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Cornell University Library 
 BT653.L34 M6 1884 
 
 Miraculous episodes of Lourdes : continu 
 
 olin 
 
 3 1924 029 315 052 
 
 THE MIRACULOUS EPISODES OF LOUEDES. 
 
THE 
 
 MIRACULOUS EPISODES OF LOURDES. 
 
 BY 
 
 .(Whejstei^i 
 
 ^ ..x^x, x.x LASSEEEE. 
 
 CONTINUATION AND SECOND VOLUME OF 
 
 OUE LADY OF LOUEDES. 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE SEVENTEENTH EDITION WITM 
 THE EXPRESS PERMISSION OP THE AUTHOR 
 ,J'^ BY 
 
 M.'^E. MARTIN. 
 
 BUENS AND GATES, 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 GRANVILLE MANSIONS, 
 ORCHARD STREET, W. 
 
 18 84. 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 
 CATHOLIC PUBLICATION 
 SOCIETY CO., 
 
 BARCLAY STREET. 
 
 \AU rights reserved.] 
 

CONTENTS. 
 
 Lettzb fboh MoirsiEim Heitbi Lassesbe to the 
 
 Teakslatoe, vi 
 
 The AuTHo:tfs DECLAEAnoif, ix 
 
 Dedication, xi 
 
 Peeface, xiii 
 
 TeANSLATOE'S DBDICATIOir, xxix 
 
 Tsamslatob's Fbeface xxxi 
 
 The Mieacle of the AssuMPTioir, .... 1 
 
 The JoufEE of Lavatte, 105 
 
 Mademoiselle de Fontbnat, 138 
 
 The Novbna of the Cvsi of ALaiEES, . . .229 
 
 The Witnesses of Mt Cube, 282 
 
 Appendix and Peoofs, 359 
 
LETTEE FEOM MONSIEUE HENEI LASSEEEE TO 
 THE TEANSLATOE. 
 
 A Mademoiselle Margabet Martin, trcdudrice Anglaise des 
 " Episodes Miraculeux de Lourdes ". 
 
 Mademoiselle, 
 
 Je suis henreux de donner mon entiere approbation h 
 votre traduction anglaise des " Episodes Mirouyuleux de Lourdes," 
 que vous allez publier chez Messieurs Burns at Gates. Vous 
 avez fait cette oeuvre avec amour, avec z61e, avec piet§, demandant 
 h, la Vierge Sainte, dont vous racontez les bienfaits, de guider 
 votre plume et d'illuminer votre style. J'ai I'esperance qu'elle 
 vous aura exauc6e et qu'elle benira oes pages, ecrites pour la 
 diffusion de sa gloire et la propagation de son culte. 
 
 Qu'elle daigne s'en servir pour aflfermir dans la vraie foi ceus 
 qui y sont dijSk, et pour y conduire ceux qui s'en sont §cartes. 
 
 Veuillez recevoir. Mademoiselle, I'expression de ma tres-haute 
 consideration en 
 
 Xo. et B. M. V.L, 
 
 HENRI LASSERRE. 
 
 LES BRETOUX, AU COUX, PEteS SlORAC, 
 
 DOBDOGNE, 19th April, 188k. 
 
TEANSLATION OF MONSIEUE HENRI LASSEEEE'S 
 LETTEE TO THE TEANSLATOE. 
 
 To Miss Mabgaret Martin, English Translator of 
 " The Miraculoiis Episodes of Lourdes". 
 
 Mademoiselle, 
 
 I am happy to be able to give my entire approbation to 
 the English Translation of " The Mwacukms Episodes of Lov/rdes " 
 that you are about to publish at Messrs. Burns & Gates'. You 
 have done your work with love, zeal, and piety, trusting to the 
 Blessed Virgin, whose favours yovi relate, to guide your pen and 
 inspire your thoughts. 
 
 May she fulfil your desires and bless these pages, written for 
 the diffusion of her glory, and the propagation of her power and 
 goodness ; and may she deign to employ them, not only to 
 strengthen those who are already of the True Faith, but also 
 to bring back to the Fold such as have wandered from it. 
 
 Receive, Mademoiselle, the expression of my highest esteem. 
 
 In Xo. and B. M. V. I., 
 
 HENRI LASSERRE. 
 
 LES BRETODX, ad COUX, PRte SlORAC, 
 DORDOGNE, 19th April, 188U. 
 
DECLAEATION Of THE AUTHOE. 
 
 In obedience to the presoriptiona of our Holy Mother 
 the Catholic Church, we formally declare : 
 
 That we submit aU we have writteur without any 
 restriction,, to the judgment of the Holy See. 
 
 That in whatever coneems the extraordinary cures 
 we may relate (even when vre employ the usual word 
 Miracle, and when we point out the circumstances 
 which seem' to us a proof of divine intervention), we 
 do not presume to decide of ourselves on their super- 
 natural character, neither do we vrish to give to our 
 words any other authority . than that of a purely 
 historical testimony. 
 
 That, when we happen, in speaMng of pious and 
 venerated, persons, to use terms employed by the 
 Church in the causes of Saints,, we have no inten- 
 tion of anticipating the judgment of the Apostolic 
 See, which alone has the right of pronouncing in 
 such matters. 
 
 HENEI LASSEEEE. 
 
TO MY DEAR WIFE, 
 
 MADAME HENRI MONZIE-LASSEEEE. 
 
 THIS BOOK, WHICH EELATES THE MIEAOLES OP THE DIVINE 
 GOODNESS, CONTAINS THE EXPEESSION OF MY MOST ELE- 
 VATED THOUGHTS, MY HIGHEST ASPIEATIONS, AND THE 
 DEEPEST FEELINGS WITH WHICH GOD HAS ENDOWED MB. 
 I DEDICATE IT TO HEE WHO, IN THIS WOELD, POSSESSES 
 MY WHOLE HEART. 
 
 AND OP THOSE WHO MAY BE TOUCHED BY THE PEEUSAL 
 OP THESE PAGES, I ASK A PEAYEE FOE THE BELOVED 
 COMPANION OF MY LIFE, FOE OUE DBAE MAEIE-MAETHE, 
 AND FOE MYSELF. 
 
 HENEI MONZIE-LASSEEEB. 
 
ATJTHOE'S PEEFACE. 
 
 I. 
 
 The "book we now publish is the continuation of 
 the one we wrote fourteen years ago, entitled OUE 
 LADY OP LOUEDES. 
 
 In considering the Pilgrimage founded by the 
 Blessed ^Virgin at the Grotto of Lourdes, and in 
 seeking to examine its history, we see opening 
 before us a quadruple and vast horizon of different 
 and sometimes of opposite aspects, as if that Land 
 of Miracles had also its own four cardinal points. 
 Whichever way the observer turns, immense fields 
 of research spread out before him, inviting investi- 
 gation and courting enquiry. 
 
 Before and above all, shines forth in incompar- 
 able brilliancy the direct work of God and the 
 Immaculate Virgin, in innumerable graces showered 
 down on Christians ; inexplicable cures of body and 
 soul ; sudden conversions ; strength given to the 
 weak ; peace restored to troubled hearts ; consolation 
 lavished on the inconsolable. Sometimes it is at 
 the Grotto, sometimes at the Sacred Spring,' or the 
 
XIV 
 
 Piscina or the Basilica, places consecrated by the 
 Apparition of the Blessed Virgin, that these touching 
 interventions of All-Pov?erful Goodness take place — 
 sometimes at a distance, in sanctuaries erected 
 to the glory of Our Lady of Lourdes, at Oostacker 
 or Constantinople, in the towns and villages of 
 Europe, or the depths of American vfilds — or again 
 in some poor solitary room where Her Name has 
 been invoked, and the water made sacred by asso- 
 ciation vTith Her memory has been piously drunk. 
 The eye pauses and reposes with delight on this 
 view of the horizon, and the soul rises and expands 
 in its contemplation. The morning sun is not 
 brighter, nor the early dawn more fresh. Indeed, 
 the grandest scenes of this world are unworthy to be 
 compared to the splendour and purity of such a 
 spectacle. It is Heaven itself inclining towards 
 earth. It is God amongst men. 
 
 The second spectacle, almost as admirable as the 
 first, is that of the endless stream of Christians 
 hastening from all countries, and by every means of 
 transport to respond to the call of Mary ; drinking 
 with pious eagerness of the Fountain of Mercy, 
 praying in fraternal union, and forming but one 
 family with one heart under the eye of the Father 
 of All. The rich helps the poor, the strong pilgrim 
 carries the infirm one : lays him carefully on his 
 couch, watches at his bedside, dresses his wounds, 
 bathes him in the Piscina, suffers with his sufferings, 
 and prays with his prayer. 
 
XV 
 
 Charity, active and holy, clothed in every costume, 
 using every means, speaking every tongue, being 
 "all things to all men" ; Charity, sacred and sweet, 
 moves about among the multitudes, firing them with 
 her example, and warming their hearts with her 
 rays. She has paid the journey of the penniless and 
 will pay his return, she has sheltered the homeless, 
 clothed the naked, fed the hungry, and still she 
 bums with the desire to spend and be spent in well- 
 doing. 
 
 K there were really longitudes and latitudes in 
 the regions of the mind, it might be said that this 
 incessant procession, this universal Pilgrimage, these 
 magnificent crowds represent the lovely zone of the 
 South, with its glorious sunshine and azure firma- 
 ment, its movement, its activity, its brilliant colours, 
 its luxuriant vegetation, its exquisite flowers, its 
 sonorous dialects, its ardent speech, its enthusiastic 
 songs. All is warmth and light, and true fraternity. 
 Can there be anything more touching than this 
 fugitive vision of what the world would be if the 
 world were Christian ? It is the movement of earth 
 rising towards Heaven. It is man with God. 
 
 In the third place, there is at Lourdes an institu- 
 tion called " The Work of the Grotto," that is, the 
 spiritual and temporal administration of the Pilgrim- 
 
 Universal Charity turning towards the guardians 
 of the Sanctuary has said to them : " I have erected 
 the Basilica in obedience to the commands' of the 
 
XVI 
 
 Blessed Virgin, I have bought ground, I have 
 planted trees tinder whose shelter the multitudes 
 that Jesus loves may pray, walk, and repose them- 
 selves on this favoured spot. Misereor super turbcis. 
 And now, here are still millions upon millions ; the 
 rich man's treasure poured out in secret, as Our Lord 
 commands ; the widow's mite ; the day's pay of the 
 workman ; the savings of the poor. Employ these 
 sacred riches in sacred uses. Build houses for the 
 poor, lodgings for the pilgrims, Piscinas for the sick. 
 Multiply and enlarge the divine workshops where 
 the Divine Worker accomplishes His wonders. 
 Place in them, before the eyes of the suffering and 
 sorrowful, the statue of Mary to speak to them of 
 Hope, and the image of Jesus on the Cross to teach 
 them Eesignation. Let them find oratories carefully 
 prepared for their devotions, and soft couches on 
 which to repose their weakness. Piously prepare, 
 in imitation of Veronica, cloths to wipe their bodies 
 and linen to cover them. How many poor creatures 
 come here, alone, neglected, and powerless to help 
 themselves, of whom, at the Last Day, Christ will 
 say — " It was I ". Those receive with open arms ! 
 Let your Brothers and your Sisters of Charity glory 
 in being always ready, attentive, and helpful, devoted 
 heart and hand to the cause of the suffering, so that 
 none may have to say here, as at the Probatica 
 Pond, "I have no man to put me into the water ". 
 Teach them to love God and to bless His Church, 
 and the world, frivolous and unconverted, when it 
 
sees you tKe willing servants of disease and sickness, 
 and utterly forgetful of self, may perhaps take the 
 lesson home and hlushfor its vain expenditure and 
 selfish pleasures. 
 
 Preserve also, with religious care, .for future ages, as 
 an in-violahle patrimony and . a priceless historical 
 relic, the venerated spot that the Virgin has honoured 
 eighteen times with Her presence, and never suffer 
 that visible page of Her divine history to be effaced 
 or altered. " The gift of God has been deposited with 
 you for the use of mankind." . . . Thus spoke 
 Catholic Charity, thus did she counsel and' thus does 
 she hope. Such were the accents of that voice of 
 the people which is truly the voice of Gbd.. 
 
 Around all centres of grace founded here below 
 by the mercy of God, the very nature of things and 
 the efforts -of the Irreconcilable Enemy accumulate 
 many dangers ; — Riches, which are a strength and 
 a power to those privileged spots, becqme at -the 
 same time a serious danger, involving,, alas ! unless 
 resisted, the spirit of vain pomp that lavishes with- 
 out counting,, and the spirit of trading and lucre that 
 ooUects and amasses; . . .- 
 
 The authorities who accept the redoubtable func- 
 tions of administering with their mortal hands these 
 sanctuaries of prayer and benediction, should make 
 it their first and most important duty to protect 
 them from such; attacks, and keep them pure from 
 such taints ; to check on their threshold the invasion 
 of -worldly splendour, to render them more sacred in 
 
XX 
 
 readers in a compact series of short accounts, a 
 hurried narrative of each and all of them. We 
 think, and we have always thought, that such ac- 
 cumulations of superficial facts can only produce a 
 superficial effect on those who read them. We will 
 even go so far as to say that, contrary to the laud- 
 able object pursued by the pious authors of such 
 compilations, the reader often turns away from such 
 books with a feeling of vague dislike^ and mortal 
 dulness, which, however, he dare not acknowledge 
 even to himself, as it might be taken for in- 
 difference or lukewarmness towards the wonders of 
 God. 
 
 From what Unknown cause does this singular and 
 truly regretable consequence proceed? It comes 
 solely from the anxious desire of the narrator to 
 relate, one after the other in rapid succession, all the 
 supernatural facts he can collect, without giving him- 
 self either the trouble or the length of time neces- 
 sary> to go thoroughly into a single one of them. 
 Like the guide in public museums and collections, 
 he hurries the reader indefinitely along the common 
 surface of things and neglects to introduce him to 
 their intimate life, their'providential workings — that 
 is, to their real iiaterest and their supreme beauty. 
 Hence, fatigue instead of repose, and satiety in the 
 place of attraction. 
 
 We have thought it desirable to adopt an entirely 
 different plan. If scientific men, if Botanists for 
 example, devote sometimes many years, or even 
 
XXI 
 
 their whole lives, to the study of one plant, or one 
 ■special tree ; if they discover in the mysteries of its 
 ■germination, the formation of its roots, the direction 
 of its fibres, the movement of its sap, the propor- 
 tions of its trunk, the arrangement of its leaves, the 
 interlacing of its branches, the roughness of its bark, 
 the blossoming of its flower, and ,the nature of its 
 fruit', admirable secrets of .universal wisdom, it seems 
 to us that a Christian, xwhen ' studying one of the 
 miracles of the Most High, should not be less consci- 
 entious, less zealous, less persevering in undertaking 
 and pursuing a similar work of minute investigation 
 and patient analysis. To examine the supernatural 
 event on all sides and in all its details ; consider its 
 course ; study its pauses and most distant preparations; 
 penetrate, so to speak, to its very essence ; determine 
 its real character ; and bring its chief features into 
 relief : — Such is not, alas! what we have done, but 
 what we have tried to do. 
 
 Experience, or rather the Higher Hand by which 
 we have been guided, marked out this path for 
 us from the instant of our first researches on the 
 subject of the miraculous interventions of Our Lady 
 of Lourdes ; and we cannot better explain how we 
 have been led in this direction, than by quoting our 
 own words written some time ago : — 
 
 "At Bordeaux, at Tartas, at Nay, at Lourdes, 
 wherever I have examined or enquired deeply into 
 any one of these exceptional manifestations from On 
 High, I have remarked, with secret awe, a surprising 
 
■XXIV 
 
 the truth, myweakei* intellect foresaw nothing, had 
 no presentiment of anything, and I owe it to Pro- 
 vidence alone, that I have been guided by the move- 
 ments of grace towards'these^marvellous shores." 
 
 III. 
 
 Some of these narratives of miracles have cost' me 
 years of preparation. It has only been by nmhber- 
 less interrogations, intimate talks, heart to heart, 
 with those whose history I relate, or with their fami- 
 lies or their friends, sometimes indeed by a few days 
 of life in common under the same roof, at the same 
 table, by ihe same fireside, that I have come to 
 know, little by little, and see gradually unrolling 
 before my eyes in their admirable order, the different 
 scenes of these miraculous dramas. 
 
 How often and how painfully have I thought, 
 while devoting myself to these researches, of the 
 deplorable error, the immense fault, committed by 
 those inconsiderate minds who seek to embellish by 
 legendary additions the marvels that it pleases God to 
 accomplish here below. Forgetting that the duty 
 and the sacred mission of the historian " consists iu 
 finding everything in his subject and in seeking 
 nothing beyond it," they have preferred the easy 
 pleasure of apocryphal inventions to the courageous 
 labour of thoroughly studying and examining their 
 subject with slow and indefatigable perseverance. 
 And yet, had they sought the Truth, they would in 
 
•XXV 
 
 -addition have discovered the Beautiful, and would 
 not have worked in vain. What is called Ait, the 
 ■ great Art of History is: attainable in no other way, 
 and reality would have shown them treasures before 
 which the fictitious productions of their imagination 
 would have perished like dross. .For imagination is 
 oT:man and Truth ie oft-G-od. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Before publishing these narratives I was "desirous, 
 for the greater certainty and guarantee of History, 
 for my own sake and ;for that of the public ;both 
 friendly and hostile, to have their rigorous exactness, 
 controlled by the direct witness, of those Christians 
 into whose life I proposed, to initiate the reader. I 
 therefore communicated .to them and their families 
 the manuscript or the proofs of my work. .All the 
 episodes which, follow (except the last which. regards 
 myself) are preceded by their declarations and 
 signed with their names. By thus associating 
 themselves with this humble book, all those of 
 whom I write and who have received from God the 
 grace of a Miracle, rise up to.say with me — "This is 
 the Truth!" 
 
 V. 
 
 We have written these pages amidst the troubles 
 and anxieties of our time, and with a heart oppressed 
 by anguish and alarm, while wicked men, in the 
 
XXVI 
 
 pride of power, sacrilegiously endeavoua? to drive God 
 from His true Temple of the human mind. 
 
 But, in proportion as our researches gave us a 
 more profound knowledge of the events we now 
 relate, our fears were dissipated and our hopes soared 
 high. 
 
 For the many details of these episodes resolve 
 themselves into a distinct, positive, imperious, and 
 irresistible proof that the Sovereign Master of the 
 world secretly and permanently intervenes in all the 
 events that, mark our lives. He intervenes every- 
 where and in everything, not only by those sudden 
 and exceptional means that we call " Miracles," but 
 by a gentle and continuous action, which, without 
 disturbing the liberty of the human will,, disposes 
 and prepares the- varied circumstances of our rapid 
 passage on the surface of this world. If this be so, 
 and if it be sometimes granted to our mortal vision 
 to witness and verify it in the lives of individuals, 
 can we for a moment suppose that the Almighty 
 will stand aloof when the guidance of peoples, the 
 progress of nations, the fate of Holy Church, and the 
 future of Humanity, are at stake? He who so 
 lovingly watches over the smallest leaf, will He not 
 much more protect the whole tree ? Whatever may 
 be the disasters of our epoch ; whatever the iniquities 
 of which we are the saddened and indignant wit- 
 nesses, whatever the persecutions against justice 
 and truth, let us never forget that the earth is 
 sustained by the hand of God; that, by His vdU, 
 
xxvn 
 
 it alternately passes from light to darkness, from 
 storm to sunshine, from the frosts of winter to the 
 heat of smnmer, and that He leads it by a way 
 of which He alone possesses the secret, towards the 
 goal predestined by Him from all eternity. Nolite 
 timere, pttsillvs grex. 
 
 A Christian lady of talent once said : " God never 
 permits Evil to interfere with Good, but to draw 
 from the Evil itself a Good still greater ''. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Our first volume brought an immense joy and a 
 signal honour to its unworthy author. 
 
 It decided Bome to break the silence it had till 
 then maintained, and proclaim in a Brief addressed 
 to the historian, " the luminous evidence " of the 
 Apparitions of Mary at the Grotto pi Lourdes, thus 
 making that religious event a part of the treasures 
 of the Catholic Faith. 
 
 This second volume of the same work appears in 
 the year of grace, 1883, at the time when our Most 
 Holy Father, Leo XIII., has just ordained an 
 universal jubilee in memory of the twenty-fifth 
 anniversary of that extraordinary event. May the 
 pilgrims of the whole universe who crowd to the 
 Bocks of Massabiella, pray God to bless this second 
 part of our work as He has deigned to bless the 
 first, and to use it, in time present and in time to 
 
xxvui 
 
 come, for the dissemination of light to the under- 
 standings, faith to the souls, and love to the hearts 
 of all men. 
 
 H. L. 
 Slst May, 1883. 
 
DEDICATION. 
 
 The Translator of these incomparable pages, de- 
 sirous of associating with her work the cherished 
 memory of her Native Land, dedicates it, with re- 
 hgious respect, to the Catholics of England. Both 
 to such as enjoy the exalted privileges of the 
 Children of the Faith, and to those whose generous 
 and Catholic exercise of the noblest Christian virtues 
 has acquired for them the glorious title of "The 
 Soul of the Church ". 
 
 May the Immaculate Mother of God ever pre- 
 serve them within the sheltering folds of Her Eoyal 
 Mantle, and vouchsafe them, hereafter, the grace 
 to contemplate her ineffable and sovereign beauty 
 through aU eternity. 
 
 Paris, S8th August, 1884. 
 
xxxw 
 
 restbredj leaving behind them- a weight of suffering 
 and infirmity that has lasted" sometimes more than 
 a quarter of a century ; the ■ ranks of the voluntary 
 infirmarians and sick nurses who find in their 
 devoted zeal for the sick members of Jesus Christ 
 the secret source of a seemingly inexhaustible 
 strength and energy, invulnerable to fatigue and 
 indifferent to weariness ; the members of the clergy 
 indefatigable and ubiquitous, all things to all men, 
 spending and being spent without counting and 
 without measure, alternately administering the sacra- 
 ments, exhorting the multitudes, leading the devo- 
 tions, apparently needing no repose and certainly 
 taking none ; above all the genuine and cordial 
 fraternity existing between the pilgrims of all classes 
 and conditions, making of that picturesque grotto, 
 sheltered by towering mountains and begirt by the 
 saphire zone of the Gave, a Paradise upon earth, a 
 little comer of Heaven, a region where the device 
 " Liberty, Equality, Fraternity," is carried out to the 
 letter : the Liberty of God's children, the Equality 
 of Christian faith, and the Fraternity of. Christian 
 charity.. 
 
 Not the least interesting, spectacle offered by this 
 unique spot is that of the numbers of resuscitated 
 persons miraculously healed of their infinnities who 
 flock to Lourdes every year on a pilgrimage of 
 thanksgiving, and offer in their own persons the 
 public and irrefutable proof of the authenticity of 
 the miracle. 
 
XXXlll 
 
 Among them may be seen the Abbe de Musy, 
 erect and imposing, his keen eyes and majestic 
 height baffling the observer who vainly endeavours 
 to pictmre him as having once been blind and help- 
 less ; beside him the Abbe Antoine, genial and 
 affable, the ready witness of the marvels accom- 
 plished in his friend ; and, again, the Abbe Domi- 
 nique Sire, at whose Mass, sight, health, and vigour 
 were restored to the Abbe de Musy. It is said of 
 the Abbe Sire that he is the spoiled child of the 
 Blessed Virgin. He has devoted his whole life to 
 glorifying the Immaculate Conception. When the 
 Vicar of Jesus Christ had proclaimed the spotless 
 purity of the Mother of God, the Abbe Sire in his 
 filial devotion would have had the whole world 
 re-echo with the Decision of the Dogma. Inspired 
 by that wish, he caused the Pontifical Bull to be 
 translated into every known language and dialect, 
 and copied out in illuminate text of infinite variety 
 and incomparable beauty,, employing sometimes the 
 papyrus of Egjrpt, sometimes the silken textures of 
 China, sometimes the ivory tablets of Hindostan, or 
 the choicest kinds of paper manufactured in Europe 
 and America. This unrivalled collection of cosmo- 
 politan translations has been presented by the Abbe 
 Sire to the Sovereign Pontiff. 
 
 Mademoiselle de Fontenay, Mile. Lucie Fraiture, 
 and many others also, faithfully make their annual 
 visit to their Celestial Benefactress ; and the ranks 
 of these favoured children of the Mother of Mercy 
 
XXXIV 
 
 are daily swelled by new examples of Divine Com- 
 passion exercised on the sick and infirm. 
 
 Monsieur Lasserre never fails to testify to the 
 beneficent power of the Blessed Virgin, by his pre- 
 sence at the Grotto of Lourdes during the time of the 
 national pilgrimages. Untiring patience, delicate 
 courtesy, high-bred consideration and Christian sim- 
 plicity mark his intercourse with the pilgrims. The 
 Translator gladly seizes this opportunity to express 
 her grateful admiration for the benevolent generosity 
 which has accompanied and encouraged her efforts, 
 and made of her sojourn at Lourdes a never-to-be- 
 forgotten period of delight and edification. 
 
 To those who have never seen Lourdes it might 
 be suggested, that, if only out of mere curiosity, 
 there would be a certain charm in visiting a spot 
 unique upon earth, where in the heart of the nine- 
 teenth century the evangelical times of our Lord are 
 revived and renewed strictly to the letter. " TJie 
 blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are mad,e clean,, the 
 deaf hear, to the poor the Oospel is preached." 
 
 M. M. 
 
 Paris, 1884. 
 
Humbert de Musy's young wife had Ijeen dead for some 
 years, leaving her husband in inconsolable grief, and 
 with his health irreparably injured by nights and days 
 of incessant watching at the bedside of the wife who 
 was dearer to him than himself, and whom he had 
 vainly endeavoured to save. He was bent, but not 
 with age, and suffered in all his joints from rheumatic 
 pains, which rarely gave him any respite. His condition, 
 however, was relatively bearable when compared with 
 the cruel infirmities of his younger brother. It is the 
 history of that younger brother which we are about to 
 relate. 
 
 11. 
 
 During his childhood Victor de Musy had enjoyed 
 excellent health. He was tall and handsome, and his 
 clear-cut features recalled, but with a frank and bene- 
 volent expression, the celebrated type of the Bonaparts. 
 Slender, active, of a well-knit frame, and foremost in 
 all athletic exercises, he seemed to promise a healthy 
 and vigorous future. But as he approached his seven- 
 teenth year, his health began seriously to fail. Although 
 nothing in his appearance betrayed the change, he had 
 become weak and delicate, and suffered continual pain, 
 sometimes in his back, sometimes in his eyes, sometimes 
 in his legs. He bore his sufferings with fortitude, 
 his mind ripening prematurely in the habit he had 
 acquired of patiently enduring them, and in the seden- 
 tary life they often obliged him to lead. He passed his 
 time in prayer, meditation, and the company of books 
 that lead to God ; and at last he said one day to his 
 parents : 
 
" I feel that the Lord calls me ; I should like to be 
 a priest ". 
 
 His parents were too profoundly Christian to think 
 of offering any opposition to the vocation of their be- 
 loved son. But the father, who deemed it wise and 
 prudent to expose that vocation to the test of time, was 
 two years before giving his full consent, during which 
 period the malady had increased and become a fresh 
 obstacle. The Priest is a soldier, and as far as may be, 
 the Church only admits into her ranks such men as are 
 capable of supporting the innumerable fatigues of their 
 sacred calling. It seemed as if Victor could never lay 
 such a burden on his shoulders, for his body was as 
 powerless as his mind was energetic ; for which reason 
 the authorities hesitated a long time before admitting 
 him into the Semiuary. Indeed, it was only after a 
 decided improvement in his health that, on his own 
 most pressing solicitations, the doors were at last opened 
 to him. He entered the Seminary of Annecy in 1851. 
 
 He had not been there many months, however, before 
 he began to feel the first attacks of a disease which 
 eventually and little by little extended to all his mem- 
 bers. This disease was no other than a gradual decay 
 of the envelopes of the spinal marrow. All persons are 
 aware — even those who have no knowledge of medical 
 science — that affections of this nature nearly always 
 produce partial or complete paralysis in some part of 
 the human system. In the present case the larynx was 
 first attacked, and the young man lost his voice entirely. 
 He was consequently obliged to leave Annecy and' 
 return home. 
 
 His faith, his piety, and his ardent desire to devote 
 
hiiaself to the service of God grew and strengthened in 
 the atmosphere of affliction. And thus several years 
 passed away. 
 
 At last he made a pilgrimage to Tours, where, after 
 praying long and fervently before the Sacred Face 
 venerated in M. Dupont's house, Victor completely 
 recovered his voice, and instantly took advantage of his 
 ciu'e to resume the interrupted course of his studies ; 
 but he did not return to Annecy, as the climate was 
 considered too rigorous for him. He went, instead, to 
 the Seminary of St. Sulpice, at Paris. 
 
 The health he had recovered in one way soon began 
 to be compromised in others. During his residence at 
 Saint-Sulpice, his sight grew so weak that he could not 
 receive Holy Orders under the usual conditions. His 
 great fervour, his high intellectual culture, and the 
 manifest signs of his. vocation, were so many reasons 
 for not refusing him the humble place he solicited in 
 the ranks of the clergy ; he was received as sub-deacon, 
 but with the most exceptional dispense of the Breviary, 
 of which the obligation was replaced for him by that of 
 the daily recital of the holy Kosary. 
 
 And then, as if physical light diminished in him in 
 proportion as spiritual light increased and he gradually 
 drew nearer to the sanctuary of the Sun of Justice, his 
 eyes became so bad, that when he was ordained a priest, 
 on the 24th of September, 1859, at the age of thirty-one, 
 it was found necessary to go even beyond the dispensa- 
 tion of the Breviary. It was impossible for him to read 
 the large print of the Missal, and he received permission 
 to say one single mass, which he knew by heart, be- 
 ginning : Salve, sancta Parens, enixa piierpera Begem. 
 
It was the mass of the Blessed Virgin, Mother of God 
 and Consolation of the Afflicted. 
 
 What a f&,e the celebration of that first mass was for 
 him ! It took place in the chapel of Digoine the day 
 after his ordination. No conqueror entering a van- 
 quished citadel in triumph, after a prolonged siege full 
 of danger and fatigue ; no king, mounting the steps of 
 a long-disputed throne, ever felt more exultingly happy 
 than the young priest when he went up to the altar for 
 the first time. 
 
 His mother, Madame de Musy, had in her possession 
 a relic which she regarded as an inestimable treasure. 
 It was the amice of an eminent priest of our own times, 
 proclaimed Venerable by the voice of the Church.* 
 The Abb4 de Musy wished to associate this precious 
 relic with his solemn entry on his priestly functions, 
 therefore he wore, at the celebration of his first mass, 
 the amice of the Curd of Ars. 
 
 Having thus attained to the supreme accomphshment 
 of the ambition of his childhood and youth, he conse- 
 crated the Body of the Lord every morning in the 
 chapel of the paternal mansion, and distributed the 
 Bread of Life to those from whom he had received his 
 being, and to the old servants, bent with age, who once 
 had watched over his cradle. His mother, his father, 
 his brother, his sister, the old housekeeper Claudine, 
 
 * The amice is the first part of the liturgic vestment worn by the 
 priest at the celebration of Mass. It is a sort of little linen mantle, 
 the npper part of which goes round the neck, while the lower part 
 covers the shoulders and back. During a retreat made by Madame de 
 Musy at Ars, the amice had been given her, after much entreaty, by 
 the venerable Ciir^, who entertained a respectful friendship for her, 
 and considered her as a soul especially favoured of God. 
 
aud all the domestics, communicated from his hand. 
 Not being able to administer an ordinary living, his 
 parish was composed of the narrow but beloved circle 
 of home. Klial and fraternal compensation ! 
 
 But, alas ! in 1862, only two years after his ordina- 
 tion, his legs were attacked in their turn, and soon 
 became useless and motionless. The Abbe de Musy 
 could no longer mount to the sanctuary, nor even stand 
 upright, and he saw Mmself forced from that time to 
 abandon the celebration of Mass. Paralysis, following 
 its course, had torn him from the promised land, and 
 exiled him from the Altar. He was then thirty-four 
 years of age. Contrary to the general order of human 
 economy, his youth had passed in a gradual decrease of 
 vitality, and at the age when a man is in the full vigour 
 of his prime, he found himself bowed down and helpless 
 with infirmity. 
 
 III. 
 
 Whenever it is question of the different miseries 
 which overwhelm huhianity, the mind turns naturally 
 back to the Biblical type of suffering. But it must be 
 acknowledged that, more fortunate than Job, the Abb4 
 de Musy was not abandoned and rejected by those 
 dearest to him. 
 
 Around his person and his sufferings were grouped a 
 devoted family, softening by their attentions the bitter- 
 ness of his trials, and, if we might hazard such a com- 
 parison, forming for his untimely misfortunes a downy 
 pillow, a couch of repose, relief, and peace. 
 
 In that family one figure especially commanded re- 
 spect and attracted attention. To introduce it to the 
 
readers is the only means of initiating them into the 
 intimate life of the Ch§,teau of Digoine. 
 
 Madame de Musy, then about sixty-five, was the 
 type of the Valiant Woman of the Old Testament, but 
 with all the pious tenderness and ardent charity of the 
 Christian of later times. Orabat et Zabordbat. She lived 
 for God, and God dwelt in her. The brightness, we 
 had almost said the glory, of her virtues illuminated the 
 ancient Chateau and all the little corner of Burgundy 
 that surrounded it. The mother of the paralytic priest 
 realised in our century the religious type of the ch§,te- 
 laine, such as it is sometimes shown to us by the Lives 
 of the Saints or the Golden Legend, in the old feudal 
 burghs of the Middle Ages. Above all, she rendered 
 her husband happy. " The heart of her husband," says 
 the Scripture, " doth safely trust in her, she will render 
 him good and not evil all the days of her life." For 
 half a century that sublime prophecy of the Scriptures 
 had been realised in the house of the Count de Musy. 
 
 She had brought up her two sons and her daughter 
 in the love of God and of their fellow-creatures, and 
 she watched with equal solicitude over the numerous 
 domestics who composed her household and whom she 
 regarded as the second degree of her family. If her 
 children loved her as a mother, her servants loved her 
 as a benefactress. All venerated her, and each one, 
 impregnated as it were with her spirit, and guessing her 
 thoughts, obeyed her at every hour of the day without 
 her ever having occasion to give an order. It was the 
 reign of intellect and the empire of love. Like Eliza- 
 beth of Hungary, she had a special predilection for the 
 poor and the unhappy. After morning prayer, Mass 
 
and meditation, she inaugurated each day by the 
 touching exercise of works of mercy. 
 
 As early as ten in the morning, a procession of the 
 sick and indigent might be seen coming towards the 
 Chateau to seek from her hand the help that was never 
 refused them. " I have just been knocking at God's door," 
 she would then say as she finished her oraison ; " now 
 God is knocking at mine." 
 
 Among her visitors were the needy of every sort. 
 One wanted a warm covering for winter ; another, broth, 
 or meat, or medicine for some sick person detained at 
 home ; another asked for baby linen ; several arrived 
 limping, or their arihs in slings, to have their wounds 
 dressed. 
 
 For Madame de Musy had determined, not only to 
 have a medicine chest for the distribution of remedies, 
 but to devote herself personally to the care of the sick 
 poor ; and for that purpose she had studied in her youth, 
 with extreme care and a rare perfection, the first secrets 
 of the art of healing. No one knew better than she 
 how to prescribe an antidote for a fever or a cooling 
 draught for a restless patient. Every sort of suffering 
 found its specific where she was ; she knew what it 
 ought to be, she had it and she gave it ; nay, more, her 
 noble hands were made the servants of pain, binding up 
 wounds, dressing ulcers, spreading over each sore the 
 healing ointment that was to calm and cure it. Or 
 with a large apron on, like a Sister of Charity, she would 
 take by turns from her case of instruments, either a pair 
 of scissors for cutting away dead or proud flesh, or 
 nitrate of silver for burning it off, or a curved needle 
 for sewing up a wound. Everything was done with 
 
9 
 
 thoughtful care and a feeling of tender commiseration. 
 Nothing could surpass the firmness and gentleness of 
 her operations and dressings ; she had if one might so 
 express it, the dexterity of love — her fingers were in- 
 fluenced by the delicacy of her nature. 
 
 In some cases she would say : " What you have the 
 matter with you is beyond my reach, you must see the 
 doctor. Sit down and warm yourself while I send for 
 him.'' Then the doctor would come, and the admirable 
 sick nurse would take another lesson from him as she 
 stood by while he attended the patient. 
 
 The labourers and vine-dressers to whom some acci- 
 dent had happened, perhaps a cut or a sprain, would 
 hasten to Madame de Musy from all the neighbourhood, 
 and from many leagues round. If anyone asked them : 
 " Where are you going in this state, my good man ? " the 
 answer would be : "I am going to be cured by the 
 'Good Lady'"! 
 
 " The Good Lady ! " It was the name, the only name, 
 by which she was known in the whole country-side. 
 To the question so often asked — " What is glory ? " we 
 might reply, " True glory is this ! " 
 
 Madame de Musy had a lieutenant, a right arm, a 
 helper after her own heart. Claudine was always near 
 her mistress, and at a sign from her, after the wound had 
 beeni dressed, or the sprain bound up, the old house- 
 keeper would go and fetch from her inexhaustible cup- 
 boards and store-rooms, clothes, linen, or food — remedies 
 of another sort for the dire evil of want — which were 
 distributed with wisdom and judgment. 
 
 Many of these poor people brought fuU baskets with 
 them, which they emptied on the table under the eye 
 
10 
 
 of the traditional Claudine. Everywhere else they 
 simply asked an alms, but beneath this charitable roof 
 they effected an exchange. The "Good Lady" had 
 found means to make the weakest of those poor dis- 
 inherited ones work without fatigue for the common 
 good. She had taught them to know a certain number 
 of medicinal plants, and had said to them, " When you 
 see them on your road, pick them and bring them to 
 me. In that way, yoii, who are poor, wiU exercise 
 charity towards the sick." 
 
 So they made a collection of simples ; and going from 
 Digoine with their baskets filled to the brim with succu- 
 lent provisions in exchange for the grass of the fields, 
 having received besides a most cordial " Thank you," 
 from the mistress of the house, the poor creatures would 
 depart- with a certain delightful consciousness of having 
 been public benefactors. 
 
 Whoever was in need or suffering, no matter what 
 their Belief or Unbelief, their conduct or misconduct, 
 were sure to find easy access to the " Good Lady ". 
 She often used to say : " Our Lord never made any 
 distinction between the ' deserving ' or the ' undeserv- 
 ing' poor. If they are unhappy, it is a sufficient 
 reason for helping them. God alone is the judge." 
 
 " God alone is the judge ! " That thought guided her 
 conduct, regulated her speech, and controlled even her 
 silence. Notwithstanding the depth of her convictions 
 and the natural vivacity of her disposition, she was 
 never heard to speak ill, either of those whose ideas 
 were opposed to hers, of persons who did not follow 
 the path she trod herself, nor yet, which is still more 
 rare in this world, of her neighbours, her acquaint- 
 
11 
 
 ances, or her friends. Evil speaking, remarks on the 
 personal affairs of others, on their faults or defects, 
 fault-finding, back-biting — all those sins of speech which 
 form the substance of most conversation in the country 
 — were carefully excluded from the Ch§,teau of Digoine. 
 
 Madame de Musy suffered cruelly and burned with 
 indignation if a word prejudicial to others was uttered 
 in her presence, but she controlled herself and allowed 
 nothing to escape her which could distress her visitors. 
 If their conversation took a tone she disapproved, the 
 mistress of the house went on with her work, and 
 maintained a silence so profound that it was understood, 
 and, as it were, heard like the irrepressible voice of 
 conscience. Then, resuming the dialogue again by some 
 easy and graceful transition, an interesting anecdote, or 
 a philosophical reflection, she would simply give another 
 turn to the current of talk, and thus maintain the rights 
 of charity towards the absent without having been 
 wanting in courtesy to the persons present. Instead of 
 noisily driving slander away, she politely dismissed it, 
 going pleasantly to the door with it and there bidding 
 it a final adieu. 
 
 Her intellect, naturally of a high order, had been 
 carefully developed; and she excelled in the art of 
 conversation. She could joke and smUe on occasion, 
 but her disposition was more inclined to gravity, and 
 she loved to draw the conversation from all other topics 
 to the higher regions of religion and philosophy. 
 
 Many souls full ,of trouble, many minds overwhelmed 
 with difficulties had recourse to her counsels. And in 
 such cases she was a clever and delicate confidante, 
 inexhaustible in charity and resource. The troubles 
 
12 
 
 hidden beneath silk and gold were no less efficaciously 
 succoured by her than the material miseries that showed 
 themselves beneath their ragged coverings. 
 
 The little kingdom of Digoine was worthy of such a 
 queen. M. de Musy was one of those men whom the 
 Scriptures designate by a term as grand as it is brief. 
 He was a "just man," under the eye of God. 
 
 Humbert, Victor, and Genevieve had been brought 
 up in this noble school of Christianity and virtue, and 
 the succeeding generation, composed of Humbert's two 
 children, Marie and Symphorien, were being formed by 
 the light of the same examples. 
 
 There was a friend, almost an adopted son, who lived 
 in the house and made one of the family. Providence 
 had placed him beneath that favoured roof where he 
 had gained the affection of all. His name was the 
 Abbd Antoine. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Some years previously, when on a visit to Mgr. 
 Decouvoux at Evreux,, Victor de Musy, whose eyes 
 were already failing him, had taken for his reader a boy 
 to whom he became attached. He had him educated, 
 and the young man, hearing within himself as he grew 
 up, the voice of God, entered the Seminary of Saint 
 Sulpice and received Holy Orders. He was the young 
 Abb^ of whom we speak, and he occupied the position 
 of secretary to the paralytic priest. 
 
 AH the care and solicitude of these noble hearts were 
 centred on the poor invalid. Who shall tell what 
 fervent prayers daily ascended for his recovery ? 
 
 Although the faculty had pronounced in the most 
 
13 
 
 positive manner on the incurable nature of the paralysis, 
 they recalled to mind, sometimes, a far-away circum- 
 stance which roused in their hearts a faint glimmer of 
 hope. At the heginning of Victor's illness (a long time ago 
 now), Mile. Genevieve had gone on a pilgrimage to Ars. 
 
 " Will my brother ever be cured ? " she asked of the 
 venerable Cure. 
 
 "Make a noveno to Sainte Philomfene, and after I 
 will answer you." 
 
 When the noveno was ended, Genevieve again con- 
 sulted the Man of God. 
 
 " Will my brother ever be cured ? " 
 
 " He will recover .one day, but you must have 
 patience." 
 
 " Will he be radically cured so as to have no remem- 
 brance of his illness ? " 
 
 " Yes, he wiU be radically cured so as to forget his 
 illness completely, but you must have patience ! . . ." 
 
 And the Priest's thoughts seemed to penetrate through 
 space into the mysterious depths of the unfathomable 
 future. 
 
 So said Genevieve. . . . But, alas ! was it quite 
 sure that the good Cur6 of Ars was favoured with the 
 gift of prophecy ? Was it quite sure that Mile. Gene- 
 vieve's memory was absolutely to be trusted ? Was it 
 quite sure that the ardent desire of her heart had not 
 attached to some vague words of hope, such as pity 
 pours into the ear of the afflicted, an imaginary sense 
 and meaning as of a certain promise and an assured 
 vision of things to come ? 
 
 Notwithstanding his infirmity, the Abb6 de Musy 
 found means to lead an active life. He had books of 
 
14 
 
 religion or study read to hira, or he dictated letters, or 
 received visits from pious persons who applied to him 
 for confession or guidance. Sometimes, even, when his 
 voice was pretty strong, he would be carried to the 
 pulpit and there preach the Word of life. 
 
 He might be seen, nearly every day, passing tin the 
 carriage which he often drove himself. Carried along 
 by the obedient strength of the animal under his hand,- 
 he would almost feel for the moment an illusiori, as it 
 were, of returning life and vigour. In this iway he 
 went about the neighbourhood of Digoinfe ■ wherever 
 there was trouble to be relieved, courage to be raised, 
 or some charitable work to be accomplished. He sat 
 at the bedside of the sick, and remembering the teach- 
 ings of the " Good Lady " at whose school he had 
 received many a useful lesson, would advise the treat- 
 ment to be followed. Ill himself, he gave health to 
 others. But most often his prescription was : " Go and 
 see my Mother ". 
 
 He was very popular in those parts where everyone 
 knew him, and where, with the exception of his stay at 
 the Seminary, and the short visit to Evreux, his child- 
 hood and painful youth had been passed. Although he 
 wore the priest's habit, he was looked ujon above aU, 
 as the son of the Ch§,teau of Digoine. In spite of his 
 title of Abb^ and his cassock, the domestics and the 
 country people hardly ever called him otherwise than 
 " Monsieur Victor ". 
 
 V. 
 
 At some little distance from Digoine stood another 
 Burgundian mansion in which lived, or rather in which 
 
15 
 
 was dying, an old relative of the family, M. de Montagu, 
 He suffered from dropsy of the heart, a hopeless disease 
 that was hurrying him to the grave. The paralytic 
 priest went to see him frequently, and the two men so 
 cruelly tried, happy in each other's society, forgot their 
 sufferings in long and interesting conversations. It was 
 then October, 1870. 
 
 But what did they find to say, and what was the 
 constant subject of their talks ? It is so consoling to 
 teU one's troubles to a friend that perhaps they com- 
 plained to each other of their afflictions. ISTot at all. 
 They were christians, and their souls rose far above 
 mere personal considerations. Neither the old man 
 leaving the world, nor the young priest condemned to a 
 life of impotence, had any thought for themselves. They 
 talked of France and they talked of God: of France 
 vanquished and God forgotten. In sounding the causes 
 of our terrible defeat they rightly attributed them, not 
 to the errors of military tactics, which were, however, 
 most glaring, but rather to moral defection. "God," they 
 would often say, " has been driven from our laws, our 
 institutions, and our army. What can prevent the 
 edifice from crumbling to ruin when the foundation is 
 taken away." 
 
 "Can you believe, Victor,'' M. de Montagu would 
 say, "that in the whole army of France, the eldest 
 daughter of the Church, there is not, at the present 
 time, a single chief who, before the battle, publicly asks 
 for the alliance and help of the Almighty? Can 
 you believe that not a single battalion has its colours 
 marked with a christian sign ? Ah ! if France and her 
 soldiers would but return to God, the Master who now 
 
16 
 
 punishes us for our instruction would cease to chastise 
 when once we had understood the lesson. There must 
 be a reaction before we can act ; we must turn back, 
 before we can march forward; we must conquer our- 
 selves, before we can conquer others." 
 
 " Alas ! we are far from that ! " cried the Abb^ de 
 Musy. 
 
 " Who knows ? . . . They say that Cathelineau and 
 Charette are busy raising a Catholic regiment. If it be 
 so they shall have my son Stephen, and while the father 
 dies here, praying for his country, the son shall give his 
 life for it on the field of battle. It is certain that such 
 a body of volunteers, formed in the name of God, and 
 of His Christ, will be a temfic legion. Even if only a 
 handful of men, the Lord will grant such great and 
 special glory to their arms that the little cohort shall 
 shine like a star in the darkened firmament of our 
 national disasters. And Evidence will force History to 
 the conclusion, that if but half the army had resembled 
 that heroic and christian Legion, France would have 
 triumphed and been saved." 
 
 While agreeing with M. de Montagu in these ideas, 
 to which he was constantly recurring with the perti- 
 nacity peculiar to old age, the Abb6 de Musy could not 
 help wondering sometimes, whether the half-dogmatic, 
 half-prophetic assertions of this relative were not rather 
 the dreamy fancies of a brain weakened by age and 
 sickness. 
 
