Seventeen Years in Paris: A Chaplain's Story — John Shaqi
Seventeen Years in Paris: A Chaplain's StoryNoyes, H. E. (Henry Edward)
Religion
Seventeen Years in Paris: A Chaplain's Story
Noyes, H. E. (Henry Edward)
Church of England -- France -- Paris; English Church (Paris, France)
To this I replied giving both the French and English regulations as to
marriage, and I heard no more of the case. I am sorry to say that during
my chaplaincy there were several sad cases of desertion after mixed
marriages (French and English); but these will be more easily dealt with
under “The difficulties of English people abroad.”
The calls of anxious parents to meet girls coming abroad to situations,
and to look after them, and requests to find French families where young
men and maidens could be placed for education in the language, and
enquiries as to schools, pensions, and hotels, were a pleasant though
constant part of every day’s work. A list of reliable abodes was kept,
and one had the satisfaction of being able to be of real service in this
way to hundreds of one’s fellow countrymen, who without good advice too
often get into difficulties.
One rather frequent call upon the services of the chaplain, in the
earlier part of my work in Paris, is happily no longer necessary. We
frequently got urgent letters and telegrams from India to look after
people who had been bitten by snakes, dogs, a jackal, etc., and were
hastening to France to put themselves under the Pasteur treatment; and
with some the experiences were very painful, as they arrived too late for
the cure to be successful.
Now happily our Government has provided a similar institution in India,
so that those who need it can be immediately attended to. This splendid
institution in Paris is, however, well worth the attention of visitors.
There were occasionally English people in Paris suffering from mental
disease—not sufficiently insane to be placed under control, but yet ill
enough to cause considerable trouble.
Upon one occasion a man came to me and gave me a sealed packet, telling
me it contained a most important document, and it was not to be opened
unless I heard of his death.
His manner made me think it might be of real importance, and he did not
strike me as insane. Some years after I heard of his death, and opened
the packet, and found it contained only torn pieces of paper with no
writing upon them.
One poor lady who lived in Paris during the whole of my stay there,
frequently wrote me letters—literally yards long—some of them must have
taken her many hours to write. Yet on many points she was sane enough,
and was engaged for years in teaching English to the French, both
privately and in classes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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