r 1 \ Seven Years Seine and Loire Valleys illustrated American McAll Association 1710 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia :a Seven Years in the Seine and Loire Valleys (1902 - 1909 ) Glimpses of the McAll Chapel Boats “LE BON MESSAGER” and “ LA BONNE NOUVELLE” By GEORGE T. BERRY With Illustrations from Original Photographs (Printed from a specially donated publication American McAll Association 1710 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia Jesus Preaching by the Lake Side Seven Years in the Seine and Loire Valleys N April, 1902, Le Bon Messager completed the first ten years of her unique cruises in the basin of the Seine and its larger tributaries, the Aisne, the Oise, the Marne and the Yonne. That same month at St. Mammes, near Fontaine¬ bleau, La Bonne Nouvelle was put into commission, headed for the busy towns and villages along the canals of the watershed to the south and the valley of the Loire beyond, up which she has at this time cruised as far as Roanne,* about thirty miles from Lyons. Statistics give but vague impressions of spiritual results. Particularly is this true of such a work as that of the McAll Mission boats, whose ministry covers so wide a territory, persons being found not infrequently in the audiences on board who have come from five, ten or even fifteen miles away. One needs to live for a week at a time on one of the boats, to study the eager faces of the listeners, to talk with those who come, out of service hours, for serious conversations with the “captain”-evangelist, to note how rapidly the supply of Bibles and Testaments is exhausted, to see the eyes of the children sparkle as the romance of the Gospel story is told to them for the first time, to interview the grateful pastors, whose churches have been “revived” by a mission in their towns, to accompany the boat’s colporteur on his daily round of visits in the outlying villages. In many an out-of-the-way place, far from any church or other evangelical influence, may be found to-day a well-thumbed Bible, purchased on one of the boats years ago. Yet it must add something to one’s impressions to read the story so far as the figures are able to tell it. These two quaint little craft have a seating capacity of but a hundred and sixty each, and yet in their cruises along the silent highways they have held over two hundred and fifty “missions”! in places located so as to reach perhaps ten times that number of towns and villages, and they have had on board an audience aggregating nearly three-quarters of a million persons. Like the canal- boats, among which they are registered, they have carried a heavy tonnage *See map on last page of cover. fA “mission” lasts usually from two to six weeks, according to the interest shown, but is sometimes extended into months, as in the case of Nemours, where the Bonne Nouvelle spent a long winter, a permanent work having grown out of the visit. 4 SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS Just Before Sunday School on Board as the years have passed with this distinction, that in place of the common wheat or corn their cargo has been that “living seed” which nourishes not only the body but the soul as well. As many as 6000 gospels and tracts have been distributed on one of the boats in a single month, and the total sale of Bibles, Testaments, single gospels, hymn books, etc., has reached into hundreds of thousands.* As Jesus taught the multitudes from the little boat on the lake in Galilee, so beside the French rivers to-day the multitudes still hear His voice speaking those same marvelous parables whose verisimilitude is felt in France as perhaps nowhere else outside the Holy Land. It is the romance of the first century repeated in the twen¬ tieth in those ageless words which “shall never pass away.” Nor does the story grow old when it becomes a twice-told or even a thrice-told tale. For since the Bonne Nouvelle —from whose launching this account begins—joined her ministry to that of the Bon Messager the latter has been chiefly occupied in revisiting the places where her former missions were held. In April, 1902, Le Bon Messager was at Chateau-Thierry, on the Marne,f and still in command of “Captain” Huet, who, aided by his effi¬ cient wife, had, since 1894, served the Mission in this capacity. It was the boat’s fourth “season” on the Marne, whither a well-known and wel- *In her first eleven years the Bon Messager was the means of putting over a quarter of a million tracts in circulation among the country folk in hamlet and village who would for the most part never have heard the Gospel message nor seen a Gospel tract had not the boat visited them. fSee map of the Marne on page 14. SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS 5 corned visitor she had returned the year before after an eight years’ absence, and along whose sinuous course, dotted with populous villages, the eager multitudes detained her yet two years more.