 About this time the Prussians occupied a third of the 
 territory. Almost the whole of our regular army was 
 in captivity beyond the Ehine or imprisoned within the 
 walls of Metz. Paris was besieged, and the German 
 
17 
 
 troops had marched forward from day to day without 
 once encountering a single check or having to give way 
 one single step. Instead of the battalions of the Crimea 
 and Italy we had poor inexperienced recruits directed 
 by a government of adventurers. Such was the situa- 
 tion. 
 
 "Now," resumed M. de Montagu, one day as he 
 ended the conversation, " you and I must do our duty. 
 We must try to save our country, and turn the fortunes 
 of our arms." 
 
 On hearing such an extraordinary proposal from a 
 man almost at his last gasp, to a priest miserably para- 
 lysed and motionless in his invalid chair, the Abb6 de 
 Musy turned on his companion a surprised and anxious 
 look. 
 
 " Alas ! what can we do except pray ? " 
 
 "Praying is fighting," replied the old gentleman 
 gravely ; " but we can do more. We can act." 
 
 " In what manner ? " 
 
 "The Blessed Margaret-Mary wrote these words: 
 France, will he, saved hy the Sacred Heart. Well! 
 Perhaps the time so foretold has now arrived, for 
 Prance seems really threatened with destruction. Let 
 us try, therefore, to put into the hands of our soldiers, 
 and at the head of our defenders, a truly christian stan- 
 dard, with the venerated emblem of the Heart of Jesus 
 Christ embroidered in its folds. We wiU do all we 
 possibly can for that : of ourselves, by our friends, and 
 by our coimections : and we wHL send that banner to 
 Paris, that it may float, in testimony of the Faith of 
 France, on the walls of our besieged capital." 
 
18 
 
 VI. 
 
 The Abb^ de Musy was so struck by the idea that he 
 immediately resolved to put it into execution. " It is 
 you who have originated the thought," he said ; " I will 
 see that it is accomplished." 
 
 It has not been forgotten that he was unable to write 
 himself, because of the state of his eyes, and it happened 
 that the Abb^ Antoine was away at the time. He dic- 
 tated, therefore, to his sister Genevieve a pressing letter 
 for the Superioress of the convent of the Visitation of 
 Paray-le-Monial couched in these terms : " I beg you 
 to have executed, by the nuns of your Community and 
 at my expense, a banner of the Sacred Heart, on which 
 is to be embroidered in letters of gold, as a remembrance 
 of our Lord's promise to the Blessed Margaret-Mary, 
 Gmur de Jesus, sauvez la France .'" In a few days came 
 the answer of the Eeverend Mother, informing them 
 that the banner had been sent off. " I have had the 
 same idea for a long time," she wrote, " but I waited to 
 know the will of God. Your request was to me as a 
 voice from Heaven. We set to work immediately . . . 
 The Banner is finished, and I have sent the case con- 
 taining it to Mgr. Bouange, Archdeacon of Autun, 
 begging him to forward it to you." No later than the 
 next day, in fact, the prelate informed the masters of 
 the Oh§,teau of Digoine that the Banner was in his pos- 
 session. 
 
 VIL 
 
 It was no easy matter to introduce this new sort of 
 Labarum into Paris, and hand it over to General Trochu. 
 
19 
 
 The enemy surrounded the capital on every side, and 
 intercepted all communication. 
 
 There lived at that time, at Tours, where the govern- 
 ment of the National defence had taken refuge, an 
 illustrious servant of God, M. Dupont. 
 
 Twenty years before, young Victor de Musy had re- 
 covered his voice before the Sacred Face of Our Lord, 
 venerated in the house of that eminent christian, and 
 • was thus enabled to continue and terminate his ecclesi- 
 astical studies, and be received into Holy Orders. He 
 saw, therefore, in M. Dupont, a valuable auxiliary, and 
 to him he sent the Banner of the Sacred Heart. 
 
 " If possible," he wrote, " try and forward it to General 
 Trochu; if not, entrust it to one of the chiefs of our 
 heroic crusaders, for example, M. de Charette or M. de 
 Cathelineau." It happened that, by a remarkable 
 coincidence. General de Charette arrived at Tours at 
 that very time, to effect the definitive organisation of 
 liis battalions ; and he said to M. Dupont, who had gone 
 to call upon him at the Hdtel de Londres : " My zouaves 
 wear the emblem of the Sacred Heart on their breasts, 
 and the only thing they want now is the Standard ". 
 
 " Providence has sent it you," replied the servant of 
 God. A few hours later, in M. Dupont's oratory and 
 before the picture of the Sacred Face, the box contain- 
 ing the Banner of the Sacred Heart, that banner pro- 
 cured by the Abb^ de Musy from the nuns of the 
 Visitation, was opened in the presence of a few pious 
 christians. M. de Charette received it as a gift from 
 heaven and an assurance of glory.* 
 
 * The case containing tlie Banner was opened before the Sacred 
 Face. The persons present were ; General de Charette, M. Dupont, 
 
20 
 
 This royal and patriotic standard was the rallying 
 point of the volunteers of the West. Beneath its shade, 
 or rather beneath its light, was fought the battle of 
 Patay : the noblest deed of arms chronicled in our his- 
 tory during those disastrous times. 
 
 Three martyrs, M; de Verthamon, and MM. de 
 BouilM, father and son, perished successively in the 
 brief interval of half-an-hour, while raising on high 
 the Banner of Jesus and of France. And during that 
 time, under the fire of a formidable artillery extending 
 over fifteen hundred metres, the terrible Legion rushed 
 on an enemy ten times their number, executing in 
 modern times, and for the defence of their country, a 
 charge as memorable as the famous resistance of the 
 three hundred Spartans buried at Thermopylee. 
 
 M. de Montagu had enrolled his son Stephen amongst 
 the volunteers of France, and the young man had 
 valiantly fought beneath the Catholic Standard pro- 
 cured by the initiative of his pious father and the 
 prompt action of the Abb^ de Musy. He did not, how- 
 ever, long survive those terrible struggles in which he 
 had received incurable wounds. Two years of suffering 
 and weakness brought him to the tornb, and when he 
 felt his end approaching, and the moment near when 
 
 M- Eatel, Dr. de la Tremblaye aad his son Martin de la Tremblaye, 
 novr a Benedictine in tlie Congregation of Solesmes ; tte Duchess of 
 Fitz^James, the children of M. de Charette, and Mme. Enule Lafon. 
 
 Prayer was made before the Sacred Face for the safety of France : 
 it was decided that the Banner should be entrusted to the R. F. Rey 
 to be deposited in the tomb of Saint Martin untE the morrow, and that 
 these words should be embroidered on the back of it : " Saint Martin 
 proiegez la France ! " The design for the embroidery was immediately 
 made by the ladies present, and executed by the Carmelite nuns. {Life 
 of M. Dupont, by the Abbe Janvier, Vol. II., p. 468.) 
 
21 
 
 he should join his father, — called to God some little 
 time before — he had himself taken to Lourdes to die 
 there. The- Sacred Heart had protected his life on the 
 hattle-field : the Immaculate Virgin blessed and con- 
 soled his dying hour. The body of Stephen de Montagu 
 reposes at Lourdes ; and from its resting-place in that 
 sacred ground it will rise again, at the hour hidden from 
 all — the hour of the resurrection of the dead. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 While the Standard of the Sacred Heart, given to the 
 Christian Legion by the Abbe de Musy, was pursuing 
 its glorious career, the long hours of national mourning 
 were passed at Digoine in works of mercy and in prayer. 
 They visited the sick and wounded who had come back 
 to their homes ; they came to the help of those whom 
 the departure, or, alas ! the death, of a son or a husband 
 had left without resource ; they provided for those 
 whom the war had made orphans ; they made lint or 
 cut up bandages ; in short, their charity assumed eveiy 
 form and discharged every office ; and in the evening 
 when the duties of the day were accomplished, they 
 found strength and courage for the morrow's work by 
 turning their eyes, their thoughts, and their conversa- 
 tion towards the things of heaven and the mercies of 
 God. After the evening meal, all the inhabitants of 
 the Ch§,teau assembled for reading and prayer. The 
 food that sustained their physical strength was served 
 in different rooms, the dining-room or the servants' hall, 
 according to the social distinctions ordained by an 
 All-wise Providence ; but the spiritual bread of the 
 
22 
 
 soul was broken in common, and at the sound of the 
 bell, masters and servants hastened to gather round 
 the same lamp, to listen together to the words of Divine 
 Truth that fell from the lips of the reader. 
 
 At that dreadful period of war, by the permission, or 
 rather by the Will of God, the book chosen for the. 
 •evening readings at the Ch§,teau was the one bearing 
 the title of Notre Dame de Lourdes; and the family, 
 prepared by a long practice of evangelical virtues, to 
 appreciate in a special manner whatever served to cele- 
 brate the Greatness and Mercy of the invisible Master 
 of the World, were deeply touched by this history of 
 the Apparitions and Miracles of Mary in our own times. 
 They listened with clasped hands and tearful eyes to the 
 recital of those divine events, recalled by the narrator 
 under the auspices of Faith, Hope and Love. 
 
 " No, no," they would say, " God cannot have aban- 
 doned France, since on its soil, His Most Holy Mother 
 has chosen to appear to men, and enrich them with her 
 gifts. . . . The catastrophe that overwhelms us is a 
 trial, not an irredeemable ruin, and the Vision of 
 Lourdes, like the Star in the East, announces that 
 sooner or later we shall be saved." 
 
 It was a strange circumstance that, though the book 
 often treated of miraculous cures, neither the Abb^ de 
 Musy, nor any member of the family circle (except, per- 
 haps, the Mother, in the secret of her heart), seemed to 
 have the least idea of asking a similar grace for him. 
 Indeed, the Abbe de Musy had been so often pronounced 
 incurable by the doctors, that he was completely re- 
 signed to his fate, and had had no thought for many years 
 of the possibility of being cured of his disease by any 
 
23 
 
 means either natural or supernatural. He did not even 
 "wish it. The successive attacks of paralysis had ap- 
 peared to him as the graduated stations of the steep 
 path, always ascending, that the Imitation of Jesus 
 Christ calls " The Eoyal road of the Cross ". 
 
 " We have each our vocation," he would say ; " mine 
 is infirmity. I wanted to be a priest ; God intended 
 me to lead a life of suffering. May His Holy Name 
 be praised ! " 
 
 IX. 
 
 The war was over, and a great religious movement 
 was manifest in Catholic France. Streams of Christians 
 flowed from all parts towards Lourdes to supplicate the 
 Virgin who had appeared to Bernadette ; and the Eocks 
 of Massabiella were, so to speak, bathed in the count- 
 less and incessant waves of prayer that broke at their 
 base, always the same yet always varying, sublime in 
 their unity and variety. The unbelieving world was 
 lost in amazement at the sight of that perpetual and 
 universal Procession of Peoples, rendered still more 
 remarkable by the accomplishment of such miracles as 
 had never been seen in any age. 
 
 By a counter movement easily understood, the im- 
 mense tide setting in towards Lourdes revived the great 
 idea and religious practice of Christian Pilgrimage, and 
 turned public attention to other centres of prayer. 
 Crowds of the Faithful reappeared at Eocamadour, 
 Paray-le-Monial and Chartres. 
 
 Now, Paray-le-Monial is only three hours from 
 Digoine, and the Abbd de Musy, whose devotion to- 
 wards the Sacred Heart had in some sort increased 
 
24 
 
 two-fold by all we have related about the ' Standard of 
 Patay, resolved, all helpless as he was, to go and visit 
 the celebrated place where, two hundred years before, 
 the devotion so dear to him had originated. Accom- 
 panied by one of his servants he arrived at Paray at 
 the end of May, 1873, intending to pass all the month 
 of June there. 
 
 The first person he met on entering the humble and 
 celebrated village, was a poor paralytic beggar, pain- 
 fully dragging himself along by the help of crutches, 
 with his feet encased ia shapeless wrappings, and 
 begging his bread. For five and twenty years the 
 people of Paray -le-Monial had been familiar with the 
 figure of the old man, whose head, superb and resigned, 
 bronzed by the sun and the inclemencies of the seasons, 
 shone, nevertheless, with the peculiar halo sometimes 
 observed, and not without religious awe, in that mys- 
 terious presence known to aU civilised nations by the 
 august name of " the Poor ". 
 
 The Abb6 de Musy was particularly touched by the 
 sight of an infirmity so exactly like his own, and being 
 powerless to relieve the unfortunate man in his physiced 
 sufferings, he took pleasure in lightening the burden of 
 his poverty. His left hand ignored what his right 
 hand did, but it is probable that his alms were liberal 
 and accompanied by gracious and pleasant words, such 
 as flowed habitually from his heart and softened the 
 sorrows of the afflicted. Hand ignara malis, miseris 
 succurrere disco. The poor man blessed his benefactor, 
 and his grateful eyes rested for an instant on his face 
 with a strange intensity of expression. Whether the 
 man was a stranger to the place, or whether he was 
 
25 
 
 ■without family, it is impossible to say ; all that was 
 known of him was his christian name. They called 
 him Jean Marie. 
 
 Two days after, on the 2nd of June, five hundred 
 pilgrims from Marseilles arrived at Paray. The Abbe 
 de Musy, drawn along in his invalid chair, followed the 
 processions, and took part in all the services. The 
 preacher who announced the Word of God to the people, 
 remarked, in the congregation, the paralytic priest lis- 
 tening attentively, and after Mass he hastened to him 
 to give him some fraternal proof of sympathy. As he 
 talked with him, hope rose in his heart, the hope that 
 the afi&icted priest would one day see, in this life, the 
 end of his trials. 
 
 " You will be cured," he said, with an accent of cer- 
 tainty which surprised himself. " Promise me two 
 things, to pray for my parish, and to write and tell me 
 when you recover." 
 
 " The first promise is easy to keep," replied the in- 
 valid ; " but the second depends on the Will of God." 
 And he shook his head with a smUe of incredulity. 
 This took place in the morning. 
 
 In the evening an extraordinary and unexpected event 
 profoundly affected the pilgrims of Marseilles. 
 
 Paray-le-Monial is a place of prayer where the 
 celestial effusions of spiritual .life descend softly , into 
 the soul; but it is only very exceptionally a land of 
 miracles. The diversity of the gifts of God, spoken of 
 by St. Paul in reference to persons, seems equally ap- 
 plicable to things. Just as in the sacraments, the water 
 of Baptism, the sacred chrism of Confirmation, or the 
 holy oils of Extreme Unction are so many channels of 
 
26 
 
 different graces, so certain privileged sanctuaries and 
 certain centres of devotion are more particularly dis- 
 tinguished by especial supernatural advantages and 
 benefits. But, as it sometimes happens that at the 
 instant of Baptism, the gifts of the Holy Spirit peculiar 
 to Confirmation descend on the catechumen, in like 
 manner, and at wide intervals, a few rare and miraculous 
 cures will take place, contrary to the usual order of 
 tilings, in Places of Pilgrimage that do not seem 
 habitually to have been established by God for those 
 particular graces. 
 
 The event which had excited the PUgrims on the 2nd 
 June, 1873, was precisely a miraculous cure — no other 
 than that of old Jean Marie, the beggar, who, the evening 
 before, when the Abb^ de Musy had given him alms, 
 had looked at him with such deep gratitude and such 
 strange intensity. At a certain moment, and while all 
 the congregation were kneeling in prayer, the paralytic 
 man suddenly stood up, and walking up the church 
 between the rows of the Faithful, went and deposited 
 his crutches, — the crutches he had used for twenty-five 
 years — on the tomb of the Blessed ' Margaret-Mary. 
 The Abbe de Musy's happiness was great when he 
 beheld the beneficent and almighty power of God, per- 
 iorming at Paray, on the indigent and infirm, the same 
 miracles as it had accomplished in other times by the 
 hands of Jesus on the banks of the lake of Genesareth. 
 He congratulated Jean Marie without any thought of 
 himself, for he had arrived, as we have already said, at 
 that state of resignation when hope no longer exists. 
 The joy he felt at the miraculous cure was full and 
 without alloy. 
 
27 
 
 " You will be walking and running now," said he 
 gaily to Jean Marie — " you, who for twenty-five years 
 have not been able to make so much as one step. But 
 the legs that God has cured must not go bare-footed. 
 I will give you your first pair of shoes." 
 
 It was one of his greatest daily pleasures, to converse 
 with the poor man and hear him talk of God. 
 
 X. 
 
 If the Abb4 de Musy had abandoned Hope, it hap- 
 pened that Hope had not abandoned him, but followed 
 him closely up. The words of the priest from Marseilles 
 were reiterated by other lips like an echo of the pro- 
 phecy of the Cur^ of Ars. He had been at Paray-le- 
 Monial about three weeks, when, on the 22nd of June, 
 one of his relatives, the Chanoinesse de Pomey, accom- 
 panied by her brother, M. de Pomey arrived at the 
 sanctuary of the Sacred-Heart. 
 
 The ancient title of Chanoinesse does not indicate, as 
 many suppose, a Keligious in the fullest acceptation of 
 the word. It is generally conferred as an honorary 
 distinction, and with the obligation of daily reciting a 
 particular Office, on certain persons of society to whom 
 the Church owes a debt of gratitude for some important 
 good work accomplished. His Eminence Cardinal' de 
 Bonald had obtained it for Mme. de Pomey. Although 
 there was a near relationship between this lady and the 
 Abb^ de Musy, they had, in the course of time, almost 
 entirely lost sight of each other, as so frequently happens 
 when members of the same family are separated by 
 distance. They had not met for twenty years, and in 
 all that time they had not exchanged one single letter. 
 
28 
 
 When Mme. de Pomey and her brother heard that 
 the Abb^ de MuSy was at Paray, they hastened to call 
 on him. The lady looked at him for a moment with 
 deep commiseration, as he sat, or rather lay, in his 
 invalid chair ; and then, appearing to respond to some 
 secret inspiration, she said in a tone of reproach and 
 surprise : 
 
 " What are you doing here. Cousin ?" 
 
 " Why," replied the paralytic priest, '' I am doing 
 what all the other pilgrims do, and what you are doing 
 yourself : I pray, I begin and end novenos, I say the 
 psalms and the rosary, I join my poor efforts to the 
 fervour of these pious souls" 
 
 " Well, you have no business here ; you. had better go 
 at once !" she interrupted. 
 
 " What ! you advise me to go away ? " The astonished 
 priest could hardly believe his ears. 
 
 " Certainly I do ! " returned the Chanoinesse. " Your 
 place is not here : The Blessed Virgin inteTwis to cure you 
 at Lourdes." 
 
 " How do you know ?" asked the invalid, ironically. 
 " Are you initiated into the secrets of heaven ?" 
 
 " No, but I am certain the Blessed Virgin means to 
 cure you at Lourdes." 
 
 "You pronounce your oracles with the accent of a 
 Pythia of Delos or Delphi — she also was convinced, but 
 mistaken," resumed the Abbe de Musy, still incredulous. 
 
 " I am not mistaken. Go to Lourdes. The Blessed 
 Virgin means to cure you there." 
 
 " My dear cousin, let us be serious and practical. I 
 feel your benevolent interest deeply ; it proves how 
 anxious you are to see me relieved of my sufferings. 
 
29 
 
 But that is a most improbable eventuality. I have no 
 right to miraculous favours which are reserved for those 
 more worthy of them than I am. However, what is 
 not only probable but certain is, that a long journey to 
 one in my position is a terrible undertaking, full of 
 fatigue and pain ; therefore, I must think twice before I 
 set off to seek, at some hundreds of leagues of distance, 
 a problematic cure that I neither hope nor ask for. But 
 although it is difficult for me to move, I contrive every 
 year, about August, to stay for a few weeks at some 
 watering-place, such as Ems, Hambourg, la Bauche, or 
 Divonne, and by that means I prevent my chronic 
 infirmity becoming more intolerable by the addition of 
 sharp and almost insupportable pains that invariably 
 rack my frame during the winter if I have not taken 
 the precaution of making a cure of mineral waters, which 
 permits me to go through the cold weather pretty easily. 
 Now, I cannot go to Lourdes and Divonne at the same 
 time, and this year my brother is going to Divonne with 
 me. Do you really think it wise or prudent to leave 
 the certain for the uncertain, to give up the tried effects 
 of the waters, that I may run after a miracle, and sO' 
 seem to be trying to force the hand of Providence ?" 
 
 " Come, sister," said M. de Pomey, intervening, " leave 
 Victor alone; do not tease him with your imaginary 
 notions, but let him do as he thinks best." 
 
 "Why cannot I implant something of my faith in 
 your hearts !" resumed the Chauoinesse, more persis- 
 tently than ever. " I tell you he must go to Lourdes ! " 
 
 "And next winter," continued the Abb6 de Musy,. 
 " when, through having missed my season at the waters,. 
 I feel through my shoulders, my knees, my back, shooting 
 
30 
 
 pains of such violence that they make me cry out, I 
 shall say, 'I owe that to my cousin de Pomey'." 
 
 " I willingly accept the responsibility ; but you may 
 be sure that the Blessed Virgin means to cure you at 
 Lourdes." 
 
 There are innumerable proverbs on the obstinate 
 tenacity of a woman's will, and they are all true. The 
 Abb4 de Musy was vanquished. 
 
 "Well, so be it!" said he at last. " I resign myself 
 to my fate. But I cannot start before the return of the 
 Abb^ Antoine, who will have to be my compaiuon and 
 sick-nurse." 
 
 They looked at the almanack and calculated the 
 dates. 
 
 " You must start the 6th of August," said Mme. de 
 Pomey, " and you will arrive at Lourdes for the Feast 
 of the Assumption." 
 
 A few days after, the Abb^ de Musy heard some one 
 knock at the door. He called out, " Come in," and Jean 
 Marie entered. 
 
 " Sir," said the beggar, gravely, " you will be cured." 
 
 " How do you know ? " 
 
 " The night preceding my cure, I had a dream in 
 which everything was as clear to me as the sun at mid- 
 day. I felt that it was not an ordinary dream, but a 
 forewarning from heaven. In my dream, I saw myself 
 cured, . . . and on the morrow, as you know, I 
 stood up on my feet, and deposited my crutches on the 
 tomb of the Blessed Margaret-Mary." 
 
 " That is very extraordinary ! " said the Abb6 de 
 Musy, with the sort of shiver that nearly always passes 
 over one at the contact of the Supernatural. 
 
31 
 
 " Well," returned the beggar, " last night I had the 
 same sort of dream about you. I saw you, with, the 
 same clearness, cured and walking about like me, full 
 of health and strength." 
 
 This dream, coming immediately on the words of the 
 priest from Marseilles and the urgent persuasion of the 
 Chanoinesse de Pomey, struck the Abbd de Musy 
 forcibly. The prediction of the Cur^ of Ars, which up 
 to that time had been lost and half-effaced in the far- 
 ofi' mists of memory, now came vividly back to his 
 recollection. 
 
 XL 
 
 When the Abbd de Musy returned to Digoine towards 
 the beginning of July, he informed his family of the 
 promise he had made to go to Lourdes. The news of 
 that supreme appeal to Mary was received with a strange 
 mingling of hope and alarm. If, on the one hand, they 
 were all christians and knew that nothing is impossible 
 to God; on the other hand, such a long journey to a sick 
 man in the state of the Abb^ de Musy, was a trial 
 fraught with suffering and danger. It is written, " Trust 
 in the Lord " ; but it is also written, " Thou shalt not 
 tempt the Lord". The perplexity was great and the 
 struggle painful between the theological virtue of Faith 
 and the cardinal virtue of Prudence. Their hearts 
 oscillated from one sentiment to another according to 
 their different dispositions, and the impressions of the 
 passing hour, but all took refuge from their anxieties in 
 the universal remedy of prayer. 
 
 They wrote to different religious Communities and to 
 their friends, to ask them to join in a noveno that was 
 
32 
 
 to commence on the 8th of August, the day fixed by the 
 Abb^ de Musy for his arrival in the town of Mary. 
 From the depths of her Convent at Nevers, Bernadette, 
 to whom they applied, promised to unite her intentions 
 to those of the inhabitants of Digouie. 
 
 The Abb^ de Musy, however, siuce his return from 
 Paray, had felt his confidence gradually diminishing, and 
 although he determined, as a gentleman, to keep his 
 word, he had come by degrees to entertain no sort of 
 hope of being cured. 
 
 " It is useless for me to try to persuade myself," he 
 said ; " I doubt ! " 
 
 " I tremble," cried the father, alarmed at his son's 
 undertaking such a painful and adventurous journey. 
 
 "We hope!" responded Mile. Genevieve, M.Humbert, 
 and the young people. 
 
 "I believe," repeated the mother invariably. And 
 thus weeks passed away and the hour of departure ar- 
 rived. In the invalid priest's room the Abb^ Antoine 
 was packing and the Abb^ de Musy talking. 
 
 " I think it absolutely impossible, my good friend, 
 that the Blessed Virgin of Lourdes should restore me. 
 to health! . . . My vocation is to suffer. . . . 
 And yet, if Mary willed it and gave me strength enough 
 to go up again to the Altar in her sanctuary. . . . 
 Oh 1 then I should celebrate that Mass of my resur- 
 rection as I celebrated my first Mass thirteen years 
 ago, in the amice of the Cure of Ars. At all risks 
 we will take that amice. . . . But what am I 
 saying ? It is impossible I Nothing but a waking 
 dream ! " 
 
33 
 
 XII. 
 
 On the 6tla of August, the Abb6 be Musy left the 
 Chateau de Digoine for Lourdes, taking with him the 
 Abbd Antoine as his only travelling companion. 
 
 " Follow me with your prayers, it is all I ask ! " he 
 said to his family. 
 
 It was a lovely summer night when he started, the 
 weather was calm and warm, and the moon shone softly 
 over the fields and forests. At midnight the carriage 
 stopped at the railway station. 
 
 " We are at Chagny," said the Abb^ Antoine. 
 If the future could have been revealed to them, or if 
 they had had a presentiment at that moment, the name 
 of Chagny would have interested them strangely, and 
 they would have looked with attentive eyes on the 
 aspect of the town and the outline of the old church 
 spire. But the future was covered as with a veil, and 
 Chagny was nothing to them but the first painful stage 
 of their pilgrimage through France ; for there began the 
 difficulties and sufferings that attended the sick man 
 each time he had to be moved from the platform to the 
 train, or the train to the platform. 
 
 Two porters and the Abb^ Antoine carried him care- 
 fully on to the platform to wait the arrival of the train, 
 and the railway officials coming and going, carrjdng 
 luggage or giving and receiving orders, were moved with 
 pity at sight of him. 
 
 " Has he been long in this state ? " asked one of them. 
 "He has been nearly blind for twenty years, and 
 paralysed for eleven years." 
 
 3 
 
34 
 
 " And where is he going like that 1 " 
 
 " To Lourdes." 
 
 " What for ? " 
 
 " To be cured." 
 
 Most of these worthy men were but novices in re- 
 ligious matters, and it will be no calumny to say that 
 in manner and thought they differed widely from the 
 inhabitants of the Chateau of Digoine. Their lives 
 were passed amongst the amazing prodigies accom- 
 plished by modern science ; they only understood, alas ! 
 what was palpable, and were little inclined to believe 
 in miracles from heaven. Thus, the expression of con- 
 fident hope that would have appeared sublime to pious 
 souls, seemed, to the station-master and his men, some- 
 what innocent and foolish, and they looked at each 
 other as much as to say : — " If one of these priests is 
 weak in his body, they must be both of them uncom- 
 monly weak in their minds ". However, their opinions 
 in no way hindered their solicitude for the invalid, nor 
 prevented their taking the utmost care in carrying him 
 to the train, that the movement might not increase his 
 sufferings. If they were far from the faith of the Cen- 
 turion, they had, at least, the charity of the Good 
 Samaritan, and without doubt the hand of the Heavenly 
 Father blessed their active zeal and their kindly com- 
 miseration. 
 
 The paralysed and helpless state of the Abbe de 
 Musy, the strange object of his journey, the distinction 
 of his person and the long time he had to wait at the 
 station, had attracted the attention, not only of the 
 railway officials, but also of the other travellers, inhabi- 
 tants of Chagny, who were going to take the night train. 
 
35 
 
 The recollection of the infirm priest going to seek in a 
 distant part of the country a cure that the Faculty 
 had pronounced impossible, occupied their thoughts and 
 fixed itself in their minds. 
 
 At every change of line, the Abb^ de Musy had to 
 be carried from one train to the other at the cost of 
 great pain, and after a few minutes of waiting, but not, 
 alas! of resting, the train resumed its course and steamed 
 rapidly towards the town of the Queen of Heaven, cruelly 
 shaking his aching limbs in its progress. 
 
 They slept at Cette and arrived at Lourdes the second 
 day after their departure from Digoine, on the Friday, 
 8th of August, in the evening. 
 
 Eooms had already been secured on the first floor of 
 a house in the street of the Grotto, and the paralytic 
 priest, exhausted with fatigue, was carried to them by 
 the Abbe Antoine and the driver of the fly in which 
 they had come from the station. 
 
 The ground-floor of the house where the two pilgrims 
 stayed was occupied by a shop of objects of piety. 
 They noticed a magnificent statue of Our Lady of 
 Lourdes. 
 
 " If I am cured," said the Abbd de Musy, " this statue, 
 the first that has met my eyes here, shall be the one I 
 take back to Digoine." . . . 
 
 XIIL 
 
 The following morning he was taken to the Crypt, to 
 be present at the Mass that the Abb6 Antoine was to 
 celebrate for him. The infirm, the paralytic, all those 
 afflicted by any visible infirmity, the pariahs of health. 
 
36 
 
 often feel a sort of shame in being seen thus disinherited 
 of a heavenly gift that nearly everyone possesses. They 
 dread the eye of man, and shrink instinctively from 
 even benevolent curiosity, most especially in the hour 
 of fervent prayer and profound meditation. The pity 
 of strangers, even of the best and most pious, seems 
 but superficial and troublesome when the aouT is in 
 silent and intimate union with the Almighty Consoler. 
 Something of this feeling induced the Abbd de Musy to 
 have his invalid chair rolled into a dark corner behind 
 a pillar to the left of the Altar. He would have liked, 
 were it possible, to be seen by none but the Virgin Mary. 
 But it happened that behind this pillar another cripple 
 had taken refuge, a poor chUd of the working classes 
 about fifteen years old, with a most angelic countenance. 
 A strongly -built workman had just laid him, with the 
 tender precaution of paternal solicitude, on two chairs. 
 His face was very pale and etherealised with long 
 suffering, his eyes were large and soft, and his hands 
 were fervently folded together, indeed, his whole person 
 expressed the interior beauty of the pure and innocent 
 soul that seemed ready to unfold its wings and soar to 
 the Heavenly Country. 
 
 The Abba's dim eyes were attracted by the boy as by 
 a light, and his heart was moved with sympathetic pity. 
 
 " What is your name ? " he asked him. 
 
 " My name is Pierre." 
 
 " Well, little Pierre, I will pray for you, and do you 
 pray for me." 
 
 " With all my heart, Monsieur I'AhM." . . 
 
 At this moment Mass began. After the consecration, 
 the officiating priest carried the Blessed Host to the 
 
37 
 
 Abb^ de Musy lying motionless in his chair. As for 
 little Pierre, the strong workman raised him in his arms, 
 and carrying him, extended across his chest, advanced to 
 the Holy Table where the priest gave Holy Communion 
 to the father and the child. 
 
 After Mass the Abb^ de Musy was taken .down to 
 the Grotto, where he remained a very long time. On 
 leaving, his friend asked him, " What was passing in 
 your mind just now when you were communing with 
 the Blessed Virgin ". 
 
 " I was praying to her. I invoked her for all I love, 
 for poor little Pierre whom we have just left, and who 
 is, at this moment, bathing in the miraculous water. I 
 begged for grace to be a better man. . . . Then I 
 remembered the special object of my pilgrimage, and 
 I said to our Mother : ' Cure me if it is for a greater 
 good. I do not even ask you to relieve me of all my 
 infirmities, but only to enable me to stand on my legs 
 so as to be able to celebrate Holy Mass.' I must own 
 that I was frightened at the daring of my prayer, so I 
 added: 'Holy Mother, if you do not cure me, I am 
 really so happy with my cross, that I shall thank you 
 quite as much as if you did '." 
 
 He then went and bathed in the piscina, but nothing 
 extraordinary took place. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 On returning to Lourdes, he said to the Abb^ Antoine, 
 " I must think of confessing ". 
 
 " Very well. I will go and fetch one of the Fathers 
 from the Grotto." 
 
38 
 
 "No, no!" replied the paralytic priest, "I want to 
 confess to the Cur^ of Lourdes, the Abb4 Peyramale. 
 He is a priest chosen of the Blessed Virgin. Try and 
 find him, and ask him to be good enough to come and 
 hear my confession." 
 
 The Abb^ Antoiae set off, but though he searched 
 for him the whole afternoon, he could not find him. 
 The next morning, Sunday, he went to the sacristy of 
 the parish church, and seeing a priest of severe aspect 
 about to go up to the Altar, he addressed him respect- 
 fully. 
 
 " Excuse me, sir, you are the Cur^ of Lourdes, I 
 think ? " 
 
 " I have not that honour," replied the priest. 
 
 " I beg pardon ! " resumed the Abb^ " but from the 
 description of M. Lasserre, I thought . . ." 
 
 " Ah ! if only I was like him in other things besides 
 personal resemblance ! " cried the priest, smiling at the 
 mistake. " Though he sometimes appears rough outside 
 he is all gentleness within, like Saint Paul. Fortis et 
 suavis. But here he is." 
 
 The Abb^ Peyramale at that instant opened the door 
 of the sacristy. 
 
 " Monsieur le Cur4, a crippled priest in the street of 
 the Grotto, wishes to confess to you." 
 
 "Tell him I will come as sooji as I have said 
 Mass." 
 
 About an hour after, the Abb^ de Musy saw him enter 
 his room. The Curd of the Apparitions saluted the in- 
 valid with a fraternal embrace. 
 
 " Courage ! " said he ; " if the Blessed Virgin takes up 
 your cause, you will soon be cured." 
 
39 
 
 Then he sat down beside the Abbe de Musy, and in 
 the secret of his chamber received his confession. And 
 when, in the name of God, he had pronounced the 
 words : Ego te absolve ah omnihus peccatis tuis, etc., he 
 rose and walked silently up and down the room, leaving 
 his penitent to meditation and prayer. He was, doubt- 
 less, praying himself also, and imploring her whose 
 apostle he was on earth, to grant their petitions and 
 vouchsafe them the cure of that long affliction. Then 
 the two priests had a conversation, in which the Abbd de 
 Musy related his history. The secret and inviolable 
 confession was succeeded by an intimate confidence, in 
 the course of which the thoughts and feelings instilled 
 by the Cur^ Peyramale into the heart of the invalid 
 might be resumed by the one word : " Hope ! " 
 
 It often happens, that when we suddenly find our- 
 selves in the presence of some illustrious man whom 
 we have known only by a portrait, sketched in outline 
 in the pages of a book, we feel a sensation of disap- 
 pointment. The contrary was the case with the Abb6 
 de Musy. He found the Cure of Lourdes just as he had 
 fancied him to be. Indeed the two priests understood 
 each other from the first : they spoke the same language, 
 they belonged to the same country, they were both 
 sons of Mary. 
 
 After the interview, the Abb^ Antoine heard the 
 double echo of their impressions. 
 
 " What a noble and priestly heart ! " cried the Cur^ 
 Peyramale on leaving the room ; " his mother must be a 
 saint." 
 
 " You are not mistaken," replied the young friend of 
 the house, who, better than anyone else, was acquainted 
 
40 
 
 with the virtues of the mistress of the Ch§,teau of 
 Digoine. 
 
 " How glad I am," said, on his side, the Abbe de Musy, 
 " that you brought me the Chosen Servant of Our Lady 
 of Lourdes ! I feel greater confidence since I have seen 
 him, and, as it were, a promise of a Miracle. He is 
 indeed the Priest of the Blessed Virgin, and his word 
 seems, in some sort, an engagement for the Queen of 
 Heaven to come to our help." 
 
 XV. 
 
 The pilgrims who hastened to Lourdes for the Feast 
 of the Assumption, soon remarked in their midst the 
 paralysed priest, stiU young, visible at all hours in his 
 invalid chair, either on the road to the Grotto — we 
 might call it with truth the Sacred Road — or in the 
 Crypt, or under the vaulted rocks of Massabiella. All 
 felt a deep interest in him, and a profound pity and 
 sympathy for this labourer of the Lord, who had been 
 powerless for so many years, and unable to work in his 
 Master's vineyard. 
 
 Christians who had come to invoke for themselves the 
 intervention of the Blessed Virgin, prayed for the un- 
 known priest as well. What spiritual alms are thus 
 given at Lourdes, of which we shall only know the 
 secret when the thick shadows that, on earth, veil the 
 mysteries of hfe, shall have disappeared, to give place to 
 the revelations of eternal light ! 
 
 Two days after his first visit, the Cur^ of Lourdes 
 came to see the Abb^ de Musy again. 
 
 " What ! " said he, " the Blessed Virgin has not cured 
 
41 
 
 you yet ? I shall quarrel with her," he added, smiling 
 at his threat, and speaking with a familiarity of ex- 
 pression that seemed almost excessive, but that holy 
 men of God have employed, from the times of Job and 
 David, down to the times of Vincent Terrier and the 
 Cur^ of Ars. 
 
 His cheerfulness, his confidence, his absolute faith, 
 and the promise of his prayers, brought renewed hope 
 to the hearts of the sick man and his companion. 
 
 " We have an advocate with Mary," they said to each 
 other. He was not the only one, however. Every 
 morning, when the Abb^ de Musy went to Mass in the 
 Crypt, he found little Pierre there before him, and 
 during the day he met him continually at the Piscina, 
 or in the winding paths leading to the Basilica, or at 
 the Grotto. These two christians, equally afflicted and 
 equally iimocent, sympathised with and consoled each 
 other. The conversation of the priest delighted the 
 child ; the sight of sufferings so angelically borne edified 
 and encouraged the priest. Thus their hearts were drawn 
 together by a tender friendship, and each prayed for the 
 other more fervently than for himself. The one who 
 arrived first at the Piscina kept the place for his friend. 
 Little Pierre did not leave it till the Abb6 Antoine 
 knocked at the door, and the Abb4 de Musy had got 
 into the habit of remaining till he heard the soft voice 
 of little Pierre, outside, asking for admittance. What a 
 strange intimacy had arisen between these two suffering 
 fellow-creatures, who, a week ago, were ignorant of each 
 other's existence, but who, coming to the sacred Grotto 
 from the two opposite extremes of France, had become, 
 beneath the regard of Our Lady of Lourdes, like old 
 
42 
 
 friends and brothers of the same blood. Cor unum et 
 anima una ! 
 
 The one, however, was a patrician of the higher 
 classes ; the father of the other was a poor working 
 shoemaker of the neighbourhood of Pan. The former 
 was a learned priest in the prime of life ; the latter a 
 child ignorant of all that men teach. One had the 
 terrible responsibility of great riches ; the other, besides 
 the trial of disease, bent under the cruel weight of in- 
 digence. But contrasts like these, which engender 
 division in societies without God, harmonise in the 
 superior unity of love amongst christians. And thus a 
 sublime friendship was formed before the Altar and in 
 the presence of the image of our divine Mother, between 
 these two, or rather these three persons, for the father 
 of little Pierre, the village shoemaker, Pierre Kochou, 
 shared the noble sentiments of his son, and was worthy 
 of such a child. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 On the 14th of August, a paralytic woman was sud- 
 denly cured at the Grotto. Meeting the Abb^ Antoine 
 a short time after, she encouraged him cordially. 
 
 " You must have confidence ! " she said ; " to-day it is 
 my turn, to-morrow, I hope, it wiU be your friend's. 
 The Blessed Virgin will hear and answer your prayers 
 for her glorious Feast of the Assumption." 
 
 The following day was, effectively, the 15th of August, 
 the date when the Church celebrates the triumphant 
 entry of the Mother of Jesus Christ into the kingdom 
 of her Son. Uncertainty and doubt gradually disap- 
 peared from the mind of the infirm priest before the 
 
43 
 
 rays of ever-increasing hope that rose like the dawn in 
 his heart, and attained by degrees to the full light of day. 
 That radiant daylight of hope of which the Saviour of 
 the world has said : " Si potes credere, omnia possihUia 
 sunt credenti : If thou canst believe, all things are pos- 
 sible to him that beheveth." "Whether it was illusion 
 or reality, it seemed to him that the atmosphere of the 
 miracle enveloped him, and the captive of so many long 
 years of impotent suffering, already pronounced the word 
 " Deliverance ! " as Columbus cried " Land ! land ! " 
 even before, with his bodily eyes, he had perceived the 
 continent beyond the limitless horizon. 
 
 " To-morrow ! to-morrow ! " murmured the priest with 
 trembling hps, " may it please Our Lady of Lourdes to 
 cure little Pierre, and heal me also if such be her 
 sovereign wiU." 
 
 The two priests passed a sleepless night from the 
 night of the 14th to the morning of the 15th of August, 
 and, as may be supposed, they passed it in prayer. The 
 stars trembled in the silent immensity of heaven, and 
 here and there, beneath the arches of cloistered chapels, 
 where the nightly office assembled the monks and the 
 religious ; in solitary rooms where Christian piety 
 watched the sick and dying ; on the couches of the just 
 where sleeplessness reigned; in thousands of different 
 places of the sleeping earth, numberless hearts, illumi- 
 nated like suns by the ardent light of Oraison, rejoiced 
 the eyes of the angels. " Hcce nunc benedicite Dominum 
 omnes servi Domini. . . . In noctihus extollite manus 
 vestras in sancta et ienedicite Dominum : Praise the 
 Lord, ye children; praise ye the name of the Lord. 
 . . . From the rising of the sun unto the going 
 
44 
 
 down of the same, the name of the Lord is worthy of 
 praise." 
 
 Thus the rapid hours flew by, and when the joyful 
 peals of silvery bells rang out simultaneously from the 
 Parish Church and the Basilica, announcing the morning 
 of the great Feast, one of the priests said to the other : 
 " How quickly the night has gone ! " 
 
 When we think and talk of the things of eternity, we 
 no longer feel the weight or the march of time : it is 
 annihilated by the immensity of our subject. 
 
 And now was heard the jingling of the harness bells 
 of two horses rapidly trotting down the street, and 
 the carriage that had been ordered the previous night 
 stopped at the door. 
 
 " We must start ! " said the Abb^ de Musy. " The 
 Curd of Lourdes is celebrating Mass, and his Memento 
 is for us. I wonder what this day wiU. bring ! " 
 
 And if, at that same hour, across hills and valleys, 
 mountains and rivers, tufted forests and boundless 
 plains, the eye could have penetrated into the silent 
 chapel of a Ch§,teau in the neighbourhood of Autun, 
 it would have perceived, by the light of the rising sun, 
 a woman with white hair, a mother, prostrate before 
 Clod, trembling with hope and expectation, and mur- 
 muring also : " What will this day bring ! " 
 
 XVII. 
 
 The hearts and thoughts of the inhabitants of Digoine 
 were turned towards Lourdes. How fervently they 
 followed the noveno of prayers ! with what avidity 
 they read the daily letters of the Abbd Antoine, giving 
 them news of the dear absent one ! 
 
45 
 
 If Faith -were banished from every other earthly 
 refuge, it would still be found in the heart of a mother. 
 Madame de Musy had no doubts. 
 
 " Yes," she had said to Genevieve, from the first day, 
 with a tone of certainty that admitted no objection, 
 " yes, my daughter, he will be miraculously cured, and 
 we shall see it with our eyes." 
 
 And with every moment that passed, her boundless 
 faith increased, admirable indeed in principle, but as 
 terrifying in reality as the joyous balancing of a child 
 playing over a precipice. . . . What would happen 
 if the branch broke or the cord gave way ? Still her 
 faith had assumed such proportions, that in the inti- 
 macy of family conversation she had come to speak 
 of her son's cure as of an accomplished fact. And 
 yet, there was in her mind a strange mixture of hap- 
 piness and alarm. It seemed to her that the cure 
 so ardently desired would be the signal of a fatal 
 separation, the entrance of her son into a new world 
 where she would not be able to follow him. She 
 thought of the mysterious words of our Lord, newly 
 risen from the tomb, to Magdalen when she drew near : 
 " Noli me tangere ! Touch me not ! " That was not like 
 the old times ! 
 
 " What a marvellous thing ! " she would often say ; 
 " it will be like a resurrection for him. ... I shall 
 tremble to speak to him, and I shall not dare to treat 
 him as I used to." 
 
 " But, mother, that would pain him." . . . 
 
 " Only think of the transformation we shall find in 
 him. God will have created him afresh. He will have 
 renewed his bones and moulded his flesh, as He did 
 
46 
 
 when He made Adam of the dust of the earth. Like 
 Moses when he came back from Mount Horeb, his 
 brow will reflect the glory of the Holy of Holies. 
 ... I shall be afraid to look at him ; only to think 
 of it makes my knees bend under me." 
 
 Thus was her radiant hope sometimes dimmed by a 
 shade of melancholy, as the pure surface of a summer 
 sky is now and then crossed by a light, fleecy cloud. 
 
 "He will be the son of the Blessed Virgin," she 
 would say dreamily; "but will he still be mine as 
 well ? " 
 
 The light clouds, however, melted quickly away in 
 the tranquil serenity of the atmosphere, and naught else 
 troubled the firmament of her happiness. 
 
 On the 14th of August, the vigil of the Assumption, 
 she said : " And he is really going to be cured ! What 
 joy ! My poor boy, he has well-earned such a reward ! 
 Such virtue ! Such patience ! Not one complaint in 
 twenty-two years ! " 
 
 " Oh, mother ! " cried Genevieve in vague terror, " do 
 not count too much upon it. Suppose he came back 
 from Lourdes without having been cured ! " 
 
 Madame de Musy pressed her daughter's arm, and in 
 a low, broken voice, and with an accent that moved her 
 profoundly, replied : — 
 
 " I am sure he will be cured ! To-morrow ! To- 
 morrow will be the sixth day. ... I shall receive 
 a telegram from Lourdes. He will be cured to-morrow 
 morning." 
 
 " And her eyes," relates Mile. Genevieve, " had an ex- 
 pression of celestial rapture. I was fully persuaded 
 that the telegram she had announced, and to which she 
 
47 
 
 was looking forward with such positive certainty, would 
 find her quite prepared." 
 
 Alas ! Providence, in its impenetrable designs, dis- 
 posed events quite otherwise to what was expected! 
 That night, the eve of the Feast, an old friend of the 
 family, the Abbe Bourbonne, Chaplain of the Visitation 
 at Paris, arrived at the Chateau of Digoine. 
 
 After an agitated night, void of sleep, and filled with 
 prayer, Madame de Musy rose before daybreak. 
 
 " It is the Assumption ! " she thought, " the triumph 
 of a Mother, of the Mother of mothers, the Mother of 
 Jesus Christ. . . . After having held in her arms 
 on Calvary the lifeless body of her Son, this is the day 
 on which she possessed Him anew and for ever, in all 
 the plenitude of His life both human and divine, reign- 
 ing over heaven and earth. And that, after first seeing 
 Him rise from the dead here, in this world ! God 
 of goodness, is it really true that, all unworthy as I am, 
 I am going to experience something of a similar 
 felicity ! " 
 
 Thus did her thoughts rise to heaven. Certain words 
 surprised on her lips the preceding day, raised a sus- 
 picion that she had offered her life in exchange for her 
 son's. Touching and redoubtable reversion ! 
 
 When she went down to the chapel, she found the 
 Abbd Bourbonne there, come like herself, to pray. 
 
 She confessed before the communion of the day, for 
 she felt herself on the verge of a crushing happiness, 
 and wished to be fortified by a renewal of strength 
 from heaven, that she might the better bear up against 
 her great earthly joy. Then she went and knocked at 
 the doors of her husband's, her son's, her daughter's, and 
 
48 
 
 her grand-children's rooms; she desired that from the 
 first dawn of the Feast they might invoke the Heavenly 
 Father for the beloved absent one, present, nevertheless, 
 in all their hearts. 
 
