38
REVS. J. SMITH AND WM. DOWNS
about six inches in diameter through the concrete roof of the sanctuary, and inside toppling over a huge granite pillar, and finally burying itself in the floor. The next shell apparently went beyond us near the Canossa Hospital, but did not yet reach the gun emplacement. After this, Masses could no longer be said with safety in the Cathedral, and were instead said in the Bishop's house. In the Bishop's house, throughout the day, a great number of people gathered during the air raids and remained all day, bringing with them their meagre food and eating it as best they could. They filled the reception hall, and corridors and finally overflowed into the priests' refectory, where some of them even slept at night, fearing to return to their homes. During the air raids and shelling they continually recited the Rosary and litanies and finally Father Rosello got out his small organ and led them in singing hymns.
During these terrible and anxious days, many came back to the Sacraments after years of laxity; confessions were heard almost everywhere, in the streets and in dugouts and pillboxes, where some of the Fathers visited the defenders. At the Cathedral calls came in for confessions to be heard in certain places. For instance, the Portuguese girls in the Telephone exchange who could not leave their posts, asked for this privilege, and the priests were kept busy. The Jesuit Fathers were extremely busy and were in constant demand. Father Rosello visited various outlying convents and institutions, and related how he had repeatedly to wend his way over and around shell holes in the pavements. Despite the danger on the streets many came to the various Masses in the Bishop's house, and many pagans asked for baptism. While we, of course, only observed the happenings at the Cathedral, no doubt the same scenes were being enacted at the various churches, in the city and in Kowloon, and many an heroic act will never be known except by the angels in heaven.
For the first few nights we all slept in our usual rooms on the upper floors of the Mission House—the building is one of four or five stories—but as the shelling increased in intensity and kept up sporadically at night, we decided to seek safer quarters, and as preparations for this eventuality had already been made in the cellar, we accordingly wended our way down to the depths. Our dugout was none other than the wine cellar into which had been put some benches over which were laid boards and these constituted our box