She was a devout Roman Catholic, and it is a creed which forms an excellent prop in hours of danger.

To her, to the Anglican Colonel, to the Nonconformist minister, to the Presbyterian American, even to the two Pagan black riflemen, religion in its various forms was fulfilling the same beneficent office--whispering always that the worst which the world can do is a small thing, and that, however harsh the ways of Providence may seem, it is, on the whole, the wisest and best thing for us that we should go cheerfully whither the Great Hand guides us.

They had not a dogma in common, these fellows in misfortune; but they held the intimate, deep-lying spirit, the calm, essential fatalism which is the world-old framework of religion, with fresh crops of dogmas growing like ephemeral lichens upon its granite surface.
"You poor things!" she said.

"I can see that you have had a much worse time than I have.

No, really, John, dear, I am quite well--not even very thirsty, for our party filled their water-skins at the Nile, and they let me have as much as I wanted.