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with Father P. J. de Smedt, died of cholera, at the age of forty-three years (19 June, 1851), fifteen of which were passed among the Indians in the Missouri VaUey.

Bishop Mi^ge was born 18 September, 1815, at La Foret, Upper i&voy, Italy. He studied classics and phi- losophy at the diocesan seminary of Moutiers where his elder brother Urban was a teacher for over forty years. He entered the Societ>^ of Jesus at Milan 23 Oct., 1836; was ordained priest 7 Sept., 1847, at Rome, where he was professor of philosophy in the Roman College. Driven from Italy by the political troubles of the following year, he was sent at his own recjuest to the Indian Missions in the United States. In 1849 he was assistant pastor of St. Charles's church at St. Charles, Missouri. In 1850 he was socius of the master of novices at Florissant. He also taught moral theol- ogy there. The vicariate subjected to his jurisdiction in 1851 consisted mostly of Indian missions. There were five churches, ten Indian Nations, and eight priests, with a CathoUc population of almost 5000, of whom 3000 were Indians. He was an indefatigable missionary, traversing on horseback and by wagon for years the wild remote regions over which his people were scattered, visiting the Indian villages, forts, trad- ing posts, and growing towns. In August, 1855, there were seven CathoUc ^milies in Leavenworth^ and he moved his residence from the Pottawatomie mission, to this city for a permanent location to minister to the fast increasing tide of inmiigration that had turned to Kansas. In 1856 the Benedictines began a founda- tion at Doniphan, near Atchison, but a short time afterwards they established a priory and a college in the latter city. They were followed by the Carme- lites in 1864. Father Theodore Heimann, a German, who later joined the Carmelite Fathers; Father J. H. Defoun, from Savoy; and Father Am])rose T. Butler, from Ireland were among the first secular priests to come to the assistance of Bishop Midge, who was represented at the second Plenary Coun- cil of Baltimore, and went to Rome in 1853. He as- sisted at provincial councils in St. Louis in 1855 and 1858. The bishop soon had a parochial school wherever there was a resident priest. He built a noble cathedral at Leavenworth. Before leaving for the (Ecumenical CouncH of the Vatican, he appointed the Very Rev. L. M. Fink, Prior of St. Benedict's, vicar-general in spiritualibus, and Father Michael J. Corbett, admin- istrator in Umporalibtis. Nebraska was formed into a separate vicariate in 1857; but the jurisdiction of Bishop Midge over the new vicariate (which included the present states of Nebraska, part of the Dakotas, Wyoming, and Montana) continued until May, 1859. The increase in the Kansas Territory-, which extended west to the Rocky Mountains, was steady. Desiring to return to the ranks of the Society of Jesus, Bishop Midge petitioned to be allowed to resign his epi8pal jurisdiction, and in 1871 a coadjutor was given him in the Very Rev. liOuis M. Fink, prior of the Benedictine monastery at Atchison, and who had as a priest worked on the missions in Pennsylvania, Kentucky, New Jersey, and Illinois. He was consecrated at Chi- cago 11 June, 1871, titular Bishop of Eucarpia.

Bishop Midge then went on a begging tour in aid of the vicariate and spent three years collecting in South America. His petition to be allowed to resign was granted in December, 1874, when he retumoxl to his order, being assigned to the house of studies at Wood- stock, Maryland. In 1877 he was sent to Detroit where he founded a college and remained until 1880, when he wa*? appointed spiritual director at Wood- stock for three years. Hero he died 21 July, 188-1.