 " Come to prayers ! Come to prayers ! " 
 
 She called them to prayers for the special work she 
 desired to see accomplished, as one is called to work 
 for the ordinary labours of life. 
 
 The Abb^ Bourbonne went up into the pulpit of the 
 parish church, and asked the congregation to pray for 
 the sick priest, the father of the poor, who had gone to 
 seek his cure in the region of Miracles. The peasants 
 knelt with tears in their eyes, and recited : " Our 
 Father," and " Hail Mary," in favour of him who was 
 called in all the country-side, " the good Monsieur 
 Victor," and whom some among them, alarmed by his 
 long, painful journey, feared they would never see again. 
 
 Madame de Musy was at her window every minute, 
 looking along the road that leads to Epinac, where, 
 about ten kilometres from the Chateau, the telegraph 
 office was situated. But the hours went by and nothing 
 arrived. 
 
 Let us go back to the Abb6 de Musy. 
 
 Notwithstanding the early hour, the upper part of 
 the church was filled with the Faithful, come to share 
 in the celebration of the great Feast of the Assumption. 
 The two priests went to the Crypt where there were 
 but few persons, amongst whom, however, poor little 
 Pierre and his father occupied their usual places. 
 
 The high altar, dedicated to the Virgin, was disen- 
 gaged. So after rolling the invalid chair with its help- 
 less occupant, by the side of little Pierre, the Abbd 
 
49 
 
 Antoine, as he had done every day, but with a firmer 
 and more ardent hope, celebrated Holy Mass for the 
 intentions of his benefactor and friend. At the com- 
 munion he carried to him the body of the Lord, and 
 little Pierre, laid in his father's arms, was presented 
 before the Holy Table and also received the Bread of 
 life. 
 
 Mass was ended. Notwithstanding so many fervent 
 invocations, and so many promising presentiments, 
 nothing of what had been asked for and expected had 
 taken place. Neither of the invalids was cured nor 
 even relieved. The Queen of Heaven seemed deaf to 
 their supplications. 
 
 The Abbe Antoine tried to be resigned, and reflected 
 with great reason that, of its proper nature, a miracle is 
 an exceptional event even at Lourdes, and that God and 
 His Most Holy Mother are not less merciful in refusing 
 it than in according it, from time to time, to the prayers 
 of the faithful. His afflicted heart found in this Chris- 
 tian philosophy the consolation he really needed. 
 
 As to the two companions of misfortune whom faith 
 had brought together in that blessed place, they had 
 communicated and left far behind them all personal 
 preoccupations. Completely absorbed and ravished by 
 the reception of the Divine Guest, they had almost 
 forgotten their previous hopes, and the bitter feeling of 
 disappointment had no place in their hearts. They 
 heard another Mass of thanksgiving, and when it was 
 ended, the father of little Pierre took his child in his 
 arms to go and bathe him in the Piscina. 
 
 " Pierre," said the Abb^ de Musy, " do not wait for 
 me this morning at the Piscina. I shall stay for the 
 
 4 
 
50 
 
 third Mass which is just about to begin." And he again 
 absorbed himself in his meditations. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 Lourdes, like Eome, is the rendezvous of the whole 
 universe. There one makes new acquaintances and 
 finds old friends. There, in the supernatural order, is 
 manifested the Miracle ; in the natural order of things, 
 the Unforeseen is permanent. 
 
 By a singular juncture, the priest who celebrated that 
 third Mass was the former professor of M. de Musy, at 
 the seminary of St. Sulpice — the AhM Dominique Sire, 
 who had arrived at Lourdes either the same morning or 
 the evening before. 
 
 " On that day," he told us, " I did not offer the Holy 
 Sacrifice for myself nor for any person that I had chosen. 
 Without naming anyone, I offered it for the maternal in- 
 tentions of the Blessed Virgin, imploring the Queen of 
 Heaven to apply the merit of it to whomsoever she 
 pleased." 
 
 The Abb^ Antoine served that Mass. 
 
 M. de Musy had not recognised, in the priest who 
 had just mounted the steps of the sanctuary, his beloved 
 master of former times. Seated in his invalid chair, he 
 meditated on the different texts that fell on his ear, in 
 the clear, distinct voice of the officiating priest. He 
 listened attentively to the reading of the Gospel, of 
 which the last words were those once uttered by the 
 Lord to His zealous hostess, and destined in succeeding 
 ages to calm all the anxieties of this fleeting hfe. 
 
 " Martha ! Martha ! Sollicita es et turharis erga 
 plurima. Porro unum est necessarium : Maria optimam 
 
51 
 
 partem elegit quae, non awferetur ah ea. Martha ! Martlia ! 
 thou art careful and troubled about many things. But 
 one thing is necessary : Mary hath chosen the best part 
 which shall not be taken away from her." * 
 
 "What!" he thought, "I have Mary's part, and I 
 grieve not to have Martha's ? I am a Christian, con- 
 secrated to God ; I can enjoy, every day, the privilege of 
 communion with the Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, 
 and yet I can wish for anything more ! " 
 
 At the altar there was sUence. The priest was read- 
 ing the secret prayers which ran thus : " Subveniat, 
 Domini, plebi tuce Dei genitricis oratio : guce etsi pro con- 
 ditione carnis migrasse, cognoscimus, in ccelesti gloria 
 apud te pro nobis intercedere sentiamus." t " May the 
 prayer of the Mother of God assist Thy people, Lord, 
 thai we may eaperience her intercession for us in heavenly 
 glory, whom we know to have passed out of this life to 
 satisfy the condition of our mortality. Amen." 
 
 Such was the invocation addressed at this moment 
 to Heaven by the Catholic priest, in the name of the 
 Church. And the august sacrifice drew on towards the 
 incomprehensible marvel of the Consecration. 
 
 Nothing remarkable seemed to have been accom- 
 plished amongst the devout congregation praying beneath 
 the vaulted roof of the Crypt. And yet, at the cry for 
 help, raised towards the Virgin Mary, " that we may" 
 said the holy liturgy, " experience her intercession for us 
 in heavenly glory " — at this cry for help to the Mother 
 of Jesus Christ, a voice which was not that of the 
 deacon or the people, had responded, "Amen ! so be it ! " 
 
 * Soman Missal, Gospel of the Mass for the Assumption. 
 + Secret of the Mass of the Assumption. 
 
52 
 
 A voice unheard by human ear but which, when it 
 speaks, fills the infinity of heaven. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 The pilgrim of Digoine was seated behind the column 
 that hid him from observation, and reposed in spirit in 
 the bosom of the Almighty Father. 
 
 The solemn words, " Sursum corda ! " pronounced 
 aloud, recalled him to consciousness. 
 
 What words can describe his feelings when, on 
 recovering himself, he felt within his astonished and 
 awe-stricken soul an absolute conviction that henceforth 
 he could rise, stand upright, and walk. He had the 
 tranquil assurance that his long-lost sight was restored, 
 and that all the ills with which he had been afilicted for 
 so many years, had disappeared at once and for ever. 
 
 It was not that he had experienced any shock, or 
 emotion, or inward flutter : nothing of that kind had dis- 
 turbed him. He suddenly found himself in perfect 
 health. The miraculous grace had penetrated his whole 
 being without his perceiving it, exactly as light pene- 
 trates into the room of a sleeping man. He falls asleep 
 in darkness, and wakes in the broad light of day. Softly 
 effacing the dark shades of night, the celestial rays have 
 flooded his house without disturbing his slumbers. Thus 
 the omnipotent and sovereign hand of Mary had removed 
 all disease from the priest's blind eyes and useless feet, 
 and had shed upon him the luminous effluvia of life, 
 without disturbing his meditations or troubling his 
 prayers. He was seized by a trembling emotion, a sort of 
 terror ; he could not believe in such a complete change, 
 such a radical transformation accomplished in him so 
 
53 
 
 suddenly and without his co-operation. On the one 
 hand, he was tempted to rise ; on the other, he resisted 
 the inclination ; he did not dare to move, he did not 
 dare to prove the truth ; he did not dare to convince 
 himself by any exterior act or movement, of the reality 
 of the miracle. His heart believed, but his mind 
 doubted, and doubt, that it might be all the more in- 
 vincible, assumed the form of humility. 
 
 " Yes, oh ! yes, the Blessed Virgin could cure me if 
 she liked, but I am not worthy." He struggled against 
 the secret impulsion which prompted him to move and 
 rise. But to the inward feeling of his cure was added 
 an outward and mysterious physical force, that seemed 
 to seize his body and urge it forward; he struggled 
 still, like Jacob with the angel. " Perhaps I am de- 
 ceiving myself, perhaps it is all illusion, and I may fall 
 down again if I attempt to rise ! I should be making 
 a false miracle, and would not that be a sort of con- 
 fusion for the Blessed Virgin ? A little later when 
 I am alone." . . . The force, however, that per- 
 suaded him became more and more urgent, without 
 ceasing to be maternal. Eesistance was impossible ; 
 the vanquished priest rose from his chair and fell on his 
 knees like all the rest of the Faithful. 
 
 At the same instant the bell of the Elevation was rung. 
 
 To cure the minister of the Lord, the Blessed Virgin 
 had chosen that moment of supreme mystery when 
 Heaven descends to earth. While the Divine Son fol- 
 lowed by the adoration of His Legions of Angels came 
 down invisible on the altar, the Virgin Mary taking the 
 paralytic priest by the hand, relieved him of his infirmity, 
 healed him, and presented him to Christ the Eedeemer.^ 
 
54 
 
 XX. 
 
 When the Abh^ Antoine left the altar with the 
 of&ciating priest to return to the sacristy, he perceived 
 the Abb4 de Musy on his knees, motionless, with his 
 head in his hands. The sight gave him a violent 
 shock, but so much are the best of us disposed to 
 doubt, that anxiety got the better of Faith, and his only 
 fear was that his friend had been making some tre- 
 mendous effort, and would sink and fall. Impelled by 
 his apprehensions, he hurried to his side ready to help 
 him at the first sign of weakness; but some time elapsed 
 before M. de Musy moved, and when he did, he rose up 
 without aid. 
 
 His agitated and trembling friend precipitately pushed 
 forward the invalid chair that the paralytic might sit 
 down. But the paralytic refused by a motion of the 
 hand, and said : " The Blessed Virgin has cured me " ; 
 then with a firm, calm step he. turned to leave the 
 church. 
 
 The Abbe Antoine was stricken speechless, and his 
 step was neither firm nor calm. Never in his life had 
 he known his benefactor otherwise than infirm. The 
 perspiration streamed down his face as he followed M. 
 de Musy, pushing before him, in his bewilderment, the 
 henceforth useless invalid chair, as if he thought that 
 the sight before him was an illusion which would 
 suddenly vanish. The coachman seated on the box of 
 his carriage was waiting for them ; when he perceived 
 the Abb6 Antoine he got down to help him carry his 
 companion, but surprised at the empty chair, he said : 
 
 " Where is your invalid ? " 
 
55 
 
 " I am here," replied the priest of majestic and im- 
 posing stature, who arrived at the carriage door at the 
 same time as the Abbd Antoine. " The Blessed Virgin 
 has cured me, and the carriage is not wanted ; we will 
 walk to the Grotto." 
 
 The astounded coachman turned his eyes towards the 
 person who spoke, and recognised in him, as he stood 
 full of health, life, and vigour, the helpless and para- 
 lysed priest of a little while ago. The words died away 
 on his lips, he felt as if he were dreaming, and looked at 
 the Abb^ Antoine in complete amazement. Then he 
 took the invalid chair and put it in the carriage. 
 
 At the church-door the two priests fell into each 
 other's arms and wept. 
 
 " Mon fire, mon pere ! you are cured ! " . . . 
 
 " I believe I am, mon fils," replied the Abb^ de Musy. 
 
 These were the only words exchanged. There- are 
 certain emotions of the heart which can only be ex- 
 pressed from man to man by tears, and from man to 
 God by prayer. So they went down the road praying 
 and reciting the Eosary : Ave Maria, gratia plena. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 They reached the Grotto about nine o'clock. The 
 crowd thronged around the sacred rocks, old men, young 
 men, women, believers of all ages, in the silence of in- 
 dividual prayer and the stillness of meditation. Some 
 on their knees, others drinking at the miraculous spring, 
 or saying the rosary, or reading their prayer-book, or 
 standing in groups on the banks of the Gave talking in 
 low voices. A little behind the rest a tall man with 
 
56 
 
 marked features, whose commanding height raised him 
 above all the bent heads, contemplated, with the melan- 
 choly smile of mournful incredulity, that multitude 
 kneeling before vacuum and adoring nothing. 
 
 Such was the spectacle which greeted the arrival of 
 our friends. They went through the crowd heedless of 
 the passage of the two priests, and entered the Grotto 
 where M. de Musy knelt on one of the chairs usually to 
 be found there. 
 
 But suddenly, to the calm silence and devout prayer 
 of these human masses, succeeds a whisper ever in- 
 creasing, a growing murmur, a profound rumour, an 
 agitated clamour. In one of the ecclesiastics who have 
 just entered the Grotto, some amongst the crowd think 
 they have recognised the infirm priest whom they have 
 remarked for the last week, sitting or rather lying in 
 his invalid chair, and being pushed along by his friend. 
 Everyone gets up to look and see. The eager crowd 
 rushes forward towards the Grotto ; and the Brother 
 who guards it promptly shuts and double-locks the iron 
 gate. A cross-fire of exclamations is heard. 
 
 " Is it he ? " 
 
 " Is he cured ? " 
 
 " What was the matter with him ? " 
 
 " Where is he ? " 
 
 " It is a miracle ! " 
 
 " Is it possible ! " 
 
 " Hail, Mary ! " 
 
 " It is some other priest ! " 
 
 But suddenly, as if at a sovereign command, all the 
 tumult was appeased and succeeded by a breathless 
 silence. Behind the gate of the Grotto, the restored 
 
57 
 
 man had risen, and turning his noble head, all illumi- 
 nated with the reflection of the miracle, towards the 
 multitude, he made them a sign that he wished to 
 speak. 
 
 " Yes, my dear brethren, it is I. I whom, ever since 
 my arrival, you have seen here with my body paralysed 
 and my sight gone. I am a priest of the diocese of 
 Autun. I have not been able to read for twenty years, 
 and for eleven years I have been totally paralysed and 
 unable to ascend to the altar to celebrate the only Mass 
 that I knew by heart. Our Lady of Lourdes has restored 
 my health and my sight ! , . . Ah ! may this great 
 miracle improve the good and convert the unbelieving. 
 Help me to thank God and obtain of Him grace to be 
 a good priest." 
 
 Instantly the chant of the Magnificat broke forth, and 
 all the people glorified the Lord. 
 
 After hearing the account of the miracle they wished 
 to prove it. 
 
 " Walk about ! walk about ! " cried the crowd, and 
 the paralytic began walking. 
 
 "Bead! read!" 
 
 They placed before his eyes a book in very small 
 print, and he, who for twenty years had not even been 
 able to distinguish the big characters of the Missal, now 
 read fluently and without the least hesitation. 
 
 " Your signature ! Your signature ! ... on this 
 book . , . this engraving . . . this paper ! " . . . 
 
 And hundreds of hands passing through the railings, 
 presented to the Abbe de Musy, prayer-books. Imita- 
 tions, little religious pictures, visiting cards, etc. He 
 traced numberless signatures with a pencil and in a 
 
58 
 
 firm clear hand, on the numberless leaves that poured 
 in on every side. 
 
 XXII. 
 
 All of a sudden a man, a workman, breathless 
 with running, was seen forcing his way through the 
 crowd. His rough, honest face was working with the 
 most magnificent emotion, the gate' of the Grotto 
 opened before him, and he threw himself, weeping 
 tears of joy, into the arms of the Abb4 de Musy. It 
 was the father of little Pierre. 
 
 " And little Pierre ? Is he cured also ? " asked the 
 priest in a voice full of anxiety. 
 
 " No, Monsieur I'AbM, such has not yet been the will 
 of God." 
 
 The priest made a movement of mournful commisera- 
 tion. He was almost ready to accuse Heaven for not 
 acting differently. 
 
 " And I ! " said he, almost sadly, " the Blessed Virgin 
 has granted me this' immense grace !" 
 
 The workman understood M. de Musy's secret feeling 
 by the tone of his voice. 
 
 " Ah ! Monsieur I'AhM" he replied, " what the Blessed 
 Virgin does she does well ! And, indeed, I feel nothing 
 but gladness." 
 
 In truth, there was no sign of pain or regret in his 
 features, nothing of that envy that so often gnaws the 
 heart at the sight of another's felicity ; no murmuring 
 against the inequality of our destiny in this world ; and 
 yet for three years running, the poor father had come 
 every year to Lourdes to pray for the recovery of his 
 son. 
 
59 
 
 " And where is little Pierre ? " 
 
 " He is over yonder, in a little corner away from the 
 crowd. When we heard the Magnificat he trembled for 
 joy. ' Father,' he said, ' it is our friend who is cured ; 
 run and see him, run and see him ! ' and I ran as hard 
 as I could. Now I shall go back to him to confirm the 
 news." 
 
 " No ! no ! I will go myself ! " 
 
 They left the Grotto together. The crowd fell back, 
 its mass broke up and formed a living hedge for the 
 passage of the man miraculously cured. 
 
 There was a carriage waiting on the borders of the 
 crowd, and in it an invalid chair. The Abb4 Antoine 
 made a sign to the coachman, and immediately the chair 
 passed from hand to hand over the heads of the multi- 
 tude, to be deposited in the Grotto in memory of the 
 miraculous event. The Abb^ de Musy crossed the 
 triumphant ex-voto on his way, and his eyes that had 
 wept so much, were wet with fresh tears at the sight of 
 the visible remembrance of his bygone sufferings — suf- 
 ferings that by some strange moral illusion seemed 
 already so far away. 
 
 Before the Piscina he found the angelic little Pierre 
 stretched iu the rustic little wooden carriage that served 
 him for an invalid chair. He went up to him and 
 pressed him in his arms. " Ah ! my dear chUd ! " he 
 cried, " how I wish Our Lady of Lourdes had granted 
 you the same grace as me ! " 
 
 But little Pierre raised to the Abbe's face his large 
 limpid eyes brilliant with celestial joy, and answered 
 as his father had done : 
 
 "The Blessed Virgin knows what is best for me. 
 
60 
 
 There are so many boys of my age who offend God and 
 blaspheme against Him. If I had my health, perhaps 
 I should do the same. Now I do not offend Him, I love 
 Him with all my heart, I receive Him in Holy Com- 
 munion and I am happy. I would much rath«r keep 
 my illness and not offend God, than have -my health 
 if I were to take advantage of it and become wicked. 
 What the Blessed Virgin does, she does well ! " 
 
 And once more holding out to the Abbd de Musy his 
 innocent arms, as if to console him for the shade of 
 sadness that hung on his brow, he tenderly embraced 
 him. 
 
 That child was scarcely fifteen — and he was the son 
 of a poor village shoemaker ! . . . 
 
 Is it possible, at such sights, Almighty God, not to 
 turn towards You our grateful souls, and not to repeat, 
 prostrate before You, the words addressed to You by 
 our Lord Jesus Christ : — " Father, Lord of Heaven 
 and earth, I thank Thee because Thou hast hid these 
 things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed 
 them to little ones. Yea, Father, for so hath it seemed 
 good in Thy sight." 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 The Abbd de Musy now bent his steps towards the 
 house of the missionaries, whither he went to give an 
 account of his cure. The crowd, never tired of seeing 
 him, continued to follow wherever he went. He climbed 
 the hill rapidly and without any limping, or fatigue, and 
 as soon as he had made his declaration to the guardians 
 of the. sanctuary, he turned towards his companion, 
 
61 
 
 thinking only of those who were so far from him in 
 person, but so near to him in heart. 
 
 " Make haste to the telegraph office ! What joy for 
 my mother, my good father, and all of them. And go 
 yourself and tell the news to the Cur^ of Lourdes. My 
 first visit will be for him." 
 
 After partaking of some refreshments that were 
 offered to him, the Abb4 de Musy returned again to the 
 chapel. 
 
 It was about one o'clock. All the masses were 
 finished, and everyone was gone back into the town for 
 the mid-day meal, so that the nave was perfectly empty, 
 for which the Abbd de Musy thanked God. He had 
 exhausted his strength in the scenes of the morning, and 
 felt the necessity of renewing it ; he had belonged to 
 the crowd, and now he wanted to collect himself. And 
 here, in the very centre of so much life and movement, 
 so much outside agitation, he had, to his great joy, found 
 a profound retreat, an absolute silence, a refreshing 
 peace, that special and peculiar peace that dwells only 
 at the foot of the altar and beneath the vaulted roof of 
 the church. He was alone, alone with God. He could 
 kneel down without a thousand eyes watching his every 
 movement; he could weep without everyone seeing 
 his tears ; he could in the intimate union of prayer, 
 pour forth his soul before the Lord, and before the 
 Blessed Virgin, without being disturbed every instant 
 by the innocent selfishness of indiscreet piety whisper- 
 ing in his ear : '' Pray for me ". 
 
 He went through the silent arches and knelt close to 
 the sanctuary ; and there, before the Tabernacle, all his 
 life of suffering, suddenly transformed into a life of 
 
62 
 
 health and strength, came back to his memory. The 
 prediction of the Cur^ of Ars, his conversations with 
 M. de Montagu, the gift of the Standard of the Sacred 
 Heart, the pilgrimage to Paray, the presentiment of the 
 priest of Marseilles, the almost violent persistence of 
 Mme. de Pomey, the beggar's dream, and the words of 
 the Cur^ of Lourdes, seemed to him like so many 
 luminous landmarks on the road, that had led him to 
 his miraculous cure. And on each one of these land- 
 marks was engraved the name of the Lord. 
 
 The thought of his mother was foremost in his mind ; 
 he attributed to the sanctity of that virtuous woman 
 the prodigious grace he had just received. As when, 
 speaking of the tears shed by Saint Monica, Saint 
 Ambrose cried : " The son of so many tears cannot 
 perish " ; so he in his heart exclaimed : " The son of 
 so many prayers was bound to be cured ! " He felt 
 that the will of God had been to keep him infirm for 
 such a number of years, that he might remain near her 
 and be strengthened more and more in the virtues of 
 the priest by the admirable and incessant example 
 of her great soul, all inflamed with the love of Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 " Three times she has given me life," he thought: " once 
 my natural life, by my birth, accomplished in pain and 
 suffering, then the sacerdotal life of my vocation, of 
 which she planted the germs in my soul, and now the 
 miraculous life of my cure, which she has obtained for 
 me by her fervent prayers. Mother ! my Mother ! " 
 . . . And this cry of gratitude rising from his heart, 
 included in one and the' same fihal sentiment, the 
 earthly mother who had borne him, and the universal 
 
63 
 
 Mother who pours forth her benefits from the heights 
 of Heaven. 
 
 What should he do with this new life ? . . . He 
 had been ordained priest for thirteen years, and he had 
 never yet been able to exercise any active ministry. 
 Should he be a Eeligious, a Missionary, a Monk, or a 
 parish Priest ? . . . How great need he had of 
 light from on high ! . . . Then contemplating the 
 Tabernacle, as the Hebrews on leaving the desert must 
 have looked at the Promised Land, " It is there," he 
 said to himself, " that I wiH ask the graces I so much 
 require, when, to-morrow, after so long an interruption, 
 I offer once more the Sacred Victim. To-morrow is 
 Saturday, the day dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, — and 
 it is the 16th of August, the feast of my mother's 
 patron Saint." 
 
 The afternoon was advancing, however, and the chapel 
 began to fill. The Abb^ de Musy returned to Lourdes, 
 where the news of the miracle was already noised 
 abroad. As he reached the town, vespers were being 
 celebrated at the parish church, and the Cur4 Peyramale 
 was relating to his people the great event of the morning. 
 
 Who shall tell with what fervour the faithful servant 
 of Our Lady of Lourdes pressed the Abb^ de Musy in 
 his arms, when, immediately after the service, the latter 
 came to see him. 
 
 " Well, I do not think you will quarrel with the 
 Blessed Virgin now ? " cried the Abb6 Antoine, gaily. 
 
 "I was already reconciled!" replied the deep but 
 joyful voice of the Priest of the Apparitions. 
 
 " To-morrow I shall celebrate my second First Mass," 
 said the Abb^ de Musy. 
 
64 
 
 " And I -will be your chorister-boy ! " cried the 
 Cur4 of Lourdes. But an unforeseen obstacle presented 
 itself. 
 
 Eleven years had gone by since the Abb6 de Musy 
 had last consecrated the Body of the Lord, and when he 
 tried, with the Missal in his hand, to see how far his 
 memory would serve him, he perceived that he had for- 
 gotten the strict letter and minute detail of the cere- 
 monies of the Holy Sacrifice, so that he was obliged to 
 put off the celebration of Mass for a day, that he might 
 learn the liturgy again in the meanwhile. 
 
 The whole of Saturday was passed in the necessary 
 study, under the direction of the Abb^ Antoine. The 
 disciple taught the master. 
 
 Towards evening a visitor, a tall man with marked 
 features, presented himself. The Abb^ de Musy re- 
 membered having noticed him the evening before, at 
 the Grotto, where he had remarked his energetic head 
 and his expression of mournful incredulity. 
 
 " Monsieur I'AIM" said the stranger with emotion, 
 " you are my benefa,ctor. Oh ! how much I thank you." 
 
 " And for what, sir ? I do not know you." 
 
 "It is to you I owe my return to the faith. My 
 name is Emile Pellegrin ; I live at Luc in the depart- 
 ment of Var. I was in a state of total unbelief, when 
 ■I arrived here a few days ago, in company with my 
 sister. I saw you before your cure, drawn about in 
 your invalid chair ; I saw you after it, and I heard you 
 speak at the Grotto. I have no more to say. The 
 hand that nothing can resist has passed over me, I have 
 been to confession, a thing that has not happened to me 
 since my childhood— that is for forty years — and I am 
 
65 
 
 come to ask you as a favour, to administer Holy Com- 
 munion to me to-morrow.'' 
 
 The minister of God opened his arms to the traveller 
 who had come from so far, on his return to his true Home. 
 He understood then that his cure was the beginning of 
 an apostleship, and that God meant to use him as His 
 instrument in bringing back to the light of truth many 
 souls groping in darkness, many hearts that had lost 
 their way. 
 
 " Our Lady of Lourdes be praised ! " cried he. " The 
 greatest grace has been for you ! Certainly I will ad- 
 minister Holy Communion to you, and there will be joy 
 in heaven over one sinner that doth penance, more than 
 v/pon ninety-nine just who need not penance" 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 Early the following morning, Sunday, the Cur4 Peyra- 
 male knocked at the door. 
 
 " I am come to fetch you," he said. " I will serve 
 your Mass first ; then I will celebrate Mass myself, and 
 after it will be the Abb6 Antoine's turn. Three priests 
 and three Masses will not be too. many to return thanks 
 to God and Our Lady of Lourdes for such a signal 
 miracle ! " 
 
 " I am ready," replied the Abb^ de Musy. 
 
 " Let us start then. You need not take an amice," 
 added the Cur^ of Lourdes, as he saw the Abb^ de 
 Musy take from the table a square of folded linen. 
 " There are always plenty at the sacristy of the chapel." 
 
 " I have special reasons for wishing to use this one," 
 replied the miraculously cured priest. 
 
66 
 
 That day was the eleventh Sunday after Pentecost. 
 
 The Abb6 de Musy, arrayed in the sacred vestments, 
 crossed the nave and reached the choir. On his right 
 hand was the Cur4 Peyramale, whom he called his 
 advocate with the Blessed Virgin, and on his left the 
 Abb6 Antoine. A compact crowd filled the Crypt; the 
 Abb^ Sire, M. Pellegrin, little Pierre and his father, 
 were aU present on this great occasion. 
 
 The celebrant pronounced the first words of the Holy 
 Sacrifice : " Introiho ad altare Dei. I will go unto the 
 altar of God." "Ad Deum qui Imtificat juverdwtem 
 meam," responded, at the foot of the altar, the deep 
 voice of the Cur^ Peyramale. 
 
 Those who heard the immortal language of the 
 Church, could not refrain from applying the mysterious 
 meanings of the different readings and prayers of the 
 day, to the extraordinary circumstances in which they 
 found themselves at the moment. 
 
 In the midst of that congregation, whose hearts 
 joined with his in thanksgiving, the celebrant read : 
 " God in his holy place ; God who maketh men of one 
 mind to dwell in a house ".* . . . 
 
 The first Oraison expressed with literal exactness the 
 feelings of gratitude that overflowed the heart of the 
 Abbd de Musy : " Omnipotens sempiterne Detis qui abun- 
 dantia pietatis turn et merita swpplicum exeedis et vota ; 
 effunde super nos misericordiam tuam ut dimittas, etc. : t 
 Almighty, everlasting God, who, in the abundance of 
 Thy loving kindness, dost exceed both the merits and 
 
 * Mass of the llth Sunday after Pentecost, introit. 
 t Mass of the 11th Sunday after Pentecost, 1st collect. 
 
67 
 
 desires of Thy suppliants ; pour down upon us Thy 
 mercy that Thou mayest forgive," ete. . . . 
 
 But when he had reached these words, the Abb6 de 
 Musy could go no further; he stopped suddenly, his 
 voice sank ; his eyes no longer distinguished the cha- 
 racters of the Missal. . . . The Cur^ of Lourdes, 
 secretly moved, but in appearance calm and impassible 
 as a bronze statue, immediately ascended the steps of the 
 altar, and standing beside the celebrant lent him the help 
 of his eyes, and pronounced one by one the words of 
 the liturgy which the Abbe de Musy repeated or rather 
 stammered after him. The collects, the epistle and the 
 gradual, were said in the same way. A mortal suspense 
 filled every heart ! A subdued agitation prevailed in 
 the devout assembly. Could it be possible that the 
 cure was not maintained? Had that visible and mar- 
 vellous grace suddenly disappeared ? Was the miracle 
 nothing but a mirage ? 
 
 Everyone knows that after the Credo, the officiating 
 priest turns to the Faithful to salute them in the name 
 of the Lord. " Dominus Vdbiscum.'' So having finished 
 saying the creed, -the Abb4 de Musy turned towards the 
 congregation ; all eyes beheld his face working with un- 
 speakable emotion. His trembling lips, scarcely able to 
 articulate, and his eyes suffused with sacred tears, ex- 
 pressed the inward joy that filled his soul. At sight of 
 him, a thriU of sublime intuition passed through the 
 crowd, they comprehended then that his eyes had been 
 blinded by tears of joy, and his voice extinguished by 
 excess of happiness. The prisoner, set free, almost 
 sank beneath the weight of his bliss. After that, the 
 Holy Sacrifice was continued in gladness of heart. " I 
 
68 
 
 will extol Thee, Lord, for Thou hast upheld me; 
 . . . Lord, I have cried to Thee and Thou hast 
 healed me," said the Abbd de Musy, pronouncing the 
 words of the Offertory.* 
 
 The communion began. The first to receive the 
 Bread of Life was the converted unbeliever ; after M. 
 Pellegrin, came the lady miraculously cured on the 
 14th of August; after her, the angelic little Pierre, 
 and then the numerous Christians who filled the 
 Crypt. The distribution of the communion lasted half- 
 an-hour, the Abb4 Antoine all the time following the 
 officiating priest, to wipe his streaming brow and his 
 face bathed in tears. 
 
 When he returned to the sacristy, the Abb^ de Musy 
 was covered with perspiration, and in many places his 
 clothes were wet through, so powerful had been the im- 
 pression made on him by the celebration of his " second 
 first Mass ". He took off the sacerdotal ornaments, and 
 helped the Cur4 Peyramale, who was going to say Mass 
 at the same altar, to put them on. The amice that had 
 encircled his neck was quite wet ; but the three priests, 
 profoundly absorbed in spiritual things, paid no atten- 
 tion to that trifling material detail. Although there 
 were other amices clean and white ready for use, that 
 was the one the Cur4 of Lourdes put on his shoulders. 
 The Abbd de Musy remarked it to him afterwards. 
 
 " I did not notice that I gave you my amice all wet 
 with perspiration." 
 
 " What matter ! I was as much at ease in it as if it 
 
 * .Exaltabo te, Domine, quoniam suscepiati me. . . . Domine 
 clamavi ad te et sanasti me. — Mass of 11th Sunday after Pentecost. 
 Offertory. 
 
69 
 
 had been my own ; one would think it had been made 
 for me." 
 
 "Oh!" resumed the Abbd de Musy, "I only half 
 regret my carelessness. That old piece of worn-out 
 Hnen is a rehc ; it was the amice of the Cure of Ars." 
 And to himself he thought that the Cur^ of Lourdes 
 was the right man to wear it ; but he refrained from 
 making the reflection aloud, for he knew it would pro- 
 voke some stormy reply from a nature, at the same 
 time, humble and abrupt. The Cur6 Peyramale never 
 took compliments in good part, and looked askance on 
 those who addressed them to him. 
 
 XXV. 
 
 While all these events were being accomplished at 
 Lourdes, what had been passing at Digoine for the last 
 two days ? 
 
 As we have already related, Madame de Musy, with 
 a confidence we have called terrifying) expected, for the 
 Feast of the Assumption, a telegram informing her of 
 the cure of her son. The morning, however, went by, 
 without bringing the despatch ; the postman came with 
 a letter from the Abbe Antoine, written two days pre- 
 viously, speaking only of the general appearance of the 
 pilgrimage, and the state, still unchanged, of the invalid. 
 The long hours of the afternoon struck, one after the 
 othier ; still no news. The least noise or the sound of 
 a footfall, made Madame de Musy start up with joyful 
 expectation ; not, alas ! to be realised. Nothing ! still 
 nothing! Nevertheless, her peaceful faith remained 
 long undisturbed, and her hope steady and unfailing. 
 
70 
 
 The sun disappeared from the horizon, evening came 
 on, as unproductive as the day had been, and the 
 shades of night enveloped the Chateau of Digoine. 
 
 The premature closing of a telegraph office on the loth 
 of August, at a station between Lourdes and Epinac, 
 had been the cause of the delay of the telegram — sent 
 off', as we know, immediately after the miracle. And 
 some unknown incident, a wrong address, or the break- 
 ing of a wire, hindered it unfortunately still more, and 
 for a time absolutely beyond all reasonable limits. 
 
 Nox nocet. Sleeplessness is fruitful in depressing 
 thoughts ; the mind, like nature itself, assumes sombre 
 shadows in the silent darkness, when the eyes are un- 
 closed by slumber. On the morrow, when Madame de 
 Musy left her room, everyone remarked the shade of 
 profound melancholy that hung over her. 
 About eleven o'clock, the postman arrived as usual. 
 The Abbd Antoine's daily letter was dated from the 
 Thursday, vigil of the Assumption, and contained but a 
 few unimportant lines. That day, the 16th of August, 
 was Madame de Musy's saint's day. There is some- 
 times, in families, a special and traditional saint, under 
 whose patronage everyone is placed at their birth, no 
 matter what their sex. Such was the case in the family 
 of Costa de Beauregard. Madame de Musy, who came 
 of that house, was called Armance Genevieve Marie 
 Boch. And though the christian name by which she 
 was known in her family was " Armance," her f^e was 
 always celebrated on the day of Saint Eoch. 
 
 On this particular occasion, the Archpriest of Couches- 
 les-Mines and his curate were invited to dinner at mid- 
 day. The mother had intended — we have already said 
 
71 
 
 with what unshaken faith — to honour Victor's mira- 
 culous cure at the same time. Alas ! her hopes were 
 fallen. What had seemed to her, up to that time, to be 
 as certain as the word of God, was now only possible) 
 and in many ways appeared improbable. Cruel doubt 
 and painful uncertainty had replaced the calm assurance 
 of her faith, as to the final result of her ceaseless 
 prayer. She had been deceived by the inward voice 
 she had thought infallible, and she knew not on what 
 to fix her fallen hopes. Still she believed, and her 
 hands nervously clasped at every instant, testified to 
 the struggle she made to maintain that confiding faith 
 to which the Lord has promised the recompense of 
 miracles. But her efforts were fruitless: vainly she 
 strove to recover what she had so fully possessed the 
 day before. Yesterday she was on dry land, to-day she 
 is struggling in the desolate anguish of a limitless sea, 
 and she whispers the name of Jesus in the terror of 
 her agony. " My God ! my God ! why hast Thou for- 
 saken me ? " 
 
 But accustomed to forget herself in her care for 
 others, she made it a duty to entertain her guests, and 
 remained in the drawing-room after dinner with M. de 
 Musy, Humbert and Genevieve, in conversation with 
 the Archpriest of Couches and his curate. Symphorien 
 had gone out somewhere in the neighbourhood, Marie 
 was walking in the park, and the Abbd Bourbonne was 
 reading his Breviary in one of the avenues. 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 About three o'clock. Mile. Genevieve went out and 
 joined the Abb^ Bourbonne, to talk with him about her 
 
72 
 
 brother and the Grotto of Lourdes, -whither her thoughts 
 were ever returning, for she dared not touch on the 
 subject in the drawing-room before her mother. 
 
 At the foot of the flight of steps that led into the 
 avenue she perceived a woman, a stranger to Digoine, 
 coming up the walk towards her. She went to meet 
 her and inquire what she wanted. She had been sent 
 by the telegraph office, and held a telegram in her hand. 
 Genevieve's blood rushed to her heart, she felt every- 
 thing turning around her. ■ She looked at the telegram. 
 It came from Lourdes, and was addressed to Madame de 
 Musy. . . . She went back to the Ch§,teau and on 
 her way met the Abb^ Bourbonne. 
 
 "This is, perhaps, to announce my brother's cure," 
 said she trembling.. " It is the telegram my mother 
 has been expecting for the last two days ! I must 
 hasten in and take it to her." 
 
 The Abb6 Bourbonne looked at the address, raised his 
 eyes to heaven, and turned away to reflect and coUect 
 his thoughts. 
 
 Mile. Genevieve mounted the steps ; she trembled so 
 that she could hardly walk. A terrible fear, the reaction 
 of hope had come upon her, and she dreaded some bad 
 news. " Up to the present," she thought, " no telegram 
 has come to Digoine but to announce a death." Her 
 step slackened ; she was strongly tempted to break the 
 seal, but respect for her mother stayed her hand. " If 
 it be really the miracle, no one must know it before she 
 does. . . . Dear mother ! she has truly deserved 
 that. But win she be able to bear the shock ? " . . . 
 The most conflicting feelings were at work in her mind. 
 At last she opened the hall door, then the drawing- 
 
73 
 
 room door, and mastering her voice by a great effort she 
 said, " Mother, you are wanted ". 
 
 It was the hour at which those of the poor who had 
 not been able to come in the morning, were in the 
 habit of presenting themselves at the house of the 
 " Good Lady," who, like the Curd of Lourdes, had her 
 " customers ". Madame de Musy thought it was one 
 of her usual visitors. 
 
 " I will come directly," she replied, not wishing to 
 interrupt the conversation of one of her guests, and 
 she was some few minutes before she appeared. During 
 that time, Genevieve waited feverishly in the hall. She 
 hid the blue envelope of the telegram in her sleeve, 
 fearing the shock for her mother if she saw it too 
 suddenly. . 
 
 At last the drawing-room door opened and Madame 
 de Musy came out. She was surprised to find her 
 daughter alone in the hall. 
 
 " Who is it wants me ? I see no one." 
 
 " It is a woman. . . . She is in the kitchen." 
 
 Saying which, Genevieve drew forward an easy chair. 
 " Sit down a moment, mother." . . . 
 
 " I, sit down ! " repeated Madame de Musy in astonish- 
 ment, wondering what made her daughter look and 
 speak so strangely. 
 
 "Do, I beg you, dear mother!" she insisted im- 
 ploringly. 
 
 " Why, what is the matter ? What is the matter ? " 
 repeated Mme. de Musy, yielding to her daughter's 
 solicitations and seating herself. 
 
 " Here is a telegram for you from Lourdes." 
 
 The mother seized it and held it convulsively pressed 
 
74 
 
 in her hands, but without breaking the seal. Breathless 
 and almost speechless, she contrived, however, to pro- 
 nounce the words : 
 
 " It is Victor's cure ! merciful God ! What a 
 grace ! He is cured ! He is cured ! " 
 
 " Mother ! mother ! " cried Genevieve terrified, '' do, I 
 implore you, open the telegram ! " 
 
 Her trembling fingers could hardly tear open the en- 
 velope. She looked at it, she read it, and by an extra- 
 ordinary phenomenon her voice recovered its firmness. 
 
 " Zourdes, 15th August. Praise to Mary ! M. de 
 Musy was cured this morning at eight o'clock. — Antoine." 
 
 She rose and returned to the drawing-room, holding 
 the telegram in her hand. Her face was incomparably 
 majestic, her regard was transfigured ; the most sublime 
 chords of human nature, adoration, gratitude, maternal 
 love, vibrated in the sound of her voice. 
 
 " Victor is cured ! It is the deliverance of my son ! 
 It is the triumph of the Mother of God ! ! ! " 
 
 The father, speechless with happiness, made a gesture 
 of thanksgiving to the Almighty, and silent tears flowed 
 down the old man's cheeks. Frantic exclamations of 
 rapture escaped from Humbert. The two priests were 
 transfixed with amazement, and Marie, who had so often 
 waited on and cheered her uncle, came running in, 
 dancing for joy, as, in old times, David danced before 
 the ark. The Abb6 Bourbonne came in also, and all 
 hearts were united as one heart in gratitude and thanks- 
 giving. 
 
 Madame de Musy had remained standing, but sud^ 
 denly her face changed ; she became deadly white. 
 
 " Mother, what is the matter ? " 
 
75 
 
 " Oh ! it is nothing, it is the joy," she said ; " my heart 
 beats with rapture. . , . Oh ! how fast it beats. 
 . . . What a grace ! After twenty years of suffering ! 
 A whole life of infirmity. All those incurable evils 
 to disappear at a word from Our Lady of Lourdes ! 
 Let us thank God and the Blessed Virgin! On our 
 knees ! " 
 
 M. Humbert began the Magnificat. 
 
 Madame de Musy desired to communicate the news 
 to her servants herself. She kissed old Glaudine, the 
 maids and the humbler servants, and then went to the 
 gardener's cottage, crying : 
 
 " My son is cured ! " 
 
 Her heart so overflowed with joy, that she was bound 
 to tell it, and talk of it, and spread it abroad. 
 
 In the evening the chapel at Digoine could not con- 
 tain the crowd that flocked to the Ch§,teau. The bene- 
 ficent mercy of God was already known in all the 
 countryside. The Abb^ Bourbonne lent the grand voice 
 of the Church to the universal gratitude : — Te Deum 
 laudamus ! Te Bominum confitemur ! 
 
 On leaving the chapel, Madame de Musy was again 
 seized with the sudden paleness she had had a few 
 hours previously in the drawing-room, and again she 
 repeated : 
 
 " Oh ! it is nothing ! It is the joy . . . my heart 
 beats with happiness. . . . It is nothing ! " 
 
 It is nothing ! Ah ! poor mother ! Joy is some- 
 thing, and it can, alas ! like sorrow, shatter our fragile 
 nature. The heart that beats too fast, may one day 
 break beneath the sudden weight of felicity. 
 
 Madame de Musy had experienced the first attack of 
 
76 
 
 a disease which was, not in any immediate way, but 
 after the lapse of a certain time, to open to her the 
 gates of Heaven. 
 
 The doctor, M. Bidault, was sent for. " Alas ! " said 
 he, " she must pass the rest of her days in her arm-chair 
 or her bed." 
 
 " The day of the Assumption would have found me 
 prepared," said Madame de Musy several times. " I was 
 expecting the telegram. But the following day I had 
 no longer any hope of it." 
 
 She would not allow her son Victor to be informed of 
 the effect his cure had had on her. 
 
 " No," she said, " I will not have anything trouble his 
 happiness and thanksgiving, at the feet of Our Lady of 
 Lourdes." 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 The Abb^ de Musy and his faithful Achates left the 
 privileged town on Thursday the 21st of August, after 
 saying goodbye to the Curd Peyramale, M. Pellegrin, 
 the Abbe Sire, and little Pierre, the friends that they 
 had, in some sort, received from the hands of Our Lady 
 of Lourdes herself And though he was intensely 
 anxious to return to the Chtteau of Digoine and its 
 beloved inhabitants, it was not without torrents of tears 
 that the restored paralytic tore himself from his last 
 prayer, before the Eocks of Massabiella. 
 
 He had chosen for the family chapel, as he said he 
 would, the magnificent statue of Our Lady ai Lourdes, 
 which had met his eyes on his first painful arrival in 
 the house of the street of the Grotto. 
 
77 
 
 " Our Lady of Lourdes," said he, " shall henceforth 
 be the Patroness of our house ! " 
 
 The two pilgrims started at six o'clock in the morning, 
 and travelled all day without stopping, tni they came to 
 Cette, where they slept. We shall not stop to relate the 
 amazement of the railway officials or the people at the 
 hotel, when they recognised in the strong and vigorous 
 priest, the helpless and infirm invalid whom they had 
 seen carried about with so much difficulty a fortnight 
 before ; nor the emotion of the Christian congregation 
 of St. Joseph of Cette, when, during Mass, it got abroad 
 among the people that the officiating priest was the 
 man miraculously cured by the Blessed Virgin ; nor the 
 trouble he had to escape from the town and withdraw 
 himself from an ovation. Like him, we decline to loiter 
 over the incidents of the journey ; like him we hasten 
 to return to Digoine. 
 
 XXVIIL 
 
 On the Friday, M. Humbert de Musy, though more 
 unwell than usual, and only able to move with the 
 greatest difficulty, left Digoine in the evening and 
 reached the station of Chagny a long time before the 
 train was due. It seemed to him that he was about to 
 wake up from some extraordinary dream, for notwith- 
 standing the letters from Lourdes and the force of 
 moral evidence, he felt himself, despite his efforts, a 
 prey to the incredulity of the Apostle Thomas, rejecting 
 all testimony. 
 
 " To see him walk ! To see him walk ! Oh ! no, it is 
 impossible ! . . . Most hkely when he sees me he 
 
78 
 
 will muster a little strength. . . . Oh ! if without 
 his knowledge I could conceal myself somewhere and 
 watch his movements ! " 
 
 Acting on this thought he resolved to remain in the 
 station-master's ofhce, and from some dark corner where 
 he could see without being seen, to await the arrival 
 of the travellers. 
 
 At last he heard the distant rolling of the iron wheels 
 on the rails, the beU rang, the porters rushed out on to 
 the platform, the flaming lights of the engine came 
 ■rushing up in the darkness, and the train stopped before 
 the brilliantly lighted station. 
 
 M. Humbert's resolution was not proof against his 
 feverish impatience. With a step, rapid in spite of his 
 sufferings, he hurried on to the platform, but already, 
 from the other end of the train, his brother's keen eyes 
 had recognised him, and descending quickly from the 
 carriage, the Abb^ de Musy ran up and clasped him in 
 his arms. 
 
 " Humbert ! " 
 
 " Victor ! " 
 
 And they embraced each other with tears of joy. 
 
 " What joy ! Oh ! what joy to see you cured ! " 
 
 " Oh ! my poor Humbert, how I wish it had been 
 you ! » 
 
 " No ! no ! certainly not ! God has well chosen, dear 
 brother ! . . . Your life is a thousand times more 
 valuable than mine ! Think of the good yOu will be 
 able to do ! " 
 
 " And father ? mother ? my sister ? your children ? 
 How I long to see them all again. We will drive as fast 
 as we can." 
 
79- 
 
 " But, my dear Victor," said Humbert, " we could not 
 reach Digoine before one in the morning." 
 
 " Well, what does that matter ? " 
 
 " Well, the fact is, mother is not very well." 
 
 The Abbe de Musy started. 
 
 " Do not be uneasy," resumed Humbert hastily, " she 
 is a little upset by the news of your cure, and last night 
 she slept badly. All she wants is a night of quiet and 
 repose — which she could not have if- it were disturbed 
 by our arrival, so we shall sleep here, at an hotel, and 
 start to-morrow morning at daybreak." 
 
