This point settled to his satisfaction (as he thought), he mounted his
horse, after a week's stay in the valley of the Lana, and made his way
to the tinners of Camlin, twenty miles further along the coast Here
he was received with open arms, and preached from his rock pulpit to
thousands of eager men and women an hour after sunrise on a summer
morning.
On still for another fortnight, in wilder districts, among people who
rarely entered a church, and whom the church made no attempt to reach.
These were the people for him. He was told that he was going forth to
sow the seed in stony ground, but when he came and began to sow, he
found that it fell upon fruitful soil. Here it was impossible for him
to find a huge congregation, so scattered were the inhabitants. But this
was no obstacle to him: he asked for no more than a group of hearers
in every place, and by the time that night came he found that he had
preached to thousands since sunrise. Beginning sometimes at five o'clock
in the morning, he would preach on the outskirts of a village and hold
a second service before breakfasting six miles away. It was nothing for
him to preach half a dozen times and ride thirty miles in one of these
days.
But as he went further and further on this wonderful itinerary of his,
that sense of loneliness of which he had become aware at Porthawn seemed
to grow upon him. During those intervals of silence which he spent on
horseback, his feeling of loneliness appeared to increase, until at last
there came upon him a dread lest he should affect his labours. He had a
fear that a despondent note might find its way into his preaching, and
when under such an influence he made a strong effort in the opposite
direction, he was conscious of an artificial note; and, moreover, by the
true instinct of the man who talks to men, he was conscious that it was
detected by his hearers.
He was disappointed in himself--humiliated. How was it that for years
he had been able to throw off this feeling of walking alone, through
the world, or making no effort to throw it off, to glory in it, as it
were--to feel all the stronger because of it, inasmuch as it could not
come without bringing with it the reflection that he--he alone--had been
chosen to deliver the message to the multitudes--the message of Light to
the people that walked in darkness?
He could not understand how the change had come about in him, and not
being able to understand it, he felt the more humiliated.
And then, one day, riding slowly along the coach road, he saw a young
woman standing waiting for a change of horses for her post chaise at the
door of a small inn.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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