In 1874 Bishop Fink took charge of the vicariate on the resignation of Bishop Midge; and 22 May, 1877, it was estabhshed as the Diocese of Leavenworth, and his title was transferred to this see. He was born 12 July, 1834, at Triftersberg, Bavaria, and emigrated in

boyhood to the United States. He entered the Bene* dictine Order in September, 1852, and was ordained priest at St. Vincent's Abbey, Beatty, Pennsylvania, 27 May, 1857. When he assumed jurisdiction in 1874, there were within the boundaries of Kansas 65 priests, 88 churches, 3 colleges, 4 academies, 1 hos- pital, 1 orphan asylum, 13 parish schools with 1700 gupils; and conmiunities of Benedictine, Jesuit, and armehte priests; of Religious of the Sacred Heart, of Sisters of St. Benedict, of Sisters of Charity, and of Sisters of Loretto; with a Catholic population of nearly 25,000. In 1887 there were in Kansas 137 priests, and 216 churches. The decrees of the second diocesan synod are admirable. The two new dioceses of Wichita and Concordia took from the diocese over 69,000 sq. miles. The parochial schools were placed under the supervision of a diocesan board that selects textbooks, and examines teachers and pupils. He fostered the Association of the Holy Childhood, the sodalities of the Blessed Virgin, and the Holy Angels; established the Confraternity of the Holy Family throughout the diocese, and acted as diocesan director of the League of the Sacred Heart. Bishop Fink took

{)art in the Third Council of Baltimore, and sedu- ously endeavoured to enforce its decrees. He con- tinued to promote the progress of the Church imtil his death, 17 March, 1904.

There were then 110 priests, 100 chiuxjhes, 13 sta- tions and chapels, 37 parochial schools, 4000 pupils, 35,000 Catholics. On his demise the Very Rev. Thomas Moore, who had been vicar-general since 1899, was made Apostolic administrator.

The successor of Bishop Fink was the Very Rev. Thomas F. Lillis, Vicar-General of the Diocese of Kansas City, who was bom at I^xiugton, Missouri, in 1862, and ordained priest in 1885. He was conse- crated Bishop of Leavenworth, in Kansas City, 27 December, 1904. His episcopjal administration of the Leavenworth Diocese was eminentlv successful. The growth of the Ch urch under his j urisoiction was marked by the foundation of new congregations, and the building of churches and parochial schools. Cathohc societies were strengthened and the diocesan statutes revised to enforce the decrees of the Third Plena^ Council of Baltimore under present conditions. He adopted practical means of enforcing the papal " Motu Proprio, on Church music. In March, 1910, he was appointed coadjutor to the Bishop of Kansas City, Missouri, cum jure successionis.

Statistics. — Orders of men : Benedictines, Carmelites, Franciscans, Jesuits. Women: Sisters of St. Bene- dict, Sisters of Charity, Sisters of St. Frances, Sisters of the Poor of St. Francis, Sisters of St. Joseph, Oblate Sisters of Providence (coloured), Ursuline Sisters, Fe- liciun Sisters, PVanciscan Sisters, Sisters of the Pre- cious Blood. Priests, 143 (regulars, 71) ; churches with resident priests 76, missions with churches 46, stations 7, chapels 8, brothers 71, sisters 160; diocesan semi- nary 1, seminary for religious 1 ; colleges and academies for boys 2, students 750; academies for young ladies 3, pupils 325, parochial schools 39, pupils 5700; high schools 2; orphan asylums 2, inmates l.'iO; young peo- ple under Catholic care, 6900; hospitals, 4; Catholic population 56,000. The Ursuline academy at Paola with 30 sisters was founded from Louisville in 1895. Mt. St. Scholastica's convent, established in 1863 sub- ject to a prioress, has one hundred and seventy-five professed sisters with schools in the Dioceses of Con- cordia, Davenport, Kansas City. Sioux City, and Leav- enworth with 3680 pupils. They conduct an acad- emy at Atchison. The Sisters of Charitv have a mother-house at St. Mary's Academy at Leavenworth since 1858. There are over 500 Sisters conducting establishments in the Archdiocese of Santa F^, and in the Dioceses of Denver, (jreat Falls, Helena, and Leavenworth, with 8000 patients yearly in hospitals, 525 orphans, and 6000 pupils. St. Margaret's Hoe-