 The Abb^ de Musy was completely reassured by these 
 words. 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 The next morning, as they drove through Couches- 
 les-Mines, Doctor Bidault, who lived in the little town, 
 and was waiting on the road to see the travellers pass, 
 came up to congratulate his former patient, and asked 
 for a seat in the carriage, wishing, he said, to share in 
 the happiness of the family. . . . The reader has 
 guessed that the old doctor was apprehensive* of the 
 effect this second overwhelming joy might have on 
 Madame de Musy, and that he was anxious to be pre- 
 sent in case of an emergency. 
 
 The carriage rolled rapidly along the road to Digoine. 
 It was well-known in all the country about, and to-day 
 the country people looked out for it with especial interest, 
 for they knew the restored paralytic would be in it, he 
 whom they called the " Good Monsieur Victor ! " When 
 it passed them as they worked in their fields or their 
 vineyards, and they caught sight of the radiant face of 
 
80 
 
 the priest, they threw up their arms and cried exult- 
 ingly, " Long live Monsieur Victor ! " 
 
 The Abb4 de Musy thanked them with his hand and 
 his smile, and cried, " Yes, my friends, it is I ; and I am 
 perfectly cured ! " 
 
 However, the carriage did not stop; all understood 
 how anxious the travellers were to reach home, and 
 besides, M. Humbert had given orders that, under no 
 circumstances were they to pull up, for fear of some 
 imprudent word being dropped about Madame de Mus/s 
 state. Besides, he wished his brother to have the full 
 enjoyment of this universal gladness. 
 
 The farmers and farm-servants had come out tomeet 
 the carriage. Many of them, not quite sure when it 
 would arrive, had waited on the road all night, and 
 when at last it passed them, they knelt down in the 
 dust, while the Abb4 de Musy, agreeable to their desire, 
 blessed them with humble simplicity. 
 
 Suddenly the severe profile of the Chlteau stood out 
 from the horizon ; the dark walls, the high towers, the 
 secular oaks. The Abb^ de Musy and the faithful com- 
 panion 'of his pilgrimage burst into tears. " There is 
 Digoine ! " They had come back to it at last, after 
 their miraculous journey. 
 
 There was a long silence. At a sign from M. Hum- 
 bert, the coachman had slackened the speed of his 
 horses, and as they drew nearer, the fagade of the 
 Ch§,teau became more distinct. 
 
 "What is the matter?" asked the Abb6 de Musy 
 eagerly, " the shutters of mother's room are closed ! " . . . 
 
 Humbert took his hand. 
 
 " Dear Victor, mother is unwell, as I told you yester- 
 
81 
 
 day, but rather more so than I let you think. She 
 keeps her bed, and the shutters are shut that she may 
 hear no outside noises." Then he told his brother the 
 whole truth. 
 
 The son's recovery had been the cause of the mother's 
 illness ! In the depths of her anguish the mother had 
 been struck by joy as by a sword ; and now in the full 
 exuberance of the purest joy, the son felt the keen 
 edge of sorrow penetrate his soul. 0, mystery of Pro- 
 vidence ! . . . 
 
 XXX. 
 
 When they reached the park gates, the Abb^ de Musy 
 stopped the carriage and got oulJ; he wished to walk 
 with uncovered head, up the shady avenue that his 
 ancestors had planted, and by which he once more re- 
 turned after such marvellous events, to the privileged 
 domestic temple called Home. But he had already been 
 •seen by those who were expecting him, and he had taken 
 but a few steps, when his old father, his sister, his 
 nephew, and his niece, came running out to meet him. 
 
 Do you remember, reader, the touching scene, sketched 
 by our Lord in the divine parable of the Prodigal Son ? 
 The father, who, no doubt, often looked out on the road 
 by which the ungrateful young man had disappeared, re- 
 cognised his son in the distance, in the miserable wretch 
 who approached with bent head, and tattered garments ; 
 and running to meet him, he pressed him to his heart, 
 and fell on his neck, and embraced him with tears of joy. 
 In like manner, the old Count de Musy clasped Victor 
 to his breast, but with feelings that had no blending of 
 bitterness, and he also cried with tears of joy, "My 
 
 6 
 
82 
 
 son was lost, and is found ; lie was dead, and is come to 
 life again ". But there was no need to go and fetch the 
 best robe ! the Virgin Mary herself had taken care to 
 clothe him in an incomparable robe, the robe of health 
 and strength ; the robe of Life. The feet, once power- 
 less, were now active, the eyes once in darkness, shone 
 with life and light. Instead of going away in sin and 
 returning in humiliation, like the prodigal, Victor had 
 departed in suffering, heroically borne, in humble 
 patience and supplication, and he had come back in 
 glorious triumph. 
 
 The father leant on his son's arm — the group had 
 become a procession. Thrilling with inexpressible 
 emotion, the conqueror crossed the threshold of the 
 paternal Ch§,teau, and a hedge of servants thronged his 
 passage ; all hearts turned towards him, but none 
 dared to draw near or speak, or even kiss the hem of 
 his garments. A religious respect restrains all outbursts ; 
 and the son, healed of his infirmities, turned his steps, 
 towards his mother's room. 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 At the sound of his feet the door opened. 
 
 Madame de Musy lay on her bed of pain. She was 
 pale as death, but her face shone with celestial bKss as 
 she held out her arms to her son, who hastened to her, 
 and kissed her with his whole soul on his Hps, kneeling 
 before the maternal couch as before the altar of sacrifice 
 where the body of a saint reposes. 
 
 '' My son," she said, in a voice of most harmonious 
 sweetness ; " my son, you were already a chUd of Mary, 
 
83 
 
 to-day you are so more than ever. She will be your 
 protectress, your force and your consolation. . . . 
 Ah," she added, smiling, " I shall not be jealous of such 
 a Mother as she is ! " 
 
 The Abbe de Musy had risen and held his mother's 
 hand in his. She was never tired of looking at him 
 and contemplating in all the splendour of the new life 
 he had brought back from Lourdes, her child of pre- 
 dilection. As for him, his heart sank within him at the 
 sight of his mother, and he asked himself with a feel- 
 ing of vague terror, what was to be the price of the 
 unparalleled grace he had received from heaven. She 
 guessed his thoughts. 
 
 " Do not be afraid, Victor ! Your recovery will give 
 me Hfe." 
 
 A subdued daylight filtered through the closed 
 shutters and shed its rays over this incomparable scene, 
 worthy to be immortalised by art, and well calculated 
 to tempt the genius of some great painter. Around the 
 sick mother and the miraculously healed son, the most 
 varied physiognomies were assembled. The father, bent 
 with age, and leaning on the foot of the bed, considered 
 those two beloved ones, and shared at the same time 
 and in all its sweetness, the sick mother's delight, and in 
 all its bitterness, the mortal anguish of the restored 
 priest. At his side, Humbert de Musy, with pain- 
 racked body and radiant face, poured forth his soul in 
 secret thanksgiving; Genevieve with clasped hands, 
 bent like a reed beneath so many crushing emotions, 
 and Symphorien and Marie seemed bewildered by joy, 
 astonishment, and a feeling of the marvellous. Old 
 Claudine stood beside her mistress ; she also was moved 
 
84 
 
 to the very depths of her being, but in no way disturbed 
 by a sight that her faith accepted as quite natural. 
 Behind, at the door, the men and maid-servants crowded 
 round in a compact group, with their heads passing one 
 above the other in their efforts to see. The Abb^ An- 
 toine, the companion of the conqueror, was the secondary 
 centre of all eyes and of a hundred silent questions. 
 He replied to that discreet and sacred curiosity, by re- 
 lating in detail all the history they were so anxious to 
 know. He pictured to them the Cur^ Peyramale, little 
 Pierre, and the Abbd Sire; the sudden cure in the 
 Crypt, the magnificat in the Grotto, the conversion of 
 the unbeliever, and the second First Mass. Listening to 
 those episodes of the drama and beholding the issue of 
 it all before him. Doctor Bidault stood petrified with 
 amazement. He turned his eyes alternately on Vic- 
 tor de Musy, and on the image of the Eedeemer hanging 
 against the wall. ... He felt as if he should like 
 to penetrate the secrets of God. In truth, there would 
 be here an admirable subject for a picture ! 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 Just then Claudine left the room in quest of something 
 that was wanted. Immediately those who had remained 
 in the ante-room rushed tumultuously round her, to hear 
 from her lips all that had been said, and of which only 
 a few unintelligible words had reached them. She, 
 however, was so overcome by emotion that talking 
 was quite out of the question, so, resuming the whole 
 history in a concise manner, rare in her sex, and worthy 
 of Csesar, she raised her bewildered hands to the ceiling. 
 
85 
 
 and uttered the three words : " He sees ! He stands 
 upright ! He walks ! " 
 
 During the whole day the Ch§,teau of Digoine was 
 visited, one might almost say besieged, by the entire 
 neighbourhood. Everyone wanted to see the man of 
 the miracle, and the Abb4 Antoine was exhausted with 
 answering the thousand and one questions that assailed 
 him on every side. At M. Humbert's request, he wrote 
 a hasty and summary relation of the supernatural event 
 accomplished at Lourdes, and sent it to the more distant 
 members of the family and to a few friends. It was 
 afterwards communicated to the newspapers. 
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 On the 8th of December following, at the Feast of 
 the Immaculate Conception, the Abb6 de Musy and his 
 brother Humbert went to Lourdes on a pilgrimage of 
 thanksgiving, and had a plate let into the stone floor of 
 the Grotto in commemoration of the miraculous cure 
 of the 15th of August. 
 
 The text of the plate runs thus : — 
 
 SuKGE ET Ambula (V. Luke 24), 
 
 Victoe-Makib de Musy, peiest 
 
 OF THE Diocese of Autun. 
 
 CUEBD THE 15th AUGUST, 1873. 
 
 Mgr. Lang^nieux, who had just been promoted to the 
 bishopric of Tarbes, happened at that time to be at 
 Lourdes, and wished to see the priest who, a few months 
 before, had received such a signal grace. The prelate 
 announced his intention of making a canonical inquiry, 
 
86 
 
 and began it at once by a series of questions to which 
 the Abb^ de Musy had to reply in writing, after having 
 sworn on his knees, and with his hand on the Holy 
 Scriptures, to say nothing but the truth. 
 
 The miraculously cured man was piously eager after 
 everything connected with Our Lady of Lourdes, and the 
 memorable event which, henceforth, was to change and 
 fill his whole life. Like the rest of the pilgrims, he 
 gathered one or two flowers from the close neighbour- 
 hood of the sacred spot, flowers which had grown 
 naturally, or been planted by the Cure Peyramale on 
 the borders of the pathways, or the banks of the Gave. 
 . . . And if we must own the truth, although the 
 directors of the G-rotto had had put up before it in large 
 print: It is forbidden to take anything away, it 
 happened, so we are told, that one dark, cold December 
 night, the two brothers succeeded in detaching (doubt- 
 less under the auspices of the Penitent Thief) a few 
 fragments from the Eocks of Massabiella. . . . 
 
 They returned soon after to Digoine. 
 
 It would be easy to terminate here the narrative of 
 this long episode. But, unless we are greatly mistaken 
 in the feelings of our readers, they would not willingly 
 separate from the privileged priest, without hearing how 
 he employed his resuscitated life, and also what be- 
 came of the different persons whom, in the course of 
 this history, they have learned to know and to love. 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 Amidst so many joys and emotions, the Abbe de 
 Musy kept fresh and warm in his heart the remem- 
 
87 
 
 brance of the companion in infirmity whom he had met 
 at the Gfotto, the gentle and innocent little Pierre. As 
 soon as he got back to Digoine, he wrote to the father 
 to enq[uire after the angelic chUd. The young invalid's 
 state was still the same, and his sufferings were cruel. 
 Several months having passed since then, the Abbe de 
 Musy became anxious and wrote again. This was the 
 father's answer : — 
 
 SiEOS, Z8th January, 1874- 
 
 "MoNSiBiTK L'ABBfi. — You write to ask me for news of my dear 
 child. He is no more. He breathed out his soul to God, the 21st of 
 October, after having received the last sacraments. Before dying, he 
 asked us to remember him, saying that, in his turn, he would not for- 
 get us. 
 
 "Since our return from Lourdes, his life was a real martyrdom. 
 Some little time before his death,' he was taken with a swelling which 
 gradually spread over his whole body, even to the chest. ' Father, ' he 
 said to me, ' I cannot breathe '. The persons present at the time said : 
 ' He is going '. I did not think so, and it occurred to me to take some 
 water of Our Lady of Lourdes, and rub his poor body with a sponge 
 dipped into it. As soon as the miraculous water touched his skin the 
 swelling disappeared, and the body and members resumed their natural 
 proportions. But a little time after, it reappeared, and we repeated 
 the remedy. Three times the swelling went down immediately on the 
 application of the water of Lourdes, and three times it came back 
 again. In this manner God manifested His will, for in showing us 
 that He heard our prayers and could cure the child if He would, He 
 clearly showed us also, that in not doing so He destined him to another 
 and better life. And that is why. Monsieur I'Aibe, I write to tell you 
 he is gone to Heaven. It was the Will of God : m'ay His Holy Name 
 be praised ! 
 
 "PIEERE EOOHOK" 
 
 In the course of these pages the reader has become 
 acquainted with the intimate life and thoughts of a 
 noble Christian family of one of the most illustrious 
 houses of Burgundy. And here, in a village shoe- 
 maker's little shop, we find sentiments that for sublimity 
 
88 
 
 of expression, are in every way equal to those of the 
 patrician house. Thus does Eeligion, effacing the dif- 
 ferences and discords of this world, raise the souls of 
 the ignorant and the learned, the lowly and the high- 
 born, to the same diapason, tuning them to the same 
 celestial strain, and harmonising their accents in mag- 
 nificent unison. The Magi and the Shepherds sing the 
 same Mosanna ! 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 The joy of the miracle had struck a fatal blow to the 
 heart of Madame de Musy, but it pleased God to spare 
 her some little time longer, that, in this life, she might 
 have the consolation of beholding the dawn of her son's 
 apostleship, and be able to watch the first steps of his 
 new life, as in the distant days of the past she had 
 watched over him at his birth. 
 
 From every part of the diocese, the Abb^ de Musy 
 was sent for, that he might relate before Christian 
 congregations the amazing history of his cure. He was 
 even called to Paris, where he spoke in the church of 
 Ifotre JDame des Vidoires. His account of the marvel- 
 lous event, and his minute analysis of the circumstances 
 which had prepared and accompanied it, rendered mani- 
 fest the intervention of a Divine Hand. Wherever he 
 went his burning eloquence, witnessing to what had been 
 so marvellously accomplished, penetrated the souls of 
 his listeners, and wrought in them powerfully for their 
 good. Human nature is more accessible to palpable 
 facts than to speculative ideas ; to a simple narrative, 
 forcible and true, than to a learned dissertation. Hence 
 these great results. 
 
89 
 
 The Abb6 Antoine also preached in different churches, 
 ■with similar fruits of edification, the glory of Our Lady 
 of Lourdes, and the miraculous cure of M. de Musy. 
 
 XXXVI. 
 
 The Abh6 Genty, chaplain of the Carmelites of Autun, 
 had been Madame de Musy's confessor for many years. 
 He was a most venerable priest, a man of fervent piety 
 and great learning. His penitent was accustomed by 
 long habit, to open her whole heart to him without 
 reserve, and obtain the help of his advice and en- 
 couragement in the incessant efforts she had made from 
 her earliest youth to advance in the heavenly road of 
 perfection. But it happened that M. Genty had been 
 called by his bishop, Mgr. Perraud, to the functions of 
 vicar-general of the diocese, and Madame de Musy, 
 then ill and unable to leave Digoine, hesitated to call 
 the excellent priest to her bedside, and thus disturb 
 him in the midst of his numerous and overwhelming 
 occupations. Therefore, discreet in that as in all else, 
 she often deprived herself of the support and consolation 
 her pious soul required. 
 
 One day she wrote and asked him to come and see 
 her, and sent the carriage to fetch him. When he 
 arrived and was brought to her room, he found the 
 Abbe de Musy there. 
 
 "Father," she said, " I wished to consult you for the 
 last time, on a new phase in my life as a Christian ; on 
 an important act I am contemplating." 
 
 The Abb^ de Musy rose to go ; she stopped him : 
 " You can remain, I want you ". 
 
90 
 
 Her grave and solemn expression foreshadowed the 
 accomplishment, on her part, of a resolution of an ex- 
 ceptional kind. 
 
 " Father," she continued, " in your own heart and 
 before God, is it still your opinion and your decision, 
 that, in the quality of his penitent, I may have confi- 
 dence in my son, the Abbe Victor de Musy, as priest, 
 confessor and director, and choose him henceforth as 
 my spiritual father ? " 
 
 " Yes," replied the priest, " and from this moment I 
 confide to the son the conscience of his mother." 
 
 Madame de Musy looked, with an expression of un- 
 speakable emotion, on the chUd she had brought into 
 the world and given to God. He had fallen sobbing on 
 his knees. 
 
 " My son," said she, " from this hour you will be my 
 confessor ; it is with you I shall treat of the affairs of 
 my eternal welfare. I shall be your spiritual child, and 
 I will obey you as my spiritual father." 
 
 XXXVIl. 
 
 A few revolving seasons passed thus in unbroken 
 peace. Madame de Musy's disease remained stationary, 
 and her family banished aU fear of a fatal issue. The 
 Abbe de Musy pursued his apostolic missions, preaching, 
 in the diocese and beyond it, the tidings of his mira- 
 culous cure. Every time he returned to Digoine after 
 one of these journeys, he gladdened his mother's heart 
 with an account of the conversions obtained — ^his 
 missions were harvests of which the rich sheaves were 
 offered to God. And thus the days flowed happily 
 away. 
 
91 
 
 Happiness, however, in this world is but a halt, only 
 in heaven will it be our permanent state. Hardly has 
 the pilgrim reposed himself an instant, and regained 
 strength for the battle, in the delights of a fleeting joy, 
 when the hour strikes that calls him back to labour and 
 pain; pain and labour that must be accepted with 
 thanksgiving, because they are the successive stepping- 
 stones by which we gradually ascend to that Heavenly 
 Father, Who leads us by the hidden and mysterious 
 ways of His Providence, and waits to welcome us at 
 the end of our journey. 
 
 Priests were scarce in the diocese of Autun, and it 
 was easily to be foreseen that the bishop might require 
 the services of the Abb^ de Musy, in some fixed and 
 regular post. His mother thought sadly sometimes of 
 this probability, and hoped he would be called to the 
 functions of chaplain in a convent, as that would leave 
 him a certain leisure to devote to his own spiritual im- 
 provement, and his love of study. He was so accus- 
 tomed to a contemplative life, he had been for so many 
 years imprisoned in disease and infirmity, as in a 
 cloistered cell separating him from the world, that the 
 thought of being called to the militant existence of a 
 parochial charge filled him with dismay. The times 
 were passed when the pastor of the flock, tranquilly 
 seated at the foot of the Cross, and meditating the pages 
 of his breviary, could guard his sheep in peace and 
 almost without effort. Alas ! the faithful sheep were 
 few, the lost sheep innumerable ; lambs had become 
 rams ; wolves fell with impunity upon the sheep and 
 the shepherd ; irreligion had corrupted the people, and 
 hostile passions had gained even the authorities, the 
 
92 
 
 administrations, and the higher powers. It was not, let 
 us hasten to add, the thought of fatigue and danger 
 that made M. de Musy hesitate — his humility was 
 alarmed, for he knew well, that with the best will in 
 the world he lacked experience, and he would have con- 
 sidered it temerity, after his long life of solitude, to rush 
 presumptuously into practical difficulties for which 
 nothing in the past had in any way prepared him, and 
 over which the most zealous priests were not always 
 triumphant. About this time nothing was talked of in 
 the neighbourhood but the imperative circumstances 
 that had obliged the cur6 of one of the most important 
 towns of the diocese, the Cur^ of Chagny, to give up 
 his parish and send in his resignation. 
 
 The fact of the resignation of the Cur4 of Chagny 
 had greatly impressed the Abb6 de Musy. Although 
 he did not feel threatened, at the beginning of his active 
 clerical career, with anything more important than a 
 simple curacy or the charge of some modest village, he 
 was nevertheless apprehensive, and thought with jus- 
 tice, that he who has never handled an oar, may as 
 easily wreck his bark against the trunk of a tree on 
 some little pond, as on the reefs of a great ocean. 
 
 Mgr. Perraud, Bishop of Autun, was acquainted with 
 his state of mind and his humble views and desires. 
 
 XXXVIII. 
 
 Towards the end of September, on 'Friday the 25th, 
 the Abb6 de Musy was sent for to the bishop's palace. 
 He came away agitated and almost upset by his inter- 
 view with his lordship. "What had happened? A 
 
93 
 
 letter from the bishop, dated two days later, and ad- 
 dressed to M. de Musy, wiU inform us. 
 
 " Bishop's Palace, Aittun, B7th September, 187 4. 
 " Cher Monsieur L'Abb:^, 
 
 " I acquitted myself most conscientiously of the promise I made 
 you on Friday. I submitted to the Council all the objections you had 
 advanced, without in any way attenuating them, and although very 
 much against my will, I constituted myself the advocate of your cause. 
 But I lost it, and the members of the Episcopal Council, more capable 
 than myself of judging the question, havS decided that the Abbe de 
 Musy, whose filial obedience is known to them, must submit and bend 
 his shoulders to the yoke. 
 
 " We intend, therefore, to entrust to him the parish of Chagny,, 
 and we shall take care that he be seconded by a good curate. 
 
 " If I trouble you by insisting, my dear Abbe, you will, I hope, 
 forgive me ; and Our Lady of Lourdes, I am confident, wUl justify the 
 choice we have made. 
 
 " Accept my sincere salutations in our Lord. 
 
 " ^ AJDOLPHE-LOUIS, Bishop of Autun." 
 
 The receipt of this letter aroused varied and conflict- 
 ing feelings in the patriarchal family of Digoine. The 
 father, who had perhaps feared that a convent chap- 
 laincy might be for his son but the ante-room of the 
 Cloister, hailed the episcopal decision with satisfaction, 
 as also did Humbert, who saw, in this nomination to 
 one of the most difficult posts in the diocese, a proof of 
 high esteem for his brother's virtues and capabilities. 
 
 But far different were the feelings that stirred in the 
 hearts of Madame de Musy and Victor. At first they 
 were both overwhelmed, the priest by the thought of his 
 incapacity, the mother at the perspective of the separa- 
 tion. The last fourteen months had been for Madame 
 de Musy as the delicious oasis of her life. She had 
 reposed herself fuUy in this anticipated beatitude ; she 
 
94 
 
 had, as it were, been lulled in the almost celestial de- 
 light of her ideal existence with her resuscitated son, 
 now become her confessor and her father. 
 
 The valiant woman felt her strength failing an in- 
 stant. It was but an instant— a few hours of inward 
 combat and struggle, just long enough to conquer her- 
 self — even at the price of death — and gain a fresh palm. 
 
 The valiant Christian woman raised the courage of 
 
 her son, despondent and overwhelmed with sorrow. 
 
 ' She had said to herself, and she repeated to him, the 
 
 watchword of those true heroes the Saints and Martyrs, 
 
 " It is God's will ! " 
 
 " Yes, Victor, it is God's will. Our Lady of Lourdes 
 did not cure you for repose, but for labour ; not for me 
 nor for you, but for this people. It is she who sends 
 you to them, and she will give you strength for the 
 work." 
 
 Thus spoke the mother, pouring out her very self into 
 her son's heart. She had nourished him with her milk, 
 now she strengthened him with her soul. 
 
 Mile. Genevieve was away from Digoine at this time. 
 And here we will quote a letter written to her by her 
 brother the following week, showing, in all their limpid 
 purity, the depths of these admirable natures. 
 
 " Mt dbab Sister, — I have seen Monseiguetir again ; he was ex- 
 tremely kind. I spoke to him about myself with a freedom and open- 
 ness that set my heart at rest ; but he and his council are absolutely 
 deterinined to place me at Chagny. 
 
 "I clearly see that this nomination is the work of the Blessed 
 Virgin, it would be impossible to doubt it. Our Good Mother in 
 Heaven wishes to try my faith and my heart. I am hers to do what- 
 ever she wishes. Be it humiliation or honour, peace or trouble, sorrow 
 or joy, I am ready for all. Everyone expects great things from me in 
 
95 
 
 the way of sanctity ; the bishop, the parishioners, the fifteen cur& of 
 my canton, the clergy of the diocese, and the civil administration. 
 The Blessed Virgin leaves me in the middle of the current, she alone 
 can bring me into port. I must have a blind and unlimited con- 
 fidence in her. How fortunate for me, if, by confidence and trust in 
 her, I succeed in doing all the good she expects from me. Our mother 
 seems much pleased; father always delighted; Humbert is touched 
 by this testimony of esteem. And you ? What do you think of this 
 terrible afikir ? 
 
 " Chagny is a parish of 4400 inhabitants. There is a very ugly 
 church, a miserable presbytery, and hardly any garden. The post is 
 painful and difficult. . . . Marie Immaculee has done me the 
 very great honour of placing me in it in spite of my incapacity, and 
 perhaps because of it. She will know how to manage, I am in her 
 holy keeping. Adieu, dear Sister. " 
 
 XXXIX. 
 
 Two or three months were absorbed by the legal 
 formalities that accompany the nomination of the cure 
 of a canton, and it was only on the 17th of the follow- 
 ing January, that the installation of the Abbd de Musy 
 took place in the church of Chagny. 
 
 The Abbe Gardette, Archpriest of Saint Vincent de 
 Ch§,lon and Grand- Vicar of the palace, came to install 
 him in the name of the Bishop, who was ill. He 
 sketched in his discourse the portrait of the Catholic 
 Pastor, the only true envoy of our Lord. 
 
 The Abbe de Musy mounted, in his turn, the pulpit 
 stairs. He knelt and prayed for a few moments and 
 then turned his face towards the people, henceforth to 
 be his family. 
 
 " Just now," said he, " you heard a pious and learned 
 priest describe what a true pastor should be, a Cur4 de 
 Paroisse after God's own heart. In all sincerity, and 
 with my whole soul, I have promised to try and be such 
 
96 
 
 a priest. I have promised it to our Lord and to His 
 Divine Mother. I am here amongst you, and have, 
 from this moment, the charge of your souls, contrary to 
 all natural prevision. I have never exercised my holy 
 calling. I have been ill for twenty years : I could not 
 use my eyes. For eleven years I have been deprived 
 of the privilege of saying Mass. For many years I had 
 lost the use of the voice which now addresses you. I 
 was resigned to my state, and neither hoped nor asked 
 for my cure. But others asked it for me, and I was, as 
 it were, constrained to pray for it myself. Our Lady of 
 Lourdes deigned to procure a favourable answer to our 
 prayers. I received that signal favour with unfeigned 
 joy, and every day I thank our Good Mother for it. 
 . . . But it was for you, my brethren, that it was 
 granted me ; for you, who wiU possess, who do possess 
 from this instant, my first and dearest affections. I give 
 you myself and all that I have, my days and my nights, 
 my watchings, my prayers, my health and strength 
 recovered at Lourdes. For you I have left my family, 
 my friends, and a ministry of missions that was . dear 
 to me, and I have done it gladly. I will not look 
 back to the past, or forward to the future, but only 
 to the present; to the work to be done with your 
 souls ; and for that aU-important work I count on 
 the help of Mary, for I have, thank God, no confidence 
 in myself. Our Lady of Lourdes must continue her 
 miracle ; she alone, the Immaculate Virgin, will be the 
 pastor of this parish. My first wish is that she may 
 be venerated and beloved amongst you, as your Queen. 
 Yes, dear brethren, you will offer her a filial devotion 
 out of the fulness of your hearts, and she will complete, 
 
97 
 
 for the salvation of your souls, the work she began at 
 Lourdes. 
 
 "Every day I will pray to her for you. For you, 
 old men, whose heads are whitened by age, and who are 
 approaching the term of your pilgrimage, that she may 
 prolong and bless the evening of your life, and finally 
 assist you at that dread hour, when the doors of heaven 
 will open before you. For you, men in the prime of 
 Mfe, who bear the burden and heat of the day, and who 
 often find so much trouble and difficulty in conducting 
 the affairs of life, that she may help, enlighten and 
 direct you. For you, young men, exposed to the storms 
 and temptations of youth, that she may preserve you 
 from all evil, and give you grace usefully to employ the 
 powerful energies that animate you. For you, young 
 women, that she may preserve you in innocence and 
 fiU you with the love of the Lord. For you, little ones, . 
 that, under her eye, you may grow like her Divine 
 Son, in wisdom, and age, and grace with God and men. 
 For those gone astray, that she may lead them back to 
 the right road; for the wicked, that she may make them 
 good ; for the good, that they may become better. . . . 
 And you, too, must pray to her for me, that she may 
 give me something of her heart to love you more and 
 more, and something of her power to serve you better 
 and better." 
 
 At these apostolic and paternal accents, the multitude 
 who thronged the church shed tears. 
 
 In the afternoon, a porter from the railway brought 
 a parcel to the presbytery. He was one of the men 
 who, eighteen months previously, on the night of the 
 6th of August, had helped to transport from the carriage 
 
 7 
 
98 
 
 to the ■waiting-room, and from the waiting-room to the 
 train, the helpless and powerless priest on his way 
 to Lourdes in quest of a miracle. Kemembering all 
 these details, and speaking of them to those around 
 him, he could not take his eyes from that same priest, 
 miraculously cured, and become by a special dispensa- 
 tion of Providence, the cut6 of the very parish where, 
 in his pilgrimage of hope, he had stopped on his first 
 nocturnal halt, his first painful station. 
 
 All Christian hearts in the parish of Chagny, and 
 even many unbelieving ones, rejoiced that day. The 
 installation of the Man of the Miracle, the burning 
 words that had stirred up the noblest feelings of the 
 heart, announced a promising future. 
 
 During that radiant ceremony, the same expression 
 was on all lips — the signs of a dawn without a cloud, 
 . and of a joyful confidence. " This is the beginning of 
 a good day ! " 
 
 But earthly things are like the earth itself, that per- 
 petually turns on its axis from light to darkness and 
 from darkness to light. While the first rays of day 
 were rising over Chagny, the melancholy shadows of 
 the west were coming slowly down on the old Ch§,teau 
 of Digoine. 
 
 XL. 
 
 Not many days after the departure of her son to take 
 possession of his cure, Madame de Musy felt the heart 
 disease caused by the sudden joy of the miracle, become 
 suddenly much worse. The happiness of the last few 
 months had checked its course, but, alas ! had not cured 
 it. 'New and alarming symptoms became apparent, and 
 
99 
 
 tlie doctors soon pronounced themselves powerless to 
 check the progress of the disease. " She wiU not last 
 many months " — was their verdict. 
 
 The valiant woman descended the supreme path and 
 followed the avenue leading to the tomb, with the 
 sublime serenity of her everyday life. She had nothing 
 to change and she changed nothing in the routine of her 
 daily occupations. She continued to commune with 
 God, by reading, meditation and prayer ; she continued 
 to direct her household and acquit herself of her works 
 of mercy ; she continued to help the poor and sick. The 
 nature of her disease permitted her to be dressed and 
 to sit in her easy chair. The only difference was that 
 those to whom she used to go, now came to her. The 
 poor and unhappy were brought by Claudine to the side 
 of the dyiug woman. Two days before her death, for 
 the last time, she dressed the wounds of Jesus Christ in 
 the person of one of the poor of the neighbourhood. 
 With her failing fingers she arranged the lint and ban- 
 dages, and Mke a heroine of charity she expired on her 
 battlefield. 
 
 Now and then her beloved son came to see her. What 
 sweet yet bitter hours must they have passed together ! 
 
 On the 7th of July, she sent to Chagny to fetch him. 
 
 " Madame wishes to see you," said the servant. 
 
 " Is she worse ? " 
 
 " I do not know." 
 
 The Abb6 de Musy hastened to her side. 
 
 " My son," said she, " I must regulate aU my spiritual 
 and temporal affairs to-day." 
 
 Then she confessed to the son whom she had sent to 
 Our Lady of Lourdes, so infirm, so worn with disease, 
 
100 
 
 and whom the Mother of God had sent back to her so 
 strong and well. She submitted all her difficulties and 
 anxieties to the wisdom and power of the priest, she 
 poured forth her soul into his for the last time before 
 leaving this world, and when a movement or an accent 
 of his voice betrayed the emotion that suffocated him, 
 interrupting herself, she would say softly, " Come, 
 Victor, my dear Victor, a little courage ! " and then 
 quietly continue her confession. 
 
 " And now," she resumed, when she had received 
 absolution, " we must put our temporal affairs in order 
 also." 
 
 So saying, she gave Victor the key of the secretary 
 that he might look over the family papers under her 
 superintendence and receive her instructions concerning 
 them. Her memory was exact, her mind easy, her speech 
 clear and precise, her countenance sometimes snuling. 
 The rays of the lamp shone with their usual steady 
 light. Her profound peace reassured her son, and 
 though it could not remove his despondency, it gave a 
 sovereign sweetness to the interview of that last day. 
 Ifotwithstanding the opinion of the doctors, he began, 
 in a vague manner, to hope again, for there are some 
 realities that the heart refuses to accept. 
 
 Madame de Musy gave him a sum of money to pay 
 the journey of some poor sick person to Lourdes. 
 
 " He will pray for me ! " she said. 
 
 " For your recovery ! " added her son. 
 
 She shook her head and repeated gravely : 
 
 " He will pray for me there ! " . . . 
 
 Some of the Abb6 de Musy's parishioners were dan- 
 gerously ill, and their lives were doubly in danger, for 
 
101 
 
 the soul as well as for the body. For their sakes 
 the Cure had to go back that night, that he might be 
 able to return to Digoine the next day. But a little 
 before he started, and as the lovely July sun was 
 sinking in the west, Madame de Musy turned to him 
 and said: 
 
 " My son, the moment has .arrived to give me Ex- 
 treme Unction ; I wish to receive it at your hands." 
 
 " What ! mother ! " . , . 
 
 " Come, my child ; a little more courage, the hour is 
 come ! " 
 
 He obeyed, and in the midst of the weepiag family 
 performed the solemn ceremony, his mother herself guid- 
 ing him, for he was cruelly moved and had some difficulty 
 in restraining his emotion. He anointed with holy oil 
 the maternal eyes, so often fixed in the course of her 
 life on the image of Jesus Christ ; the ears, which, above 
 the discordant noises of the earth, had listened to 
 the sweet harmonies of heaven and the teachings of 
 Holy Church ; the tongue, whose Christian words had 
 spread so many truths and consoled so many sorrows ; 
 the feet, that had known so well the road that led to 
 the poor, and had so steadily walked in the straight 
 path; the charitable hands, that had distributed so 
 many alms and dressed the wounds of so many suffer- 
 ing ones. He prepared for death her from whom he 
 had received life ; he opened the tomb to her who once 
 had laid him in his cradle. 
 
 When aU was ended, she said to her son : 
 
 " N"ow I am ready and all things are accomplished. 
 . . . Go back to your parish, there are souls there 
 who need you." 
 
102 
 
 But the priest, whose agitation was only equalled by 
 his mother's calm, begged her to let him stay. 
 
 " No," she said, " your duty is at Chagny with the 
 dying. I am prepared." 
 
 The Abb^ de Musy, broken-hearted, insisted: — "I 
 pray you, mother, let me remain with you ! " 
 
 " What ! Are you wanting ia courage ! " she said. 
 " God is calling you yonder ! " 
 
 And the valiant woman gave a farewell kiss to her 
 beloved child. 
 
 When he was gone, she drew the curtain from the 
 window and remained watching till the carriage was 
 out of sight and she could no longer hear the harness- 
 bells. Then she burst into tears. Very soon after fever 
 came on. All the night through she called for Victor. 
 . . . Alas ! the next day, when Victor arrived, his 
 beloved and venerated mother, stretched on the bed of 
 death, slept her last sleep. 
 
 XLI. 
 
 More than six years have passed since her death. 
 The Count de Musy and his son Humbert repose by 
 the side of the admirable Christian woman, whose mild 
 and noble character we have endeavoured to retrace in 
 these pages. 
 
 Symphorien de Musy, Humbert's son, lives in the 
 Ch§,teau of Digoine. His sister Marie, now the Countess 
 de Prunel^ often goes there with her family; and to 
 follow the paths of virtue, they have but to walk in the 
 way already traced out for them. 
 
 Through the woods there is a road, shorter than the 
 
103 
 
 avenue, whicli used to bring into nearer and more direct 
 communication the sick poor and their remedy, neces- 
 sity and relief, the misery from without, and the charity 
 from within. A post placed at the entrance of this 
 path, hears the name given by the whole country-side 
 to that privileged road — "The path of the Good Lady ". 
 
 Our friend the Abbe Antoine, after having been pro- 
 fessor in the Seminary of Autun, is Precentor at Chauf- 
 faiUes, preparing others for Holy Orders as he himself 
 was once prepared, and rendering a hundredfold to the 
 Church the benefit he has received from her. 
 
 Mile. Genevieve has built a little hoiise near her 
 brother's presbjdiery, and helps him in all his good 
 works. 
 
 As he had announced to his parishioners, the Cure of 
 Chagny has constituted Our Lady of Lourdes the Queen 
 of his parish, and at all hours and in all circumstances, 
 he seeks help from her. The throne on which he has 
 placed her is similar to the one she chose for- herself at 
 the foot of the Pyrenees. The Abb^ de Musy has 
 erected in his church a reproduction of the Grotto of 
 Massabiella, with the statue of Mary. Before the 
 Grotto is an altar where he, who was for so many years 
 paralytic and helpless, comes to ask his Deliverer: — 
 " What do you wish me to do to-day ? " 
 
 Employing his whole heart and mind and strength in 
 the cultivation of the vineyard confided to his care by 
 God, he works at the conversion of the present genera- 
 tion, and devotes his fortune to preparing a better 
 generation in the future. He has built immense schools 
 at his own expense where hundreds of children are 
 educated. He can be seen at those schools every day. 
 
104 
 
 Sometimes he goes to Digoine : every year he goes to 
 Lourdes for the anniversary of his miraculous cure, and 
 in this way, if he happens to experience any trouble in 
 the present, he strengthens his soul by the contempla- 
 tion of the future and the memory of the past. 
 
 Les Brbtotjx, February, 188S. 
 
THE JOINEE OF LAVAUE. 
 
 A jovial companion in his time was the journeyman 
 joiner Franqois Macaiy. Always chatty and gay, and 
 the foremost in fun and laughter. Mmble-footed and 
 clever-handed, he had gone the round of France, to 
 Nantes, Cambrai, Nimes, Marseilles and Lyons, and from 
 being apprentice soon became master-joiner. A good 
 workman and jovial companion, he was fond of work 
 and did not despise pleasure. He was not troubled 
 with many prejudices. Having completed his very 
 complete course of philosophy by the reading of a few 
 bad novels and worse newspapers, he promptly rid him- 
 self of anything like superstition, threw belief to the 
 winds, and thus disembarrassed of aU dead-weights, he 
 travelled gaily along the road of life. 
 
 As he thus rambled about the world, perfecting 
 himself in his trade, his free-thinking became stiU 
 freer. He did not encumber the churches with his 
 presence, and his voice was not given to psalm-singing. 
 Songs of another sort were more to his mind. When- 
 ever one of the good women in the houses where he 
 lodged, spoke to him about prayer, he would answer 
 abruptly, " Working is praying ! " without ever stopping 
 
106 
 
 to think of the other reading of that truth, " Praying 
 is working ! " 
 
 In religion, as in everything else, his impetuous dis- 
 position could accept neither lukewarnaness nor a just 
 medium, it may therefore be supposed that he was not 
 long in breaking down the frail barrier that separates 
 indifference from hostility, and in becoming a declared 
 enemy of the Truth. 
 
 Notwithstanding all that, he was a worthy fellow; 
 hot-headed but good-hearted ; loyal and prepossessing, 
 open as day, obliging with his comrades, and gifted with 
 that natural wit and picturesque imagination so fre- 
 quently found amongst the people of the South. Wher- 
 ever he went he was sure of a welcome. He was easily 
 moved by whatever appeared to him noble or good, 
 always compassionate for the troubles of others, and 
 willing, to help those weaker than himself with his. ' 
 strong arm, or relieve those poorer than himself froitf 
 his shallow purse. With that, hasty in temper and ex- 
 plosive as gunpowder. The least thing that went wrong, 
 a broken plane, a tottering bench, a knot in a plank, put 
 him beside himself with impatience, and his impatience 
 invariably vented itself in an exclamation that was 
 either an oath, an imprecation, or a blasphemy. Never 
 were heard more appalling interjections than those which, 
 from morning till night, mingled with the sounds of 
 sawing and hammering in Macary's workshop. 
 
 II. 
 
 In 1833, after eight years passed in wandering from 
 town to town in search of perfection, the journeyman 
 
107 
 
 joiner went back to his native town of Lavaur* He 
 had retained just sufficient Christianity to wish for the 
 sacrament of marriage. 
 
 But before going further we may mention that, if the 
 idea of religion for himself, and for men in general, was 
 repugnant to him, he held it as essentially important 
 that women should be pious ; and to those who reasoned 
 with him on such contradictory priaciples, he replied by 
 the most unexpected arguments. 
 
 " When I used to go to school," he would say laughing, 
 " I was taught in my grammar that La iJe%iow belonged 
 to the feminine gender and not to the masculine." ' 
 
 " But, surely, if you think religion true and proper for 
 women, why should it not be as suitable for men, and 
 why should you not practise it yourself ? " 
 
 " You might as well suggest that if I consider a dress 
 suitable for a woman, I ought to put on a petticoat 
 myself ! " 
 
 The real motive hidden beneath these jokes and para- 
 doxes was that in histravels, Macary, who was naturally 
 a keen observer, had noted that good Christian women 
 made good wives, while the opposite was the case with 
 girls who professed no religion. Very soon, then, after 
 his return to Lavaur, he led to the altar a pious young 
 girl, who seemed to possess every quality requisite to 
 make him happy. She was a fervent Catholic, and as 
 she loved her husband tenderly, she naturally desired 
 to discuss the great question of religion with him, and 
 draw him again within the pale of the Church. So one 
 evening as they were walking up and down under the 
 trees, by the soft light of the honeymoon, she began an 
 
 * Layaur is a sous-prefecture in the department of Tarn. 
 
108 
 
 apostolic speech, that she had been carefully meditating. 
 But the workman cut the homUy short. 
 
 " I love you passionately, my dear little Virginie," 
 said he, " and you preach very well, almost as well as 
 Mcmsieur le Cur£ But if I do not go to hear sermons 
 at church, it is probably because I do not like them, so 
 it is useless treating me to them at home. My ideas on 
 that point are unchangeable, as unchangeable as my 
 love for you, my darling, so instead of sermonising, be 
 content with loving me and being loved in return. Do 
 not fall into the error of seeking to force your own 
 opinions on your husband and worrying him continually 
 to go to Mass or confession. If you compromise our 
 peace by trying to turn me about your finger, we shaU 
 always be quarrelling, and I shall end by hating religion 
 even in women." 
 
 The young wife's eyes were full of tears. 
 
 " Come ! " said Francois, kissing her, " let us say no 
 more about it, or rather, do you remain silent on' the 
 subject. If you think I am not religious enough, you 
 may be religious for us both, your Bon Dieu will lose 
 nothing by the bargain, nor I neither. We shall each 
 have our task in the house, my little wife ; I will work 
 for you, and you shall pray for me." 
 
 Virginie, being an intelligent woman, understood (what 
 most women ignore) that a husband's conversion is not 
 to be obtained by overdue pressure, pertinacity and 
 torrents of words — means that are seldom efScacious 
 and always dangerous — but by the surer and mor6 
 patient means of the example of Christian virtues put 
 into practice every hour of the day by the domestic 
 hearth and in the home circle ; and by the voice of per- 
 
109 
 
 severing prayer, knocking without ceasing at the door 
 of Heaven. So the young wife hid her trouble in her 
 heart and maintained an unbroken silence on the for- 
 bidden topic. 
 
 " Henceforth," she thought, " I will say nothing ; but 
 pray and wait for the hour of grace, and my only 
 preaching shall be to try and grow better every day, 
 and render my husband happy." 
 
 Consequently Macary was happy. 
 
 But happiness is fugitive, and hardly do we think we 
 possess it than it escapes from our grasp and vanishes 
 away. Such, alas ! was the case with the poor joiner's 
 too brief felicity 
 
 III. 
 
 He had only been married a few months and was 
 still in the first bliss of his union, with his excellent 
 wife, when a disease which had vaguely threatened him 
 towards the end of his journeyings, began to assume 
 serious proportions. Large varicose veins came out on 
 his legs, and were most painful and exhausting. The 
 person so afflicted experiences extreme lassitude and 
 acute suffering when standing up. Macary found that 
 out by cruel experience ; but as he was not a man to 
 give way easily before pain, he struggled bravely against 
 his infirmity. 
 
 " I have two lazy legs," he would say, " that would 
 like to go to bed early and get up late. If they were 
 two servants I would turn them out of doors, but since 
 I am bound to keep them, I will give them such a 
 shaking up that, whether they like it or not, they shall 
 be forced to do their duty." 
 
110 
 
 And all day long, by a violent effort, he stood on 
 his legs, planing and joining as usual, and obstinately 
 refusing to see a doctor. Two or three years passed in 
 this way, when an incident — his mother's illness — 
 brought Doctor Eossignol to his house. 
 
 "Well, FrauQois," said the latter, "there you are, 
 always indefatigable. I never pass in the street with- 
 out seeing you at work." 
 
 " Indefatigable ? " said Macary ; " not exactly. As 
 soon as I am up in the morning, and during the whole of 
 the day, my legs feel like lead ; I have sharp shooting 
 pains in the calves as if you were sticking your lancet 
 into them. And in the evening my legs are all swelled 
 up." 
 
 " You work too hard, my good friend." 
 
 " That is a rich man's excuse ; a poor man can never 
 work hard enough. My children eat like ravens 
 already." 
 
 " You must have a thick vein all down your thigh, I 
 think ? " 
 
 " I have two immense veins. One in each leg." 
 
 " Let me see." . . . 
 
 " They are varicose veins," said the doctor after exa- 
 mining them ; " they are very large indeed, and threaten 
 to assume alarming proportions. The lumps are con- 
 siderable and there is a marked obstruction. You must 
 take most serious measures." 
 
 " What ones ? " 
 
 " You must compress your legs with linen bandages, 
 and strap them up in leather gaiters ; and at the least 
 fatigue you must lie down and rest yourself." 
 
 The very window-panes must have trembled at 
 
Ill 
 
 the terrific oath with which Macary received this 
 advice. 
 
 " What ! Stop working at twenty-six ? A nice 
 father of a family you would make of me ! You must 
 be laughing at me." And he looked as if he would like 
 to turn the doctor out of doors. 
 
 He continued to treat himself in his own manner, but 
 the disease rapidly gained ground, and he was forced at 
 last to consult the doctor of the St. Louis Mutual Help 
 Society, of which he was a member. Doctor Segur's 
 opinion was the same as Doctor Eossignol's. 
 
 " Unless you follow my advice, you will lose the use 
 of your legs. At forty you will be an old man." 
 
 'Now Macary was extremely practical. The unani- 
 mity of the two doctors' opinions, confirmed, besides, by 
 his own ever-increasing sufferings which were becoming 
 intolerable, brought him to reason. He resigned himself, 
 not without tempests of fury and invective, to the treat- 
 ment prescribed by the doctors. He rested from time 
 to time and encased his legs, from his toes to his knees, 
 in linen bandages, over which he wore strong dogskin 
 gaiters tightly laced together. 
 
 But in spite of all precautions the varicose veins grew 
 worse from year to year. When Macary was about 
 thirty-five or forty, the two inner saphena veins had 
 swelled enormously, and stood out under the skin as 
 thick as a finger. Lumps had formed of extraordinary 
 dimensions, as large as an egg, which, when the patient 
 took off his bandages, looked like great wens. A little 
 later on the legs began to ulcerate and had to be dressed 
 with cerate and lint. 
 
