All this he bore very patiently, but the suffering was often acute. A deep abstraction of manner would come over him at such times, making him quite unconscious of his own actions and of the impression they made upon those around him. One day when he was going through the streets of Rome with a brother religious, they passed a fountain. "He went over and put his hand so far into one of the jets that he squirted the water over a number of poor persons who were basking in in the sun a few steps beneath him. They made a stir, and uttered a few oaths as the water kept dashing down on them. The companion awoke Father Ignatius out of his reverie, and so unconscious did he seem of the disturbance he had unwittingly created, that he passed on without alluding to it." But whoever might blame Father Ignatius for his projects and his peculiar pertinacity in carrying them into execution, one consoler never failed him. The Holy Father was ever ready to speak with him of the conversion of England, merely requesting him to endeavor to interest persons to pray also for all those separated from the faith in all countries. His Holiness has granted an indulgence of three hundred days to any one who shall say a devout prayer for the conversion of England. The preaching of Father Ignatius was peculiar to himself; he could not be said to possess the gifts of human eloquence in the highest degree, but there was something like inspiration in his most commonplace discourse. {187} He put the point of his sermon clearly before his audience, and he proved it most admirably. His acquaintance with the Scriptures was something marvellous; not only could he quote texts in support of doctrines, but be applied the facts of the sacred volume in such a happy why, with such a flood of new ideas, that one would imagine he lived in the midst of them, or had been told by the sacred writers what they were intended for. Besides this, he brought a fund of illustrations to carry conviction through the mind. His illustrations were taken from every phase of life and every kind of employment; persons listening to him always found the peculiar gist of his discourse carried into their very homestead; nay, the objections they themselves were prepared to advance against it were answered before they could have been thought out. To add to this, there was an earnestness in his manner that made you see his whole soul, as it were, bent upon your spiritual good. His holiness of life, which report published before him--and one look was enough to convince you of its being true--compelled you to set a value on what he said far above the dicta of ordinary priests.