A Protestant pastor makes a beautiful bouquet for the Virgin Mary

Clovis Cantaloube recounts in the foreword to a book, The Reformation in France as seen from a Cévennes village, that a long time ago, on a clear May morning, a child asked for a bouquet from an old man in a frock coat who, pruning shears in hand, was contemplating his rose bushes: 

“Of course! You'll get your bouquet,” said the old man. “But what do you want to do with it?” “It's for the Blessed Virgin”. 

At the child's admission that the bouquet would be for the Virgin Mary, the old man smiled mysteriously: “Of course, you'll have your bouquet!” And the pruning shears began to cut the most beautiful roses. To make it more beautiful, he even added long branches of seringa, heavy with white bells and scents. 

Soon the child had an armful. He said thank you, not with his lips, but with his eyes. The old man's eyes met the child's, and a smile, even more mysterious than the first, lit up his face. It was the village's former pastor, who, having retired from the ministry, was living in a country house in the middle of the fields.

Clovis Cantaloube, excerpt from La Réforme en France vue d'un village cévenol, Les Éditions du Cerf, 1951; 309 p.