Mearns The Vinegar Saint

1. Auflage 2023
ISBN: 978-3-98826-268-4
Verlag: OTB eBook publishing
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 308 Seiten

Reihe: Classics To Go

The Vinegar Saint is a historical novel written by Hughes Mearns that tells the story of the life of St. Francis of Assisi. The novel begins with the early life of Francis, a young man who is the son of a wealthy cloth merchant. Despite his privileged upbringing, Francis is troubled by the suffering and poverty that he sees around him. He begins to question the materialism and selfishness of his own life, and eventually he decides to devote himself to a life of poverty and service to others. Francis becomes a wandering monk, preaching a message of love, compassion, and humility. He attracts a group of followers, who become known as the Franciscans. Over time, the Franciscan order grows and spreads throughout Italy and beyond. One of the most famous stories about St. Francis is the legend of the Vinegar Saint. According to the legend, Francis once encountered a peasant who was carrying a basket of rotten grapes. The peasant offered Francis a drink of vinegar, and Francis accepted it gratefully, praising God for the sour taste. The novel explores the many facets of St. Francis's life and his legacy, including his deep love of nature, his dedication to the poor, and his radical vision of Christianity. It also examines the challenges that Francis and his followers faced, including opposition from the Church and the temptations of materialism. The Vinegar Saint is a moving and inspiring portrait of a remarkable historical figure. Mearns's prose is lyrical and evocative, bringing to life the beauty and wonder of St. Francis's world. The novel is a tribute to the enduring legacy of this beloved saint, and a reminder of the power of love, compassion, and humility in our own lives.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Mearns, Hughes

