Stories for a Lost Child by Meland Carter

Author:Meland, Carter [Meland, Carter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781609175269
Publisher: Michigan State University Press

Lord! I wanted to shout, but dared not. These Indians little tolerated my complaints. They had agreed to carry me over the big lake in their canoes, but each time I opened my mouth to speak, their stern looks conveyed their utter lack of regard for my thoughts. It would be at least two more weeks before we reached the village where I would undertake my mission. Until then I was at their mercy. I sat; they paddled. All day my thoughts on you, God. I wonder if you can hear me. If so, provide me a sign so that I might know I still remain in your regard. A cruciform cloud reaching from the center of the sky to the far horizon would affirm my faith, but a day without pestering flies creeping up the skirt of my cassock would be sufficient. As the flies are now under my collar and the sky is but one unbroken cloud, I doubt you are much listening.

You seem—seem, I emphasize, God forgive me—to have forgotten me, deserting me to these Indians. Here, I have to endure their impieties in silence so as not to offend them. Imagine Christ, to not offend them. They, whose every gesture is an offense to the ransom you paid for their souls with blood! I cannot even wear the hat of my station during the day for fear that those behind me in the canoe will take affront at having their view of this lake interrupted. By day I wear my nightcap, inverting the natural order of civil life, to conciliate these Indians. Perhaps that insult to propriety explains your silence toward me, Lord. I am your child, and ever will be, but it would please me if you understood that any deficiencies you record in my behavior are evidence of the hardships that I suffer gladly for your Glory. My nightcap is not worn to offend the divine eye, but to ameliorate the Indian’s.

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