An Englishwoman in Utah. Mrs. T. B. H. Stenhouse
in very bad French to make them understand. I pitied him very much, but those who were present made as if they did not notice his embarrassment, and listened with marked attention. Among the Mormons it is a woman’s duty to keep silence; I therefore remained a listener only. But at the close of the service—for such it was regarded—when I might speak, my missionary labours began; I was aroused to eloquence, and our parting was longer than our meeting.
The warmth with which the few who were present responded to our efforts satisfied me that they had come under the same mysterious influence which I had observed in England. I was then convinced that Mormonism could awaken the Christian soul more to a realization of what it already possessed, than impart to it any new moral or religious qualities. Mormonism of itself never made Christians, but Christianity built up Mormonism. It was an awakening to the teachings of Christ and His Apostles that begat confidence in the mission of the Mormon Prophet.
Although we observed the very strictest economy, it did not take long for us to exhaust what little money we brought from England. This placed us in a very awkward position. It is inconvenient enough to be without money in one’s own country, where one understands and is understood by everybody; but to be in a strange land, especially in a country like Switzerland, where every Englishman is supposed to be a “milor” and the bounteous dispenser of unlimited wealth, it is more than inconvenient.
We left our first quarters, where we had had so many visitors, and rented a room from a widow woman, who fortunately was not inquisitive. She had a family of children to support; and as we paid our rent monthly in advance, she had no occasion to know whether or not we kept a bank account; and we were thankful that it was so, for, had it been so ordained, we could there have starved to death without attracting the notice of any one. A nice thing to be thankful for!
We were not hopeless, though we were heavy hearted; but we had expected trial, and could not complain, for we knew from the beginning that thus it would probably be.
One day my husband received a letter from an infidel gentleman who lived in Lausanne, a neighbouring canton, requesting him to come and see him, that they might talk together over Mormonism, for he had heard of us and of our doctrine; and my husband resolved to visit him before our money was all gone.
When Mr. Stenhouse reached Lausanne, he visited first a Protestant minister with whom he had some slight acquaintance, and who was also interested in Mormonism, and told him that he was going to call upon the Gouverneur de l’Hôpital. The minister was greatly opposed to my husband visiting such a man. “He is a socialist,” he said, “a revolutionist; he fought at the barricades; he is a mauvais sujet, and anything but a fit person to be spoken to about religion.”
This only increased the interest which Mr. Stenhouse felt in the governor, and made him more than ever determined to see him; and he did see him, although the good minister had represented him “aussi noir que le diable.” So they met; and my husband began the work for which he had come. They had long talks together, and my husband—as did the elders ever in such cases—spoke to the governor of redemption through Christ, and baptism for the remission of sins. Faith is not an act of the will. Like the unseen wind, it comes, and we see the power thereof, but know not whence it proceeds. Thus at first the unbelieving governor found it; he might find himself no match for the arguments of his opponent, but he could not force his heart to believe, and he was by no means a willing convert. My husband, however, remained with him; and before he left, the governor had been baptized into the church.
Our new convert proved to be a most excellent and worthy man, notwithstanding his former infidelity, and he was subsequently a great aid to us in our mission. We felt satisfied that the expenses of that journey had been well spent, although a few francs at that time could ill be spared.
But our circumstances seemed to be getting worse and worse, and my health began to fail. For several months neither of us had had sufficient nourishment, and my anxieties increased my physical weakness. I was dispirited, yet I feared to complain, or even to let my husband know what I felt. At length I fell really ill, and could not leave my bed. I well remember the solemn silence that reigned in our home one day. I had risen from my bed, weak, and oh, so faint-hearted that I had scarcely any desire to live; and I was sitting with my little daughter in my arms. She had cried herself to sleep, cold and hungry, and, much as I loved her—nay, idolized her—I confess that for an instant I harboured in my soul the impious, the unnatural wish, that rather than see my darling awake again to cold and hunger, she might sleep her sweet young life away. For me to yield to such a thought—to wish my child to wake no more! I, who would have given gladly the last drop of my life-blood to save her! For me to look upon her innocent little face with such a thought! I can hardly now believe that such a thing was possible, even for a moment. But I was desperate, and bold, and cowardly—all at the same time; or my heart was humiliated by poverty, and my faith was rousing bitter thoughts in my mind.
My husband was pacing the room. I knew too well all that was passing in his mind, although we had long been silent. At length I said to him, “Take courage, dear, for we are the servants of the great God, and surely He will find a means of escape for us. We were sent here; we came because the Lord wanted us to come, and surely He will provide for us!”
He turned to me in reply, and said kindly, “We can at least have some water;” and he went for some water; and then, with as reverential feeling in his soul as ever inspired a grace before dinner, he blessed it, and we drank.
We had scarcely done so when the mail-courier brought a letter to our door.
Governor Stoudeman, with a feeling of delicacy, had hesitated, when my husband visited him at Lausanne, to offer him any assistance; but, he said in his letter, he had been “impressed” to do so, and hoped that we should not be offended. As the letter was opened, a piece of gold fell upon the table. We could hardly believe that God had so soon answered our prayers, and sent us relief; and our emotions of gratitude for this timely aid, found expression in tears.
All this time our landlady knew nothing of our distress; she was as ignorant of our situation as if she had never seen us. So long as I was able to walk about, I used at regular hours to go to the kitchen, get the cooking utensils, and go through the routine of cooking, as if we had had a well-filled larder all the time. I set the table with punctilious care, and the good old widow never suspected but that we had plenty. Thus supposing that we wanted nothing, she and her children were more than ordinarily kind to us and to our little girl, who was now old enough to toddle round and go from room to room. Very often they would get her into their room at meal-time, and give her little things to please her; and while they felt honoured in being permitted to do so, we were silently thankful for our child’s sake, for her sufferings were more than we could endure.
The temporary aid from Lausanne was very welcome to us, though it only served to make us feel more keenly our dependent position. I might relate stories, alas, too true! of cold and want; of days, and even almost an entire week, passed at one time without food—stories which for painful detail would eclipse romance. It was a weary waiting for Providence! Such things are better forgotten. And yet I feel that in after years my temper was more subdued, and my mind more patient under affliction, than it would have been had I not experienced this preparatory discipline.
People who have heard, with a sneer, of Mormon missionaries and their work, would perhaps have realized that faith may be sincere, although mistaken, if they could have seen us at that time. The first teachers of a doctrine, whether it be good or evil, if only it stems the current opinions of the hour, have ever found that at the end of a rocky way there was waiting for them a crown of thorns.
Many a time since then I have felt the weight of anxious care in providing for my family; the trial of our faith has not been light, or seldom repeated; but those days of trouble in Switzerland were, I think, the darkest I ever experienced. We realized literally the necessity of trusting to God’s daily mercies for our daily bread; and the assurance that the Lord would provide, was our only hope. To say that we practised the strictest economy, would be to give but a faint idea of the way in which we had to consider and contrive in order to exist at all. For years we kept the “Word of Wisdom”—a “Revelation of Joseph Smith,” which enjoined abstinence