EPISODE OF THE CONTENTED TAILOR 



" I know," I said. " Sometimes the country dresses 

 itself as if a lover were coming." 



" Do you ever read Browning ? " he asked. " Be 

 cause he answers a lot of questions for me." 



" For me too." 



" Well," he said, and reddened shyly as he said it ; 

 *' do you remember the poem that ends 



' What if that friend happened to be God ? ' n 



I understood perfectly. He was a man of soul, my 

 tailor. 



" I expect you are surprised to find I read a lot," 

 he went on in his artless way. " But when I was a boy 

 I was in a book shop, before my father lost all his money, 

 and put me out to be a tailor. My mother was a lady's 

 maid, and she encouraged me to read. There was a 

 priest, Father Brown, who helped me too ; it was from 

 him I first learned to love flowers." 



" Then, as you are a Catholic, you know what to-day 

 is," said I. 



" The twenty-ninth of August. No, sir, I'm afraid I 

 don't." 



"It is dedicated to one of our patron Saints there 

 are two for gardeners Saint Phocas, a Greek, and 

 Saint Fiacre, an Irishman. To-day is the day of Saint 

 Phocas." 



The tailor crossed himself reverently. 



" I'll tell you the story if you like." And, as he lay 

 on his back, I told him the little legend of 



SAINT PHOCAS : PATRON SAINT OF GARDENERS. 



" At the end of the third century there lived a certain 

 good man called Phocas, who had a little dwelling 

 outside the gates of the city of Sinope, in Pontus. 

 He had a small garden in which he grew flowers and 



31 



