Part 2

Prince Gallitzin seems to have manifested no displeasure at the religious conversion of his wife and children. As his son was receiving the liberal education befitting a youth of his rank--an education that included French, music, riding, fencing, dancing, and the more serious studies requisite for the military profession,--the father was satisfied, and had sufficient good taste and feeling to be glad that to all these things should be added innocence of life and high principle. Seven years earlier Amalie had considered the children old enough to profit by travel; and Demetrius in later life would recall with interest the visits paid with his mother to the Stolbergs at Eutin, to Jakobi at Düsseldorf; above all to Weimar, the Athens of Germany, where the noble Herder seems to have attracted the lad more than the great Goethe himself; though Goethe was a sincere admirer of the Princess.

There is an account of an interesting interview between Amalie and Goethe in after years. She, full as usual of her beautiful, earnest zeal for souls, invited Goethe to her house at Münster,--an invitation gladly, though perhaps a little timorously, accepted. The great man probably guessed what he was "in for," and showed no resentment when the Princess began, after the manner of the saints, to speak to her guest of the judgment to come. The next day, when he departed, she accompanied him a stage or two of his journey, still speaking to him with that wonderful absolute conviction which invariably commanded respect, often admiration, and not infrequently brought about conversion. Alas! in the case of Goethe it was to bring forth only the first two of these fruits.

But such pleasant journeys in the Fatherland were considered insufficient for the liberal education of the children of the upper classes of those times. As Demetrius grew older, Prince Gallitzin did indeed talk of sending him straight to St. Petersburg to join the army; but his mother was opposed to this plan. Her Catholic heart, no doubt, shrank from exposing her son, whom she considered very unformed, very young for his age, very "infirm of purpose," to the corruption of Russian high life. Moreover, her motherly vanity wished to see him more polished, less angular; and so a distant voyage was discussed.

Till now there had been but one place where "golden youth" could receive its extra coat of gilding; but, happily, Paris, the gilder's shop, could not then be thought of,--it was in the throes of that terrible revolution of which no one could foresee the end. An alternative was decided upon, in which we can not fail to see the guidance of Providence. The Gallitzins determined to send their son to America for two years,--_why_ it seems a little difficult to say. Probably the Princess, who looked upon Mitri as an idle dreamer and somewhat of a weakling, judged that having to "shift for himself" and stand alone for a time would strengthen and develop his character.

A young priest named Brosius, tutor in the Droste family, had just decided to go to America as a missionary. This would be an excellent escort for Demetrius, whose two years in America were to be spent in making himself conversant with the language, laws and habits of this interesting and most flourishing country. Prince Gallitzin was an admirer of Washington and Jefferson, and in his letters to his son bids him try for familiar intercourse with such great men. His mother, too, furnished him with an introduction from the Bishop of Hildesheim and Paderborn to the celebrated John Carroll, first Bishop of Baltimore,--indeed in those days the only Catholic bishop in the whole of the United States.

Demetrius set out on his long journey in August, 1792. His departure furnishes a curious anecdote. Had the sensitive and high-souled youth of twenty-two summers some presentiment that, once gone, he would never return; that this was a last solemn farewell to home, to friends, to country,--in fact, to all human brightness? At any rate, his resolution failed him; and, with what his mother considered characteristic indecision, he began to discuss whether the journey had not best be given up, after all. The moment was certainly ill chosen: already his mother and he were walking arm in arm to the quay at Rotterdam, whence a little boat was to take him on board the great ocean vessel. For a few minutes Amalie said never a word; then, with flashing eyes, she exclaimed, "Mitri, I am most heartily ashamed of you!" and the next moment Demetrius found himself floundering in the water. He was quickly picked up by the laughing sailors, who at a sign from his mother rowed him swiftly away.

The dear old priest, Father Gallitzin, when he merrily told this tale against himself forty-two years later, would not be positive that the "accident" had not perhaps been occasioned by a quick, involuntary movement on the part of his mother, causing him to stumble and so fall into the sea; but he very much inclined to the opinion that she had purposely given him this wholesome ducking.

II.--AMERICA.

It is strange that Gallitzin's sudden immersion should have effected as sudden a change in his character. Up to then he was the refined, romantic, purposeless youth; henceforth he is a man of energy and action--devoted, self-sacrificing, ready to do and dare anything in the great cause to which he was about to give his life. Almost the first news received in Germany from our traveller was the very astounding intelligence that he had resolved to leave all things and settle down in America as a poor, despised missionary of the Cross of Christ.