* Of the “good messenger’s” first passage up and down the Marne a frequent visitor on board wrote that her coming “had started an efferves¬ cence of religious discussion throughout the entire valley.” Let some incidents from Captain Huet’s diary tell the story of the people’s joy at her return—the appealing story: for, O, the pity of it, as expressed by the people of a town on the Yonne as the boat was about to leave them: “How dismal Laroche will be in the evening without the lights of the boat. Your Mission is badly organized. You come and tell us a thousand interesting things and, just as we begin to understand them, you go away.” It is not that the Mission is badly organized that it does—has to do—intermittent work. It is the lack of a fleet of boats, each to be assigned permanently to its own territory until all the riverlands of France are evangelized. But to return to Captain Huet’s diary. Writing from Azy on the 26th May (1902), he says: “With the return of fine weather we had yes¬ terday one of the most splendid meetings that we have ever held on board. At two o’clock the boat was overfilled with children and their parents and in the evening some three hundred persons were crammed in, while there must have been quite two hundred outside. M. Nicolet had never been at any of our meetings before, and at first he was not a little aston¬ ished at the somewhat free and easy ways of our good friends. But he soon saw how the people came truly to listen and to be taught, and thanks to his excellent addresses they were not sent away empty. The *For the chronology of the cruises of each boat, see page 31. The “Gallant Little Bon Messager” en route 6 SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS population in these parts never goes near the churches, and at Azy there are no services held except burials and marriages, so the people never hear anything to remind them of God or of a future life. But it is certain that they have great sympathy for us and they listen to us with wonder¬ ful attention.” Of the missions at Saulchery, Charly, Crouttes, Nanteuil-sur-Marne, etc., the account continues in the same strain: “What shall I say of Saul¬ chery? The most wonderful thing is that now (November) our mission there has not ceased, though we are five miles away. Yesterday again at Nanteuil five or six young men from Saulchery came to the meeting, as they have been doing for weeks despite the distance and the bad weather. * * * When the people of Charly first came to the boat they found it already half filled with our Saulchery friends. We overheard them complaining to these intruders: ‘What! have you not had enough of your boat! Must you come here, too, and occupy our places ?’ After¬ wards they took the precaution to come earlier. * * * A barber, who never missed any of the meetings, while shaving his customers used to tell them what the subjects of the addresses had been and brought many of them to the services. * * * What most astonished us at Crouttes as elsewhere, was the fermentation produced throughout the whole district and during several months by the passage of the boat. This fermenta¬ tion has two component elements—there is, on the one hand, the noisy part, made up of false rumors, calumnies and clerical diatribes, of petty intrigues and serious or comic indignation, and of disputes between the two parties; but on the other hand, silently, below the surface, there is a most intense moral and intellectual heart-searching. Testaments are hunted up, old Bibles are passed from hand to hand, proof-texts are studied, the subjects of the addresses are analyzed. We believe that this fermen¬ tation is an indication, as well as a cause, of life, and is similar to that which accompanied Christ’s preaching of old.” The story of a freethinker of Crouttes, who followed the boat to Nanteuil for the purpose of an interview with M. Huet, is a case in point. “After he had told me of his visit to a journalist who tried to put him on his guard against our work, he planted himself right in front of me, and looking me steadfastly in the face, said most solemnly: ‘Oh, sir! Tell me in all sincerity, your hand on your conscience, do you really believe in God?’ Since that day I have realized more than ever the necessity of dealing thoroughly, at each of our stations, with this fundamental ques¬ tion. I have seen this friend again many times; I have lent him books; he possesses a Bible which he reads and appreciates, and I am happy to be able to testify that he has now become an earnest and enlightened believer.” Until the Huets left the Bon Messager in December, 1904, it is a continuous story of cordial receptions and earnest appreciation. With surprise and gratitude those who had taken part in the services on previ¬ ous visits record “what deep impressions had been left, how well the people knew the hymns and how popular these had become.” Of the boat’s third visit to Meaux, M. Huet writes: “The evenings being very fine the attendance was large from the first and therefore difficult to control. On SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS 7 the third evening the crowd was so great on and especially around the boat that we were obliged, much to our regret, to call in the aid of the police. * * * We especially remember a group of well-educated young men—professors, post office employees, etc.