 Henceforth, the unfortunate man could only work a 
 
112 
 
 few hours a day, and very often lie had to stop work 
 altogether for a month and more at a time, and 
 keep his bed or lie on a sofa. Old age had come on 
 prematurely as Doctor Segur had warned him it would, 
 at least as far as his legs were concerned, for the rest of 
 his body remained perfectly healthy, and his mind had 
 retained its youthful vivacity. 
 
 His deplorable condition got gradually worse. He 
 saw his children growing up around him, and was exas- 
 perated at his inabnity to be the first and the last in 
 the workshop. 
 
 " I am not worth a quarter of an apprentice ! " he 
 would cry sometimes, smiting a formidable blow with 
 the hammer on his working bench. 
 
 Now and then, when enforced inaction had put him 
 beside himself with impatience, he would tear off his 
 gaiters and bandages and throw them out of the window, 
 as if, by getting rid of the remedy, he could drive away 
 the disease. But a few minutes after he howled with 
 anguish. The blood rushed into the veins no longer 
 compressed, and seemed like liquid fire burning into his 
 flesh. Macary, suffering like a soul in perdition and 
 swearing like one too, called for his bandages again, with 
 the same fury he had employed in tearing them off. 
 " Make haste ! " he would say, " and put my dogskin on 
 my dog of a skin." 
 
 The present was gloomy, the future without hope of 
 cure or even of relief. The joiner had consulted other 
 doctors, amongst them Doctor Bernet ; everywhere and 
 by everyone he had been declared incurable. The 
 faculty was unanimous. 
 
 It only remained for him to bear his sufferings with 
 
113 
 
 patience and resignation. But to Macary patience was 
 unknown, and the sweet flower of resignation did not 
 bloom amongst the harsh fruits of his garden. The 
 active and impetuous man condemned to immobility ; 
 the fiery nature driven violently back and imprisoned 
 between four walls, could only find relief in impreca- 
 tions. He growled, stormed, and fulminated from morn- 
 ing tni night. A regular domestic thunderstorm. 
 
 This tempest of pain and passion lasted ten, twenty, 
 thirty years. For thirty years Macary was on the rack 
 and knew not what' saint to invoke ; or rather, as the 
 reader has guessed, he did not invoke any saint at all, 
 but instead, devoted himself to the devil from morning 
 till night. When he addressed himself to heaven it 
 was by imprecations, and prayer was replaced by blas- 
 phemy. Non precahai, imprecabat. The name of God 
 could be heard in his house, at every hour of the day, 
 but only in frenzied exclamations and interjections of 
 rage. 
 
 IV. 
 
 In that same house, however, the same sacred name 
 
 was often pronounced in a reverent whisper. Macary's 
 
 pious wife and his daughter, Delphine, prayed with their 
 
 whole hearts, and He who hears the secret murmur of 
 
 the Christian, was doubtless more attentive to those 
 
 humble supplications poured forth in silence^ than to 
 
 the noisy outbursts of the exasperated joiner. They 
 
 could not hope for the cure of an incurable disease and 
 
 did not ask impossibilities, but they prayed God to 
 
 soften the bitterness of the trial and pacify the rebellious 
 
 soul of the sufferer. 
 
 8 
 
114 
 
 That nothing may be forgotten, we will here add that 
 if Macary revolted against Heaven in a sort of open war, 
 he had always lived at peace with his fellow-men, and 
 had remained, in ripe, manhood and in the evening of 
 life, the same frank, open, obliging fellow that he had 
 shown himself in his youth. He cherished his wife and 
 children, and assuredly, if he had died at that moment, 
 he might have had engraved on his tomb, the epitaph 
 (so often untrue !) that may be read at every step on 
 the marble of the cemeteries : — " He was a good husband 
 and father ". His fits of passion attacked things, not 
 persons, he was furious against his ill-luck, but perfectly 
 gentle and affectionate with the companion of his life ; 
 and if, in the midst of his oaths and stormings, one of 
 his children or grand-children (for time had gone on, 
 and he was a grandfather) came near him, he was calmed 
 as by magic, and smiled tenderly on them. He was 
 an excellent neighbour, charitable and cordial, and 
 the needy never knocked at his door in vain. Macary 
 had but little, yet he willingly shared that little. His 
 compassion for other people's troubles made him forget 
 his own ; and though his own sufferings might draw 
 cries of pain from his lips, the sufferings of others drew 
 tears from his eyes. Many times, giving alms of the 
 work that was so painful and dif&cult for him, he would 
 enjoy the noble satisfaction of making a bedstead, or a 
 cupboard, or a table for some poor destitute home. Like 
 the widow spoken of in the Gospel and praised by the 
 Saviour, he gave of his very substance, as if to yield to 
 the promptings of pity was more necessary to him than 
 the necessaries of life themselves. 
 
 When a man without religion possesses such qualities 
 
115 
 
 as these, or to speak more justly, when he practises 
 snch virtues towards his fellow-men, his apparent im- 
 piety towards God proceeds from a pure misunderstand- 
 ing. If he blasphemes it is through ignorance, because 
 he does not comprehend and because his ideas have 
 been warped. The wrong he does in such a case, how- 
 ever monstrous may be its form in .our judgment, pro- 
 ceeds infinitely less from perversion of the will than 
 from an error of the mind and a partial overclouding of 
 the reason, Kttle intellectual miseries which God pities 
 and takes into consideration in the touching verdict of 
 his forgiving justice. 
 
 Through the mud of the gutter the eye of the Al- 
 mighty discerns the rays of the pure diamond. Thus it 
 often happens that the Father of Mercy takes pleasure 
 in turning those generous wanderers into servants and 
 friends. While the blasphemers are uttering their blas- 
 phemies, or the furious exhaling their fury, the day of 
 grace marked by Providence comes upon them. God 
 calls them suddenly as He called Saint Paul, and, in a 
 voice that brings them prostrate on their knees. He 
 says : " Why persecutest thou Me ? " To the amaze- 
 ment of all He gives the preference to the publican's 
 house : " Zacheus, make haste, and come down ; for 
 this day I must abide in thy house ". Nay, more, He 
 quotes them as examples to the orthodox officials, the 
 men of strict dogma and literal practice, and when he 
 wants to show these latter a type and pattern to be 
 followed, he chooses some poor lost one on the road be- 
 tween Jerusalem and Jericho, upright in heart, though 
 perhaps out of the right path in understanding, and He 
 relates to His Disciples the divine story of the Samaritan. 
 
116 
 
 Never let as forget that not in vain has the Lord 
 chosen to be called the "Bon Dieu". Amongst His 
 numberless and limitless perfections the chief one, so to 
 say, is goodness ; and goodness is above all the charac- 
 teristic of His children. " Be ye therefore merciful as 
 your Father also is merciful. . . . Blessed are the 
 merciful : for they shall obtain mercy." Whoever is good 
 belongs to the flock even though he seem to be without 
 the fold ; and the Divine Shepherd comes in a blessed 
 hour to seek the lost sheep marked with His mark, the 
 lost drachma stamped with His image and superscrip- 
 tion : Detos charitas est ! 
 
 "La Bonte, c'est lefond des natures augustes. 
 If line sevle vertu Dieu fait le ccmr desjustes, 
 Comme dJvm. seul saphir le coupole du ciel." 
 
 God will even work a miracle rather than not save 
 such souls and such hearts. From His invisible throne 
 comes a voice audible to mortal ear. He cries to Augus- 
 tiae : " Take and read ; Tolle, lege ! " and He places 
 beneath his eyes the apostolic page that is to convert 
 him. 
 
 V. 
 
 The excellent blasphemer, Macary, had been then for 
 more than thirty years in the state we have just de- 
 scribed. As we have already said, if at certain periods 
 he could stand up and work for a few hours, or walk 
 about a little, there were other and longer periods when 
 he was obliged to remain in a lying posture. This was 
 especially the case when the idcers suppurated very 
 much. His little business had to be arranged in view 
 
117 
 
 of these continual stoppages, or he would have lost his 
 customers and been utterly ruined. Macary had brought 
 up his son Charles to the business of joiner, and the 
 latter was as clever a workman as his father. He was 
 married and lived close by, but he came to work, in his 
 father's shop every morning and kept the business going. 
 
 VI. 
 
 About the middle of July, 1871, Macary had been 
 stretched for six weeks on his sofa, condemned to com- 
 plete immobility by the intensity of the disease and 
 the open wounds of the ulcers. He was in a deplorable 
 state, both physically and morally ; his body eaten up 
 with pain, and his whole soul absorbed in dreary melan- 
 choly. It occurred to him that if he had something to 
 read it would divert his mind, so he asked them to get 
 him a book he had heard of as containing most extraor- 
 dinary things. He mentioned it as he might have 
 mentioned a volume of fairy tales or The Th<msand and 
 One NigMs. Providence, however, intended to turn this 
 chance reading to account for its own purposes. When 
 God, in the hours of yesterday — fifteen hundred years 
 ago, but to Him not even as a single day — when God had 
 resolved to conquer Monica's son. He placed in the hands 
 of that prince of intellect and science, that great philoso- 
 pher and profound thinker, the Divine Book itself, the 
 text traced by the pen of the great Apostle Paul and 
 inspired by the Paraclete. But for the joiner Macary, the 
 illiterate Samaritan, the poor publican, the horny-handed 
 workman, handling the saw and the plane on his humble 
 bench, it was not needful to have recourse to such depths 
 
118 
 
 and such splendours : neither to an epistle written by a 
 Saint, nor to an inspired text. 
 
 The volume that Macary had asked for was a con- 
 temporary work, a history of Apparitions and Miracles, 
 written by a man of the world, a layman, some one or 
 anyone, a publican also. 
 
 The book, entitled Notre Dame de Lourdes, having 
 been brought to him late in the evening, he took it up 
 listlessly at his waking next morning and glanced at the 
 first pages, stopping every now and then to direct the 
 work then in hand, or enquire if such and such things 
 had been taken home ; but by degrees, he became silent 
 and absorbed in his reading, and seemed to see and hear 
 nothing of exterior things. A.s a traveller leaving the 
 high-road scorched with the summer sun, enters a thick 
 forest where cool shades and woodland silence await 
 him, and where, walking in solitary paths beneath the 
 thick arches of the green trees overhead, he feels him- 
 self separated from the rest of the world and lost in the 
 majestic bosom of nature— so Macary, as he advanced 
 in his reading, became gradually absorbed by unknown 
 feelings which penetrated him irresistibly, separated 
 him from all worldly preoccupation " and mysteriously 
 enveloped him in a vivifying atmosphere, filled with 
 the presence of the Living God. 
 
 His strongly -marked face was bathed in tears. 
 
 " Why ! you are crying ! " cried his wife in amaze- 
 ment ; " what is there so dreadful in that book then ? " 
 
 "My dear wife, I cannot teU you — let me be! let 
 me be ! " 
 
 " Well, but read me a few pages that I may know 
 what it is about." 
 
119 
 
 " No, no ! it is impossible ! My tears choke me. We 
 will read it together afterwards, but now I must have it 
 all to myself." 
 
 It seemed to Franqois Macary that he was waking 
 from a bad dream, and emerging from a long dark night, 
 into the brilliant rays of unexpected day. The bright- 
 ness dazzled his eyes. His country, the country of the 
 immortal soul, so long forgotten, reappeared before him 
 with its rivers of living waters, its refreshing peace 
 and its celestial horizons. Old Macary had recovered 
 the Paith of his childhood. 
 
 What was it that acted so powerfully upon him ? 
 Was it the book itself ? Certainly not. No more than 
 the simple water of earthly fountains acts in Baptism. 
 No more than the trumpets of the Jews acted on the 
 walls of Jericho, which fell at their sound. It was the 
 blessing of God shed upon a means, valueless in itself ; 
 but all things become instruments of good in the hands 
 of Him- who made the world out of nothing. 
 
 When Macary read the chapters where the author 
 relates the miraculous effects of the supernatural source 
 which sprang up at the command of the Blessed Virgin 
 in the Grotto of Lourdes, he felt within himself a secret 
 conviction that if he could procure some of that water 
 he would be cured. 
 
 Faith did not return alone into his soul, it was accom- 
 panied by hope. 
 
 Having opened the book with the first dawn of 
 day, he finished it with the last rays of the setting 
 sun. 
 
120 
 
 VII. 
 
 That day, which was destined to mark a great date 
 in his life, was a Sunday, the 16th July, 1871, the 
 feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, and the 13th 
 anniversary of the Apparition of the Blessed Virgin 
 Mary to Bernadette Soubirous. 
 
 " From that moment," he wrote to a friend later on, 
 " the hand of God was upon me and guided me. With- 
 out it I never could have thought of getting up, when 
 I could hardly move for the state of my legs and when 
 it was agony to stand, and taking the few steps that 
 were to lead me to health by a way I little guessed." 
 
 It was about eight in the evening. All day long the 
 heat had been intense. 
 
 " I cannot stay on this sofa any longer,'' said Macary. 
 " I must get some air ; let us go for a turn." 
 
 " But how can you go for a turn, my poor Franqois," 
 replied his wife, "when you are not even able to stand ? " 
 
 " No matter, I don't care. My legs may grumble if 
 they like, I have borne them long enough, and the least 
 they can do is to bear me sometimes." 
 
 " Come ! come ! Do not be rash ! " 
 
 " I mean to get out of this room and breathe the fresh 
 air. Give me your arm." 
 
 He was already on his legs, and, whether or no, they 
 were obliged to let him have his way. 
 
 Leaning with one hand on his devoted Virginie, the 
 faithful support and stay of his sickness and old age, 
 and with the other on a stout knotty stick, he dragged 
 himself with difficulty along the street leading to Saint 
 Alain, the Cathedral of Lavaur. 
 
121 
 
 So violent was the pain he endured, that nothing less 
 than his extraordinary energy could have kept him on 
 his legs under such atrocious sufferings. He managed, 
 however, to reach his sister's house. Madame Bonafous 
 saw him from her window and' hailed him. 
 
 " Where are you going, FranQois ? " 
 
 " For two pins I would go and throw myself over the 
 hridge. My legs feel like red-hot irons." 
 
 " Come in and rest a little." 
 
 " Eest ? my dear Mary ! . . . I don't know what 
 it is ! " The room being on the ground floor he openq^i 
 the door and sat down overcome. 
 
 They talked for a few moments. On what subject is 
 of little moment, but while they were talking, night 
 came on and they could no longer recognise the faces 
 of the passers-by. 
 
 A priest went along the street. It was one of the 
 curates of the Cathedral, the Abb^ Coux.* As he 
 drew near the open window he recognised the joiner's 
 voice, which was sufficiently characteristic, being clear 
 and abrupt* 
 
 " What, Macary, are you there ? " he called from out- 
 side. " You are better then ? " 
 
 " On the contrary. Monsieur VAIM, I am worse. I 
 should like to sell you the skin of my legs, but I warn 
 you it is not worth much. It is all over varicose veins, 
 ulcers, lumps, and knots. Before, behind, to the right, 
 to the left, at the ankles, the calves, from the toes to 
 the knees,it is as full of holes as an old stocking." 
 
 The Abb^ Coux entered the house. He exhorted 
 
 * The AbW Coux is now Cure at Lagrave, near Gaillac in tie dio- 
 cese of Alby. 
 
122 
 
 Macary to patience and resignation; and after exchanging 
 a few words in a general way he rose to go. 
 
 " I must leave you," he said, " to finish my packing. 
 I start for Notre Bame de Lourdes to-morrow, and if you 
 have any commissions I will gladly undertake them." 
 
 At the words, Notre Dame de Lourdes, Macary sud- 
 denly raised his head. 
 
 " Yes, certainly, I have a commission ! If your 
 . Blessed Virgin has compassion on the afflicted, she 
 might surely have pity on me. Tell her there is a poor 
 wretch at Lavaur whose legs are rotting away with 
 disease, and that one does not leave a man in such a 
 state as that, if it is possible to help him out of it. Tell 
 her I am worn out with suffering, that I can bear it no 
 longer, and she must either kiU or cure me ! " . . . 
 
 " I shall not ask her to kill you, you may be sure," 
 replied the Abb6, smiling, " and she would certainly not 
 listen to me if I did." 
 
 Macary thought of the book he had been reading, 
 and the miraculous cures it contained ; and he felt 
 within himself a strong revival of hope. , 
 
 " Monsieur I' Abbe," he resumed gravely, " if you will 
 bring me a little of that water and pray for me, you 
 wUl render me a great service." 
 
 " I promise you I wUl," replied the Abb^. 
 
 vrii. 
 
 On the following Wednesday, the l9th of July, about 
 nine o'clock at night, Pranqois Macary's sister, Marie, 
 the same Madame Bonafous to whose house he had so 
 laboriously dragged himself, and where he had seen the 
 
123 
 
 Abbd Coux, opened the door of his room. and came in. 
 The Abbe was come back and had sent him a little 
 bottle of water of Lourdes, about a fifth of a litre. 
 
 " That is the thing for me ! " cried Macary, beaming 
 with delight ; " I shall soon be cured now ! . . . Good 
 night, Mary ! " 
 
 The joiner got off his sofa with the help of his wife, 
 then holding on to the furniture with one hand, and 
 leaning on her shoulder with the other, he hobbled pain- 
 fully to his bedroom. He put the bottle of water of 
 Lourdes on a table, and kneeling down before a crucifix 
 that his pious wife had hung over the fireplace the day 
 of their marriage, he prayed a short prayer, the only one 
 he could remember, to the Blessed Virgin. It was the 
 " Hail Mary ! " which floated up in his memory from 
 the wreck of his religious recollections, and which he 
 recited with his whole soul. Then he took off his 
 dressings, his bandages, and his dogskin gaiters, and 
 pouring a little of the mysterious water into the hollow 
 of his hand, he gently moistened his two legs, the veins, 
 the enormous lumps, and the suppurating sores. His 
 whole being was in prayer ; not, as just now, in a set 
 form of words, but with a profound and inward uplifting, 
 a mute and eloquent faith, the supreme prayer in spirit 
 and in truth spoken of by the Lord Jesus, and which 
 ascends straight to the pity of Almighty God. 
 
 A little water still remained in the bottle. 
 
 " Drink that, my man ! " said Macary to himself. And 
 he swallowed at a draught all that was left. 
 
 The linen bandages and the laced gaiters with which 
 he enveloped his diseased legs, were lying on his bed. 
 It was Macary's custom of a night after he was in bed. 
 
124 
 
 to roll up those bandages with the greatest care (they 
 were each about five or six metres long), ready for use 
 the next morning. On the evening of which we are 
 speaking, however, he did nothing of the kind. A man 
 of such an impetuous nature would give an impetuous 
 turn even to his very faith. He gathered up his ban- 
 dages and gaiters, rolled them into a shapeless mass, 
 and threw them with all his strength into a comer of 
 the room. 
 
 " Good night, gaiters and bandages," cried he, as they 
 flew from his hand, " good-bye for ever, dogskin and 
 laces ! Since the Blessed Virgin has cured so many 
 others, she will certainly cure me too. Never again will 
 you be twisted round my legs ! " 
 
 Macary's wife, though a fervent Christian, did not share 
 her husband's imperturbable confidence. She smiled 
 sadly at his curious mixture of prayer and hastiness, 
 as she thought to herself. " Alas ! my poor old man ! 
 the bandages and dogskins will have to go on again 
 to-morrow, and then we shall hear the usual accom- 
 paniment of expletives." 
 
 Faith generally in the power of God and in the reality 
 of miracles does not imply special faith in a certain 
 fixed miracle that other people choose to proclaim as 
 indubitable. Nature revolts against belief in anything 
 beyond its comprehension, and to nature a miracle seems 
 an impossibility. Thus in the ancient Biblical times, 
 Sara, the wife of Abraham, laughed when she heard 
 the angel proclaim her tardy maternity ; and the joiner's 
 wife laughed on the 19th of July, 1871, when her 
 husband announced with audacious assurance his cer- 
 tain and immediate cure. 
 
125 
 
 Macary was generally a long time getting to sleep at 
 night ; for when the bandages were removed from his 
 legs the Mood rushed into the veins in torrents, causing 
 him acute feverish pain, and consequent sleeplessness 
 for several hours. 
 
 But he had hardly laid his head on the pillow that 
 night when he fell into a deep sleep, to the great as- 
 tonishment of his wife, who crept noiselessly away 'and 
 went to bed, leaving the door of communication between 
 the rooms wide open. The lights were put out, and 
 darkness and silence reigned in the house. 
 
 IX. 
 
 About midnight Macary woke up. Contrary to the 
 usual state of things he felt no pain in his legs. He 
 passed his hand over them. The lumps were gone ! 
 
 " Wife ! " cried he. " I am cured ! " 
 
 " You are dreaming, my poor Francois," she answered. 
 " You are dreaming. Go to sleep ! " 
 
 " I am not dreaming," answered Macary. " I touched 
 my legs, and "... 
 
 But sleep, for a moment interrupted, weighed down 
 his eyelids anew, and notwithstanding his delightful 
 surprise, his head fell on the pillow again, and his senses 
 were lost in profound slumber. 
 
 He opened his eyes at five in the morning. The July 
 sun was shining in at the window, and now he could 
 not only touch his legs but look at them too. They 
 were perfectly whole and sound. The distended veins 
 ha,d diminished to their right size, the ulcers, the lumps. 
 
126 
 
 the knots had all disappeared, and the skin was soft and 
 supple to eye and touch. Ah ! if up to that moment 
 Macary had always expressed his feelings by terrific 
 oaths, the cry to which he now gave vent denoted the 
 complete revolution that had taken place in his nature. 
 The poor fellow clasped his hands and raised them to 
 heaven : " God ! Blessed Virgin of Lourdes ! " And 
 embracing in the same thought his Heavenly Bene- 
 factors, and the tried companion of his earthly pilgri- 
 mage, he called out in a voice that betrayed inexpressible 
 agitation : 
 
 " Virginie ! Virginie ! " 
 
 She thought he was calling for help, and sprang out of 
 bed in terror. Her husband, his face bathed in tears, 
 showed her his legs perfectly whole and sound. 
 
 " Now look ! " he cried. " You would not believe me 
 last night, when I told you I was cured ! " 
 
 She looked and trembled, and falling on her knees by 
 the bedside; buried her face in lier hands and sobbed 
 aloud. • 
 
 Macary got out of bed, stood up, walked about with- 
 out gaiters or bandages and felt neither pain nor fatigue. 
 He knelt down and prayed, then hurrying into' the 
 workshop he lifted and carried a great plauk without 
 the least effort, took it to his working-bench, fixed it 
 and began planing it. His son Charles coming in for 
 his day's work found him thus occupied, and uttered a 
 cry of surprise. 
 
 "What! father? You up already and in the work- 
 shop ? . . . What in the world has happened ? " 
 
 " What has happened, my boy ! Why, the water of 
 Lourdes has taken effect. Come and see ! " 
 
127 
 
 And turning his wide linen trousers up above his 
 knees, he uncovered his legs. 
 
 The son was stricken dumb, as the mother had been 
 a few minutes before, and could not utter a word. He 
 pressed his father in his arms and wept silently. 
 
 X. 
 
 In the course of the morning Macary caught sight 
 of a priest passing rapidly along on his way to the 
 cathedral, and recognised the Abb6 Coux. He rushed 
 to the door, but the priest was already fifteen or twenty 
 paces off. 
 
 "Good morning, Monsieur I'AhM!" cried Macary. 
 " The Blessed Virgin has answered your prayers and 
 mine too. I am cured ! Come and see ! " 
 
 " Very well ! Very well ! " replied the Abbe Coux, 
 who either did not hear distinctly, or who feared some 
 trick on the part of the workman, and certainly did not 
 for a moment suppose it possible that an incurable 
 disease of more than thirty years' standing had disap- 
 peared in a single night. " Very well ! Very well ! I 
 am in a hurry ! " And he continued his way. But 
 during the day he passed before the shop again. This 
 time the happy joiner ran after him, and came up with 
 him. 
 
 " I told you this morning I was cured. Monsieur I'AhM, 
 but I plainly saw you did not believe me. . It is true, 
 however, and you can prove it with your own eyes. 
 The Blessed Virgin has saved me ! " 
 
 Macary's tone excluded all idea of joking or untruth. 
 The priest was seized with a secret terror, for the super- 
 
128 
 
 natural had passed beside him, and he had failed to 
 recognise it. " Is it possible ! " he cried, turning 
 pale. 
 
 They went into the nearest house, which happened 
 to be that of Macary's sister, where, three days ago, the 
 old joiner had asked the Abb^ Coux to pray for him at 
 the Eocks of MassabieUa and bring him back some 
 water of Lourdes. A crowd had collected in the street 
 on hearing the conversation of Macary and the curate, 
 and several persons went with them into Madame Bona- 
 fous' house. Macary made them all feel his restored 
 legs, the places where the veins had stood out, where 
 the ulcers had suppurated, and where the lumps had 
 been. 
 
 " And now, Monsieur I' AIM I " said the joiner, "now 
 that the Blessed Virgin has cured my body, we must 
 also heal the rest, and you shall be my doctor." . . . 
 
 The Divine hand which had removed his physical 
 disease had also touched the joiner's heart, and rran9ois 
 Macary was an altered man. The unbeliever, the 
 swearer, the man who never opened his mouth but to 
 utter some awful imprecation, rose up the following 
 Sunday from the midst of the faithful, and accompanied 
 by all his family, went to receive at the Holy Table the 
 God he had so long blasphemed. Tears feU from his 
 eyes, and a touching joy was visible on every face. If 
 there is more joy in heaven over one sinner converted 
 than over a hundred just men who need no conversion, 
 the Celestial Father's felicity is surely re-echoed in the 
 hearts of his children here on earth. All the congrega- 
 tion of the Cathedral of Saint Alain on that day 
 rejoiced and were glad. 
 
129 
 
 XI. 
 
 The news of this event soon spread in the town of 
 Lavaur and the surrounding neighbourhood, and created 
 an immense sensation. 
 
 Macary went to see his three doctors. Nothing could 
 equal their astonishment at finding him cured. The 
 disease was notoriously incurable, it dated from over 
 thirty years ago ; no medical treatise had ever recounted 
 a circumstance of the kind ; . . . and yet Macary 
 was there, before their eyes, without either ulcers or 
 varicose veins. A power, unknown to science and 
 superior to Nature, had removed them all. Of the 
 numerous and enormous bunches of veins, and the 
 great lumps that had deformed the leg, nothing remained 
 except one little knot — the smallest — and that one 
 reduced, flattened, and diminished to the usual propor- 
 tions without any obstruction. The disease had entirely 
 disappeared, and those slight traces of its presence were 
 left simply to witness to past infirmities, as the dried 
 bed of a torrent testifies to all eyes the ancient passage 
 of the waters. 
 
 " Decidedly," cried Doctor S^gur, after a minute ex- 
 amination, " I can only discover some few traces of those 
 erun-TTums varices!' 
 
 " Yes, indeed," responded Doctor Eossignol, examin- 
 ing in his turn, " the symptoms have mddenly disappeared, 
 and nothing remains of those great knots but this one 
 little one, which is sensibly smaller." 
 
 " And in which there is not a sign of obstruction," ob- 
 served Doctor Bernet, astounded. " What is especially 
 striking, is that the bunches of varicose veins have en- 
 
 9 
 
130 
 
 tirely disappeared, and in their place nothing can be 
 felt but little cords, hard, void of blood and rolling 
 under the finger. In. each leg the vein has its proper 
 volume and follows its proper course. Now we know 
 that Macary suffered from a ferpetual infirmity. All 
 docfsrs are agreed on one point, namely, that varices not 
 properly taken care of are incurable ; that they cannot he 
 cured hy 'palliative treatment, still less do they cure spon- 
 taneously ; on the contrary, they continue to get worse and 
 worse. . . . And yet, this radical cure has been 
 effected in a single night and under the influence of a 
 simple application of compresses dipped in water of 
 Lourdes." 
 
 " This case of spontaneous cure appears to me all the 
 more surprising," declared Doctor S^gur, " that the annals 
 of Science make no mention of any fact of this nature.'' 
 " It must be admitted," concluded Doctor Bernet, 
 " that in fact, no author mentions any similar or anala- 
 gous observation, and Science is powerless to explain such 
 a cure. Thus, if even authentic witnesses had not 
 proved certain details, affirmed by Macary, the fact of 
 itself would stUl remain most extraordinary, and, to 
 speak plainly, Supeenatueal." 
 
 Such was the textual verdict pronounced by the three 
 eminent doctors, one after the other. It is from their 
 written declarations that we have copied their positive 
 and formal expressions. At the end of the volume 
 (Note I. of the Appendix) we reproduce in extenso, as 
 proofs, the three certificates of these members of the 
 Faculty with their signatures, attested by the Mayor 
 and the Sous-Prefect. 
 
 Adversaries of the supernatural always require 
 
131 
 
 authentic proofs and certificates emanating from men of 
 science. Here they have them. 
 
 XII. 
 
 Two months later, on the 18th of September, Macary 
 took as ex-voto to the Grotto of Lourdes, his gaiters and 
 bandages, those silent witnesses of his former iUs now 
 divinely cured. They can be seen there still, but little 
 by little the inclemency of the changing seasons is de- 
 teriorating and destroying those touching relics, placed 
 there to remind visitors of one of God's miracles.* 
 
 Beneath the shadow of the Rocks of MassabieUa, 
 those rocks sanctified by the presence of her who had 
 so miraculously succoured and saved him, Macary's 
 feelings were overwhelming. He describes them in a 
 letter that we have before us. 
 
 " I fell on my knees," he writes, '' and for ten minutes 
 or more, my heart was in such a tumult of emotion, 
 that I could not utter a word though I tried to pray. 
 
 * On this occasion we wish to express our regret that precautions 
 are not taken to preserve ex-voto of this sort for the edification of the 
 faithful . It would be desirable to enclose the more fragile amongst them 
 in crystal cases, as treasures of price, and each might bear an inscrip- 
 tion stating to what event, what date, and what miraculously cured 
 person it relates ; so that, with the help of euch an indication every- 
 one might, on the one hand, verify the fact, and on the other, be able 
 to read, if they chose, in the Annals of Notre Dams de Lourdes, or 
 some other such publication, the detailed account of the miracle to 
 which such and such an ex-voto bears witness. It would be the touch- 
 stone placed in everyone's hand ; it would be the stamp of the mint, the 
 official guarantee, graved in a metal whose intrinsic value must other- 
 wise remain unknown to the public. What inappreciable importance 
 would not such authenticity give to that mass of anonymous docu- 
 ments? 
 
132 
 
 At last a flood of tears relieved me, and I found words 
 in wMch to address a prayer of thanksgiving to the 
 Mother of Mercy, whom I almost fancied I saw in 
 reality. Never in my life shall I forget that moment. 
 If our free-thinkers could taste such happiness as one 
 feels in hours like those, they would soon understand 
 the difference between our Faith and their doctrines." 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Words such as these reveal at once, that the change in 
 Macary's mind was no less great than the improvement 
 in his body. From that day his life passed between 
 work — ^for he had recovered his strength, and prayer — 
 for he had recovered his faith. As the persecutor Saul 
 was overthrown on the road to Damascus, so the 
 blasphemer Macary had been transformed by the grace 
 of God. 
 
 His joy was great at being delivered from his infir- 
 mity, but we can confidently say, after having seen and 
 heard him, that it was nothing compared with his hap- 
 piness at being once more a Christian. The Gospel 
 speaks of the joy of the Good Shepherd when He finds 
 His lost sheep, but it tells us nothing of the feelings of 
 the sheep itself when gently brought back to the fold, 
 or of the prodigal son when embraced by his father, or 
 of the sinner when reconciled with his God. The ex- 
 cellent FrauQois Macary experienced those feelings, that 
 filial joy, that secret and unutterable felicity in all their 
 plenitude. 
 
 His heart was henceforth as the heart of an apostle. 
 He would have Uked to convert the whole world, and 
 
133 
 
 cause every member of the great human family to share 
 in the knowledge and love of the Sovereign Truth. From 
 the moment of his cure he never ceased to offer thanks- 
 giving to God, and to witness publicly before men to 
 the celestial favour of which he had been the object. 
 
 Every evening, after the labours of the day, he went 
 and passed an hour in church, alone before the Blessed 
 Sacrament. To those who came to see him he related 
 his history ; to such as wrote to him he replied scrupu- 
 lously by a clear, succinct and animated account of the 
 great event of his life. 
 
 If by chance he read in some newspaper an attack 
 on miracles, the worthy joiner left his plane, took up 
 his pen and sent the editor a detailed account of what 
 had happened to himself. Several of the letters which 
 he thus wrote have been communicated to us, and we 
 have drawn largely from them in our efforts to intro- 
 duce into our own relation something of the fresh per- 
 fume of his frank straightforward language. 
 
 "... From that moment I have worn nothing 
 but stockings on my legs, like everybody else. I have 
 never seen the least swelling nor felt the least pain, and 
 I work every day from five in the morning till seven in 
 the evening." 
 
 " These are the exact details of the marvel that it 
 pleased Our Lady of Lourdes to accomplish in me, and 
 that I forward to you on oath, requesting you to publish 
 and proclaim them wherever you like. I shall be only 
 too happy if I can hear that my letter to you has 
 brought back some unbeliever to the right road ! As 
 for me, who never prayed, I can assure you I make up 
 for lost time, and never shall I cease to thank God and 
 
134 
 
 the Blessed Virgin for having chosen me as a witness 
 
 and a proof of their glory and goodness. Adieu. Please 
 
 think of me in your prayers, and believe me your 
 
 brother in Jesus Christ, 
 
 "Feanqois Macary." 
 
 XIV. 
 
 In the following year, on the 24th of June, a proces- 
 sion of about a thousand Christians, men and women, 
 priests and laymen, went singing hymns, along the road 
 that leads to the Grotto of Lourdes. The pilgrims re- 
 membered that the Blessed Virgin had, in old times, 
 delivered their city — once from the plague, in the four- 
 teenth century, and a second time from an invasion in 
 the sixteenth century — and a magnificent emblasoned 
 banner bearing two dates recalling those ancestral 
 traditions, was carried at the head of the procession. 
 . . . But between those two dates of the past stood 
 out, in large gold letters, a quite recent one^l9th July, 
 1871, the date of the supernatural cure we have just 
 related. On the other side of the banner was the in- 
 scription. To the Immaculate Virgin, the grateful tovm 
 of Lavaur. The man who carried this banner, token of 
 the gratitude of a whole town, was FranQois Macary. 
 Every year from the time of his cure, he went to 
 Lourdes on a pilgrimage of thanksgiving. 
 
 XV. 
 
 He made his usual pilgrimage to the sanctuary of his 
 benefactress in 1875, at the beginning of October. We 
 were then at Lourdes, and Macary came to see us. 
 Never shall we forget his open, genial face. 
 
135 
 
 " Ah sir ! " lie cried, " how much I have wished to 
 know you. It was through your book that I found the 
 way to my two cures.'' He called his conversion his 
 second cure. 
 
 In saying these words, the worthy man opened his 
 arms and gave us the friendly embrace and the brotherly 
 kiss so common amongst the early Christians. 
 
 WMle listening to him talking, and examining his 
 once diseased legs, we noted the peculiar character of 
 his physical state. Since his miraculous cure, which 
 had taken place four years previously, Macary had been 
 preserved, not only from any return of his disease, but 
 from every other kind of indisposition. It seemed to 
 please the Divine Hand to deliver from any change in 
 detail, the health of the man who had suffered for so 
 long. He was thin, agile, vigorous, straight, and firm. 
 His appearance was invulnerable. Subject to the law of 
 death, he looked like a man inaccessible to the attacks 
 of illness, and like a soldier in steel armour on whose 
 breast a lance slips without leaAring any trace. A 
 violent shock may overthrow them, but no attack can 
 harm them. 
 
 We begged him to sit at table with us and share 
 our meal. And it was during this fraternal repast that 
 he related his history with extraordinary animation and 
 spirit, and an emotion that we all shared. The Cure 
 Peyramale, the Abbe Pomian, Bernadette's catechist, 
 the Abbe Peyret, Curate of Lourdes, at present Cure 
 of Aubar^de, and M. and Mme. Ernest Hello, were with 
 us. We were all under the charm of his Christian, 
 picturesque, and eloquent language. 
 
136 
 
 In a corner of the dining-room my secretary was 
 seated at his desk. 
 
 " What is that young man doing ? " asked Macary, 
 towards the end of the dinner. 
 
 '■ He is a short-hand writer. He can write as fast as 
 anyone can speak, and he has Caught and fixed on the 
 paper every word that has left your lips." 
 
 " Well, there is not one to be scratched out. From 
 the beginning to the end you have heard nothing but 
 the truth." 
 
 He remained with us during his stay at Lourdes, and 
 only left us two days later. I went with him to the 
 station, and promised to go and see him the following 
 month at Lavaur, on my way to Paris. I wanted to 
 talk with him again, to get more thoroughly into the 
 heart of his history and the history of his heart. . . . 
 Alas ! man proposes and God disposes. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 A fortnight after, on the 21st of October, 1875, there 
 was general mourning in the town of Lavaur. An im- 
 mense crowd followed to the cemetery the remains of 
 the most popular and most esteemed workman of the 
 place. Franqois Macary had been suddenly carried off 
 by the rupture of an aneurism. 'No suffering, no sick- 
 ness, no uneasiness had preceded his sudden death. 
 The man healed by the Blessed Virgin had not been 
 ill ; he had simply ceased to live in this world to enter 
 into the life above. He died cured. 
 
 " Thus," writes a friendly pen, '' Lazarus was resusci- 
 tated and died. Thus died in the same way, after a 
 
137 
 
 certain number of years passed on earth, all those 
 whose miraculous cures, by the hand of the Saviour 
 Jesus, are related in the Gospel. But their restoration 
 to health and life attested the power of the Lord ; and 
 when once that work was accomplished, God suffered 
 them to die like other men, and to enter like them into 
 the place of reward." * 
 
 That is the reason, good and pious Macary, why I 
 could not see you again in this world, nor keep my 
 promise of paying you a visit. Pray God that the 
 engagement be only put off, and that one day, with all 
 those whom I love, we may be united in the glory of 
 the throne of God, at the feet of her, whose history, all 
 unworthy as I am, I have had the supreme joy of 
 writing, and whose powerful hand, to use your own 
 language, has cured you twice. -f- 
 
 * E. Artus. 
 
 + The miraculous event whicli we have given in detail, is the sub- 
 ject of one of the painted glass-windows in the Basilica of Lourdes. 
 The window is in the chapel of the Rosary, the seventh to the right 
 on entering. Francois Macary is represented at the moment when he 
 discovers his cure by the water of Lourdes. Beside him on the table 
 is the book which revived his faith. At the top of the window Our 
 ' Lady of Lourdes is represented shedding rays of grace on the workman. 
 The wife of the joiner of Lavaur stands by, clasping her hands and 
 thanking God. 
 
MADEMOISELLE DE FONTENAY. 
 
 THEEE LETTEES SEEVING AS PEEFACE. 
 
 I. 
 
 To Moniieur Henri Lasserre. 
 
 AuTUN, 10th September, 1883. 
 
 Monsieur, 
 
 In consenting to the publicity you propose 
 giving to the narrative you have communicated to me, 
 I make, as you are aware, a very great sacrifice. It is 
 more painful to me than I can say that things of so 
 intimate a nature should be exposed to the universal 
 gaze of the world. 
 
 But since it may be for the greater glory of the 
 Blessed Virgin that her benefits be thus brought to 
 light, I do not hesitate to surmount my repugnance, 
 and I declare, as also do my family who sign this letter 
 with me, that everything contained in this narrative is 
 the exact truth. 
 
 I must add, however, that its pages contain certain 
 
139 
 
 personal appreciations and friendly portraits which I 
 should have wished, and still wish, to see suppressed. 
 
 Jeanne-Marie de Fontenay, 
 Enfant de Marie. 
 E. DE Fontenay. 
 
 M. DE Fontenay, 
 
 nde DE Feoissaed-Broissia. 
 Joseph de Fontenay, S.J. 
 
 Henry de Fontenay. 
 
 II. 
 
 Answer to the precedinff Letter. 
 
 Les Bretoux, 12th September, 188S. 
 
 Mademoiselle, 
 
 The glory of the Blessed Virgin does not allow 
 me, as you have understood yourself, to leave in dark- 
 ness and under a bushel the remarkable event of which, 
 some time ago, I was providentially a witness at the 
 Crypt of Lourdes. Doubtless it was accomplished in a 
 certain measure for your own personal advantage, but 
 infinitely more, believe me, for the good of souls, and 
 the edification of Christians. As for my personal 
 appreciations and the colouring of my portraits, I 
 cannot, alas ! even to avoid giving you some little 
 pain, abdicate the just rights of History. So you must 
 forgive me for publishing these pages exactly as I have 
 written them, in all sincerity of thought and in all 
 uprightness of intention. 
 
140 
 
 Pray to Our Lady of Lourdes that it may please her 
 to bless this narrative, and use it to spread Paith, Hope, 
 and Charity in all hearts. 
 
 Henei Lasseere. 
 
 III. 
 
 To Monsieur Henri Lasserre. 
 
 LouEDES, 16th September, 1882. 
 
 Monsieur, 
 
 I have just read your narrative. The history 
 you relate, with which I have been personally mixed 
 up, and of which I have known every detail for a long 
 time past, could not possibly be chronicled with more 
 respectful exactness. I am happy to add my testimony 
 to that of the family de Fontenay. 
 
 De MtrsY, 
 Cur^ de Chagny. 
 
MADEMOISELLE DE FONTENAY. 
 
 In 1865, Mile. Jeanne was eighteen. Intelligent in 
 mind, enthusiastic in heart, and alert and active in body, 
 she came and went, hither and thither, carried away by 
 the joyous fever of youth just waking up to life, and 
 unwilling to lose anything of the dazzling spectacle that 
 nature presents to that privileged age. Full of health 
 and strength, with sensitive nerves capable of deep 
 feeling, and muscles of steel invulnerable to fatigue, 
 she loved the open-air life of the country, and braved 
 with equal impunity the scorching rays of the summer 
 sun, or the piercing blasts of the wintry wind ; indeed, 
 not even the frost and snow of winter could check her 
 excursions and exploring expeditions through the fields, 
 the pastures, and the woods, that adorn the banks of 
 the Meurthe. 
 
 Providence had endowed her with an engaging grace 
 of person, more attractive far than- mere beauty. The 
 firm, clear lines of her face, her large black eyes, her 
 long silky hair rolled round her head in a coronet, her 
 supple form and graceful walk, gave to her whole per- 
 son a captivating harmony, that charmed the mind and 
 fixed itself in the memory. She had been brought up 
 at the convent of the Sacred Heart of Nancy, by pious 
 
142 
 
 and highly educated teachers, and had received at their 
 hands a complete education according to the world, and 
 a perfect education according to the Church. Her heart 
 and mind had been formed to love all that w^as great 
 and noble, good and true, and in her eyes, the type of 
 all greatness, goodness, beauty, and truth, after Our Lord 
 Jesus Christ and above every other creature, was the 
 Blessed and Immaculate Virgin, towards whom she 
 cherished an ardent devotion. She was proud to pos- 
 sess among her baptismal names that of the Queen of 
 Heaven, and to have been consecrated to that Mother 
 of mothers. She always signed her name thus : — 
 " Jeanne Marie, Enfant de Marie ". 
 
 Her father was of noble race, and occupied an im- 
 portant position in a high-class manufacture that touches 
 on the confines of art, and is almost an art of itself. 
 M. de Fontenay was the Director of the celebrated 
 Glass-works of Baccarat. The workmen who had 
 watched Jeanne from her cradle, and seen her try her 
 first steps on the lawns of the manufactory, now beheld 
 her sometimes running and playing in the park, like a 
 gazelle, sometimes following the road leading to the 
 town with a parcel under her arm. Whither was she 
 going thus mysteriously laden ? Accompanied by her 
 mother or a Sister of Charity, she was directing her 
 steps to the dwellings of the poor and sick, taking 
 necessaries or even acceptable superfluities, to those of 
 whom Jesus Christ has said : " Amen, I say to you, as 
 you did it to one of these my least brethren you did 
 it to Me ". And that was why she was beloved by the 
 whole country-side. She attributed to the Almighty 
 all the sx^lendours of the creation, thanked Him for the 
 
143 
 
 good things she enjoyed, accepted His gifts with grati- 
 tude, and expanded innocently, like a fair, flower, in the 
 exuberant delight of Ufe. Fortune spread its softest 
 carpet before her, and scattered its most luxuriant 
 flowers on her path. She was in the dawn and spring- 
 time of her existence, and birds of Paradise sang their 
 morning song in the garden of her heart. Within and 
 without all was content and rejoicing. To-day, Happi- 
 ness; to-morrow, Hope. The sky was pure, and to 
 Jeanne's delighted eyes the future revealed only smiling 
 landscapes and cloudless horizons. Happiness, health, 
 riches, youth. Christian belief, and human science : 
 Jeanne possessed them all. Could anything be wanting 
 in her life' ? Nothing. 
 
 Her father, M. de Fontenay, a man whose merit was 
 only equalled by his modesty, was a distinguished 
 chemist, and the art of glass-making was indebted to 
 him for some remarkable improvements. At the 
 International Exhibition, of 1867, the articles in glass, 
 incomparable marvels of beauty, that had been manu- 
 factured under his directions were universally admired.* 
 
 *The illustrious chemist Dumas speaks o£ him thus : "Monsieur 
 de Fontenay," he says, "had hardly finished his education when he 
 transformed the manufacture of crystal hy introducing into France the 
 art of making coloured glass, painted or ornamented. This art has 
 developed, and become a source of immense commerce to our 
 country ". — " The first manufacture of coloured glass," says M. Emile 
 MuUer, " is due to M. de Fontenay, who has gloriously opened the way 
 to our glass-making engineers by the success of the Glass Works of 
 Baccarat. They have been for the last thirty years embodied in their 
 Director, to whom we are also indebted for some interesting studies on 
 liqueous combustibles. "—(Speeches of MM. Dumas and MuUer on 
 the 21st of June, 1879, on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the 
 foundation of the School of Arts and Manufactures, presided over by 
 the Minister of Agriculture and Commerce.) 
 
144 
 
 But he was something more and better than a scientific 
 man ; he was a man of Faith and Charity. 
 
 The working population of Baccarat were always sure 
 of finding in their paternal Director, help and protection 
 in time of need. The distinguished glass-maker was 
 beloved and revered by the worthy people whom he had 
 guided for more than a quarter of a century in the 
 glorious path of labour, and whom he led also, by the 
 great teachiag of example, in the path of reKgious ob- 
 servance ; realizing in his own person, the type, alas ! 
 too rare in our days, of the Christian man of business. 
 He was seconded in his task by a wife in every way 
 worthy of him. The blessing of God had descended on 
 their house. Pive children were born of M. de Fon- 
 tenay's marriage with Mile. Marthe de Froissard- 
 Broissia, two of whom, Antoine and Marthe, had died 
 young. The three others who remained were the joy 
 and delight of their parents. The eldest son, Henry, 
 followed in his father's footsteps, and loved to investi- 
 gate, surrounded by retorts and alembics, the fruitful 
 secrets hidden by the Creator in the constitution of 
 bodies. His brother Joseph, who at that time was about 
 ten or twelve years of age, was of an ardent nature, im- 
 pulsive, full of life and spirits — always on fire, but a 
 fire whose pure flame rose straight to heaven, and was 
 never turned earthward by any evil wind. — He had, so 
 to speak, all the impetuosity of innocence. The elder 
 was the ripening fruit, the younger the bud, full of sap 
 and ready to break forth into blossom. Between the 
 two, Jeanne shone a fair spring flower bright and per- 
 fumed. . . . Was anything wanting in this family ? 
 Nothing. 
 
145 
 
 We are mistaken. — Something was wanting: Mis- 
 fortune. 
 
