Indeed,  so  desperate  seemed  the  condition  of  the  Province,  so
gloomy  its  prospects,  so  few  its  members,  that  the  Capitular
Fathers  were  in  favour  of  breaking  up  the  English  Province
completely,  a  step  from  which  they  were  deterred  by  the
solitary  exception  of  Fr.  Albert  Underhill, '  who  flatly  refused
to  assent  to  the  proposition,  and,  heartened  by  despair,  under-
took himself  to  educate  postulants  for  the  Order  rather  than
see  it  fail  for  want  of  courage  and  faith.  His  energy  inspired
respect  and  tolerance,  and  in  his  mission  at  Leeds  he  set  to
work  at  once  to  redeem  his  promise.  Before  he  died  he  had
begun  to  gather  some  young  men  around  him.
In  1814  the  chapter  met  at  Leicester,  and  as  by  now  Cars-
halton had  ceased  to  be  in  Dominican  hands,  the  noviciate
was  formally  transferred  to  Hinckley,  where  since  1765  a
mission  had  been  established.1  Here  in  1822  another  Pro-
vincial Chapter  was  held,  which  now  so  far  believed  in  its
own  prospects  of  final  settlement  as  to  protest  violently  to
the  Master-General  against  the  proposed  amalgamation  of
England  and  America  in  one  province.  It  is  strange  that  so
soon  after  the  War  of  Independence  there  should  have  been

1   Obituary  Notices,  p.  26.  2  Merry  England^  Feb.,  1S89.
'   Obituary  Notices,  p.  23.
*  Conway,  O.P.,  History  of  Hinckley,  for  account  of  this  ancient
Catholic  mission.