Leseproben

BOOK ONE
The Golden Child
The Vinegar Saint
LEGS
THE young man of twenty-three was not a clever tennis player, but his partner and his opponents, men of forty, were obviously less clever. The Mount Airy Club courts were sought chiefly by two sorts of players, boys too uncourageous for baseball, and men of impending girth; secluded by fine old ragged trees and off an unused road, it had no gallery of experts to disturb the timid. The young man belonged to neither class, but he found his Saturday afternoon game of tennis with perspiring business-men just the thing to put him in tone for his own week’s business of research among revered but defunct Elizabethans. Besides, he often had the joys of victory hard won. At present, he was fighting it out with a butter-and-egg middleman. Years of handling a fragile and perishable commodity had made the middleman self-conscious in the presence of so egg-like an object as a tennis ball. He puzzled his opponents, therefore, as the inexperienced whist player so often does, by unaccountable delicacy when one naturally expected a smashing drive, and at other times by reckless lobbing—as if he had just condemned a bad shipment!—when the safe return was a gentle touch. A wife or two sat sewing in the lee of a cherry tree. They often stopped their mild chatter to watch some contested point—sometimes the ball stayed in play unaccountably long; a quarter of the returns was accidental!—at such times the repartee on the courts was equally compelling. A “professor” is by instinct talkative, and the enforced reticence of butter-and-egg middlemen unloosens sudden outbursts of speech—the figure has an unfortunate but truthful suggestion—like dammed things. All this was a generation ago—June 17, 1888, to be exact—a period when tennis in America was an exclusive sport like lacrosse or cricket. But the game had already made great headway toward being an American thing. Mount Airy players had long ago dug out the English “lawn” to make a “skin court”; they had twisted the English “thank you” into a technical and not always polite order to return stray balls, and had adopted the usual American system of “badgering.” Anyone could see that the young chap was trying to “talk” his opponent into error. In the American code, the man loses caste who cannot stand the steady grind of talk directed persistently at every weakness. An accidental shot to the middleman’s left hand, and an apt remark about left-handedness in general, had unnerved the professor’s opponent for the moment, causing a deposit of several easy balls in the net. Further well-placed banter encouraged the irritated middleman to take out a little private revenge on the ball; result, a walloping “three-bagger” over toward the Mount Airy sky line. “Hard luck!” the young man murmured in mock politeness, gazing satirically after the ball, but the middleman seemed to view that terrific flight with deep satisfaction. His partner, however, scolded and advised him to be “steady.” The game stood “four all.” It was the middleman’s service. That looked like a sure win for the young professor’s side; that is, unless the middleman grew cautious and canny. Tennis is a game requiring great strength and equally great delicacy. The middleman had been brought up in the produce business. For ten years he had assisted, between two o’clock in the morning and sunrise, in the transportation of hundreds of cases of eggs, than which there are few occupations requiring more combined strength and delicacy. The middleman settled down to business. Balls were served with the wizard-like dexterity of a juggler. There was absolutely no “breakage”—a clean, fine shipment; score, 5-4. At the same time the professor suddenly slumped. He missed easy shots and fouled his partner. A young person sitting cross-legged on the side-lines—it was one of the many Levering girls, although one could not be sure without one’s glasses—had been for some time deliberately making fun of him, and in a very stealthy fashion, too. His private and original twists of chin, arm, head, even the crinkling of the eyes to avoid the glare, these had been sedulously imitated. The professor put the left palm to his chin—a thoroughly characteristic attitude; the young lady, squatting like a tailor, put her left palm to her chin and wiggled the fingers in some subtle token of derision. The professor played with a twisted lock at the very crown of his head; the young lady elevated a gorgeous bunch of her own brown hair. This mirror-like mimicry got on his mind and caused some extraordinary tennis. Yes, she was one of the “Leverings”—a familiar name in that locality—but for a time he could not precisely place her. Ah! Those Leverings with the outlandish names, Regina?—Juanita?— “Hard luck!” grunted the middleman, with a sharp tinge of vengeance in his tone. The professor had served a monstrous “out.” What was the name? He cocked an eye aloft and sucked in both cheeks—an attitude of cogitation; the Levering young lady twisted her head and neck into a Pre-Raphaelite Pièta. He had danced with her many times. He had played tennis with her at—ah! Manheim! Manheim Levering! That was it. No! Manheim was the name of a street.... Some absurd family name. What was it? A bad return threw the game into deuce. He clapped his hand over his mouth as a sign of apology; the Levering person—first name not yet recalled—immediately hid her face with a spread-out palm and peeped out between the fingers, a sign of utter shame over the bad play. Keyser! That was it! Keyser Levering. Of all the absurd names to give a girl! The Keysers had come over with Pastorius; that was enough to justify the maltreating of a young woman who—gracious!—she was pulling her nose, stroking it gently! Extraordinary conduct! Perhaps the name had affected her in some way. Names do react upon the owners; few Percys ever become valiant; Percy Hotspur was only a glorious exception. Pulling the nose was one of the young professor’s really bad habits; he had struggled all his life to stop it; the very thought of stopping gave him an uncontrollable itching. There! he was doing it again. And she? She was polishing vigorously with little finger upraised. The minx! The professor suddenly doubled-up and rubbed his belt. He had caught a stabbing blow “in the wind,” as they say in boxing. “Game and set!” exulted the middleman, and then offered satiric apologies for the knock-out; but the young man heard not; he was busy getting his breath and watching Miss Levering mimicking a gentleman doubled-up with a tennis ball in his stomach. A man may do some things, he thought as he pressed his lips and tried not to wince, that a lady should under no circumstances do. The young woman was certainly not herself that morning. Besides, he had borne the blow like a soldier, and had only passed a hand lightly over the burning spot, while she—she was pantomiming like a child with the colic. His memory of her conduct on other occasions gave no hint of this. He recalled a quiet, lady-like person, mature, solicitous of the latest news of Elizabethan playwrights. The miss before him, sitting tailor-fashion on the grass, was carrying on—why, she was puckering her lips like a—but so was he! And now she was flirting with him, one eye deliberately closed, the other looking up mischievously. Could it be the heat? Finally he marched over and accused her of losing his game. “You sat there telling me all my faults in sign language,” he told her. “I got so interested I forgot how to play.” “Just when did you learn?” she inquired mildly. “Well!” he looked at her. Without doubt he was an erratic player, brilliant and simply bad alternately, the sort that never improves; but he had not the least ambition to do better, so the satire had no sting for him. “Well!” he retorted. “It wasn’t yesterday.” “No!” she speculated. “No! It couldn’t have been yesterday; it must have been this morning—after luncheon.” Her right hand made a vigorous swish through the air; her eyes followed an imaginary ball which obviously sailed high out of bounds; her left had come clap over the mouth in clear chagrin. In a flash the professor had himself dramatically presented at his worst, but her cheerful laughter saved the mimicry from anything but good-natured raillery. Then she told him how to hold his racket for certain plays, and instructed him in the theory of the angles of incidence and refraction upon which both tennis and billiards are founded. “Yes!” he would say, and “Really, now!”; or “Why, we learned all that in physics, but I never saw any use for it!” But his main interest was in watching the bright, eager face, the frank, brown eyes which looked straight into him steadily and explored him; and without the slightest gleam of—well, there is no word for it—the sort of mature awareness that is rarely absent when a woman looks steadily into the eyes of a man. There was health in her face and a dominant egoism like a man’s. The last time he had talked with her she had been timid, and clinging, and feminine; a thing that had frightened him off. He remembered that he had likened her to a young aunt—visited rarely—who used to throw her arms about him without notice and kiss him back of the ear. After much practice he had learned finally to sense the beginning of the aunt’s attack and so, in a measure, defend...