 In making the round of the vast magazines of Bac- 
 carat, the eye contemplates at every instant the most 
 brilliant specimens of ancient and modern glass-making. 
 Here and there, on magnificent vases of muslin-crystal 
 ornamented with engravings of flowers and artistic 
 arabesques, noble names, ancient coats of arms and 
 illustrious mottoes were inscribed. On all sides shone 
 great lustres glittering with countless drops and pen- 
 dants, urns, goblets, chandeliers and girandoles glowing 
 with warm colour and rainbow hues. . . . Alas ! alas ! 
 was not this the place in which to remember with fear 
 and trembling old Corneille's terrible and melancholy 
 verse : 
 
 " Toute cette faicM, 
 
 Sujette k rinstabilit^ 
 En moins que rien tombe k terre, 
 Et comme elle a I'eolat du verre, 
 EUe en a la fragility ! " * 
 
 II. 
 
 One day that the ladies were out_ driving, either 
 through the horses running away or the inexperience of 
 the coachman, Jeanne had a narrow escape from death. 
 A sudden and violent shock threw her out of the car- 
 riage, which fell heavily upon her, crushing her beneath 
 its weight. 
 
 * "All our felicity, 
 
 Subject to instability, 
 Falls to the ground, alas ! 
 And possessing tie briUianoe of glass. 
 Has also its fragility ! " 
 10 
 
146 
 
 No limbs were broken, but the accident, which a little 
 later on was aggravated by a fall from a horse, had 
 caused a serious shock to the young girl's organisation, 
 the consequences of which, as time passed on, became 
 far more disastrous than any fracture could have been. 
 
 Those consequences, however, did not manifest them- 
 selves immediately. Although a little delicate, Jeanne 
 appeared, after a certain time, sufficiently recovered to 
 be permitted to realise in the summer of 1867 the 
 favourite dream of her childhood, and pass two months 
 in the capital of the Christian world. There she saw 
 the Pope, Pius the Ninth, and brought back with her, 
 as a precious remembrance of her pious journey, a 
 rosary that the Holy Father had held in his hand 
 during the interview, and which never left her from 
 that time. 
 
 A circumstance of that journey had particularly im- 
 pressed itself on Jeanne's memory. As she and her 
 mother were walking one day in the outskirts of Rome, 
 they perceived, a few steps before them, the august 
 successor of the Prince of the Apostles. He also had 
 wandered in that direction in search of fresh air and 
 solitude. At that moment a few drops of rain began 
 to fall, and the Pope re-entered his carriage. Jeanne 
 ran and threw herself at his feet. 
 
 "Holy Father, bless me !" 
 
 The Vicar of Jesus Christ laid his venerable hands 
 on the young girl's head. 
 
 " I bless you," he said. 
 
 Then, fixing on her his soft and penetrating eyes, he 
 added : " And the Blessed Virgin wiU bless you also ". 
 
 That pilgrimage to Eome, that poetic journey across 
 
147 
 
 the picturesque plains which border the Appeuines, 
 the stay in the Eternal City, the memorable audience at 
 the Vatican, and the filial prostration at the feet of the 
 Sovereign Pontiff, composed the supreme fite, of her 
 youth. 
 
 Dark shadows were about to descend on that pro- 
 mising dawn, and enduring trials to succeed to fleeting 
 joys- 
 
 III. 
 
 From the time of her return to France, the latent 
 consequences of Jeanne's two previous falls began to 
 assume a more marked and threatening character, and 
 her health was seriously affected. She became subject 
 to violent attacks of pain, and felt within herself that 
 something in her organisation was radically wrong. 
 
 The effects of the disease, as so often happens, soon 
 manifested itself in her legs; they became gradually 
 weaker and weaker. As much as she had once loved 
 movement and activity, so much she was now appre- 
 hensive of the least fatigue and anxious for repose. 
 She hardly ever went out, for the shortest walk over- 
 whelmed her with weariness, and she was obliged to 
 rest after it in an arm-chair or on a sofa. Dark rings 
 encircled her eyes, which gradually assumed that painful 
 brilliancy peculiar to fever and sleeplessness 
 
 Such was her state when, from the very beginning of 
 the war, the Prussians over-ran Baccarat. 
 
 It is not our intention to retrace the sombre scenes, 
 the terrors and the suspense of those terrible hours. 
 But it is easy to imagine what the poor girl must have 
 felt at the sight of the German ofi&cers and soldiers. 
 
148 
 
 making themselves masters of the house, and filling it 
 from morning tiU. night with the tumult of their cries 
 and oaths, the suffocating atmosphere of their pipes 
 and the sinister clanking of their arms. 
 
 Although the room where Jeanne was so often de- 
 tained in bed was guarded by her mother as a sanctuary 
 of suffering, the brutal curiosity of the invaders did not 
 always respect its threshold ; and more than once the 
 poor girl was terrified by her door half-opening and a 
 head covered with an iron-pointed helmet intruding 
 itself to glance with , insolent inquisition round the 
 room. In addition to that, she was ever in constant 
 agonies of terror and alarm, for whenever a franc-tireur 
 was seen in the neighbourhood the Prussians threatened 
 to set fire to the Manufactories and shoot the Director. 
 
 M. de Fontenay's admirable energy never once forsook 
 him in the midst of so many perils ; he thought of his 
 workmen as much as of his family — the father watched 
 over all and everyone. 
 
 The eldest son Henry had, from the commencement 
 of the national disasters, engaged as volunteer, and ac- 
 quitted himself bravely in the decimated ranks of our 
 armies. He was struck by a Prussian ball and obliged 
 to undergo the amputation of one of his fingers. . . . 
 What sorrow and bitter grief in that once calm and 
 happy home ! By the end of the war Jeanne's condi- 
 tion had become seriously worse. Her weary limbs 
 only found a little relief, or rather only escaped absolute 
 suffering, when stretched on a sofa covered with cush- 
 ions and pniows. There she passed long days, some- 
 times reading, sometimes with eyes fixed on space and 
 thoughts lost in sad reflections of which God alone 
 
149 
 
 knew the secret !— sometimes witli clasped hands im- 
 ploring assistance and courage of the Sovereign Consoler. 
 
 Amongst the works she glanced at or read to help to 
 pass the time was one that, for about a week, seemed to 
 pre-occupy her mind and make her thoughful. The 
 different chapters of Our Lady of Lourdes (such was 
 the title of the volume) treated, in fact, of divine mar- 
 vels and extraordinary cures accomplished in our own 
 days at the foot of the Pyrenees, without any other 
 help than prayer and the direct intervention of the 
 Blessed Virgin. She imagined that it would be ambitious 
 to aspire to a miracle, such celestial favours, according 
 to her ideas, being granted only to very saintly persons ; 
 but the thought that she might be taken to Lourdes 
 presented itself to her mind still absorbed with the 
 narrative she had just read, and thrilled her with a sort 
 of vague hope, while she passed through her feverish 
 fingers the rosary given her by Pius the Mnth. 
 
 But Jeanne, like a fragile and flexible flower which 
 the breeze inclines from side to side according to its 
 varying caprice, soon turned her reveries in another 
 direction and thought no more of that fugitive impres- 
 sion. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Madame de Fontenay was a most devoted mother, 
 and her daughter's cruel disease was her constant 
 anxiety, and her continual preoccupation. It was she, 
 and she alone, who filled the post of sick nurse, and 
 from her hand only did Jeanne receive the attentions 
 her state required, for she would yield to no stranger 
 the dear but cruel privilege of waiting on her child. 
 
150 
 
 She was on foot instantly at every call, every moan, 
 every complaint even unconscious, always near Jeanne 
 during the day, and sleeping beside her bed at night the 
 light watchful sleep of vigilance — that sleep so unknown 
 to heavy selfishness, and so natural to anxious love. 
 
 It will easily be understood that in consequence of 
 this state of things, the family isolated themselves from 
 the outside world, and kept to themselves a trouble that 
 nothing could alleviate, neither the common-place 
 civilities of the indifferent, nor even the sympathy of 
 friendship. And, indeed, there are some troubles which 
 are only aggravated by any attempt at consolation. 
 
 We must add that the poor mother courted retire- 
 ment all the more, because she was preoccupied per- 
 haps excessively by the thousand rumours spread by 
 the curious, and she objected, above aU things, to her 
 daughter being looked upon as a confirmed invalid. 
 She feared also that the sight of her prolonged weak- 
 ness might bring to some inadvertent lips the fatal 
 word " consumption," wherefore she was urgent that 
 in public Jeanne should struggle against her feelings 
 at any cost. 
 
 The young girl, endowed with great strength of 
 mind, constrained herself, therefore, whenever visitors 
 called, to sit up in an easy chair, and take an animated 
 part in the conversation, hiding her sufferings as well 
 as she could, and, by a last effort accompanying her 
 friends to the door. But when they were gone, she 
 threw herself on her bed writhing in agonies of acute 
 pain, occasioned by the momentary violence she had 
 imposed on nature. 
 
 Madame de Toutenay, who was naturally extremely 
 
151 
 
 open and unreserved, maintained on this sore place in 
 her heart an absolute silence. When anyone enquired 
 after her daughter, she invariably replied : 
 
 " Oh ! Jeanne is pretty well, her little indisposition is 
 natural to her time of life, and will soon disappear." 
 
 V. 
 
 But if they were thus careful to throw a veil — 
 a transparent one at best — over their secret trouble, 
 on the other hand they neglected no means likely 
 to restore health to the invalid. They knocked at 
 every door, tried mineral waters, and exhausted the re- 
 sources of the druggists. Madame de Tontenay would 
 have liked to have the advice of all the doctors in the 
 world for her beloved child, and would have tried every 
 known remedy to save her. 
 
 Alas ! " Human science," as Montaigne says, " is 
 wavering and changeable, malleable and pliable to 
 every wind of doctrine ". They naturally began by 
 consulting the doctor of Baccarat, Doctor Mangin, who 
 knew Jeanne's constitution, and had observed her illness 
 from its origin. He was a man of great experience, sure 
 diagnostic, and devotedlj"^ attached to the family. He 
 displayed all his talent, his erudition, his intellect, in 
 attempting to cure Jeanne — he had called to the help 
 of science the powerful action of natural springs, and 
 had sent the sick girl to Aix-les-Bains, for two successive 
 seasons — ^in 1869 and 1870. But the resources of tra- 
 ditional and classical medicine had been of no avail 
 against the tenacity of the disease and its rapid pro- 
 gress. 
 
152 
 
 By the advice of M. d'Hotelans, one of her uncles 
 who lived at Besan^on, Madame de Fontenay applied 
 to Doctor Labrune, a learned practitioner of that town. 
 
 Doctor Labrune shook his head while listening to the 
 history of the treatment that had been followed, and 
 then raised it, not \srithout some conscious pride, to pro- 
 nounce his opinion : 
 
 " My colleague of Baccarat has been following the 
 old routine. We wiU leave it, and save the young lady 
 by homeopathy. No more pUls ! Globules instead. 
 'No more mixtures ! Dilutions in their place." 
 
 The new trial lasted some weeks ; but globules and 
 dilutions were not more ef&cacious than pills and mix- 
 tures had been. Disappointed but not discouraged by 
 this new failure, the mother and daughter consulted a 
 celebrity of Lorraine, Doctor Schustemberg of the 
 Faculty of Strasbourg. 
 
 " How difficult it is to keep in the right path," cried 
 he. " Allopathy has deviated to the right, homeopathy 
 has turned to the left. In medio stat virtus. Made- 
 moiselle has a rheumatic constitution, and is suffering 
 from pronounced anemy. We must employ the univer- 
 sal tonic, the all-powerful reviver : cold water ! Sudden 
 immersions, vigorous jets, and icy douches. Hydropathy 
 will be the saving of her." 
 
 The hydropathic treatment was adopted. 
 
 Jeanne submitted to a rigorous application of it at 
 the great establishment of La Hoube, in the duchy of 
 Baden, but that energetic therapeutic method produced 
 no serious result. 
 
 It was about this time that M. de Fontenay retired 
 on a pension, after having directed the Glass Works of 
 
153 
 
 Baccarat for thirty-two years. He returned and settled 
 in his native town of Autun. 
 
 At Autun lived Dr. Lagoutte, who was much attached 
 to the family. He was consulted. After thoroughly 
 examiniug the previous treatments, and discovering 
 besides a bronchial affection, he formally condemned 
 the ideas of his predecessor. 
 
 " What you want," he said, " is not cold water, but 
 warm water. Go back of a season to Aix-les-Bains." . . . 
 
 At Aix-les-Bains, Doctor I'Espines advised a surgical 
 treatment, that the sick girl could not bring herself to 
 consent to. . . . 
 
 " Oh ! Who will reveal the secret of how to cure 
 her ! " thought the poor distracted mother, as she had 
 recourse successively to every means, listened eagerly to 
 all opinions, and besought advice from every source. 
 She remembered then a famous doctor of the south of 
 France who had exhibited remarkable skill when he 
 attended her son Henry, at the time of the amputation 
 of his linger, which operation had been performed under 
 considerable difficulties. He lived at Lyons, and thither 
 Madame de Fontenay took her daughter. 
 
 Life was gradually diminishing in her bloodless and 
 exhausted veins. Jeanne was always cold. 
 
 " We must have a perfectly pure atmosphere and a 
 perpetual summer to restore her congealed blood and 
 fortify her shattered health. It is no use plunging her 
 in hot or cold water. She should bathe in the rays of 
 the sun. You must go to Cannes.'' 
 
 Thus spoke Doctor Bouchacourt. 
 
 Immediately Madame de Fontenay and her daughter 
 pitched their wandering tent on ' the warm slopes of 
 
154 
 
 the incomparable shores that border the Gulf of 
 NapoH 
 
 Sheltered on all sides, from the North and South 
 winds, by the ranges of the Alps, or the mountains of 
 the Est^rel, poor Jeanne warmed her frozen blood in the 
 sun. The cosmopolitan population of Cannes noticed 
 the young invalid painfully dragging herseH along on her 
 niother's arm, and seeming to measure with anxious eye 
 the few steps that intervened between her and the chair 
 or bench on which she would find a little repose after 
 her efforts, and where she was no sooner seated, than 
 her maid hastened to wrap her in the folds of warm 
 shawls and thick rugs. 
 
 Six years had passed since the manifestation of the 
 weakness and morbid crises which in 1867 had marked 
 the first phases of the disease ; they were then at the 
 beginning of 1873. It had been a long period of suffer- 
 ings endured and hopes deceived. From year to year, 
 and from treatment to treatment, the young girl's con- 
 stitution had finished by being almost completely ruined. 
 
 It would be well to mention here, as an explanation 
 of the numerous uncertainties and contradictions in the 
 doctors' opinions, that through her absolute ignorance of 
 the physiological importance of certain details, Jeanne, 
 in consulting the men of science, had contented herself 
 with speaking only of such things as appeared grave to 
 her, and remained silent on the subject of her internal 
 sufferings which she considered as without importance. 
 
 " The pains I endure, and the uncomfortable feelings 
 I have," she thought, " are peculiar to my constitution. 
 They make me suffer, but to suffering I can oppose re- 
 signation. ... If only I could be cured of this mortal 
 
155 
 
 weakness that paralyses me, and if I could walk again, 
 the rest would be a little trial that I. might offer to God." 
 
 And in this manner, without knowing or intending it, 
 she misled the doctors, by entirely concealing, or by 
 lightly passing over the violent sufferings and distressing 
 sensations she experienced in those parts of her body 
 that had been crushed beneath the weight of the over- 
 turned carriage. 
 
 However praiseworthy and comprehensible may be 
 the motives of Jeanne's reserve, we are of opinion that 
 a clearer understanding of the necessities and laws of 
 existence might have determined her from the beginning 
 to conceal nothing. Doctors are like confessors : they 
 must know all. — But notwithstanding her reticence, 
 certain of them had suspected that the roots of her 
 disease lay in some organic injury, some hidden evil. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Towards the end of January, 1873, Jeanne had be- 
 come so much worse that it was impossible for her to 
 stand upright or make a single step. About this time 
 also, the excruciating inward pains that she suffered 
 increased so much in intensity that her friends were 
 forced, at last, to open their eyes to the gravity of the 
 symptoms. They sent for Dr. Buttura, who saw Jeanne 
 in one of these attacks. She writhed screaming in 
 agony, and when the attack was over, she was persuaded 
 to reveal its nature. 
 
 The doctor took the mother aside and spoke openly. 
 " It is a complicated case which cannot be resolved 
 either by pills or globules, or cold water or warm water. 
 
156 
 
 or sunshine. Her state of health proceeds from an 
 internal cause. Dr. d'Espine of Aix was right, and how- 
 ever trying it may be, you must have recourse to the 
 surgeon. If Mademoiselle was a daughter of mine, I 
 should not hesitate for a moment to call in an experi- 
 enced specialist. Now, there is a celebrated English 
 doctor staying in the neighbouring town of Mentone. 
 You had better see him at once, and without losing a 
 moment of time, for it has already been left far too 
 long." 
 
 The poor girl therefore resigned herself to the surgical 
 care of Dr. Bennet, and passed ten or twelve weeks in 
 bed, enduring the gradual cauterizations of the Dupuy- 
 tren of the other side the Channel. 
 
 But however clever he might be, the English prac- 
 titioner only succeeded in making her suffer scientifically, 
 and came no nearer a cure than his predecessors had 
 done. 
 
 Sometimes she fell into a state of nervous exaspera- 
 tion before or after the doctor's visit. Her delicacy 
 rebelled against the nature of the treatment that her 
 mother's entreaties and her own faith in human science 
 made it her duty to foUow. She was generally ex- 
 tremely docile with doctors, properly so called, and 
 willingly accepted their prescriptions, but her whole soul 
 revolted with horror against the pitiless hands of the 
 surgeon. Therefore, after enduring everything for three 
 months without any result, her aversion and repugnance 
 became insurmountable, and she was on the point of 
 absolutely refusing to continue the treatment when Dr. 
 Bennet was called away to England, and thus it was 
 temporarily suspended. 
 
157 
 
 VII, 
 
 Informed of the situation and justly alarmed, M. de 
 Fontenay, who was then at Autun, hastened to join his 
 wife and daughter. Notwithstanding so many useless 
 trials and repeated failures, the father and mother still 
 clung with tenacious credulity to their belief in the 
 power of Medicine. Hanging over their child's bed, 
 they encouraged her to overcome her repugnance. 
 
 " If not for yourself, dear child, do at least try for our 
 sakes." . . . 
 
 Jeanne, however, in her long hours of sleeplessness, 
 had recalled to mind a book she had read years ago, 
 and the current of her thoughts brought back to her 
 recollection and revived in her heart a once fugitive 
 impression. 
 
 " Father," she said, " I wiU submit to all the treat- 
 ments you like — but on condition that before beginning 
 a single one you will let me go to Lourdes." 
 
 Her parents were too sincerely Christian to oppose 
 the least resistance to their child's wish, but still they 
 hardly dared hope for a divine intervention in their 
 troubles ; and, in any case, it was considered • desirable 
 to ask the advice of an eminent ecclesiastic, Mgr. 
 Oaverot, then Bishop of Saint-Die, and now Cardinal- 
 Archbishop of Lyons. He had known the family for 
 many years, and wrote them the following letter, which 
 we copy without comment. It is sufficiently clear in 
 itself, and shows, by the words printed in italics, how 
 grave the situation was. 
 
158 
 Bishop's Palace, St. Die, ^5th April, I884. 
 
 Mt vbet deae Child, — What you tell me of the state to which 
 God has permitted you to be reduced completely confirms the apprecia- 
 tion contained in the letter 1 have had the honour of writing to your 
 mother. If you were actually staying at Lourdes, doubtless you might 
 be allowed to be taken to the church there. But to undertake the 
 journey from Cannes to Lowrdes m the situation you are in would ie, 
 unless you had a direct order or revelation from God, a sigruil act of 
 folly. 
 
 But, my child, you will do well to consult your doctor. If he 
 declares that the journey would not involve any grave consequenees for 
 you, my objections fall of themselves, for I am not a man of science. 
 If I were, I should not change my opinion. 
 
 You must endeavour to see in all this, my child, the will of Ood, 
 and learn, if necessary, to make Sim the sacrifice of your ovm. Besides, 
 nothing prevents your promising to make the pilgrimage if you recover. 
 The Blessed Virgin has no difficulty in performing miracles at a dis- 
 tance, and Our Lady of Lourdes accomplishes many such every day. 
 
 Offer my homage of respect, etc. . . . 
 
 L. M., Bishop of Saint Di^. 
 
 Following the prelate's advice, the doctor was con- 
 sulted, and the man of science spoke literally in the 
 same terms as his lordship. 
 
 " It would be a signal act of folly to undertake the 
 journey under such circumstances." . . . 
 
 Dr. Buttura, however, who was as experienced as he 
 was learned, had often remarked during his long prac- 
 tice how hard and painful the sick find it to give up a 
 pet idea, a plan conceived, a project that their hearts 
 are set on. In the natural course of things the sick are 
 petted up like spoiled children, and are often subject to 
 terrible fits of obstinacy that yield to no consideration, 
 and cannot be opposed without danger. The tender 
 care of those about them has often been, for years. 
 
159 
 
 devoted to sparing them every little annoyance and 
 watching their slightest wishes in order to gratify 
 them, so that, little by little, they have got accus- 
 tomed to an absolute compliance in everything; and 
 when that redoubtable habit is acquired, it becomes 
 almost impossible to act in opposition to their desires. 
 A formal refusal to accede to a wish turns that wish 
 into an imperious necessity, especially with women : 
 they become low-spirited, lose their appetite and their 
 sleep, and are subject to feverishness. What is to be 
 done in such a case? Yield, yield always, whatever 
 may be the consequences. This was certainly not 
 Jeanne's case ; but Dr. Buttura, perhaps, was less sure 
 of that than we are, for he added : 
 
 " Yes, to undertake such a journey under such cir- 
 cumstances would be a signal act of folly. . . . Still, 
 considering the intense desire of the patient to go, it would 
 perhaps be less dangerous to let her commit the folly 
 than to prevent her." 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Jeanne pleased herself by distorting this sentence 
 into what she called " the doctor's consent ". ISTever- 
 theless, both she and her mother needed no small share 
 of courage to set off on their journey, and they drove 
 to the station in fear and trembling. But thanks to the 
 ingenious inventions by which a railway car can be 
 turned into a bedroom, and a seat into a sofa or a couch, 
 the sick girl arrived safely at Lourdes the 21st May, 
 1873, after a journey of two hundred and fifty leagues. 
 The 21st of May in that year was the eve of the Ascen- 
 sion. M. de Fontenay, her father, left Cannes at the 
 
160 
 
 same time to return to Autun, where he was one of the 
 organisers of the diocesan pilgrimage which was to 
 start for Paray-le-Monial the oth of June; he had 
 assumed the difficult and fatiguing charge in the hope 
 of increasing by his good work the chances — so uncer- 
 tain, alas ! — that his daughter might have of recovering 
 her health at the Grotto of Lourdes. 
 
 Jeanne had great faith in miracles, as was proved by 
 her taking such a long and difficult journey in quest 
 of one. But it must be added, in all truth and sincerity, 
 according to our own personal impression, — it was not 
 the faith that transports mountains. 
 
 Jeanne's faith, like her mother's, bordered on that 
 vague sort of hope, obstinate in its efforts and yet never 
 sure of itself, that some sick persons encourage and 
 cherish — as much in the natural as in the supernatural 
 order of things — in all that seems to them to contain 
 the least chance of help or safety. Jeanne believed and 
 believed not: she would and would not. "I had no 
 faith that I should be cured," she said, " and I should 
 add that some secret inward feeling prevented my ask- 
 ing it with all my heart." She hesitated, and like all 
 hesitating natures she thought to reconcile everything 
 by taking a middle course and contenting herself with 
 what might be called a half-request for a half-cure. 
 
 " Holy Mother, at least permit that I may walk while 
 I am near you ! " And the young girl, ignorant of what 
 she was doing and unaccustomed to sound the depths 
 of her heart, could not understand that this timidity in 
 her prayer was the worm at the heart of a ripe fruit: 
 doubt in the heart of faith; she could not see that 
 it was the contrary of what our Lord had taught when 
 
161 
 
 He cried, in the days of old : — Cmfidite ! " Have 
 faith ! " Nolite timere ! " Fear not ! " 
 
 IX. 
 
 Madame de Pontenay and her daughter remembered 
 the important part taken by the Cure Peyramale in the 
 events that marked the period of the Apparitions of 
 Our Lady of Lourdes, and they were inspired with the 
 excellent idea of choosing him for their confessor and 
 director. He was a man who, in matters of faith, pos- 
 sessed superabxmdantly whatever was wanting in others ; 
 and was able to make up all deficiencies without impo- 
 verishing his treasure. He borrowed the expressions of 
 the Divine Master to reassure our two travellers and 
 raise their courage. " Si potes credere, omnia possibilia 
 sunt credenti : If you believe, all things are possible to 
 those who lelieve ! . . . Omnia qucecumque petieritis 
 in oratione, credentes, aecipietis : Whatever you ask for 
 believing, you shall receive!" And like the Israelite 
 spoken of in the Gospel, they cried : " We believe ! We 
 believe!" But they did not take into account their 
 secret misgivings, and so forgot to add humbly : " Help 
 our unbelief ! " 
 
 The Servant of Mary helped them nevertheless, 
 and little by little, during the course of a Noveno to 
 Our Lady of Lourdes, Jeanne's strength came gradually 
 back. One day she took five or six steps. The next 
 day she went forty. The day after that she walked 
 pretty easily ; and at last, after the N'oveno, on the 3rd 
 of June, which was the double anniversary of her own 
 and Bemadette's first communion, she went on foot 
 
 11 
 
162 
 
 ■with the other pilgrims to the Chapel and the Grotto, 
 followed the processions of Ari^ge and Pontacq, and 
 returned to the town. At every step she took, Jeanne's 
 surprise increased. Even after such long walks she felt 
 not the least fatigue. . . . She then went with her 
 mother to visit the Cur^ of Lourdes. 
 
 • X. 
 
 It appears to us opportune, before going on with our 
 narrative, to recall a scene of the New Testament, and 
 to insert here for the greater edification of the reader, a 
 page of the Sacred Book : 
 
 And forthwith Jesus obliged his disciples to go up into the 
 boat and to go before him over the water till he dismissed the 
 people. 
 
 And having dismissed the multitude, he went up into a moim- 
 tain alone to pray. And when it was evening he was there alone. 
 
 But the boat in the midst of the sea was tossed with the 
 waves ; for the wind was contrary. 
 
 And in the fourth watch of the night, he came to them walk- 
 ing upon the sea. 
 
 And they seeing him walking upon the sea were troubled say 
 ing : It is an apparition. And they cried out for fear. 
 
 And immediately Jesus spoke to them saying : Be of good 
 heart : It is I. Fear ye not. 
 
 And Peter making answer said : Lord, if it be thou bid me 
 come to thee upon the waters. 
 
 And he said " Come " And Peter going down out of the 
 boat walked upon the water to come to Jesus. 
 
 But seeing the wind strong he was afraid : and when he began 
 to sink he cried out saying : Lord, save me. 
 
 And immediately Jesus stretching forth his hand took hold of 
 him and said to him : " thou of little faith, why didst thou 
 doubt?" 
 
163 
 
 And when they were come up into the boat the wind ce&sed. 
 And they that were in the boat came and adored him saying : 
 Indeed thou art the Son of God. 
 
 XI. 
 
 The Cur^ Peyramale was greatly rejoiced to see the 
 young girl able to walk. However used he might be 
 to such sights, his eyes always filled with .happy tears 
 at each new grace accorded by Our Lady of Lourdes 
 to the sick and suffering. "Glory to God and Our 
 Blessed Lady ! my dear child/' he cried. " You are 
 delivered from your seven years of paia and infirmity ! " 
 
 " But, Monsieur le Cur^, I feel no proof in myself of 
 being cured." 
 
 The Abbe Peyramale looked at her in boundless as- 
 tonishment. 
 
 " What ! when you arrived at Lourdes last week, you 
 were stretched motionless on your bed, powerless to 
 stand or even sit up; you were carried about from 
 place to place; and now, to-day, after having walked 
 to the Grotto" and back ; after having followed the pro- 
 cession from beginning to end ; after returning in haste 
 to come and see nie ; after, in short, striding about like 
 a rural postman and climbing the steep paths like an 
 antelope, you come and ask if you are cured ? " 
 
 "Yes, but" . . . 
 
 " Yes, but what ? Are you tired ? " 
 
 " Not more than a person in good health." 
 
 " Do you experience any difficulty in walking ? " 
 
 " None whatever." 
 
 " Are you in any pain ? " 
 
 "No." 
 
164 
 
 " Well then ! if you feel no pain, and no diffictilty in 
 walking, if you experience no weariness after the dis- 
 tance you have gone, how can you possibly suppose that 
 you are not cured ? " 
 
 "But I am not in my usual state. — I miss some- 
 thing." 
 
 " I should think you do ! You miss your Ulness. . . 
 You have been used to it for so long that it leaves a 
 blank." 
 
 '■ Yes, but I have not felt what I expected and what 
 evidently one ought to feel when the Blessed Virgin 
 intervenes to work a miracle. Wo sudden shock, no 
 secret thrill, no illumination of the soul. — None of aU. 
 those things have happened. I walk Hke everybody 
 else, it is true. I suffer no inconvenience, I am not 
 tired; but I have never felt anything to indicate the 
 exact moment when my organs were restored to their 
 place, and I cannot persuade myself that I am cured." 
 
 " Come ! Come ! It is your head that is not in its 
 place, and your faith that wavers. You doubt, in the 
 face of a miracle, my child, as Simon Eeter doubted 
 when at the Saviour's call he walked on a sheet of water 
 as if it were dry land. You must react energetically 
 against this temptation which often assails the miracu- 
 lously cured, and not fall into the trap set for you by 
 the perfidious enemy of mankind." 
 
 That day, which was the Tuesday of Pentecost, the 
 spirit of the Holy Ghost seemed to breathe through the 
 lips of the Servant of Our Lady of Lourdes. He added ; 
 " Start for Paray-le-Monial to-morrow ; M. de Fontenay 
 will be there on Thursday with the Pilgrimage of your 
 Diocese. And there, with aU your family and your 
 
165 
 
 friends from Autun, you will thank Our Lord Jesus 
 Christ on your knees for the supernatural cure that His 
 Holy Mother has granted you here." ... 
 
 Madame de Fontenay and her daughter yielded com- 
 pletely to the influence of his persuasive eloquence, 
 which had the effect of driving away all hesitation and 
 trouble from their hearts, as the wind dissipates the 
 clouds and mists of the morning. 
 
 XII. 
 
 On leaving the Presbytery, the mother and daughter 
 talked of the man of God. 
 
 " That priest has the soul of an apostle," they said ; 
 " did not our heart burn within us while he was 
 talking ?" 
 
 Christian tradition reports that Simon Peter, son of 
 Jonas, had no direct descendants except his only 
 daughter, Saint Petronilla. Some learned ones, indeed, 
 pretend that even she was only his spiritual daughter. 
 But his indirect descendants are very numerous. Madame 
 de Fontenay and her daughter belonged, doubtless, to 
 that ancient race, and they were also, we believe, dis- 
 tantly related to the Apostle Thomas. 
 
 So when they got back to their hotel, and were busy 
 with the preparations for their departure, they began 
 to think, and their courage began to diminish. 
 
 Although Madame de Fontenay saw her beloved 
 daughter walking, moving, busily attending to the 
 packing, she was stUl, from excess of maternal solici- 
 tude, in a state of alarm. She could not get used to 
 being without fear. After having .trembled so often 
 
1,66 
 
 before her ch}l(i's cruel disease, she trembled now before 
 the health so miraculpusly but so recently recovered. 
 Such an extraordinary thing seemed to her from its 
 very suddenness to be without that foundation or that 
 solidity -which is assured by the slow progress of an 
 ordinary convalescence. On her side, Jeanne, although 
 cured, would have Hked to see herself stronger. The 
 stones of the road were hard to her feet, unaccustomed 
 for so many years to walking; when she saw herself 
 in the glass she was frightened at the paleness of her 
 face. In short, while they thanked God for the miracu- 
 lous favour bestowed upon them, they became more 
 and more inclined to express their gratitude in a manner 
 notably different to the one recommended by the Cur^ 
 of the Apparitions. 
 
 " What a signal benefit Our Lady of Lourdes has 
 granted us ; and who would have dared to hope it ? . . . 
 How grateful we ought to be ! But the Blessed Virgin 
 expects us to be prudent. Is not Prudence the virtue 
 of the wise ? Let us be careful, then, not to fall into 
 the opposite extreme, which would be sinful, nor rush 
 presumptuously into some thoughtless course. Our 
 Lady of Lourdes evidently looks to us to help her in 
 her work of grace. Under existing circumstances, the 
 best means to co-operate in it would be to resort to the 
 natural resources discovered by science. Instead, then, 
 of exposing ourselves by blameable temerity to the 
 fatigues of Paray-le-Monial, would it not be wiser to 
 start for Aix-les-Bains ? The waters are very strength- 
 ening, and wiU help and consolidate the miracle." 
 
 So, settling this admirable project in their minds, the 
 ladies strapped up their trunks and portmanteaus, and 
 
167 
 
 prepared to start for Aix by the first train in the 
 morning. 
 
 But at dawn the next day, when Jeanne tried to rise> 
 she could neither stand nor make the least movement 
 with her legs and feet. The unfortunate young girl had 
 suddenly fallen back into her former state. 
 
 Her cry of horror at this frightful awakening may be 
 easily imagined. To obtain the benefit of a cure and 
 lose it again ! To have had, as it were, a miracle in her 
 possession, to have been invested for an instant with 
 the plenitude of health, and then to see it suddenly 
 disappear like an Eastern mirage ! The despair of 
 Jeanne and her mother, in real life, must have equalled 
 the fabled despair of Sisyphus at the fatal moment 
 when the rock rolled with such difficulty to the top of 
 the mountain, fell headlong down again to the bottom 
 of the ravine. 
 
 And yet, notwithstanding their clear good sense, 
 they neither of them understood the meaning of this 
 sudden relapse. A veil was over their eyes, or rather 
 their eyes were directed away from the truth. The 
 clearest-sighted people can only see what. they look 
 at, and are blind to the horizon that stretches out 
 behind them. 
 
 " I am as ill as I was before, and out of reach of a 
 doctor ! " cried Jeanne. ... " Ah ! how right I 
 was ! No, no ! I was not cured ! . . . Let us start 
 for Aix at once ! " 
 
 Lourdes had become intolerable to her. The ringing 
 of the church bells, the sound of the hymns chanted 
 by the processions that passed under her window, irri- 
 tated and increased her sufferings. 
 
168 
 
 The Cur^ of Lourdes met the carriage which was 
 taking Jeanne to the station. 
 
 " The blessing of Our Lady of Lourdes go with you ! 
 You are starting for Paray ? " . . . 
 
 " No, Monsieur le Guri" said the mother ; " we are 
 going to Aix-les-Bains. Jeanne has had a relapse." 
 
 And she told him the events of the morning. . , . 
 
 The servant of Our Lady of Lourdes listened thought- 
 fully, and the words of the Saviour to Simon Peter 
 when he was sinking, came of themselves to his Ups : 
 
 " Quid duhitasti, modiccefidei? Why did you doubt, 
 women of little faith ? " 
 
 However, in spite of his sanctity the Cur^ PejTamale 
 had not the gift of miracles : he could not cure Jeanne 
 of her illness, as Jesus, by extending His hand, had 
 saved the chief of the Apostles. 
 
 He looked long and anxiously after the unfortunate 
 girl, as the carriage whirled rapidly towards the station ; 
 and he prayed for her with his whole heart. 
 
 " 0, Our Lady of Lourdes ! " he implored, " let this 
 be only a trial, and do not repent of your gifts." 
 
 The superior of the little Seminary of Autun, the 
 Abb^ Duch^ne, Jeanne's spiritual director, went on a 
 pilgrimage to Lourdes some little time after. The Cur^ 
 Peyramale then explained the relapse to him in these 
 words : 
 
 " Both mother and daughter were wanting in faith. 
 The disease will only get worse and worse, since they 
 prefer the waters of Aix to the waters of Lourdes." 
 
169 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Disappointed and saddened, Madame de Fontenay 
 and her daughter resumed their wandering life, and 
 prepared to recommence their groping perigrinations 
 after the lost health, taking their chance with medical 
 consultations, and the contradictory opinions of human 
 science. 
 
 The further they got from the city of Mary, the worse 
 Jeanne felt herself. She had a violent attack of bron- 
 chitis, which obliged them to stop at Montpellier. They 
 called in Doctor Courty, one of the cleverest practi- 
 tioners of the celebrated Faculty. He prescribed for 
 the bronchitis, and nearly cured it, but he made no 
 secret of his fears for the general condition of the 
 patient. 
 
 " You must, at any cost, reconstitute the exhausted 
 muscular system, stimulate the digestion, animate the 
 circulation, and restore the action of the mucous. Start 
 at once for Aix-les-Bains." 
 
 " We were on our way there, doctor, to try another 
 season, when the bronchitis obliged us to stop in your 
 town." 
 
 " You had better stay six weeks at Aix-les-Bains ; 
 after that, you must go to Brides in Tarentaise, and 
 there have your bed carried out into the open air, that 
 you may breathe the vivifying air of the Alps, laden 
 with aromatic tonics. After three weeks at Brides, you 
 must go through France again to reach the hot-water 
 springs of the Bourboule, in the mountains of Auvergne. 
 Those waters, which are exceedingly active ia their 
 
170 
 
 effect, will complete the amelioration begun at Aix. 
 When you have finished your season at Bourboule, come 
 back here to Montpellier, for you will then be strong 
 enough to undergo an energetic surgical treatment of 
 two months, to which I shall subject you. You can 
 then rest yourself by passing the winter at Am^lie-les- 
 Bains in the Eastern Pyrenees." . . . 
 
 XIV. 
 
 During three or four months, the successive precepts 
 of this learned consultation were everywhere followed 
 to the letter under the directions of the best local 
 doctor, and everywhere fruitlessly. Neither at Aix-les- 
 Bains, nor at Brides, nor at Bourboule, did Jeanne feel 
 the least improvement in her health.* The most 
 melancholy presentiments overshadowed her soul, she 
 saw herself slowly descending to the grave, and after 
 having most unhappily doubted — at Lourdes, when she 
 was cured and in perfect health — of the reality of the 
 miracle, she now lost by degrees and under the in- 
 fluence of her increasing sufferings, her chimeric faith 
 in the power of the doctors. 
 
 Towards the middle of September she was at Bour- 
 boule, stretched motionless on her invalid chair, mourn- 
 fully considering the long shadows stretching out over 
 the country as the setting sun approached the horizon 
 
 * At Brides, Mile, de Fontenay was fortunate enough to meet the 
 Bishop of Tarentaise, who took the gi'eatest interest in her, and 
 showed her much kindness. Mgr. Turinaz, now Bishop of Nancy 
 was thus one of the witnesses of the long illness of which we are re- 
 lating the history. 
 
171 
 
 behind which it would soon disappear. By a train of 
 thought peculiar to those who suffer, she connected in 
 her own mind the various details of the landscape spread 
 out before her with her own melancholy condition. 
 Summer was giving place to Autumn, and through her 
 \7ind0w she noticed, here and there, amongst the luxu- 
 riant foliage of the trees, some few yellow leaves, which, 
 struck with premature decay, fell fluttering to the 
 ground. She pictured in the immense granite rocks 
 whose ponderous masses hung frowning over the hum- 
 ble village, the symbol of the crushing calamity which 
 weighed down her young life, resisting, and in all proba- 
 bility ever likely to resist, her efforts to escape from 
 it. And the river Dordogne. flowing at her feet seemed 
 to her dejected imagination like the fleeting waves of 
 her own existence. 
 
 " Mother, dear mother," said she, " let us go back to 
 Autun !" 
 
 " My dear child, how can you think of such a thing ! 
 And Montpellier, and AmeHe-les-Bains V . . . 
 
 " Oh ! do let us go back to Autun ! I am dying of 
 these perpetual attempts to be cured, and my whole 
 being revolts against the kind of life we are leading. Is 
 it not enough to be exUed, alas ! from health, without 
 being exiled from one's own place, one's family, one's 
 home ? I am home-sick. Hot-water springs, remedies, 
 journeys, doctors and medicine are £•! become an intole- 
 rable torture to me, and I want a respite. I want to 
 live agaia in our own house, sleep in my own pretty 
 room, see my father and brothers. ... I want it for 
 myself and for you too, poor, dear mother, who are 
 wearing out your strength far from your faithful ser- 
 
172 
 
 vants, in nursing me night and day — for you, who are 
 killing yourself in trying to make me live." 
 
 "But, my dear child, you must pass the coming 
 winter in a mild climate, Doctor Courty — " 
 
 " Dr. Courty has said and may say just what he likes. 
 I must go back to Autun. You can put felt on the 
 doors and windows and have a graduated hot-air stove, 
 and fill my room up with flowers in the day-time and 
 surround me with an artificial spring. And then." . . . 
 
 " And then what ? " 
 
 " And then — nothing ! " replied Jeanne, wiping away 
 a tear. 
 
 The thoughts to which Jeanne would not give expres- 
 sion for fear of distressing her mother were, that since 
 she must die, she would rather yield up her soul to God 
 beneath her father's roof, surrounded by the prayers 
 and adieus of her family, than expire in a strange place, 
 in the vulgar atmosphere of an hotel room and exposed 
 to the mercenary care of hotel servants. Her mother 
 at last consented and they left Bourboule. 
 
 XV. 
 
 At Autun the few friends who were allowed to pene- 
 trate into the sick girl's room were horrified to see the 
 ravages made by disease in a constitution once over- 
 flowing with exuberant life. Poor Jeanne was the 
 shadow of her former self, and weak beyond anything 
 that could be imagined. Her languid arms refused to 
 carry the food to her mouth, and during three weeks or 
 a month her mother was obliged to feed her like a baby. 
 
173 
 
 It fatigued her to hear anyone talking ; her eyes were 
 too weak to read and her head to think. 
 
 From the depths of this abyss she turned her heart 
 to God and implored the help of the Blessed Virgin, 
 the Hope of the Hopeless. In her secret heart began 
 to dawn the wish to return to the Sacred Grotto ; and 
 her memory actively repassed every detail of her visit 
 to Lourdes. She asked to see the Bishop who was then 
 the very venerable Mgr.de L^s^leuc de Kerouara, and 
 to him she communicated the strange event of her fugi- 
 tive cure. 
 
 " I have a priest in my diocese, who was miraculously 
 cured," said he ; " it is the ^bbe de Musy. Well ! I will 
 pray the Blessed Virgin to cure you miraculously also. 
 In her name I command you to pray to her for your 
 cure, and on my side I will call on her also." 
 
 Then taking a little picture from his- Breviary, he 
 traced a few words on the back of it and gave it 
 to Jeanne. The words he had written were these, 
 borrowed from the Word of God : — " Ask and you shall 
 .receive." 
 
 Therefore, Jeanne asked. 
 
 A priest who was living at that time, a man of 
 fervent piety and immense charity, also joined Ms 
 prayers to hers and encouraged her to hope and be- 
 lieve. It was the Abbe Duchgne, Superior of the little 
 Seminary of Autun. Amongst all the souls whom he 
 directed towards the Heavenly Country, Jeanne was 
 his spiritual child of predilection and the special object 
 of his most paternal solicitude. He often went to see 
 her, at his word doubt and discouragement fled from 
 her mind, and her beloved parents were comforted 
 
174 
 
 When the latter were more than usually overcome by- 
 grief, they sought him whom all called the " Good 
 Superior," and they seldom came back from their visit 
 without having found some balm for their troubled 
 hearts, some consolation for their sorrow, some soften^ 
 ing of their inward affliction. 
 
 One, morning in November, Madame de Fontenay, 
 feeling more than usually crushed beneath the weight 
 of her cross, went to seek a little strength at the source 
 whence she was accustomed to draw it. As she was 
 coming out, after her interview with the Abb^ Duch^ne, 
 she crossed a tall priest, who was unknown to her, at 
 the door of the Seminary. 
 
 " What is his name ?" she asked of the concierge. 
 
 " It is the Abb4 de Musy." 
 
 " M. de Musy ? The pa,ralysed priest who was cUred 
 at Lourdes V ' 
 
 " The same." 
 
 The poor mother hastened to run after this priest, so 
 favoured of Heaven. 
 
 " Monsiew I'Ahhe," she said, " would you perform a 
 work of mercy, and come into our house to bless my 
 daughter, who is infirm as you were V 
 
 " Very willingly." 
 
 A few minutes after, the Abbe de Musy was standing 
 beside the sick-bed. 
 
 " Alas ! alas ! what must I do 1" murmured Jeanne. 
 
 " Believe and pray. Be resigned for the present, and 
 hope in the future." 
 
 " Monseigneur de Les^leuc has already given me the 
 same encouragement, and has promised to intercede for 
 my cure even without my asking him. What a great 
 
175 
 
 miracle it would be! You will pray for it also, will 
 you not?" 
 
 " Yes, indeed, I will. T am going to Lourdes very 
 soon, to thank my Benefactress. On the day of the 
 Immaculate Conception, at the very altar where my 
 prayers were answered, 1 will supplicate the Blessed 
 Virgin to do for you what she has done for me." 
 
 XVI. 
 
 M. de Musy started on his pilgrimage the first week 
 in December. We have given an account of the journey 
 elsewhere.* The fame of his miraculous cure had spread 
 through aU the Diocese and beyond it, and the natural 
 consequence was, that people from all parts recom- 
 mended themselves to his prayers. Therefore, at the 
 Memento of the Mass, at the moment when the priest 
 becomes, before God, the ambassador of the inhabitants 
 of the earth, and presents to Him their prayers and 
 their desires, the excellent Abb^ de Musy took exces- 
 sive care to remember everything, and minutely searched 
 his memory so as not to forget any of those who had 
 charged him with their invocations and messages for 
 Our Lady of Lourdes. But amongst those numerous 
 intentions there was one which seemed to detach itself 
 from the rest, and preponderate in his thoughts, not 
 by any inclination of his own heart, nor by any effort 
 of his own will, but by a sort of divine obsession im- 
 possible to control, and which imposed itself on him in 
 spite of himself. That intention, that thought, that 
 prayer, was the one relating to the recovery of Mile, de 
 
 * See " Tlae Miracle of the Assumption," page 85. 
 
176 
 
 Fontenay. During the day, he was careful to write to 
 Autun and tell them of this sign of good omen. From 
 the instant she heard of it, the determination to return 
 to the Grotto of the Apparitions, and bathe in the Pis- 
 cina, took definitive possession of Jeanne's mind. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 During the course of her long illness, they had been 
 able to carry her sometimes, at wide intervals, as far as 
 the church of Notre Dame, or the chapel of the Little 
 Seminary. But, notwithstanding the care they took to 
 make the carriage go at a walking pace, that she might 
 not be shaken during the short distance that separated 
 the house from the church, it was found necessary to 
 give up all idea of taking her there for the future, 
 because of the intolerable suffering that all movement 
 caused her, and especially because of the grave conse- 
 quences apprehended by the doctors. 
 
 Thanks to a permission obtained from Eome, she was 
 able to have an altar put up in the room next her own, 
 and the door of communication being put wide open, a 
 large looldng-glass was so arranged that in its reflection 
 she could follow, from her bed, the celebration of the 
 Holy Sacrifice. 
 
 But while the bodily condition of the young girl 
 became visibly worse, her moral state entered a fresh 
 phase, and assumed new and striking features. While, 
 on the one hand, her ailing body, already so frail and 
 exhausted, became daily weaker, on the other, her soul, 
 which seemed to everyone on the point of leaving the 
 world, grew strong in the certain hope of a speedy cure. 
 