Mitri, her own beloved Mitri--dear and good, it is true, but somewhat of a "softy," a purposeless dreamer,--now a priest, and above all a missionary! His mother could hardly believe her senses. This was the son to whom but a few years before she had written: "It is a wretched thing that a youth of eighteen should be a child. He can not, of course, as yet be a _man_; but he must be a _youth_ and no longer a _child_, if he ever means to be a man."

And now Princess Amalie had a hard time of it. She was a chronic invalid, a great sufferer. With all her seeming harshness toward Mitri, she loved him dearly and well. Yet she had to bear not only his loss, but to be blamed by her husband and all her relatives for being in the secret,--for having known "all about it" throughout. And when able to disprove this assertion, she was still accused of having, through her exaggerated piety, been the means of putting such high-flown ideas into the young man's head. The Prince was the first to recognize his mistake and to write a generous letter to his wife, freeing her from all blame; which, considering his grievous disappointment, was most creditable to him.

The Gallitzins were indeed in a very awkward position. As Demetrius held an ensign's commission in the Russian army, and was due in St. Petersburg at the end of two years at the latest, his father now wrote to him entreating him, almost commanding him, to return; for he foresaw clearly enough what a refusal would entail. According to Russian law, he would be disinherited for becoming a Catholic priest; but besides this he would, because of his neglect to take up his commission, be looked upon as a quasi-deserter, and be banished from the empire as a rebel.

It was now that the full beauty and magnanimity of Amalie Gallitzin were seen in their true light. Her absolute unworldliness, her reverence for the slightest whisper of the Divine Voice were so great that never once did she seek to turn Mitri from his purpose, beyond quietly laying the state of the case before him for his own judgment. In spite of worry and opposition and a good deal of secret heartache, in the depths of her great soul she rejoiced and gloried in the vocation of her son.

When the Princess had given Mitri the Bishop of Hildesheim's introduction to the Bishop of Baltimore, she no doubt imagined him one of those dignitaries of the Church, such as they were in Germany--a temporal lord, a man of vast influence, who lived in a palace and had a large seminary and other ecclesiastical establishments under his control. How different was the reality!

John Carroll had been named Bishop in 1790, two years before Gallitzin's arrival. He belonged to one of those honorable families that had come over to America in Lord Baltimore's time and settled in Maryland. His cousin Charles was a true-hearted patriot, who had signed the Declaration of American Independence. Demetrius found Bishop Carroll living a life of truly evangelical poverty and hardship. Beyond a small private fortune, he possessed no means except such as, with some difficulty he derived from Europe; for no endowment went with the episcopal dignity.

Carroll had received his ecclesiastical education in France, where he had formed many friendly relations. Hence when the revolution broke out several distinguished French priests came to America and offered him their services. Among these were the Abbé Dubois, who died in extreme old age as the first Bishop of New York; Flaget, Bishop of Louisville; Bruté, afterward Bishop of Vincennes; and Nagot, president of the famous Seminary of St. Sulpice in Paris. When first this little band of devoted men came to the new country, they had to earn their daily bread by giving French lessons; and only after mastering the difficulties of the English language were they able to help Bishop Carroll in the care of souls.

The Abbé Nagot soon founded an establishment for training youths for the priesthood; it was on so modest a scale and so humble in its beginnings it could hardly be called a seminary. Among its candidates for the priesthood, Stephen Badin was the first and Demetrius Gallitzin the second.

At first, of course, Gallitzin took up his abode in the quasi-seminary simply for convenience' sake--as a visitor,--for Brosius, his travelling companion, had been sent off to another mission; so he was alone. But he had hardly been Abbé Nagot's guest for two months ere he wrote a letter to Münster, in which he said that he had dedicated himself, soul and body, with all that he had and all that he was, to God's service and the salvation of his neighbor in America; and that what had led him to this resolve was the urgent need of workers in the Lord's vineyard. He saw that priests in this country had often to ride for forty or fifty hours or more to administer the Sacraments to the faithful. He could scarcely fear that any one would doubt the sincerity of his vocation, considering the prospect of very hard work which it entailed.

This was indeed true. Mitri had well counted the cost; for was he not living in the heart of the painful but glorious self-immolation which characterized those first Catholic missionaries? There was nothing feverish or spasmodic in his resolve: the sacred fire had been quietly kindled in his heart; little was said by him at any time, only much was done.

