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The Story of Notre Dame
Brother Aidan's Extracts


ELLIOTT, REV. WALTER (On the Holy Cross Brothers)

"May God the Holy Ghost guide young men to the holy place, and yet holier activity of your splendid order. I could do an inquiring soul no better favor than to recommend him to enter your Brotherhood." Rev. W. Elliott, C.S.P., In a letter to the complier of OUT OF MANY HEARTS

"I remember Brother Amadeus, the postmaster, and professor of pennmanship. He was the first member of Holy Cross that I ever met. He was always busy but an interior man, with the demeanor of one who would rather pray then work. Dear old Brother Bonaventure taught us bookkeeping; the soul of kindness, and ever impressing us, in spite of his retiring manners, with the solididty and extent of his mathematical acquirements. Brother Benoit was the great prefect of the bigger boys. I think he might have been canonized at his death, for he had no purgatory: we boys saw to that this side of eternity. Then there were Brother Charles and Brother Cyprian, assistant prefects, truly religious men, and very much attached to us. It was chiefly owing to the vigilence, sense of duty and absence of human respect in these three, especially in Brother Benoit, that early Notre Dame, was an orderly college. Brother Anthony was, I think, the name of the blacksmith. He was the most genial of men, and we loved to chat with him to the music of his hammer and anvil. Brother Francis Xavier was the carpenter and undertaker -- how sweet and sincere a character, how kindly a religious! Against Brother Lawrence, the great farmer of Notre Dame, we had the grievance that he cut down the noble trees of the forest primeval upon the banks of the lakes, little beckoning the terrible financial straits that this shrewd and no less pious manager more than any one else, enabled the authorities to tide over in those early days. He was rated the best farmer in Northern Indiana. I must not forget Brother Augustus, of Brother "Gus", as we always called him. He led a saintly life. And he played the double bass in both orchestra and brass band, and sung or rather sawed off the plain chant in choir. May God rest them all in everlasting peace. How enviable was their holy vocation! How glad they are now that they were so true to its divine guidance" THE BROTHERS OF HOLY CROSS", pp 100-02, 1906

"Reminiscing at the jubilee he jocularly remarked 'In my day we had reading at table in the refectory, but I noticed you had none now. O, ye degenerate sons of Notre Dame!" . . . . (See also "Table of Corrections") 1917


‹— Brother Aidan's Extracts —›