177 
 
 But, did this increase of hope proceed from that un- 
 hesitating faith to which Our Lord has promised 
 miracles, or from the burning and ungovernable excite- 
 ment that fever and forced idleness often engender in 
 sick brains ? Painful questions that suggested them- 
 selves to the minds of those who watched around her 
 bed. It was so much the more to be feared, that some- 
 times the appearance of absolute certainty suddenly 
 collapsed, and gave place to exactly opposite feelings.' 
 Now and then, Jeanne was assailed by depressing pre- 
 sentiments ; she apprehended the fatigue of the long 
 journey, and feared to find only death at the very 
 place where so many others had revived to health and 
 life. 
 
 Having resolved to be at Lourdes for the loth of 
 August, Feast of the Assumption, Jeanne desired to 
 distribute, in the three months which preceded her 
 departure, a triduum of Masses to prepare her for the 
 pilgrimage so ardently desired and so tremblingly 
 apprehended. On the eve of the first monthly Mass, 
 however, the 14th of May, towards evening, she was so 
 weak and sinking that the Abb^ DuchSne, whom she 
 had sent for, thought it better not to hear her confession 
 for fear of exposing her to a fatal fatigue. She was 
 much distressed at his refusal, and went sadly to sleep, 
 after imploring the Mother of the afflicted to support 
 her in her afflictions. But during her slumbers, Ber- 
 nadette, in religion Sister Mary-Bernard (who was then 
 still living at the Convent of St. Gildard) appeared to 
 her in a dream, smiling and gracious, and dressed in her 
 costume of a Sister of Nevers. 
 
 " Do not be troubled, neither be afraid," said she to 
 12 
 
178 
 
 Jeanne. " You will be cured at Lourdes. Only pray 
 with confdence to the Blessed Virgin." 
 
 Then Jeanne raised herself towards the Voyante of 
 Lourdes and embraced her tenderly ; but, finding herself 
 incommoded by the nun's cap, she made a movement 
 and suddenly awoke. She saw nothing before her but 
 her bed-curtains, dimly lighted by the uncertain flame 
 of the night-light, but she felt herself filled with inex- 
 pressible joyfulness, and, as it were, fully assured of 
 recovery. 
 
 No one gave vent to their reflections aloud in her 
 presence, but many of her relatives and friends, priests 
 and lay, murmured sadly : " Alas ! alas ! a young girl's 
 dream on a Spring night is but a fragile foundation for 
 such great hopes ! " 
 
 Jeanne herself wished for a more solid basis to what 
 she called " her certainty ". She had letters written to 
 the different members of her family, her friends, the 
 nuns of her acquaintance, and Bernadette, asking them 
 to pray for her. She distributed alms, and besought 
 the help of the weak and poor of this world, who are so 
 strong and powerful in heaven ; she borrowed the riches 
 of the poor, and begged of the beggars. She turned 
 her face towards Eome and addressed herself to the 
 Holy Father. Pius IX. sent her his blessing with these 
 words : " May the Blessed Virgin bless you and heal 
 you". 
 
 Jeanne's pious and beloved grandmother, the Dowager 
 Viscountess of Proissard-Broi^ia, took an active part 
 in this crusade of supplication and invocation. Like 
 Moses on the mountain, she raised to heaven her arms 
 laden with good works, and humbly but fervently prayed 
 
179 
 
 for the cure of her grand-daughter, in exchange for her 
 eighty years of sainlily and charitable existence. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 In the midst of the doubts and anxieties of the 
 greater number of Jeanne's friends, the Abbe de Musy 
 remained calm and confident. For him everything was 
 a reason for increase of faith, and he proclaimed aloud 
 what he also called " his certainty ". On that occasion 
 a few sceptics, even among the faithful, remarked, with 
 a certain touch of truth, that moderation is the rarest 
 thing in the world, and they were almost inclined to 
 think that the priest of Digoine, after the miracle which 
 had transformed his hfe, could not avoid falling into 
 the virtuous excess of inclining to believe too much. 
 
 Weeks and months passed on, and M. de Musy cele- 
 brated Holy Mass, on the 3rd August, at the private 
 altar of the house of Fontenay. Jeanne followed it 
 from her bed of pain. As they were at the epoch of 
 the Feast of Saint Peter in Bonds, the officiating priest 
 was inspired by the remembrance of that event, and the 
 train of ideas it suggested was prominent in the few 
 words he addressed to his intimate audience. He thus 
 ended his allocution : — 
 
 " You see. Christians, you see ! When the Almighty 
 commands, nothing can resist Him ! The prison-doors 
 open and the chains fall off the captive. . . . But 
 there are other chaias than those with which the perse- 
 cutors bound the beneficent hands of the Prince of the 
 Apostles. There are infrangible chains, which bind to 
 a sick-bed and seem to incorporate with incurable dis- 
 
180 
 
 ease, one of God's creatures. There are chains which ■ 
 though worn by only one child, bruise and weigh down 
 a whole family. But I confidently believe that the voice 
 from heaven wiU soon be heard, and at its sound those 
 chains also will fall off!" 
 
 These words, like those pronounced in the preceding 
 November by Mgr. de Les^leuc, sank deeply into 
 Jeanne's soul, and she loved to repeat them over and 
 over during her painful days and her long sleepless 
 nights. The pious prelate whose name we have recalled 
 had fallen asleep in the Lord hardly a month after 
 having promised Jeanne to pray the Blessed Virgin for 
 her cure. The young girl, who venerated his memory, 
 often invoked him in the secret of her prayers as a 
 powerful auxiliary and a celestial friend. 
 
 The day of the discourse on the " chaim vjhich were 
 to fall off," Jeanne and her mother, knowing that the 
 Abb^ de Musy intended to arrive at Lourdes a little 
 before the loth of August, solicited permission to go 
 with him. But he flatly refused them. 
 
 "Ko, certainly not," said he. "The whole diocese 
 has its eyes fixed upon me because of the miracle with 
 which I have been favoured. If I went with the patient, 
 and she came back to Autun in the same state, it would 
 only make the failure more evident ; whereas if, on the 
 contrary, she came back cured, it would be thought that 
 I had done something towards it, and the infallible 
 result would be that I should be looked upon as a sort 
 of miracle-worker by a good many worthy people, who 
 would immediately want to canonize me. No ! no ! a 
 thousand times no !" 
 
 This decision was received with profound regret. 
 
181 
 
 Jeanne had flattered herself from the beginning that 
 the priest miraculously cured would be as the angel 
 Eaphael of this distant pilgrimage. However, no ob- 
 jection could be raised against the reasons he had given, 
 and her only answer was in her silent tears. . . . 
 Those are arguments of the heart, often a thousand 
 times more eloquent than any argument of the intellect ; 
 and the Abb^ de Musy, troubled by that mute supplica- 
 tion, and afflicted at the sight of the pain his refusal 
 had caused, was in reality more perplexed than he 
 cared to show. However legitimate might be the 
 motives that determined him, pity cried aloud in his 
 heart. Following his invariable custom in moments 
 of trouble, he had recourse to prayer. 
 
 It happened that like Jeanne and her family, he had 
 a profound veneration for the pious memory of Mgr. 
 de Leseleuc. He implored the prelate to lighten and 
 guide him through the labyrinth of his uncertainty and 
 anxiety. 
 
 What passed after that ? We cannot tell. But it is 
 certain that during the last mass of a noveno said in 
 memory of the defunct bishop, the Abbe de Musy felt 
 his hesitations suddenly cease under the impulsion of 
 an iaward voice whose accents were irresistible. And 
 his wiQ, like a ship which the pilot's hand suddenly 
 turns on another tack, took an exactly opposite view of 
 what had at first appeared to his reason as the only and 
 the best possible course to pursue. 
 
 " I consent to whatever you choose," he said to 
 Jeanne and her mother. " Your itinerary shall be 
 mine. Fix the day and hour for starting yourselves, 
 and may God be with us." 
 
182 
 
 XIX. 
 
 Jeanne's religions enthusiasm increased to a degree 
 that alarmed many of those who loved her. She could 
 talk and think of nothing but the miracle, she even 
 fixed its early date. Theological considerations mixed 
 themselves up with her excited hopes. 
 
 "The solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed 
 Virgin," said she, "has been a Feast of Feasts to me 
 all my life, and I have celebrated it more joyously than 
 any of them. From my earliest years my soul rejoiced 
 at the supreme triumph of our Celestial Mother: on 
 the 15th of the month I used to communicate iu honour 
 of the great 15th of August which is consecrated to her 
 in the Catholic liturgy. If the Immaculate Conception 
 marked Mary's entry into our poor world, the Assump- 
 tion marked the blessed moment when she took pos- 
 session of the Eternal Kingdom. The Church has 
 proclaimed the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed 
 Virgin as a dogma of faith. I long with all my heart 
 for the happy time when she will proclaim as a corre- 
 sponding dogma, the glorious Assumption of the Mother 
 of God." 
 
 Thus spoke Jeanne, much to the surprise of those 
 who heard her. She added : 
 
 " It is on the Feast of the Assumption that I shall 
 see the end of my cruel sufferings. As soon as the 
 Blessed Virgin has cured me I shall wear her colours. 
 Let my dress be prepared. A white dress and a blue 
 sash!" 
 
 Such exuberance of hope made them tremble for the 
 
183 
 
 consequences of a disappointment. But no one dared 
 trouble her calm conviction by seeming to doubt. 
 . . . They were carried away by a current against 
 which resistance was impossible, so yielding to Jeanne's 
 desire, Madame de Fontenay sent for the dressmaker 
 and ordered the gala dress. But the following day, the 
 poor girl could not sit up to have the white body tried 
 on. One of her relations of whom she was very fond, 
 Madame Harold de Fontenay, had come that day to see 
 her. 
 
 " You must , replace me, dear," said the sick girl. 
 " You are about my size, and whatever fits you will be 
 sure to do admirably for me. And then I shall be so 
 happy to have a remembrance of you in my resurrection 
 dress." 
 
 The young lady tried on the costume. While it was 
 being fitted Jeanne's feverish eyes followed every detail 
 attentively and took note of the cut and style of it. 
 The measures had been well taken, the dressmaker 
 had used her scissors cleverly, and everything had per- 
 fectly succeeded. 
 
 There was something in this scene at the same time 
 graceful and terrible. For Jeanne, infirm and helpless, 
 incapable of raising herself on her bed, to be able to 
 wear the costume that a friend was trying on in her 
 place, — the dress with its long white folds, and the 
 blue sash, — it would require nothing less than a direct 
 intervention of Almighty God in the form of one of 
 those incomprehensible miracles such as used to be 
 worked by the hand of Jesus Christ. 
 
 " Stand before the glass," said Jeanne to her cousin ; 
 " that is how I shall be in a week from now." 
 
184 
 
 Madame Harold de Fontenay was quite overcome. 
 The light muslin weighed on her shoulders like some 
 sinister vestment, and she hurriedly took off the white 
 rohe that reminded her of a winding-sheet. " Alas ! " 
 she thought, " this resurrection dresS' as she calls it, wUl 
 perhaps be only the spotless garb of her burial ! " She 
 hurried from the room, for her tears choked her, and 
 hardly had she closed the door when her sobs broke 
 forth. 
 
 " "What is the matter ? What is it ? " asked her hus- 
 band, who was waiting for her in the next room. 
 
 " Oh ! dear husband, I think Jeanne must be raving. 
 She declares she is going to be cured, and is having a 
 white dress made ! . . . Oh ! I never before under- 
 stood how ill she really is ! "* 
 
 XX. 
 
 On the Monday morning, 10th of August, the " Good 
 Superior " carried the Holy Communion to Jeanne. It 
 was a necessary viaticum for such a perilous journey, 
 undertaken in opposition to all human prudence, for 
 the purpose of seeking a divine remedy for her ills. 
 They had the greatest difficulty in carrying the sick 
 girl along the winding passages and corridors of the 
 house, and laying her in the carriage that was waiting 
 to take her to the station. The least movement of her 
 body had for some time caused her such acute shooting 
 pains, that when it was necessary to lift her from place 
 
 * Madame Harold de Fontenay of whom it is here question, has been 
 prematurely taken from the affection of her family, leaving behind her 
 the memory of her sweet and exquisite virtues. 
 
185 
 
 to place, they had to carry her in a horizontal position, 
 like a dying person on a stretcher or a dead body on 
 a bier. 
 
 The domestics and the few intimate friends who sur- 
 rounded the carriage, could not refrain from tears. 
 Jeanne alone, amidst so many anxious and grief-stricken 
 faces, was radiant with hope. 
 
 " Do not cry," she said, smilingly, " but look at me 
 well. It is the last time you will see me like this." 
 
 " God grant it ! my dear child," replied Mme. Joseph 
 de Fontenay, one of her aunts, a most excellent person, 
 full of anxiety about her. " But we must be prepared 
 for everything. — You know that in provincial stations 
 orders for saloon-carriages must be given at least a week 
 beforehand. Has anyone thought to order one for your 
 return ? " 
 
 " My return ! " cried Jeanne. " I shall come back 
 like other people, and in a third-class carriage if it is 
 necessary ! " 
 
 Her answer made most contrary impressions on those 
 who heard her, 
 
 " What faith ! " cried some. 
 
 " What excitement ! " sighed others. 
 
 The patient was placed in a railway carriage trans- 
 formed into a bedroom. Her mother and an old servant, 
 the faithful Pierette, herself half -crippled with rheuma- 
 tism and afflicted with deafness, took their places beside 
 her. Pierette was going to Lourdes, to pray not for her 
 own cure but for her young mistress's. The Abbe de 
 Musy, according to his promise, was in the train. He 
 and Joseph de Fontenay had places in the carriage next 
 to Jeanne's. Henry was unwell and obliged to keep 
 
186 
 
 his room, and M. de Fontenay alone had been able to 
 accompany the travellers to the station. When the 
 train moved slowly out of the station, he followed with 
 his eyes that long string of carriages hurried noisily 
 away by the roaring powers of fire and steam ; and 
 remained there motionless, with fixed gaze, until the 
 last clouds of smoke had disappeared from the horizon 
 and he could no longer hear the rattling storm of iron 
 which whirled away from him his wife, his daughter,, 
 and his youngest son. Whither were they hastening, 
 those beloved ones who had just vanished from his 
 sight y They were going towards the unknown — an un- 
 known which a few minutes before had been full of hope 
 when they were all together praying and believing, but 
 was fraught with terror now that they were separated and 
 that neither Jeanne's amazing certainty nor the ardent 
 exhortations of the miraculously cured priest were there 
 to animate his heart and revive his failing faith. . . . 
 At the branch line of Montchanin, where the train 
 stopped for a few minutes, the pilgrims perceived on the 
 platform of the station a young and grave bishop, whom 
 they immediately recognised. . "What a happy coin- 
 cidence," they cried. It was their bishop, Mgr. Perraud, 
 who had arrived from Paray-le-Monial and was re- 
 turning to Autun. He came up to the carriage where 
 Jeanne was and gave her his blessing, which seemed to 
 fill her with new strength as his presence filled her with 
 
 joy. 
 
 " I start," said she, " under the protection of my two 
 bishops. In heaven, where Mgr. de L^§^leuc certainly 
 is, he keeps his promise and implores the Blessed Virgin 
 for me. Here, on earth, by a providential dispensation, 
 
187 
 
 Mgr. Perraud, his successor, comes across our path to 
 bless me just at the moment when we touch the limits 
 of his diocese." 
 
 After indescribable fatigues, and many painful attacks 
 caused by the shaking of the train, Jeanne arrived at 
 Lourdes on the Tuesday evening more dead than alive. 
 The journey had lasted thirty-three hours. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 The next morning as soon as she was awake, she 
 asked to be carried to the Grotto ; but her aching limbs, 
 her exhausted state, and her extreme feebleness rendered 
 it impossible. She was obliged to wait till late in the 
 afternoon. The morning, however, was not entirely 
 lost. About eleven o'clock, there came a knock at the 
 door, and a prelate of a rugged but pleasant aspect stood 
 on the threshold. 
 
 " Monseigneur Peyramale ! " cried mother and daugh- 
 ter, delighted.* And the remembrance of the words of 
 the Servant of Mary came suddenly back to their minds. 
 
 " We are come back to invoke anew the power of 
 Our Lady of Lourdes. But this time we believe with 
 all our souls ! " 
 
 "Fiat tibi sicut credidisH. According to your faith 
 so be it done unto you. . . . Have confidence, and 
 hope for a great miracle. I have an idea that the Blessed 
 
 * The Cur6 of Lourdes had been promoted in the month of March 
 previous to the dignity of Apostolic Protonotary by a brief from Pope 
 Pius the Ninth. At the same date the chapel of the pilgrimage was 
 made a basilica. 
 
188 
 
 Virgin is going to kill the fatted calf for the return of 
 her prodigal child ! " 
 
 " Ah ! Monseigneur, pray for us." 
 
 " It is already done ! " 
 
 The heat at Lourdes in the month of August is often 
 torrid. On that day the scorching southern sun pursued 
 his way through a sky of cloudless blue, and rendered 
 the atmosphere intolerable. And yet, Jeanne was 
 cold, very cold. 
 
 " Transie et grelottante en la fleur de ses ans 
 On eut dit que I'hiver habitait son printemps ! " 
 
 When she was put into the carriage to go to the Eocks 
 of Massabiella, it was necessary to wrap her in shawls 
 and travelling rugs, and put a hot water bottle to her 
 feet. 
 
 She overcame without hesitation the instinctive 
 shrinking of her nerves, and was immersed on her 
 arrival in the icy water of the Piscina. 
 
 The disease which had ravaged all the rest of her 
 body had respected her thick and magnificent hair. 
 When her tresses and plaits were undone, her hair fell 
 to her feet ; and feminine nature is so constituted, that 
 the mother for sure, and the daughter most probably, 
 took a certain pleasure in contemplating the splendid 
 ripples of that silky mantle. So Jeanne bathed her body 
 in the sacred stream, but on that and the following days 
 they were careful to put her in only up to her neck, so 
 that her thick hair might not be wetted ; it would have 
 taken so long to dry, and might have given her cold or 
 brought on a feverish attack. Prudent precautions 
 were thus mingled with the aspirations of faith. 
 
189 
 
 Partly from necessity, and partly from a kind of half- 
 superstitious idea, it occurred to them on leaving the 
 Pisciua that they might borrow for the purpose of wheel- 
 ing Jeanne about on that miraculous ground, an invalid 
 carriage left in the sanctuary as an ex voto the previous 
 year by a paralytic priest who had suddenly recovered 
 the use of his Umbs. There is often iu the human, mind 
 a childish tendency to believe that certain objects are 
 lucky. 
 
 XXII. 
 
 At the Grotto of Lourdes, as formerly around the five 
 porches of the Pool of Bethsaida at Jerusalem, suffer- 
 ing of every kind might be met at every hour, awaiting 
 the uncertaiu moment of deliverance, and amongst the 
 sick and afflicted who implored the help of the heavenly 
 Doctor some naturally attracted attention more parti- 
 cularly than others. There was the Abb(3 Cabane, a 
 poor old priest of the diocese of Agen, who, with his 
 left side completely paralysed, passed all his time at 
 the Grotto dragging himself painfully about with the 
 help of a stick. There was also an elderly lady, quite 
 impotent, lying in an invalid chair on wheels. She was 
 the Countess du Boulay from the neighbourhood of 
 Eouen, and she prayed for her cure with ardent piety 
 and almost impatient fervour. She passed whole days 
 at the feet of the statue of Mary, she called to her 
 help the prayers of aU those whom she supposed to 
 possess any iafluence with Our Lady of Lourdes, and 
 when a priest, a bishop, or a pilgrim of fervent appear- 
 ance met her eye, she iastantly despatched her maid (a 
 worthy person who seemed devoted to her) to whisper 
 
190 
 
 in their ear : " Please, have the charity to pray for my 
 poor mistress whom you see yonder ! " As that pious 
 embassy was often renewed and to a great number of 
 persons, several of them had noticed the maid parti- 
 cularly, and observed that though she asked so many to 
 pray to the Blessed Virgin for her mistress, she herself 
 never knelt nor even bowed before the statue of Our 
 Lady of Lourdes. 
 
 " Alas ! " replied Madame du Boulay in answer to an 
 indiscreet remark made before her, " my maid is a good, 
 devoted, affectionate creature, she is even pious in her 
 way, but she is a protestant and does not believe in the 
 Blessed Virgin." 
 
 Around these afflicted ones crying for help knelt two 
 or three hundred pilgrims praying or whispering to- 
 gether, and through their midst, drawn along in her little 
 carriage and holding in her hand the rosary that never 
 left her, Jeanne passed on her way to the Grotto. 
 
 It was there that the writer of these pages perceived 
 for the first time, half -lying on her pillows and cushions, 
 the sick girl whose history he is now relating. He 
 remarked her as a new-comer amongst the human 
 miseries that crowded around the Eock of Miracles, 
 and he felt for her that sorrowful compassion and pity 
 that one experiences at the sight of youth blighted in 
 its flower and vaguely threatened with premature decay. 
 But he did not know her then, neither was he acquainted 
 with the tall distinguished looking priest who was pray- 
 ing near her, and seemed to be encouraging her every 
 now and then. It was not till later that we knew him 
 as the celebrated Abb^ de Musy. 
 
 Kneeling beside her daughter, the mother raised her 
 
191 
 
 heart and her tearful eyes in fervent supplication to the 
 merciful Mother of God. Near her, a humble servant- 
 maid of delicate appearance clasped her hands in fervent 
 prayer, and a young man stood with his arms crossed 
 and his eyes fixed on the statue of Mary, expressing 
 in the contraction of his candid brow and the play 
 of his mobile features, his ardent faith and his anxious 
 brotherly love. It was Joseph de Fontenay. 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 On the Friday, 14th of August, vigil of the Assump- 
 tion, a person called at the house where we were 
 staying during our annual pilgrimage, and asked to see 
 us. It was the young man whose pious attitude and 
 expression had so struck us at the Grotto the evening 
 before. 
 
 " Sir," he said, " I am come to you from my sister, 
 who has been ill for seven years, and who arrived here 
 a few days ago, to obtain if possible, a miracle from 
 the Blessed Virgin. It was your book which revealed 
 Lourdes to her and first inspired her with the thought 
 of making this long journey to ask for her cure. She 
 would very much like to speak to you, but she is infirm 
 and suffers intense pain whenever she is moved about. 
 If you could call on her, she would be very grateful to 
 you." . . . 
 
 " Very well, go back and tell her I will foUow you in 
 a few moments." 
 
 . And, indeed, ten minutes after I was in the street of 
 the Grotto at the address Joseph had given me. 
 
 Madame de Fontenay received me, " It was kind of 
 
192 
 
 you, sir," she said, "to comply -so promptly with our 
 request." 
 
 And she introduced me into her daughter's room. 
 
 The sick girl was in bed, and, notwithstanding the 
 heat of the season, was literally buried under blankets 
 and eiderdowns. She held out to me a wasted hand 
 which I respectfully pressed to my hps. 
 
 " You are the author of ' Our Lady of Lourdes/ she 
 said in a faint voice, and looking at me with innocent 
 curiosity. " Oh ! sir, how your book has fascinated me 
 and what tears I have shed over it ! It is a wonderful 
 history." . . . 
 
 " The events were so striking in themselves, that I 
 could not spoil them entirely," I answered smiling. " It 
 has pleased God to bless those humble pages and use 
 them for His glory. But the book, alas ! is better worth 
 than the author, and you would be sadly in error. 
 Mademoiselle, if you estimated the one by the other. 
 Unfortunately for me, it is better to read my books than 
 to know me personally. . . . But I am come, all 
 the same, as you expressed a wish to see me." 
 
 In a few brief words she sketched me an outline of 
 her long sufferings. 
 
 " Monsieur I'AhM de Musy has accompanied me to 
 Lourdes, and we are lodging in the apartments that he 
 occupied himself last year. He went out of here im- 
 potent and helpless the day of the Assumption, and 
 came back a few hours after completely cured. . . . 
 Oh ! I believe ! I believe ! I am full of hope and con- 
 fidence." 
 
 While she was talking I looked at her attentively, 
 and read in the expressive lines of her face, all changed 
 
193 
 
 and, so to speak, ravaged by suffering, the silent com- 
 mentary of her painful story. 
 
 She was very pale, and her deadly pallor was brought 
 more strikingly into relief by contrast with her large 
 black eyes and the dense masses of her hair. Her 
 complexion had the peculiar transparency that long 
 illness gives when it strikes at last at the very prin- 
 ciple and essence of life. It almost seems then, that 
 the opacity of the body is effaced and dissipated, and 
 that matter, become partially immaterial, allows glimp- 
 ses of that inner . life invisible in a state of perfect 
 health. Through the young girl's diaphenous features 
 shone the reiiection. of a soul delicate and innocent in 
 itself, and brought to a high degree of purity in the fire 
 of tribulation. 
 
 The poor girl felt certain she should be cured 
 on the morrow, which was the Feast of the Assump- 
 tion. 
 
 As she went on opening her heart to me, I felt myself 
 gained over by her absolute confidence, and began to have 
 the brightest and happiest presentiments. At the same 
 time I would not yield completely to their influence, 
 for, more than once, under similar circumstances, my 
 hopes and expectations had been deceived. . . . 
 Nevertheless, I could not help encouraging her faith 
 by relating some of the marvels accomplished by Our 
 Lady of Lourdes, especially the miraculous cure of 
 Lucie Fraiture — a most touching miracle that we hope 
 soon to communicate to our readers. . . . Jeanne 
 listened with emotion to the various details of that 
 celestial drama, and the suffering girl's eyes overflowed 
 at the history of the affliction and joy of her unknown 
 
 13 
 
194 
 
 sister. Like herself she was a "Child of Mary". She 
 resumed — 
 
 " The Abb^ de Musy will pray for me to-morrow at 
 his Thanksgiving Mass. He intends to celebrate it at 
 eight o'clock at the high altar of the Crypt before which 
 he was cured last year, on the same day and at the 
 same hour. Mgr. Peyramale has promised me his 
 powerful help ; he will ask fervently for my cure. Ber- 
 nadette and a number of Eeligious, many poor persons, 
 friends and relatives will receive Holy Communion 
 to-morrow, to obtain the grace I am soliciting. Please 
 join your prayers to those of my friends, you who have 
 been so mercifully favoured of the Blessed Virgin." 
 
 " With all my heart. Mademoiselle, I will pray to her 
 to cure you ; and I shall be present with all my family 
 at the eight o'clock mass to-morrow morning." 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 The dawn of the Assumption had risen whei Joseph 
 
 entered his sister's room. Her mother and Pierette 
 
 had just finished dressing her. 
 
 " Well, Jeanne, so it is to-day that the Blessed Virgin 
 
 is to grant your prayers V 
 
 "Yes," she replied, with child-like gaiety, and also 
 
 with child-like faith ; " yes, it is to-day that Our Lady 
 
 will cure me — to-day, Joseph, to-day!" 
 
 Then after a moment of silence, she added — 
 
 " Will you do me a great favour, my dear brother?" 
 
 " Certainly, anything — I am at your orders." 
 
 " Then go and tell Mgr. Peyramale that I was anxious 
 
 to obtain a special prayer from him at the moment of 
 
195 
 
 starting for this mass, where I hope to find the end of 
 my sufferings. 
 
 Joseph ran out, and soon came back. 
 
 "Monseigneur sends you word that he hopes more 
 than ever, and that he will pray as fervently as he can." 
 
 The Abb(? de Musy had gone on before, and Joseph 
 went to the Grotto to fetch the invalid chair, and have 
 it ready on the esplanade of the Basilica to take his 
 sister into the Crypt when she arrived. It was now 
 more than half-past seven. An immense crowd of 
 people had assembled at Lourdes on the occasion of the 
 solemnity of the Assumption ; consequently most of the 
 carriages that passed along the street of the Grotto were 
 fuU, and the coachmen of the others refused to take as 
 their fare an impotent person whom they would be 
 obliged to carry downstairs. They began to be very 
 anxious and fearful of not being at the Crypt for the 
 Abb^ de Musy's mass. Jeanne alone was serene and 
 confident, and she reassured the others. 
 
 " Do not be afraid," said she, " the happy time is at 
 hand, when I shall no longer require to be carried to 
 the Grotto. . . . And as for this carriage^the last 
 I shall need— since I am bound to have it, the God of 
 Goodness will inspire the driver of it with sufficient 
 compassion to accept me as his fare." 
 
 And, indeed, a very few minutes after, a driver con- 
 descended to stop, certainly without any sort of sus- 
 picion that the Lord had been invoked for him and that 
 he was the agent of Providence. With a good deal of 
 grumbling and Hi-temper, he brought the poor sick girl 
 down in his arms, and laid her, helpless and powerless, 
 on the back seat of the open carriage. 
 
196 
 
 Madame de Fontenay sat opposite her daughter. The 
 carriage had soon passed the last houses of the town, 
 and entered the admirable green country, in the midst 
 of which the limpid, foaming waters of the Gave flow 
 over their rocky bed. To the right stretched the soft 
 outline of the hUls of Visens or of Bartres, and through 
 the thick foliage of the trees, floated a long waving 
 cloud of white smoke, emanating from the train that 
 was steaming into the station of Lourdes, filled with 
 pilgrims from Pau, Orthez or Ba,yonne. To the left 
 the summits of the Pyrenees and the eternal glaciers 
 sparkled in the sun. 
 
 It was superb weather on that magnificent morning 
 of the Assumption, and Nature, like the Church, seemed 
 all joy and gladness. The sky was cloudless, the sun 
 brilliant. The liglit breeze from the snowy mountains 
 came charged with reviving freshness ; and here and 
 there could be heard the blithe warbling of a bird. On 
 the road, carriages and foot-passengers hurried along in 
 a rapidly increasing crowd ; some going in haste to the 
 Grotto or the Basilica, others returning to the town or 
 moving in the direction of the Field of the Chllet, for 
 the early Masses — some wearing round their necks, or 
 at their waists, the big rosary of six decades, peculiar 
 to those parts ; others carrying a basket of provisions, 
 intending after Communion, to take their repast with 
 their family or their friends under the sheltering thatch 
 of the rustic Eotunda^* 
 
 Further on, a group of young girls went along singing 
 the Ave maris Stella, or some other hymn to Our Lady 
 of Lourdes. And on every face could be read innocent 
 
 * On the subject of the Eotunda, see Note II. of the Appendix. 
 
197 
 
 joy, brotherly goodwill, and the cordial content of God's 
 children. 
 
 " There is a poor afflicted person going to ask for her 
 cure. May it please Our Lady of Lourdes to grant it ! " 
 said they as Jeanne passed in the carriage. 
 
 She, however, took no notice of the lovely landscape, 
 or the living masses of people around her. Her hands 
 were clasped, and her colourless lips murmured supreme 
 invocations. . . . 
 
 As they passed the Eotunda, she raised her eyes and 
 beheld, all at once, the spire of the Basilica springing 
 from its earthly foundations towards the blue firmament 
 of heaven. It seemed like the image and symbol of 
 her hope, that turned away from earth and aspired only 
 to Celestial Mercy. The sight moved her so deeply, 
 that her feelings could no longer be expressed in arti- 
 culate prayer, but found vent in a burst of tears. Weep, 
 my child, weep ! " Blessed are they that weep, for they 
 shall be comforted." 
 
 XXV. 
 
 On the esplanade of the Basilica her brother Joseph, 
 in company with a few friends, was waiting for her 
 with the invalid chair. Some of her relatives were 
 there also, amongst them Madame de Fontenay, de Som- 
 mans and her daughter Jeanne, the sick girl's cousin, 
 who had come from Luchon to pray with her, and join 
 their supplications to hers. There were also present : 
 the Countess du Boulay, mournfully seated in her in- 
 valid chair ; the poor Abbe Cabane, half-paralysed and 
 leaning on his stick; the Duchess de Salviati; Mme. 
 
198 
 
 and Mile, de MontiUe ; Mile, de Oharodon ; the Countess 
 d'ArmailM and her nieces ; and many more, all anxious 
 to be present at the anniversary Mass about to be said 
 by the miraculously cured priest. 
 
 Jeanne was lifted out of the carriage and placed in 
 the invalid chair with every possible precaution; but 
 in spite of all their care, the least movement was so 
 painful to her, that her features contracted with agony. 
 Her friends came eagerly round her to say a word of 
 hope, and promise to pray for her ; she thanked them 
 gratefully, but in her secret soul, she longed for the 
 peace and repose only to be found beneath the sacred 
 roof of a church ; and was impatient to reach her place 
 before the altar. 
 
 " It is time, Joseph dear, to take me into the Crypt." 
 But it happened that the Eeverend P^re Sempe, the 
 Superior of the Missionaries at Lourdes, whose active 
 piety and universal zeal regulated the order of the pil- 
 grimage, was accustomed on feast-days to forbid the 
 entrance of the faithful into the Crypt, so that all might 
 be constrained to be present at the ceremonies in the 
 Basilica and by that means increase their splendour. 
 
 The outside door of the Crypt was therefore locked 
 and double-locked. In vain Joseph and several others 
 knocked and thumped for it to be opened. 
 
 " It is quite useless to knock," said one of the Brothers 
 belonging to the convent; " the Eeverend Father Superior 
 has forbidden anyone to enter the Crypt this morning." 
 
 The consternation and anguish of the little crowd of 
 pUgrims at this interdiction may be more easily ima- 
 gined than described. 
 
 " But that is impossible ! " 
 
.199 
 
 " I tell you it is the order of the Superior," repeated 
 the Brother. 
 
 " But why has he given such an order ? Could we 
 not speak to him ? " 
 
 " No, he is busy in the Basilica." 
 
 Joseph then thought of a means which would give 
 him access to the Crypt by an indirect road. He 
 whispered a word to Jeanne and his mother, and going 
 up to the Basilica, he worked his way through the 
 throng of worshippers, entered the sacristy and ran 
 down the stairs leading to the underground chapel 
 where the Abb^ de Musy was getting ready to celebrate 
 the Sacred Mysteries. By the greatest chance in the 
 world, the Abb^ had also come into the Crypt by the 
 upper church, and had thus entered without any diffi- 
 culty and without having the slightest suspicion of the 
 Superior's prohibition. 
 
 "Why, where is your sister?" he asked, on seeing 
 Joseph. 
 
 " She is outside. Father Sempe has ordered the door 
 of the Crypt to be kept locked this morning that no 
 one may come in." 
 
 The Abb^ de Musy immediately went out and applied 
 to the functionaries of the Temple, who opposed to his 
 arguments the Superior's formal orders. He insisted as 
 one insists under urgent and supreme circumstances, he 
 became imperative, even. At last the sacristans and 
 lay-brothers yielded to the representations of the priest 
 who had been cured by the Blessed Virgin ; but they 
 tried to attenuate their disobedience by limiting the 
 congregation to one class. 
 
 " Only the sick ! Only the sick ! By order of the 
 
200 
 
 Eeverend Father Superior!" cried the sacristan, who 
 was going to half-open the door, to the crowd outside. 
 
 But without paying the least attention to this in- 
 junction, the foremost among the pilgrims did their best 
 to rush in after Jeanne and the other invalids. Fifty 
 or sixty persons succeeded thus, in opposition to all the 
 ukases, in penetrating into the interior of the edifice 
 before the door could be shut on the torrent of invaders. 
 A white-headed priest of distinguished appearance, the 
 Abbe Bouvier, was foremost in this pious insurrection. 
 He believed already in the miracle, and meant to be a 
 witness of it at any price. • 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 The door had been shut and again besieged by a 
 compact crowd of complaining and grumbling pilgrims, 
 when, according to the promise I had made to MIle.de 
 Fontenay the previous evening, I arrived at the Crypt 
 a little before eight o'clock. " Monsieur Lasserre ! " cried 
 a chorus of voices, as soon as I appeared, " do go and 
 tell them to open the door and let us in." 
 
 " Alas ! my good friends, I have no authority for that. 
 As I cannot get the door opened for myself any more 
 than for you, I shall try and overcome the difficulty in 
 another way." 
 
 Taking therefore the indirect road by which Joseph 
 de Fontenay had preceded me a few minutes before, I 
 succeeded like him in getting into the Crypt, followed 
 by my family and two or three insubordinate pilgrims 
 whom my bad example had led away. 
 
 We looked immediately for Mile, de Fontenay. She 
 
201 
 
 had had the chair in which she was sitting, or rather 
 lying, placed against the double pillar, to the left, where 
 the Abbe de Musy had hidden himself the year before ; 
 her mother, her faithful maid, and the friends we have 
 already mentioned, were grouped around her. 
 
 A few minutes later, the door was again cautiously 
 opened, by favour. But, this time, measures of pre- 
 caution against public faith were so well taken that no 
 one entered except the Duke de Nemours, the Prince 
 Ladislas Czartoryski, the Princess Czartoryska, and the 
 Princess Blanche of Orleans. AU the other pilgrims 
 were excluded in spite of their entreaties. In this 
 manner only about a third of the Crypt was filled up. 
 
 As I have just said, my attention was directed to- 
 wards the sick girl. She held Pius the Ninth's rosary 
 in her fingers as 'she had done when I first saw her. 
 Her eyes often rested on her mother, and their expres- 
 sion of filial tenderness clearly showed that if she so 
 ardently desired to be cured, it was not only for herself, 
 but still more for the sake of those who loved her. 
 
 It is always easy to believe what one wishes to believe, 
 and my heart was moved and full of hope. 
 
 A reUgious thrill seemed to pass through the little 
 assembly when the Abbe de Musy, clothed in the sacred 
 vestments, mounted the altar steps. 
 
 Joseph de Pontenay, Jeanne's brother, served the 
 Mass. 
 
 The Holy Sacrifice commenced and continued in the 
 midst of a devout and rapt attention. After having 
 administered to himself the Divine Sacrament, the priest 
 distributed the Bread of life to all who presented them- 
 selves at the eucharistic table; then passing amongst 
 
202 
 
 tte faithful he carried to the different sick persons, and 
 finally to Jeanne herself, the Sacred Body of Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 Thus finished the Mass of the Abb6 de Musy. Mile, 
 de Tontenay was still motionless in her invalid chair. 
 Had the King of Glory visited her without curing her ? 
 And did He intend her to bear for ever the cross of 
 disease ? Was He only trying the sick girl and her 
 family by a momentary disappointment to render their 
 faith more fervent ^and their reward more magnificent ? 
 or had some supernatural action taken place, silently, 
 and mysteriously, and unknown to all 1] Anxiety was 
 on every face, and in every heart the feeling that aU was 
 not yet finished ; each one remained in his place and 
 seemed to await the final issue. 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 The priest who was to celebrate the following Mass 
 now came out of the Sacristy. He also was accompanied 
 by Joseph de Fontenay as chorister boy: and as he 
 passed, I raised my head and recognised him. At the 
 same instant hope suddenly fled. It was the Abb6 Sire, 
 professor at the Seminary of Saint Sulpice, the same 
 Abbe Sire who, the year before, at the same Feast of 
 the Assumption and at the same hour of half-past eight, 
 had offered the Holy Sacrifice at that same altar of the 
 Crypt, when the Abb^ de Musy was cured. At sight of 
 him a flood of thoughts filled my mind. 
 
 " What a strange fancy of the de Fontenays," said I 
 to myself, " to have invited this priest here, so that all 
 the conditions in which the Abbe de Musy's cure took 
 
203 
 
 place a year ago being minutely and scrupulously copied 
 to-day, the same supernatural phenomenon might be 
 expected to happen again ! . . . And do they really 
 think that because it is the same placej-^the same pillar, 
 — the same mass, — the same altar, — the same Peast of 
 the Blessed Virgin, — the same date, — the same hour, — 
 the same officiatiag priest, — they will suddenly see a 
 reproduction of the same miracle ! , . . What vain 
 superstition ! A miracle is not a chemical precipi- 
 tate that one can obtain when one likes by uniting 
 and mixing together the same quantities of the same 
 elements. God is a Spirit! and the effects of His 
 power and goodness have nothing in common with the 
 clever arrangements of exterior things and the mathe- 
 matical calculations of material combinations. On the 
 contrary the Almighty is indignant at such an outrage 
 to His divine essence. Poor Jeanne^s prayers will cer- 
 tainly not b£ answered, and she will remain a confirmed 
 invalid ! " . . . While I was thus following the 
 logical course of my deductions the Abbe Sire finished 
 reading the gospel of which my wandering attention 
 had heard very little. 
 
 Must it be acknowledged that these considerations 
 seemed to me full of such rational and Christian philo- 
 sophy, that I rather admired myself in petto for having 
 analysed the actions of Almighty God and the myste- 
 rious laws of supernatural events with so much discern- 
 ment. Some vague echoes of the Pharisee's thanksgiving, 
 some vaiu likeness to Garo's foolish vanity, were mixed 
 with my prayers and meditations. " Yes, indeed. Lord, 
 I thank Thee for having granted me the precious grace 
 pf a well-balanced, far-seeing, and intelligent faith! 
 
204 
 
 Thanks to Thy benefits, I raise myself far above the 
 frivolities, forms, and superstitious tendencies that are, 
 alas ! so wide spread, and which even to-day have mis- 
 led this poor young girl, . . . who assuredly will 
 not be cured ! " . . . 
 
 I had reached this point of my complacent reflections, 
 when a sort of electric start went through the whole 
 congregation, causing every head to be raised and every 
 eye strained. . . . Jeanne had just risen from her 
 invalid chair, dropping all the shawls and rugs that 
 covered her on the ground. . . . What had passed 
 in the young girl's ardent soul and debiHtiated frame ? 
 
 We must retrace our steps a little to i relate it pro- 
 perly. \ 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 During the Abb6 de Musy's Mass, and shortly after 
 Holy Communion, Jeanne had experienced a painful 
 tingling in her helpless legs. ' 
 
 " What is going tb happen to me, now ? " she thought, 
 in terror. " Am I going to have ah attack in the church? 
 . . . Oh! Blessed Virgin, will you really kot cure 
 me?" 
 
 The painful tingling ceased in an instant and the 
 young girl resumed her prayer, " Our Lady of Lourdes, 
 have pity on me ! " 
 
 But again it came on and again she addressed herself 
 to the Mother of God : 
 
 " Blessed Virgin, can it be possible that you will 
 not cure me ? " . . . 
 
 The tingling again ceased. This time, however, Jeanne 
 understood by a sort of divination of the heart that 
 
205 
 
 the secret agitation which penetrated her nerves, her 
 muscles, the very fibres of her being and the marrow of 
 her bones, was the cure itself being operated in the 
 mystery of her organization. She abandoned herself 
 then without reserve. 
 
 " 0, Mary ! my Mother ! do with me whatever you 
 wiU." . . . And as if the Sovereign Creator had 
 only been waiting for this act of acquiescence, iinmedi- 
 ately Jeanne's whole body was subjected to the influ- 
 ence of the divine action. She felt a sort of secret 
 fermentation in her frame similar to that of new wine ; 
 life-giving heat boiled and burned within her like an 
 inward fire. And then a profound calm filled her being, 
 removing all agitation except the awe-stricken tremor 
 of her soul which still trembled at what had just taken 
 place. She had an intuition that the Blessed Virgin 
 was contemplating her ; and she seemed to hear a voice 
 saying with imperious sweetness : " Stand up ! Stand 
 up ! " At that moment the Abbe' Sire went up the 
 altar steps. 
 
 The young girl, bewildered and hesitating, raised her 
 heart in supplicating enquiry towards God. 
 
 " Lord ! dearest Lord ! what is this I feel ? It 
 must be a dream from heaven ! perhaps it is only an 
 illusion ! What shaU I do ? What shall I do ? Must 
 I get up and go through this crowd ? " . . . 
 
 And while she asked for an answer from on high 
 to her increasing perplexity, the officiating • priest pro- 
 nounced the first phrase of the Creed : — " Credo in 
 wvwni Deum Patrum omnipoteniem." 
 
 '' Credo ! I believe ! " It was the word she wanted. 
 " Credo ! I believe ! " It was the feeling she needed. 
 
206 
 
 " Credo ! I believe ! " It was the act slie must ac- 
 complish. . . . And then it was that Jeanne stood 
 upright, and that an electric thrill went through the 
 assembly. 
 
 She got out of her little carriage, and making a few 
 steps forward, went and knelt at the rails of the 
 sanctuary. I was near her and heard her sobs. . . . 
 The tears sprang to my own eyes, and I quite forgot all 
 about my philosophy. 
 
 (We must here add, so as not to lead our readers into 
 error, that the Abb^ Sire had in no way been convoked 
 by the family of Mile, de Fontenay, who were not even 
 acquainted with him, and that the coincidences which 
 we imagined to have been sought after and prepared by 
 human influence, were absolutely fortuitous, and had 
 been disposed by the hand of God.) 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 There rose a sort of suppressed tumult and a re- 
 strained agitation in that prayerful assembly. 
 
 Joseph de Fontenay, who was serving the Mass, 
 hearing a vague rumour of whispered exclamations, and 
 becoming aware of an extraordinary movement in the 
 congregation, of which he ignored the cause, turned 
 suddenly round to impose silence, and remind those 
 present by a sign that they were in the House of God, 
 . . . but what were his feelings when he caught 
 sight of his sister, his beloved sister Jeanne, walking 
 towards the altar rails and falling on her knees before 
 them. . . . His emotion was so great that he could 
 
207 
 
 hardly continue the responses to the different prayers 
 of the Holy Sacrifice. 
 
 Jeanne remained on her knees during the Credo, the 
 Offertory, and the Elevation. . . , Irresistible tears, 
 tears of ineffable sweetness, such as she had never be- 
 fore shed in aU her life, streamed down her face which 
 was hidden in her hands. 
 
 Having communicated at the previous Mass, she 
 withdrew when the faithful approached the Holy Table, 
 and returned to where her invalid chair was standing. 
 There she knelt on a prie-Dieu, advanced for her by the 
 trembling hand of one of the congregation. 
 
 Such, however, were the devotional habits of her 
 family, such was, also, the religious awe of all, in the 
 presence of the work of God on His creature, that no 
 one bent towards Jeanne, not even her mother, to en- 
 quire what had happened. The general feeling seemed 
 to be that a consecrated minister of the Lord was the 
 proper person to penetrate the mystery of the divinie 
 labour. 
 
 The Abbe de Musy, being informed of Mile, de Fon- 
 tenay's extraordinary state, hastened to arrive. 
 
 " What is it ? " he whispered. " What has happened ? 
 Are you cured ? " 
 
 Everyone guessed the sense of the questions asked, 
 everyone expected to see the priest and the mother 
 brighten with delight at the young girl's answer. But, 
 on the contrary, their faces became overclouded and 
 anxious, M. de Musy went silently back to the upper 
 church to resume his devotions, and doubt was upper- 
 most in every heart. The reason of it all was, that 
 Jeanne, suffocating with emotion, was unable to articu- 
 
208 
 
 late one single word in answer to the questions put to 
 her. Her voice failed her, and she could no more get a 
 sound from between her lips, than if she had been, like 
 Zachary in the temple, stricken dumb by contact with 
 the Supernatural. 
 
 The Abbe Sire's Mass was over, yet stm Jeanne 
 remained absorbed in adoration, and motionless as a 
 statue of Prayer. All eyes were fixed on her, in eager 
 expectation. 
 
 At last she rose once more, and slowly making the 
 sign of the cross, turned a long look on the altar which 
 she seemed to leave with regret. Then, amidst the 
 unutterable emotion of the faithful, she crossed the 
 Crypt. Entering the long passage that leads to the 
 outside, and seeing an empty space before her, she 
 sprang forward and ran down it, looking perfectly trans- 
 figured. But, as it wiU be remembered, the outside 
 door was shut and locked by order, and suddenly stop- 
 ped by this obstacle, Jeanne came back to the Crypt. 
 
 A respectful hedge, that even her mother did not 
 dare to pass, was formed before her steps. Joseph 
 alone, in a burst of brotherly feeling, ran towards her 
 and pressed her in his arms. 
 
 " Oh ! sister ! My dear sister ! " 
 
 But Jeanne's heart turned towards the priest who 
 had been miraculously cured like herself, who had ac- 
 companied her to Lourdes, and who had encouraged her 
 for so many months to believe and to hope. In passing 
 before the writer of these pages she said : 
 
 " I should like to see the Abb6 de Musy." 
 