The young man was to receive no outward encouragement. The letter to which I have just referred was written to his confessor in Münster,--a good man, a Franciscan friar, but a man of the eighteenth century. He seems to have been too much alarmed to reply. Only after a second letter from Mitri had made it clear that his advice was no longer needed, and that the decisive step had already been taken, did he pluck up courage to write. In a long-winded Latin epistle, full of platitudes, he, a son of St. Francis, dared not positively say, "Give up this high-flown nonsense and return to your family"; but he said that it was Mitri's duty to consult his father, and to do nothing till he had obtained his consent. Alas for the friar if _his_ blessed founder had followed such advice!

Demetrius had, of course, written to him in confidence, with the express recommendation to say nothing even to his mother for the present; for he had made up his mind not to proceed in the matter till he had waited a reasonable time for a reasonable answer. The reply failed to come; and when at length the friar did write, it transpired that Demetrius' first letter had been handed to him by the Princess herself, who said she had received but a short, unsatisfactory letter from her son; and as the Father's seemed to be a longer letter, she asked him if he would read it and tell her what her son wished or was doing.

"As I had forgotten my spectacles," the worthy man writes, "Dr. Overberg, who was also present, offered to read the letter aloud, which he did from beginning to end. How I felt during the reading and how overcome the reader himself was you can not well imagine. What deep sorrow filled my heart as I saw your mother look so sad and anxious! Herr von Fürstenberg was absolutely silent. Oh, how I sighed when I noticed that I had been the innocent cause of so much sorrow!"

The poor young student, so far from receiving encouragement, was disturbed by long letters from all sides, seeking to change his purpose. Even good men could not appreciate the heights of such a vocation as this. Such a new experience in the even tenor of the dear old Münster existence puzzled the saintly Overberg himself,--who, however, soon came to Gamaliel's conclusion--"If it be of men it will come to naught; if it be of God no one can resist it,"--and contented himself with merely exhorting his young friend to prove his own heart earnestly, and not to be in too great a hurry to take any irrevocable step.

The excellent Von Fürstenberg winced at the scandal of the Cross,--at the trials and humiliations of an unknown missionary in a strange land. If Mitri really wished to be a priest, he wrote, why not return to Europe, where such a vocation could at least be carried out in a manner suitable to his rank and position? It can, therefore, be no matter of surprise that Mitri's Protestant relatives should be furious. His uncle, a Russian general, wrote that he considered certain enthusiasts must be to blame for making his nephew forget his rank and family, as well as all sense of fitness and propriety, to embrace "a state of shame and disgrace."

In the meantime, as Gallitzin's German biographer writes, "his mother, though she was the hardest hit and had to bear the brunt of the storm, behaved much the most sensibly. She wrote immediately to the Abbé Nagot, the Bishop of Baltimore, and Herr Brosius. And when, through their answers and the letters of her son, she felt assured that it was a true vocation, she was unconcerned as to the worldly consequences of so unusual a proceeding, and exulted in the happiness of being the mother of a young man so superior to the colorless, commonplace personalities of these times as to have been capable of choosing such a state of life."

Prince Gallitzin (or Herr Schmet, as he was called) was all the while quietly pursuing his studies at Georgetown, to which place the little seminary had been removed from Baltimore. Humility had doubtless much to do with the ugly alias to which Gallitzin persistently clung; but in the first instance it had been motived by a little human prudence. A prince is often fleeced; and Mitri's father had wisely suggested that the American tour could be made equally pleasant at half the expense if the young man travelled as plain Herr Schmet.

In 1793 his mother writes: "The greatest--nay, the only happiness that can rejoice the heart of man here below is to be able to put himself just there where God would have him be, and then to fill that post worthily and well." She goes on to assure him that all the reproaches and unpleasantnesses she may have to bear on his account will be accepted cheerfully; and that she can conceive no greater delight, no more splendid reward for all her sorrows and cares than to see the son of her heart standing at God's altar. Only two things would she ask of him: first, not to hurry--carefully to examine his own heart before taking the irrevocable step; secondly, to promise her to keep his freedom--not to bind himself by vow to the American mission; for, though determined not to keep back anything in her sacrifice, she could not as yet face the thought of never seeing her only son again.

Gallitzin's friends were of opinion that by a timely, merely temporary return to Europe, some settlement might be made with the Russian government so that at least part of his inheritance might come to him. However, a request for his return had been anticipated by Demetrius, who had at once written to say that he renounced all claim to his inheritance. In a letter to Amalie the elder Gallitzin explains that the mere fact of their son's having become a priest disinherited him according to Russian law. And he adds:

"All that I have will consequently go to Mimi, whom, however, I know to be honorable and generous, so that her conscience would never allow her to rob her brother in order to enrich herself.... If you wish you may send on this letter to Mitri. It will save me the pain of writing to him myself. I must add, however, that, in my opinion, if a nobleman renounces the profession of arms to which he is destined by his birth and enters the Church, he can do no less than become either a missionary or a monk, if he wishes to prove to the world that the career to which he was entitled was abandoned neither through cowardice nor ambition."

