, year of His age, and the 16^th, of his episcopacy. may his soul rest in peace. Amen.

I do not know whether Dr. Newman had, at that time, written the following exquisite poem, but it reads like a message from the saintly, twin souls, Brute and Dubois, already, as their children hoped, enjoying the delights of heaven, while in reverend and tender doubt they offered the prayers that the Church in her wisdom makes obligatory.

A voice from Afar:

Weep not for me: Be blithe as wont, nor tinge with gloom. The stream of love that circles home, Light hearts and free! Joy in the gifts Heaven's bounty lends, Nor miss my face, dear friends.

I still am near, Watching the smiles I prized on earth, Your converse mild, your blameless mirth; Now, too, I hear of whispered sounds the tale complete, Low prayers and musings sweet.

A Sea before the throne is spread its pure, still glass Pictures all earth-scenes as they pass. We, on its shore, Share in the bosom of our rest, God's knowledge and are blest.

Historical Society Note: In honor of the 200th anniversary of the founding of the Grotto of Lourdes we'll be posting a at least 2 new chapter every week.

Special thanks to John Miller for his efforts in scanning the book's contents and converting it into the web page you are now viewing.