little parish in the suburbs, during several months of declining health, and after my departure he continued to visit the congregation and preach for them occasionally. It was during the autumn of 1845 that I left Baltimore. At the close of the Holy Week of 1846 I was received into the Catholic Church, at Charleston, S. C., and in March, 1847, I was ordained priest by the Right Rev. Dr. Reynolds, the bishop of the diocese. Before leaving Edenton, N. C., where I resided during the previous winter, I wrote to Mr. Baker to inform him of my intention, and I continued to write to him occasionally, receiving letters from him in return, for some months afterward. The correspondence on his part soon became constrained and formal, and at last was stopped at his request. For the three years, immediately following my ordination, I saw or heard nothing of him. I continued to hope for his conversion, and often offered up the Holy Sacrifice for that intention. By degrees, however, the thought of him passed away from my mind, and I ceased to anticipate that the broken thread of our friendship would ever be re-united. I supposed that he had become permanently settled at some halting-place between Protestantism and the Catholic Church, and would live and die contentedly in his chosen position as an Episcopalian clergyman, forgetting his earlier and nobler aspirations as among the dreams of youth. {69} For the history of his mind during this period, I am indebted to the letters which he continued to write to the bosom friend who has been already spoken of, and the information which that friend has given me personally. I am also indebted to the same source, chiefly, for the history of his progress toward Catholicity, during the entire period of seven years which elapsed before his reception into the Catholic Church. For, although I saw him repeatedly during the last three years of this period, he was extremely guarded and reserved in his language; and during our common life together, as Catholics, afterward, I never asked him for any detailed account--the subject having, in great measure, lost its interest for us both.