III.--THE FOUNDING OF LORETTO.

In March, 1795, Demetrius Gallitzin was ordained priest, and at once set to work; for in April we already find him at Port Tobacco with another missionary. The self-forgetful zeal and splendid spiritual gallantry which were to characterize his long and arduous apostolical career at once showed themselves. In the very first month of his new labors there was a letter from Bishop Carroll bidding him moderate his ardor and spare his strength more; for it had reached his Lordship's ears that the young priest would often travel unconscionable distances in his love for souls, even "in weather unfit for a dog." Bishop Carroll knew only too well from personal experience what sort of entertainment awaited the weary missionary after a journey of this kind. So Gallitzin was ordered to return to Baltimore for a while to take charge of the German Catholics, who were clamoring for a priest conversant with their language.

Gallitzin remained for two or three years, first at Conewago, a settlement composed mainly of Germans; and then at Taneytown, Maryland, which had an exclusively English-speaking community; so that he had to resort to this language, which he soon learned not only to speak but also to write with singular ease and purity. Indeed toward the end of his life his German grew very rusty. After all, French had been the fashion at home; and there was now a strong feeling that Gallitzin preferred the English and Irish sheep of his flock to his own country people. If so, it was not unnatural: the Irish and English emigrants were often excellent specimens of their countrymen; whereas in those days the settlers from Germany were frequently the reverse. But this is anticipating.

He had not been long at Taneytown before he and his church-trustees fell out,--a thing at that time so common that it would not be worth mentioning, says his biographer, had it not been the occasion of making Gallitzin first think of founding an independent colony established on entirely Catholic lines.

In the year 1798 Bishop Carroll wrote to inform him that some of his flock had been complaining of his harshness and high-handedness. The good Bishop knew how to take such an accusation with a very large grain of salt; still he thought it well to remind his ardent missionary to temper zeal for God's glory with gentleness and forbearance toward his neighbor. The advice was given in the most paternal spirit; and it may well have been that Gallitzin, with the blood of many a Russian despot in his veins, should sometimes have found it difficult to accommodate himself to the ways of American democracy. But he was singularly clear-headed as well as far-seeing; and not many years were needed to prove to the rising episcopate that he had been contending for something worth a contest--the freedom and independence of action of the clergy, without which a priest's position in regard to his flock becomes false and untenable. The trustee system, which answers among the various Protestant sects, does not work well in a Catholic parish. The priest's position is that of the spiritual father of a family, not that of a salaried preacher to a congregation of critics.

It may here be objected that trustees were useful in the erection of churches, founding of missions, etc. Even in such cases it is not clear that the system worked well. In a new country, where speculation was the order of the day, sharp practice might be resorted to in the building of a church or school as unscrupulously as in that of a theatre or factory. Sacred buildings would be erected with borrowed money, which might be reclaimed by an unfortunate speculator at a moment when it was impossible to pay back the loan; and thus a church might come under the hammer, without any regard to its holy character.

Pews--of the old-fashioned kind, provided with lock and key--filled the churches, and were let to the highest bidders by auction. To Gallitzin, such a system, which left the poor no alternative but to be jostled in the doorway or to stop at home, was an abomination. He also strongly resented trial sermons, such as are usual among Presbyterians, where the congregations are free to choose whichever candidate has pleased them best by his discourse. Gallitzin could not and would not be a parish priest under such conditions. It was not for this that he had left home and country and fortune and honors.

In his old age he was asked how the strange idea had ever entered his head of wandering forth into the wilderness to found his Catholic colony, from whence at first he had had to send no less than fifty miles to the nearest mill, and twice as far for coffee, salt, sugar, and other necessaries. He replied: "I migrated to get away from trustees, pew-renting, and all the other evils connected with the system; and there were no means of escape but to devise another system with laws of its own. Wherever the work had been already begun, it was spoiled because Catholics had always copied Protestants. I recollect going to Philadelphia to pay Brosius a visit and to see what the place was like. While saying Mass in the church belonging to the Germans, I heard a constant rolling and banging, with shouts and loud speaking. When I asked what it all meant, I was told that there was a cellar under the church which had been let by the trustees to a wine and spirit merchant. 'Well, well,' I said to myself, 'and has it really come to this? Never will I enter that church again.'"