—who were most atten¬ tive during the meetings, and during the first weeks had frequent talks with us.” Now and then a disgruntled priest, who had long been preaching to empty seats and astonished at the crowds on the boat, would show his jealousy; but for the most part popular sympathy was with the little floating chapel. The explanation was not far to seek and was frankly given by a fine old man of eighty: “If our cure would only speak of Jesus Christ and explain the Gospel as you do he would not have to reproach us for leaving Interior of Le Bon Messager the church empty.” Even the freethinking schoolmasters, whose influence is perhaps the strongest over the children in France to-day, could not deter either children or their parents from coming to the meetings. One such “posted himself regularly every evening near the boat, trying to stop, by persuasion or by ridicule, those who came that way!” The Report for 1903 closes with the words: “We feel that we ought to thank God with all our hearts for giving us such opportunities of evangelizing those who live beside the rivers of France.” The change of commanders occurred during the boat’s fourth mission at Trilport. Over fifty missions had been held during this third cruise on the Marne; and in the spring the new “captain,” M. Cooreman, took the boat for her second cruise up the valley of the Seine and Yonne—as in the case of her sojourn on the Marne, nearly eight years having elapsed since her previous visit. During the three years—to May 21, 1908—given 8 SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS to the present visit, twenty-nine missions were held, for the most part ai towns and villages where the boat had stopped once and in a few instances twice before. Many cordial acclamations greeted the little craft: “There is the Protestant boat!” cried one. Another: “Sell me a large print Testament; I have read a great deal of the Bible that I bought before.” Still others: “Since you were last here a service has been held twice a month, and on alternate Sundays we go to another meeting eleven miles off.” Not a few recalled with gratitude the boat’s former visit as the time of their conver¬ sion. To freethinkers and Catholics alike the boat brought a blessing. “The interest awakened by our meetings,” writes M. Cooreman, “has been shown by the private conversations which I have often had at their close. A well-known freethinker said to me: T never could have thought that I could be so much attracted by religious questions as I find I am since coming to the boat. I am forced to believe and to own to you that you have rendered my conscience more clear-sighted and sensitive, for I now find many imperfections in our club which were not apparent to me before. Therefore I am breaking it up publicly in order to reorganize it more worthily and, together with a few friends, I shall soon count on you for a talk !’ ‘Without ceasing to be a good Catholic/ said a lady to me one day, ‘for about twenty years past I have not been satisfied with the Romish Church. I want something more. Your meetings have done me a great deal of good. I read the Gospel, which is all new to me; it is what I wanted.’ The adopted son of the same lady, an intelligent schoolboy of fifteen, following attentively the religious instruction of the priests and often asking them questions, was distressed to be answered continually: ‘My boy, it is the teaching of the Church; it is not right to dispute about what she affirms.’ ‘On the boat,’ he said to us, ‘it is sensible and clear !’ We sometimes receive postcards from these friends, on which they mention passages from the Gospels that correspond to their situation.” Of the dense ignorance of true Christianity, of the need of a per¬ manent gospel boat in the Yonne valley, as in that of the Marne, some glimpses may be had from the following comments noted by M. Cooreman while holding services in Auxerre. To the question: “What do you know of Jesus?” one child answered: “He was the son of a cobbler.” Another said: “It was he who founded the Catholic Church.” The greater number had no answer to give. “We cannot believe in him,” said a well-dressed man, “for he abolished the family.” “The gospel as you call it,” remarked another, “the religion of Jesus Christ, upholds a mass of errors and keeps up the state of riches and poverty.” “We are seeking for one who will deliver us from all our miseries,” was the sad confession of an anarchist. So the experiences of the boat preachers, like those of the servants of Christ everywhere, run the gamut of realization and disappointment, of promise and hopes unfulfilled. M. Canet, of the Limoges Mission hall, spending some weeks on the Bon Messager the following summer, wrote from Villeneuve: “If the success of the meeting is to be judged by numbers, our mission here is certainly a good one. But we are thankful for something better than mere numbers. At the end of the first week a group of young men came to ask an interview, that we might explain to SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS 9 them our religious experiences ‘in order to give them the opportunity of seriously reflecting upon the uneasiness which from time to time oppresses them.’ ‘We have much to learn,’ said one to me. ‘We are going on to end in sheer unbelief, as do all those whom Catholicism does not satisfy.’ ” M. Pacherie, the boat’s colporteur, meets, in the course of the years, men of all sorts and conditions, from whose various points of view much may be gathered of the urgency and character of the boats’ ministry. Thus, from a village not far from the Yonne the following is related by the indefatigable Pacherie: “I came across a saddler at his work and offered him my books. Greatly annoyed at being interrupted, he exclaimed, ‘I have no time to look at your books; I am busy and have to get this job done in an hour, and am sure it will take over two hours to finish.’ I replied very quietly that if he was so pressed I would gladly help him. (M. Pacherie is a saddler by trade.) He looked at me with a mixture of wonder and doubt and told me to set to. So I showed him by a long spell of work that if I was only a loafer in his eyes, yet I knew how to do an honest day’s work. The good man not only insisted on giving me a dinner, but bought three books and persuaded others to do the same.” From a neighboring village he reports: “I met an old man who told me that he had studied in the Catholic schools to become a member of the Christian Brothers, dilating upon the evil things he had seen and heard while in the school and because of which he had ceased to have any faith since that time. We had a long discussion and I showed him that God was not to be charged with the sins of men, even if they professed His name. He promised before we parted that he would go to the meetings on the boats.” It is a very typical story that he writes from still another hamlet: “The woman in charge of the stamp and tobacco shop informed me that she was On the Way to the Boat IO SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS sixty-three and her husband seventy-one, and that they were too old to think of changing their religion, being ‘good Catholics.’ She had to con¬ fess, however, that she did not believe in the divinity of our Lord, nor in the sanctity of the Virgin, nor in confession, nor in purgatory, nor in hell. I said that in some respects she had more in common with Protestants than with Catholics, but this she did not wish to understand.” Basket-Makers—Photographed by Request An interesting instance of the genuine worth of the boat’s ministry is also reported by M. Pacherie, in the case of a basket-maker, converted at the time of the boat’s first visit nine years before, and who, though left without other spiritual resource than the Bible he had bought, had never¬ theless remained steadfast. “He began,” says M. Pacherie, “by telling me how impressed he had been with the preaching on the boat, and how deep he found was the chasm that separated the Church of Rome from the teaching of the Bible. I had a long talk with him and found that I was conversing with a man who really understood the Word of God. He said that he had never ceased to read his Bible and had tried to remember all that he had heard on the boat. His wife had died a few years since and was buried by the priest, as she had wished it and he had respected her desire. Pastor Fallourd, of Sens, has since promised to visit him, as he desires to unite with the Church.” But it would be hard to find a more truly representative and illumi¬ nating incident than that which our faithful colporteur describes in con¬ nection with a visit to the village of Chauviere. Incidentally it also reveals much of the quality of the man, who from a Limousin peasant has become a tactful and winsome preacher to his fellow-countrymen. “A family of easy circumstances asked me to tell them what constituted the Protestant SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS I I religion, and in particular how Protestants pray. I first read them some passages from the Bible and showed them the Bible as well as the brochure, ‘What is a true Protestant?’ Having consulted with his family the father then bought both Bible and brochure. After I had told them that prayer did not consist in mere vain repetition, but that it was an action of grace, a dependence upon God for the needs of each day, a rendering of thanks to the Creator for the blessings one receives, and also a Godward outlook (un regard vers Dieu) in our moments of peace or of anguish, of joy or of sadness—that in all things we should refer our lives to God—then the daughter of the family begged me to pray. I read first the Lord’s Prayer, and then I made a short prayer, in which I asked of God that He would bless my work and the members of this household who had bought His Word; that He would make plain to them by meditation upon it both how they might approach unto Him, and also that He looked upon them as His children; that the blessing which came upon them might be felt among all their neighbors; and I closed by asking that God’s heavenly benedic¬ tions of both spiritual joy and material good might descend upon this family and the entire community. When I had ended it was evident that all were greatly moved and seemingly saying silently to each other: ‘What! Can it be that that is the way Protestants pray, who, we have been taught, do not even believe in God !’ There were tears in the daughter’s eyes as I took my leave and the father thanked me heartily for the hour spent in his home.” The impression produced upon unprejudiced minds is undoubtedly that of a revelation. “If you could understand how new it all is to us,” said a man of some education to M. Cooreman, “all that we hear on the Lace-Makers 12 SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS boat. I have learned more with you during these few weeks than I have at church during all my previous life.” In the summer of 1907 M. Cooreman was transferred by the Mission to the new McAll station at Nemours and M. and Mme Brochet were called to succeed in the direction of the boat. The Bon Messager was now in the Seine, headed towards Paris. Captain Brochet’s first annual report is most cheerful in tone. De¬ spite the vintage and consequently small audiences at Thomery, “the meetings,” he writes, “were excellent. Two elderly women, one eighty- seven, the other ninety-three, came two miles on foot to hear about ‘the good God.’ ” At Valvins he tells of three riverside laborers, all drunkards, who came to the boat. “At first all three came fearfully drunk. C- was struck with amazement because he heard in the meeting that Christ had compassion on those who were down in the mire; M- began to come, free from drink; B-promised to drink no more, and kept his word, at least till we were too far away to visit him. Valvins is only about two miles and a half from Fontainebleau, so that we had many visitors, all of whom were in sympathy with the work.” The pen of Mrs. George Theophilus Dodds, widow of our lamented co-worker in the Mission’s early days and daughter of the late Dr. Hora- tius Bonar, draws a vivid picture of a visit to the boat at this time: “The last evening of my stay in Paris was spent in a visit to Le Bon Messager, at Hericy, on the Seine. It was the closing night of a month’s mission. It was a dark night, and when we got down from the “Captain” and Madame Brochet SEVEN YEARS IN THE SEINE AND LOIRE VALLEYS 13 train only the ghost-like outline of trees on either bank of the river could be traced. The roads were muddy; the rain dripped slowly, but as we came near the boat it was well lighted and red azaleas at the entrance, a gift from some friend, shone brilliantly. Mr. and Mrs. Greig and my¬ self, with M. and Mme Brochet and M. Pacherie, ate a simple dinner on board rather hastily, as the things had to be cleared before the people began to arrive. “Towards eight o’clock they began to come in by ones, twos and threes. We heard the splash of oars as some were being ferried over the river. At last the hall was nearly full. M. Foulquier, the speaker, arrived, and the meeting began under the direction of Mr. Greig. Several hymns were sung and the people were determined to enjoy them on this last evening. Some young women near the front sang well and seemed thoroughly accustomed to the hymns and tunes. The fact was, these and others had been attending the meetings for two months, having begun to come at the former stopping place of the boat and having followed on to Hericy, a walk of several miles, and they were prepared to follow still farther on to the next place—at least on Sunday nights. “I spoke to a young man who expressed keen interest. ‘One heard serious things there, not as at other places where one went to be amused.’ He asked why the boat could not always stay there; he remembered its coming ten years previously, when he must have been quite a young boy, and had never lost interest. “All three speakers were very good, mostly upon the change of heart required and given by God. M. Brochet makes a bright and sym¬ pathetic captain and his wife seconds him.” A testimony from an unexpected source, the village schoolmaster, was given during the stay at Fontaine-le-Post. “I am very glad,” said this gentleman to M. Brochet, “of the good moral influence you have over these young men, though you draw them from me; I have an evening class for adults, which they have abandoned to go to the boat.” “We had,” adds M. Brochet, “a capital mission. Most of those who came were young men, masons, who astonished us by their earnest and rever¬ ent behavior ; they sang our hymns with much enthusiasm. We arranged a Christmas tree, which was a great success. Each one had done his and her best to have a beautiful boat, and they had succeeded. Three children went seven miles with a wheelbarrow to fetch us some mistletoe; the boat was decorated with evergreens and paper roses. This fete will be long remembered in the district. Unfortunately there was not room enough for all who came.” At Melun, again, it is the wife of a professor of science who gives her testimony. Although a pious Catholic, she was disappointed by the emptiness of the pompous ceremonies of her religion and still more by the teaching of her Church. “All is new to me,” she said one evening after the meeting, “because all is new within me. I do not know myself. I used to try to earn everything. I strove to multiply my good works, yet each day I became more fearful and discouraged. I came here almost in terror; it was so novel to hear preaching on a boat; but even the first evening I was struck by the hymns, the reading of the Scriptures and iN 1 H 1 X •to vj 1 . o 2 ^ J •> o C: •S' •N Vj < V >o VO 1 l/ > 1 o F C '