 I ran up the stairs leading to the Basilica as quickly 
 as I could. 
 
209 
 
 "Come down!" said I to M. de Musy. "Mile, de 
 Fontenay is asking for you." 
 
 He hurried down. 
 
 " Ah ! Father," she cried, " I doubt no longer. I am 
 cured !" 
 
 " Very well," replied he. " Then follow the secret 
 counsel of your heart, and obey the inspirations of the 
 Blessed Virgin." 
 
 XXX. 
 
 Jeanne then directed her steps towards the place 
 where she had been touched and cured by the all-power- 
 ful right hand of her God and Saviour. Everyone 
 asked as they made way before her : 
 
 " What is she going to do ? "What is she going to 
 do?" 
 
 What she did was to take hold of the handle of her 
 invalid chair and realise to the letter those words of 
 the Gospel: Tolle grabatum iuum et vade: "Take up 
 thy bed and walk ". 
 
 Some good-natured persons wanted to help her by 
 pushing the carriage from behind; but Joseph cried, 
 " No, no ; let her alone !" And she started on her way. 
 
 She went out of the Crypt, along the corridors, across 
 the esplanade of the Basilica, and on to the high road, 
 surrounded by her family shedding tears of joy ! And 
 her family at that moment was all of us, and all the 
 crowd of piously-excited people gathering round her, 
 and increasing every minute. She was our sister, our 
 child. 
 
 Delighted, yet with eyes modestly bent down, feeling 
 at one and the same time the glory of the grace received 
 
 14 
 
210 
 
 and the confusion of being the centre of such a grand 
 scene, the young girl went down the road with a firm 
 step. 
 
 But now she noticed that she had forgotten in the 
 Holy Place, Pius the Ninth's rosary, the rosary which 
 had been the companion of her illness, and was now 
 rendered still more precious by the remembrance of the 
 Miracle. When she had suddenly stood up, it had 
 fallen on the ground by the pillar. 
 
 Her cousin, Mile, de Fontenay, de Sommans, ran back 
 immediately to look for it, and they stopped to wait for 
 her. Jeanne turned towards the August Temple, knelt 
 down with her clasped hands on the handle of the in- 
 valid chair, and recited aloud the Virgin's prayer : 
 " Hail, Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee . . ." 
 All the multitude of people knelt down with her and 
 repeated : " Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us, 
 poor sinners ". 
 
 The rosary was found, and the happy procession con- 
 tinued its way to where the road branches off towards 
 the Grotto. 
 
 Now it happened that the Eeverend Father Semp^, 
 who was then Superior of the Missionaries, had consi- 
 dered it necessary to stretch padlocked chains across 
 the road, day and night. These chains permitted foot- 
 passengers to walk on the pathways on either side, but 
 carriages were stopped by them until a permission from 
 himself or from one of the Fathers removed the obstacle 
 for some sick or favoured person. That formality, of 
 which the execution was sometimes complicated by the 
 absence of the guardito, frequently resulted in the sick 
 and suffering being forced to wait some time ip their 
 
211 
 
 conveyances before they could reach the Grotto or the 
 Piscina. 
 
 The Abbe de Musy thought instinctively of this 
 circumstance, for he had himself been inconvenienced 
 by it the previous year, as well as Mile, de Fontenay 
 on the preceding days. He ran by a short cut to the 
 residence of the Missionaries, got the key, and opened 
 the great padlock himself: so that when Jeanne arrived, 
 puUing her chair after her and followed by a crowd of 
 people, she saw the heavy links of the iron chain lying 
 on the ground before her. 
 
 Then the Abbd de Musy, suddenly remembering the 
 circumstance of the Feast of St. Peter-in- Bonds, and of 
 the words he had uttered from the altar to the sick girl, 
 stretched on her bed of pain, cried with an accent 
 of hosanna : " You can pass ! you can pass now ! The 
 chains are fallen." And Jeanne passed. 
 
 At that moment Jeanne was unlike herself. Her 
 whole frame was animated with mysterious strength. 
 Her chest was expanded and palpitating — her head was 
 thrown back by a gesture inexpressibly noble — her face, 
 formerly so pale,, was bright with the colours of health. 
 Doubtless, it was the first respirations of a new life, the 
 coursing of rich new blood in the once exhausted veins ; 
 but before all and above all, it was the divine reflection 
 of the light from on high, that the luminous hand of 
 the Queen of Heaven had left on this daughter of the 
 children of men. 
 
 So far from being exhausted, her supernatural vigour 
 increased. After having trampled under foot the fallen 
 chains, the young girl, like an escaped steed, hastened 
 her steps and began running, dragging after her, like a 
 
212 
 
 triumphal car, the sort of bed upon wheels, where, a 
 few moments before, all the energies of her youth had 
 been held captive and motionless. She galloped along, 
 weeping, laughing, sometimes giving sudden jerks to 
 the little carriage, and playing, so to speak, in the midst 
 of the Miracle, like a child playing beneath the caressing 
 eyes of her mother. She had nothing on her feet but 
 her invalid slippers, and at every five or six steps one 
 of them fell off. Then she stooped with supple agility, 
 seized the flying slipper, put it on again, and resumed 
 her rapid course. 
 
 Near the Piscina she stopped, and her brother Joseph 
 brought her a glass of the miraculous water that had for- 
 merly sprung up at the command of her Benefactress. 
 
 But hardly had she drunk, when a priest with white 
 hair seized the glass, which in his eyes had become a 
 relic, and took possession of it with so much eagerness 
 that we do not think we calumniate the good Abbe 
 Bouvier very deeply by suspecting that the guardians 
 of the Grotto never saw that glass again. 
 
 Jeanne then ran on till she arrived before the Eocks 
 of Massabiella. There was an enormous wax taper in 
 the magazine of the Missionaries : Joseph took it and 
 presented it to his sister ; and it was thus, bearing the 
 taper in one hand and pulling along her little carriage 
 with the other, that she made her triumphal entrance 
 into the Grotto of the Apparitions. She threw herself 
 on her knees and raised her heart in silent gratitude to 
 the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 But the need of a public thanksgiving was felt by 
 all : Jeanne looked round for the Abbe de Musy to lead 
 the Magnificat or the Te Deum. 
 
213 
 
 " Do you see him anywhere in the crowd ? " she 
 whispered to me. 
 
 "No, Mademoiselle, he is not there, neither do I 
 think he will come." 
 
 I felt that the humble priest had withdrawn himself 
 from the general rejoicing for fear of an ovation ; and 
 that if he had helped in time of trouble, he would refuse 
 to take part in the glorious reward. He had probably 
 gone to thank Our Lady of Lourdes in the obscurity of 
 the Crypt or the solitude of his chamber. 
 
 An ecclesiastic then came forward and said : 
 
 "I am a priest of the diocese of Autun, in right of 
 which I lift up my voice to praise the Lord : Magnificat 
 anima Tnea Dominuin ! * 
 
 The canticle of the Virgin broke forth beneath the 
 rocky roof of the Grotto and was taken up by the 
 multitude outside with indescribable enthusiasm. A 
 decade of the rosary was then recited for the sick and 
 afflicted who stUl awaited their cure. 
 
 XXXL 
 
 Two sick persons, in fact, were there present: the 
 Countess du Boulay, in her invalid chair ; and the half- 
 paralysed priest still painfully leaning on his knotty 
 stick. 
 
 Poor woman, who had prayed and implored, with such 
 impatient fervour and such tenacious hope, to be healed 
 of her disease ! 
 
 * That priest was the Abbe Bonnamour, professor at the Little Semi- 
 nary of Autun. 
 
214 
 
 Poor priest, old and indigent, who so much needed 
 health and strength for the exercise of his sacred min- 
 istry ! 
 
 My heart ached at sight of them, and a shadow passed 
 over my joy. 
 
 I only waited for the last Ave Maria, to go and speak 
 to Mme. du Boulay. 
 
 " Courage, Madame ! Let us hope that Our Lady of 
 Lourdes, who has this morning so worthily inaugurated 
 the glorious feast of her Assumption, will not allow it 
 to pass without according you a similar grace ! " 
 
 " Ah ! Monsieur Lasserre," she said, as she pressed 
 my hand in hers, " I am not thinking of myself ! I am 
 too happy ! I am overflowing with joy ! Only just 
 look at Mile, de Fontenay's radiant face ! . . : When 
 I saw her yesterday, so young, and yet more infirm than 
 old age, as infirm as I am myself, I reaUy could not 
 think of myself, and I prayed to the Blessed Virgin to 
 cure her rather than me." Then she turned towards 
 her protestant maid, who was so devoted to her, and 
 said : — 
 
 " See, my dear girl, see what the Blessed Virgin can 
 do!" 
 
 " It is true ! " replied the woman, much disturbed. 
 . . . " Such miracles are unknown in our religion ! " 
 
 '' Who knows," resumed Mme. du Boulay, " if the 
 Blessed Virgin is not waiting for your conversion before 
 she grants me my cure 1 " 
 
 The excellent waiting-woman stammered, hesitated, 
 wept, and did not know what to answer. . . . 
 
 " Lord, enlighten her understanding ! " 
 
 Then I went towards the unfortunate priest of the 
 
215 
 
 diocese of Agen, the Abb^ Cabane. . . . Great tears 
 were rolling down his cheeks, his face was flushed, his 
 breathing oppressed. He stopped me abruptly as I was 
 about to speak. 
 
 " I am suffocating with happiness ! " he murmured in 
 a trembling voice ; " I taste something of the delights 
 of heaven ! . . . How beautiful, how beautiful it 
 is ! ... I wish everybody might be cured except 
 me!" . . . 
 
 While listening to such sentiments, I understood 
 better than ever that our bodily eyes only perceive in 
 this world the deceitful appearance of things, and that 
 the marvellous splendours of the real and spiritual life, 
 being all interior, are hidden from our gaze. Truly, 
 the grace of God had descended in great and admirable 
 abundance on the young girl who had just been drawing 
 her invalid-chair after her in triumph along the road. 
 Truly, that multitude of people did well in glorifying 
 the Lord for such a manifest miracle. Truly, we act 
 rightly in relating it to-day, to perpetuate the memory 
 of it among Christian people ; but, in the judgment of 
 the spirit, and in real superiority, was not that invisible 
 grace, which had secretly descended on those two souls 
 lost in the crowd, incomparably greater and more ad- 
 mirable ? That sweet and powerful grace which, pene- 
 trating to the very essence of the human heart — that 
 heart, alas ! so naturally disposed to selfishness — filled 
 it with such noble, such disinterested, such divine 
 sentiments ! 
 
216 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 How the rest of the morning and afternoon was 
 passed it would be impossible to tell. Except the de- 
 tails which during those amazing hours were indelibly 
 fixed in our mind by the impression of the miracle it- 
 self, everything is effaced from the misty horizon of our 
 remembrance. 
 
 I remember only that Mile, de Fontenay, thoroughly 
 cured as she was, wished still for something that she 
 seemed to consider as the seal of the celestial favour 
 she had received. She wanted the blessing of Mgr. 
 Peyramale, and hastened into Lourdes to get it. 
 
 The Cur^ of the Apparitions spread over her his 
 venerable hands. " Your faith has saved you ! Go and 
 doubt no more ! " 
 
 Then turning towards Joseph, whose youthful face 
 beamed with delight, he took him in his powerful arms 
 and pressed him to his breast. 
 
 " Happy fellow ! " he cried. " Did I not tell you how 
 it would be ? " 
 
 He consecrated Jeanne to wear for a year, from that 
 date, the colours of the Blessed Virgin : blue and white. 
 (It will be remembered that she had had her dress pre- 
 pared at Autun.) And in doing so, the venerable 
 patriarch of Lourdes, filled with the thoughts of the 
 great Assumption, addressed these grave and simple 
 words to the resuscitated girl : — 
 
 " My daughter, try to lead a holy life, so that at your 
 death it may be said of you as it was of the Blessed 
 
217 
 
 Virgin: — ' Assumpta est in cmlis, she is ascended into 
 Heaven ! ' " 
 
 It has been the custom at Lourdes ever since the 
 origin of the Pilgrimage, for the town to make its solemn 
 procession to the Grotto on the day of the Assumption, 
 after Vespers. On the day in question, Mgr. Peyramale 
 was seen for the first and last time invested with the 
 cappa magna of the Eoman prelate. He had an intense 
 dislike to anything that attracted general attention 
 towards himself, and the pompous vestments were 
 embarrassing to his love of simplicity. But at such 
 a time he could not resist the desire of one of his 
 faithful friends who had remarked to him : — 
 
 " In honour of the miracle, and to please your parish- 
 ioners, you must put on your vestments of honour 
 to-day." 
 
 The Abb^ de Musy walked beside the Cur(^ of Lourdes. 
 In the ranks of the procession and the midst of the 
 Children of Mary, Jeanne Marie de Fontenay had 
 taken her place. She wore her white dress and blue 
 sash and advanced quietly amidst the legion of virgins, 
 singing with her companions : 
 
 Un souffle de gr^ce 
 Pousse vers ce lieu ; 
 Ce souffle qui passe 
 Est celiii de Dieu ! 
 Ave, Ave, Ave, Maria! 
 Ave, Ave, Ave, Maria ! 
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 About five o'clock that evening I was standing near 
 the Grotto, when a considerable group of pilgrims who 
 
218 
 
 knew that I had been present in the morning at the 
 miraculous cure, gathered round to interrogate me and 
 ask me to tell them all about it. They were anxious to 
 hear an eye-witness who could say : " That is what I 
 saw myself ! " 
 
 Having answered all their questions, I withdrew to 
 seek a little solitude after the emotions of the day. 
 A stranger then detached himself from the crowd 
 and with some hesitation approached me. He was 
 an Englishman. 
 
 "Sir," he said, "I am a tourist travelling in the 
 Pyrenees to admire." . . . 
 
 " And you find yourself in a country worthy of ad- 
 miration, do you not ? " 
 
 "Very beautiful! Very splendid! But I came to 
 Lourdes as an unbeliever ready to sneer and mock at 
 everything," 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 "Well, sir, on arriving the day before yesterday I 
 read the history of the events which had determined this 
 Pilgrimage. And now I have just been listening to you 
 relating the miraculous cure with which the whole town 
 is ringing to-day. I feel that I am beginning to turn, 
 that a change is taking place in me. Oh ! tell me, sir, 
 what I ought to do ? " 
 
 " Why, turn altogether ! Yes 1 altogether : the hour 
 of complete conversion is come." 
 
 But it was easier said than done. The Englishman, 
 who was Catholic by birth, had been for many years a 
 stranger to religion, and though he was shaken by the 
 evidence of facts, he still endeavoured by some few 
 hostile arguments to escape the grasp of the grace of 
 
219 
 
 God, which had seized him and was drawing him towards 
 the Truth. I tried to make him understand that Pro- 
 vidence itself had attracted him to the Grotto of the 
 Apparitions, and rendered him the almost direct witness 
 of the miracle due to the intercession of Mary on pur- 
 pose to bring him hack to his first faith. 
 
 " But if I make up my mind to follow your advice," 
 he said at last, " to what priest can I open my heart ? " 
 
 "To the one you prefer: they can all receive the 
 avowal of your faults and absolve you from them. 
 . . . However, it is always preferable, even at the 
 Holy Tribunal, to seek the direction of those ministers 
 of God who appear the best and the most enlightened. 
 Go to the Cure of Lourdes, or the Abbe de Musy, or 
 the Abb^ Sire." . . . 
 
 " The Abbe de Musy ? " he interrupted ; " the one they 
 say has also been miraculously cured, and who said 
 mass for that young girl ? " 
 
 " The same." 
 
 " Ah ! His sermon to-day in the Basilica, where I 
 entered by chance and out of curiosity, seemed to me 
 very eloquent." 
 
 " Would you like me to introduce you to him ? " 
 
 He accepted. As we were entering Lourdes, we 
 crossed a passer-by whom I recognised. 
 
 " You see that tall man ? " I said to the Englishman. 
 
 " Ye^," he replied, a little surprised. 
 
 " Well," I continued, " that man was converted this 
 day last year, after the Abb^ de Musy's miraculous 
 cure. . . . He went alone along the road we are 
 following, and he went where you are going." 
 
 The Englishman was much struck. He felt as though 
 
220 
 
 surrounded by the mysterious action of the Super- 
 natural. We arrived at the Abbe de Musy's lodgings 
 and asked for him. He came out of the little drawing- 
 room, and supposing that we were simply making a call, 
 he said : 
 
 " Alas ! I am very sorry, but I am with someone 
 whom I cannot leave. We shall see each other again, 
 this evening or to-morrow." 
 
 " No ! no ! " I cried hastily, " no delay ! I am not 
 come to day, Monsieur I'AhM, simply for the pleasure of 
 seeing you; and it is not I who wish for an interview. 
 . . . Think of this day last year, the same Feast of 
 the Assumption. The day which commenced, for you, 
 by a physical cure, terminated for another by a cure of 
 a higher order. Do you miss nothing to-day ?" . . . 
 
 Then pointing to the Englishman who stood a little 
 behind, anxious and agitated, and seeming to struggle 
 with himself, I added : 
 
 " There is your evening harvest ! " 
 
 And I left them together. 
 
 The next day but one, at the altar before which 
 Jeanne had been cured, the Englishman received Holy 
 Communion at the hands of the Abb6 de Musy. 
 
 And a few days later, also kneeling at the foot of the 
 Holy Tabernacle, the Countess du Boulay's maid abjured 
 Protestantism. Her name, Madame Lef^vre, is written 
 in the registers of the Pilgrimage. 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 Jeanne could not make up her mind to leave Lourdes ; 
 she wanted to make a noveno of gratitude there. 
 
•221 
 
 The happy news had been carried by telegrams to 
 Autun, where her father, her family, the good Superior, 
 and their friends received it with transports of joy : to 
 the chateau of Dammartin where the Viscountess de 
 Froissard Brossia sang her Nunc dimittis . . . Henry 
 de Pontenay, who had not been able to go with his 
 sister, started immediately to rejoin her at Lourdes, 
 desiring to see her for himself without loss of time and 
 join with her in thanking the Mother of God who had 
 granted their prayers. 
 
 The ceremony of the benediction of the bells of the 
 Basilica took place on the morrow of Jeanne's cure and 
 attracted an immense crowd of spectators. His Emi- 
 nence Cardinal Donnet, Archbishop of Bordeaux, and 
 their Lordships, Mgr. Lang^nieux, Bishop of Tarbes, 
 Mgr. D'Outremont, Bishop of Agen, Mgr. Epivent, 
 Bishop of Aire, wished to make the acquaintance of 
 the young girl healed by a miracle. She went to see 
 them at the Bishops' Cottage* and answered all their 
 questions. 
 
 During the course of that week, several other miracles, 
 equally touching and amazing, took place at Lourdes ; i* 
 indeed, that Octave of the Assumption in 1874 might 
 be said to have brought back the gospel times. Those 
 who had been favoured by a miracle came and went in 
 the midst of the crowd ; they had but one heart and 
 
 * Concerning the Bishops' Cottage, see Appendix, Note III. 
 
 ■j- Ang^le Lesbroussarl, de Valompierre (Oise), Marie Labonne, de 
 Montpazier (Dordogne), a girl of fifteen, brought to Lourdes by her 
 father, and Mr. P. Hughes, a banker of Toronto, Canada, suddenly- 
 recovered their health. 
 
222 
 
 one spirit, and that little comer of the earth was, as it 
 were, bathed in rays of heavenly light. 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 Towards the last days of August, a group of five or 
 six persons entered the church of Paray-le-Monial. A 
 graceful young girl of firm straight figure and supple 
 movements went first. Her blue dress, fastened round 
 the waist by a cord and tassels, seemed to be a gala 
 toilet, and her whole expression was that of a cahn 
 felicity. 
 
 She knelt before the Sanctuary, bowed her head and 
 became absorbed in earnest prayer. . . . Her mother, 
 her two brothers, and a maid-servant bent with iq- 
 firmities had taken their places on chairs behind her. 
 
 While they were thus prostrate, an elderly gentlemaUj 
 who had come to Paray in the last train, opened the 
 church door and advanced up the nave. On perceiving 
 the young girl he silently raised his hands to heaven in 
 a burst of unutterable gratitude. His wife and sons 
 remained motionless, although they were strongly 
 tempted to go and embrace him. 
 
 The young girl, however, was so absorbed in prayer 
 that she had not heard his step. He therefore quietly 
 went up and tremblingly knelt beside her. 
 
 Who can tell the intensity of Jeanne's feelings when 
 she saw him thus praying at her side ? She leant her 
 head on her good father's shoulder as though over- 
 whelmed with happiness, and began to weep. Her 
 father's burning tears fell on her brow, and thus they 
 
•223 
 
 remained some little time in gratitude and thanksgiving 
 before God. But how exquisite must have been the 
 ■ meeting of that family all united once more after the 
 miracle, in that blessed Temple that men have dedi- 
 cated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ ! 
 
 XXXVI. 
 
 Jeanne has resumed the usual current of her life. 
 Six months after her cure, in giving an official account 
 of her state, she says : — " Not only have I never been 
 ill again, but my general health gets stronger every day. 
 As for my inward complaint, the Blessed Virgin cured 
 it instantaneousli/, and since the 15th of August, I have 
 been able to stand up for hours together, and walk and 
 run like other people. I can often be seen walldng 
 along the streets of the town ; and I am proud and 
 happy to wear the livery of the Blessed Virgin, and 
 proclaim her mercy aloud. For the last three months 
 I have been nursing my mother, who is ill, and in con- 
 sequence have had, at the same time, to superintend the 
 house. My family, the doctors, and the strangers who 
 come to see me, are amazed at my robust health ; they 
 never could have thought it possible for me to bear so 
 much fatigue. How thankful I should be if these 
 details might console the sick and suffering, and give 
 them entire confidence in the compassionate Virgin of 
 Lourdes ! I suffered so much and for so long — I had 
 so many physical and moral weaknesses, that, feeling 
 myself now full of health and strength, I should like to 
 bring all those who suffer to the feet of her who has so 
 perfectly cured me !" 
 
224 
 
 Mile, de Fontenay walks a good deal.. Her frame 
 seems inaccessible to fatigue, and nothiag remains to 
 remind her of the inward wound of which the disastrous 
 effects had reduced her, for so many years, to the 
 state of an infirm or paralytic person. All the ills 
 • which were cured in her were perfectly cured, and yet 
 sometimes she suffers from violent neuralgia and sick 
 headache, which the doctors she has consulted have 
 been powerless to remove. 
 
 " I know what causes these pains in my head," said 
 Jeanne. 
 
 " What ?" 
 
 " When I bathed in the Piscina, it was not thought 
 prudent, because of the thickness of my hair, to put 
 my head under the water as well as my body. I am 
 persuaded that that worldly preoccupation, and that 
 want of faith on one point, was an obstacle on that same 
 point to the grace of God. Therefore, while I make it 
 my duty to seek to cure my headaches by natural 
 means, I bear with resignation those consequences of 
 my doubt which serve to strengthen my faith still 
 more ; and I willingly accept the little trial that God 
 has seen fit to send me in the place of the great trial 
 from which it pleased Him to release me." 
 
 XXXVIT. 
 
 Mgr. Lang^nieux, bishop of Tarbes, has given permis- 
 sion for a commemorative stone to be let into the stone 
 floor of the Grotto of Lourdes, bearing the following 
 inscription : — 
 
225 
 
 15th August, 1874. 
 
 On the Feast of the Assumption 
 
 Of the Most Blessed Virgin Maey, 
 
 Mlle. Jeanne-Makie de Fontenay 
 
 OF THE 
 
 Diocese of Autun 
 was cured. 
 
 "Go, and as thou hast believed so be it done unto thee. And the 
 servant was healed at the same hour." 
 
 — St. Matthew, mii. 13. 
 
 There is in the Cathedral of Autun a lateral chapel, 
 more frequented than any other; indeed, it is, in some 
 sort, the religious centre of the diocese. It is called the 
 Bishops' Chapel, and beneath its pavement sleep the 
 bishops who have succeeded each other in the episcopal 
 chair of Autun. All round the walls are black marble 
 .slabs let in, bearing engraved on their surface the names 
 of these successors of the Apostles. . . . 
 
 In the midst of those funereal mementos, a large 
 white marble ex-voto stands out in prominent relief. 
 It is placed there to remind the reader, not of those 
 overtaken by death, but of one miraculously restored 
 to life. Three years of trial having satisfactorily proved 
 beyond all doubt the permanent character of the mira- 
 culous favour accorded by the Blessed Virgin to Mlle. 
 de Fontenay, the Bishop of Autun gave the necessary 
 authorisation by episcopal ordinance, for the erection of 
 the ex-voto. We here reproduce the memorable in- 
 scription engraved upon it : — 
 
 15 
 
226 
 
 For Ever. 
 
 The 15th of every Month at half-past eight in the 
 
 MORNING, A Mass of Thanksgiving, 
 
 To Mary Immaculate, 
 
 In gratitude for the recovery 
 
 Of Mlle. Jeanne-Marie de Fontenay, 
 
 Obtained at Lourdes, 
 
 The 15th August, 1874. 
 
 In pious remembrance of Monseigneur de Les^leuc, 
 Bishop of Autun. 
 
 This Foundation, 
 
 Accepted by the Chapter of the Cathedral, 
 
 Has been .authorised by an Episcopal Ordinance 
 
 Of the 2nd August, 1877. 
 
 With the condition 
 
 That it shall be announced every year. 
 
 On the Sunday before the Assumption, 
 
 At the two principal Masses, 
 
 And shall be said 
 
 In the Bishops' Chapel. 
 
 XXXVIII. 
 
 Jeanne's feeUngs of eternal gratitude are shared by 
 aU her famUy ; which, though already religious, became 
 after the miracle Still more profoundly Christian. 
 
 Soon after receiving their daughter a second time 
 from the hands of God, M. and Mme. de Fontenay ex- 
 perienced the tearful joy of offering to the Sovereign 
 
227 
 
 Master a precious jewel from their treasure, a ripe fruit 
 from their garden. In the month of November of that 
 same year, 18*74, their youngest son, whom we have 
 seen serving the mass of the miracle, was invested at 
 Saint Acheul with the habit of novice in the Company 
 of Jesus. To-day he is called Father Joseph de Fon- 
 tenay, and has had the glory of being expelled by the 
 founders of our liberties. " Blessed are they," says our 
 Lord, " who suffer persecution for justice' sake." 
 
 As for Jeanne, she often went back to Lourdes to 
 thank her Benefactress and receive Mgr. Peyramale's 
 blessing. The Cure of the Apparitions had become her 
 adviser, her supreme director, her spiritual father. 
 
 Alas ! There came a day when she found him no 
 more and when, if she desired to ask for his help and 
 his prayers, she had to kneel at a tomb.* 
 
 One of Mile, de Fontenay's greatest pleasures is to 
 employ her newly-recovered strength in the service of 
 the sick. At one of the last Pilgrimages she passed two 
 or three nights in the train, getting out at every station 
 and going from carriage to carriage to minister to the 
 necessities of the sick pUgrims ; and on arriving at 
 Lourdes, she still continued on that miraculous soil her 
 laborious office of Sister of Charity. 
 
 At the moment of writing the last lines of this narra- 
 
 * It was a terrible blow to her when sbe beard of the death of the 
 Servant of Mary, with whose cruel sufferings she was well acquainted. 
 " The martyrdom of his last years had attained its extreme limit." 
 She wrote us, "I am angry with myself for weeping. . . . I ought 
 rather to sing the Te Bewm for his deliverance. But will Lourdes 
 still be Lourdes without him ? He was the depositary of the actual 
 traditions. With him one felt oneself at home. His blessing brought 
 happiness with it ; his counsels were joyfully followed. "... 
 
228 
 
 tive, we have just met her at Lourdes, during the anni- 
 versary month of her deliverance. Helping those who 
 suffer as she once suffered, bathing them piously in the 
 miraculous water, experiencing the inexpressible joy of 
 seeing some of them cured as she was once cured her- 
 self, she puts into practice the sacred precept : " Show 
 to others the mercy that God has shown to thee ".* 
 
 Les Brbtoux, 8th September, 1882. 
 On the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 * See Appendix, Note IV. 
 
THE NOYENO OF THE CUE^ OF ALGIERS * 
 
 To M. Henri Lasserre, Paris. 
 
 Beaunb, 1st Becemher, 1877. 
 
 Monsieur, 
 
 Madame Guerrier and myself have read the 
 manuscript you were good enough to send us, and in 
 which you relate the circumstances of her cure on the 
 16th of September of this year, at the Sanctuary of 
 Lourdes. 
 
 We have both much pleasure in witnessing to the 
 truth of your narration, which is, on every point, per- 
 fectly exact. All the facts you describe are true, true 
 in their every detail, and true in their general bearings. 
 Eeeeive, Monsieur, the assurance of our distinguished 
 sentiments. 
 
 Ed. Gueeeiee. Justine Gueekiee. 
 
 n^e Biver. 
 
 * This narrative was printed separately, a few years ago, under the 
 title of " The Miracle of the 16th of September, 1877," as an extract 
 from the second volume we were then preparing, and which we now 
 publish. 
 
230 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Towards the month of August, 1874, the Canon 
 Martignon, former Cure and Arch-priest of Algiers, ar- 
 rived at Lourdes. He was a man about forty years of 
 age, and had fallen iU. on the African soil, of an affec- 
 tion of the chest and throat, by which he had lost 
 his voice. Having heard of the miracles accomplished 
 at Lourdes, he had crossed the Mediterranean and 
 reached the town of Mary, in the hope that he also 
 might obtain a part in those signal graces. He knelt 
 and prayed at the Eocks of Massabiella, he bathed in 
 the Piscina, and drank at the miraculous spring : but 
 the cure so fervently desired descended not from Heaven. 
 
 " Come ! Come ! " said he to himself. " ISTo dis- 
 couragement! A few short prayers are not enough; 
 we must knock often if we want the door opened to us. 
 Let us make a Noveno ! " 
 
 The noveno was begun and ended without any visible 
 amelioration in his health, but the Canon's faith and 
 hope remained unshaken. 
 
 " I will make a noveno of weeks," said he. 
 
 And he settled at Lourdes for a stay of sixty-three 
 days. On the sixty-fourth day, however, finding himself 
 in exactly the same state, he went for a short time to Pau, 
 hoping that the mildness of the climate might give him 
 relief. But soon he reproached himself with his flight 
 
231 
 
 from Lourdes, as a weakness and a want of confidence. 
 Besides, in the secret of his heart he felt an indefectible 
 presentiment, that sooner or later the Blessed Virgin 
 would yield to his supplications and answer his prayers. 
 
 Animated by that thought, he hastened back to the 
 privileged Grotto, and established himself in the town 
 in a less temporary manner, taking root there, so to 
 speak, from that time. 
 
 Sick himself, he constituted himself the sick-nurse of 
 others ; and such pilgrims as made a stay of any length 
 at Lourdes at the epoch of which we are treating, will 
 surely remember having remarked there a priest, still 
 young, with a long fair beard, a bright soft eye, a dis- 
 tinguished air, and a tall frail figure, thin and with 
 narrow shoulders, a little bent with suffering. A priest 
 who led the blind, gave his arm to the halt and maimed 
 to bring them to the Piscina, and employed the remains 
 of his lost voice in consoling the afflicted. That priest 
 was the Abb^ Martignon. 
 
 "If the Blessed Virgin does not grant my prayers 
 this time," said he, smiling, " I am resolved to make a 
 noveno of years, and after that, a noveno of centuries. 
 Then I will stop." 
 
 He had the joy and consolation of witnessing the 
 miraculous cure of several of the sick persons whose 
 guide and support he had been ; but for himself, though 
 he felt a slight relief from time to time, he did not 
 receive the supernatural gi'ft so ardently desired, of a 
 complete cure of his disease. 
 
 Did he then begin to have an intuition of some secret 
 reluctance on the part of the Blessed Virgin to grant 
 him the grace he solicited ? We cannot tell. But it 
 
232 
 
 almost seemed that if his faith was still the same, and 
 his charity ever increasing, the virtue of hope was turnr 
 ing little by little into the virtue of resignation, or to 
 speak more exactly, his hope was adjourned. Happy 
 in being able to remain in that corner of the earth 
 where the Queen of Heaven had rested her feet ; con- 
 tented in breathing the sacred atmosphere, and. in going 
 every day to pray before the sacred Grotto, he de- 
 ferred the noveno of years and centuries, of which he 
 had smilingly spoken, and said to us one day : 
 
 " I stay here at the orders of Our Lady of Louides. 
 She will grant my prayers when she pleases. I am like 
 a person sitting in an ante-room, and waiting for an 
 audience. My turn will come. I shall have my hour 
 or my minute, and I shall not let it escape." 
 
 He waited for that minute or that hour during three 
 years. But after the expiration of those three years, he 
 was interiorly inspired to knock again at the celestial 
 door ; and in the course of the year 1877, he resolved 
 to make, in the month of September, a new noveno that 
 should terminate on the Feast of Our Lady of Seven 
 Dolours. He had not, however, observed that, the Feast 
 being a movable one, the first day of the noveno would 
 coincide with the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, and 
 that, in consequence, his prayer would extend in a cer- 
 tain way from the birth of Mary to the last sigh of 
 Jesus, from the cradle of the Mother to. the tomb of 
 the Son.* 
 
 * The Feast of Our Lady of Seven Dolours is celebrated the third 
 Sunday in September. And that year, 1877, the third Sunday being 
 the 16th September, it fell on the ninth day after that of the Nativity, 
 which is on the 8th of September. 
 
233 
 
 II. 
 
 Why, then, did not Mary immediately, grant the 
 prayers and wishes of the Abbe Martignon ? Why had 
 she not restored health, strength and voice to one who 
 loved her with such iilial tenderness and spoke of her 
 with such eloquence ? Perhaps there was some hidden 
 reason for it. Might it be our privilege to suspect the 
 nature of that secret cause and seek the solution of it 
 in our Mother's heart ? If the Abbe Martignon had 
 been cured, he would have left the neighbourhood of the 
 Grotto and resumed his sacred ministry in some town 
 of Algeria ; but being ill he remained at Lourdes and 
 accomplished his admirable office of mercy, in which he 
 edified those who saw him by the grand preaching of 
 his example infinitely more than he could ever have 
 done by the most eloquent sermons from his lips. 
 
 Therefore we imagine, that if the Virgin did not 
 immediately grant the cure so much desired, it was be- 
 cause she would not suffer such a servant to depart too 
 soon. The service of God lost nothing, it seems to us, 
 by this arrangement, and the Servant of God lost noth- 
 ing either. When God refuses to grant our prayers, or 
 keeps us waiting for some temporal grace we have asked 
 Him for, it is because, instead of the little quantity of 
 dross we have desired. He is preparing us a hundredfold 
 more in pure gold either in this world or in the next. 
 
 Besides, it was not long before, in his zeal and ardent 
 charity, the Abb6 Martignon took a fresh mission on 
 himself, which was the natural result of his self- 
 imposed functions of consoler of the afflicted. 
 
234 
 
 From the commencement of his sojourn at Lourdes, 
 he had met a man whose sufferings and trials exceeded 
 the ordinary sum of human afflictions. He had been 
 prominently brought forward in the most considerable 
 religious event of our times ; he had been distinguished 
 by the incredible honour of receiving a message from 
 Heaven, and accomplishing the divine commands in 
 spite of every obstacle. But the Blessed Virgin, desir- 
 ing, doubtless, to prepare him a still higher place, had 
 said, " I will show him how he must learn to suffer for 
 love of me". And the most unexpected tribulations 
 had then tortured his heroic heart. 
 
 By a strange and striking contrast he was, at one and 
 the same time, on Calvary and on Mount Thabor. While 
 his name was famous in every Christian land, and while 
 the great family of his Parish, whose beloved Father 
 and Patriarch he was, prayed for blessings on him, he 
 experienced from another quarter (especially of late 
 years) the bitter pain of being misunderstood, neglected, 
 and secretly persecuted in what was dearest to him, his 
 zeal for the welfare of his people, and for the house of 
 the Lord. Like the Cyrenian he carried the Cross, and 
 his robust shoulders were torn and bleeding from the 
 weight of the sacred burden. Around his sufferings, as 
 once around those of his Master, many wagged their 
 heads, and said : " Since he was Mary's instrument, let 
 her deliver him and come to his help ". At the period 
 of the Apparitions of the Mother of God at the Grotto 
 of Lourdes, now nearly twenty years ago, he had prayed 
 the Blessed Virgin to make roses blossom in the season 
 of snows. But Our Lady of Lourdes, who in that same 
 spot purposed to work such numberless miracles, had 
 
235 
 
 refused that particular one to the priest she had chosen, 
 and had answered his request by the austere word 
 "Penance ! " Eoses are not for the cold winter of this 
 world. Mary reserves them for her elect, her servants, 
 her friends, in the eternal Spring that succeeds to death. 
 The illustrious Abbd Peyramale, the great Cure of 
 Lourdes, the priest of the Immaculate Conception, had 
 therefore been condemned to suffer. 
 
 He understood it himself, and here we cannot 
 resist quoting some of his own reflections. They 
 treat of the dispositions of Providence in the ordering 
 of trouble and Dolour. A pious person whose con- 
 science he directed and who took note of his counsels 
 with scrupulous care, has been good enough to lend us 
 the little volume in which he had carefully noted the 
 advice and instruction received from time to time at the 
 Sacred Tribunal. It is easy to retrace in what he 
 taught others the precepts and rules he must have 
 applied to his own case every day of his life. Here 
 are some of his sayings : — 
 
 " Let us suffer with strength and courage, and even 
 with joy, so as to insure our election, as Saint Paul 
 says ! . . . Yes ! when a soul has been faithful, 
 and the great God Who sounds the heart and reins, sees 
 that He can depend upon that soul, never to abandon 
 Him ; after having visited it by graces which are the 
 forerunners of the severest trials. He hides Himself 
 and gives it up a prey to its own personal weakness 
 and misery; to annoyances, to desolation, to oppro- 
 brium; sometimes even to slander, contempt and 
 calumny." 
 
 " Then let that soul learn to suffer and be still ; God 
 
236 
 
 is at hand : He will not lose sight of it, for He loves it. 
 And yet, in vain wUl it seek Him, call Him, sigh for 
 that unique Bridegroom who alone is its joy and 
 delight. He appears deaf and dumb. It is His will 
 to be sought for and pursued, and when you think 
 you hold Him — He is gone ! . . . But, one day, 
 like a child hidden behind a door and being sought by 
 those he loves. He will open heaven to you with a smile, 
 rejoicing at having forced you to acquire merits that 
 you would have allowed to escape if you had had your 
 own way." 
 
 " When God sees a faithful and generous soul. His 
 eye is always on it ; He reserves it for heaven and 
 purposes to turn it into one of the most precious stones 
 of the Eternal City. He employs the hammer and 
 chisel to shape it, and in spite of its cries, He subjects 
 it to a cruel discipline. If it remains faithful to Him 
 in the midst of so many afBictions, He rewards it by 
 increasing them; if it shows itself still constant and 
 generous, He weighs it down with other and greater 
 trials ; and if it continues to persevere, and instead of 
 abandoning Him, exhibits its readiness to accept every- 
 thing, how does He testify His satisfaction ? He sends 
 it tortures that are sometimes intolerable, and such as 
 He reserves for heroic hearts alone : that is His highest 
 reward. He treats the soul as He treated His Son Jesus, 
 for He considers it as His own child, and He loves it 
 too well not to lavish on it all that is most precious on 
 earth: suffering, humiliation, and affliction. But in 
 this chaos of trouble, the soul is united to God for all 
 eternity. What should that tried, afflicted soul do ? 
 
237 
 
 Eeinember that God loves it and never voluntarily 
 doubt Him for one single instant." 
 
 Such was the man, such was the priest of whom the 
 Abbe Martignon had been, for the last few years, the 
 filial comforter and the unfailing friend. 
 
 Another ecclesiastic seconded him in that noble work. 
 The Abb^ Lafont, chaplain at the hospital of Tarbes, 
 had been a friend of the Cure of the Apparitions from 
 childhood. He was a man of God, filled with courage, 
 ardour and faith, ready for every sacrifice and of im- 
 movable fidelity. Efforts were made to estrange him 
 from the Cure of Lourdes. It was said to him, " You will 
 make yourself powerful enemies ! " " What ! " he cried, 
 " give up Peyramale and betray him when he is per- 
 secuted ! Never ! " . . . 
 
 He passed humbly and simply the life he had devoted 
 to Jesus Christ in the persons of the sick and poor : 
 Christo in pauperibus. 
 
 Monseigneur Peyramale, the Abb^ Lafont, and the 
 Abb^ Martignon were three friends after God's own 
 heart. 
 
 III. 
 
 • It is not our intention to expose here the weight of 
 sorrow beneath which succumbed the venerable priest, 
 of whom Mgr. Langenieux in one of his letters addressed 
 to him had said that " Our Lady of Lourdes had chosen 
 Mm for her confident, her witness, and her apostle in 
 the marvels of her Apparitions ".* 
 
 * Letter from Mgr. Langenieux, Bisbop of Tarbes, dated the 22nd 
 August, 1873. This letter is in our possession. 
 
238 
 
 We will simply recall to mind that when the Basilica 
 of the Grotto, — enriched with gifts from all parts of the 
 world — was finished, the Basilica which formed the goal 
 of the processions demanded by the Blessed Virgin ; the 
 Cur^ Peyramale undertook to rebuild the parish church 
 which was to be their starting-point. He sank under 
 the task without having been able to complete it. 
 
 He had often spoken of his approaching death as a 
 thing of necessity and a supreme sacrifice to be offered 
 in the interests of the House of God. 
 
 The works of the unfinished church were stopped 
 when the roof was reached, for the help on which he 
 had counted failed him, and the most amazing hostility 
 had trammelled his efforts. 
 
 " I shall not enter into the promised land," he would 
 say sometimes, " I shall only see it from afar. I must 
 die to ward off impending ruin. When I am gone 
 every difficulty will be smoothed away. My death will 
 pay all debts." 
 
 These melancholy words brought the tears to his own 
 eyes as well as to the eyes of those who listened to him 
 and loved him. We had the sorrowful consolation of 
 being present at his departure from this world, and we 
 intend to relate, in the history of his life, how it pleased 
 God to choose the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed 
 Virgin as the day on which He opened to His servant 
 the gates of Eternity. 
 
 On the day.of the Nativity the Incomparable Virgin, 
 whom the Office of the Immaculate Conception shows 
 us as present at the Councils of the Most High, had 
 appeared, shining with innocence and glory amongst the 
 shadows of this world ; and on the day of the Nativity 
 
239 
 
 the Cure of Lourdes quitted those shadows to enter into 
 the glory of- the heavenly country. Around Mgr. Pey- 
 ramale's bed were grouped his brother, his relatives, his 
 curates, his friends, and all those of his people who could 
 obtain admission into the room of the Man of God. The 
 intimate friend of the last few years, the Abbe Martignon, 
 was there, in the midst of the weeping family, broken 
 down with grief and thinking neither of himself, nor 
 his niness, nor his cure, nor even of his Noveno to Our 
 Lady of Seven Dolours, which, by a strange coincidence, 
 he was going to begin that very day. 
 
 IV. 
 
 After a long agony, Mgr. Peyramale breathed his last 
 sigh upon earth, and yielded his immortal soul into the 
 hands of God, leaving his faithful friend the good Canon 
 of the African capital alone in the world. Not but what 
 he still had a father in his venerable and beloved Arch- 
 bishop of Algiers, Mgr. Lavigerie, but was he certain 
 ever to see him again, and was he not too ill to under- 
 take the journey ? ... At that hour of sorrow and 
 solitude, his soul turned towards the invisible regions 
 in which, henceforth, dwelt the Servant of Mary. And 
 in raising his heart to the Comforter of the afHicted he 
 recalled the projected noveno, and remembered that 
 that day, the 8th of September, was precisely the first 
 day of it. What then passed in his soul ? Kneeling 
 beside the deathbed and holding the inanimate hand of 
 the Cure of Lourdes in both his own, he remained a 
 moment prostrate and silent. 
 
240 
 
 Then he rose and said to several of those present, the 
 curates of the parish, the writer of these lines, and 
 others : 
 
 " I have just made the first prayer of my noveno to 
 Our Lady of Seven Dolours. In asking for my cure 
 beside these sacred remains, I conjure Our Lady of 
 Lourdes to permit that on the ninth day our friend shall 
 communicate the answer to me, himself, in her name." 
 
 Then he added : 
 
 " The choice that it has pleased God to make of the 
 8th of September, to recall to himself the Cure of the 
 Apparitions, is a sufficient authorisation for me to as- 
 sociate my humble supplications with his memory." 
 
 They asked the Abb4 Martignon what inscription 
 should be engraved on the tomb of the Servant of Mary. . 
 He replied through his tears : 
 
 " Engrave these two verses from the Sacred Scriptures: 
 — ' Domine, dilexi deaus domus tuw : Lord, I have loved 
 the beauty of Thy house. Zelus domus tuae comedit me : 
 The zeal of Thy house hath eaten me up.' The first 
 text is the history of his life ; the second, the history of 
 his death." 
 
 The master has quitted the earth. What will be the 
 fate of the two disciples, the two friends, the two priests, 
 who remain here below in this valley of tears ? They 
 look to heaven for help. Quid aspicietis in caelum, viri 
 Galilei ? 
 
 On the evening of the obsequies of Mgr. Peyramale, 
 and after having been present at them, bathed in tears, 
 
241 
 
 his old friend, the Abb^ Lafont, came to see us, and 
 said : 
 
 " He is gone ! What will become of us now ? " 
 
 It happened that on his return to Tarbes, the follow- 
 ing day, the Abb6 Lafont, who was chaplain of the 
 hospital there, was present at a great fire. The house 
 called the Little Convent, in the rue Saint Louis, was in 
 flames. He rushed forward to help to save the children, 
 and remove the Blessed Sacrament to a place of safety, 
 when he was struck dead by the falling of a piece of a 
 burning waU. He went to rejoin in the bosom of God 
 the friend for whom he had wept the previous day. 
 
 Thus, entering into eternal life by a sublime act of 
 self-devotion, Mgr. Peyramale's first friend, the friend of 
 early days, departed this world immediately after the 
 Servant of Mary. 
 
 The more recent friend, the Abb6 Martignon, stUl 
 remained. 
 
 VI. 
 
 A great hope as weU as a great sorrow had filled the 
 soul of the sick priest beside the death-bed of the 
 Servant of Mary. Assuredly the thought of being 
 cured could in no way alleviate his affliction, for no 
 personal consideration could attenuate his grief at the 
 loss of his friend. But feeling himself henceforth alone 
 in the world, it was pleasant to know that his protector 
 was in heaven, and that doubtless, after God and the 
 Blessed Virgin, it would be to his intervention that he 
 would owe the grace he had so long solicited. 
 
 16 
 
242 
 
 It seemed to him that with such an intercessor, the 
 Blessed Virgin would, on the ninth day, become perfectly 
 accessible and favourable to his prayers. He even 
 wrote to Paris, to the E. Y. Picard, Superior General of 
 the Assumption, to tell him of his hope, or rather of his 
 certainty of being cured. 
 
 He already began to talk of what he should do when 
 he was restored to health, and how he should employ 
 himself in the Cur6 Peyramale's unfinished work. In 
 the midst of his mourning and tears, he enjoyed by 
 anticipation the sweets of recovered health, strength 
 and voice. 
 
 He prayed fervently, and many friends united their 
 prayers to his. In this manner he reached the 15th of 
 September — the eve of Our Lady of Seven Dolours, and 
 the eve of the ninth day. 
 
 In the morning of the 15th, which was a Saturday, 
 he received a telegram informing him of the departure 
 of M. and Mme. Guerrier for Lourdes, and asking him 
 to be good enough to meet them at the station with a 
 carriage. 
 
 M. and Mme. Guerrier were entirely unknown to 
 him. A letter he had received by post from the Cur6 
 of Saint-Gobain, twenty-four hours before the arrival of 
 the telegram, had informed him simply that Mme. 
 Guerrier had suffered for many years from a painful 
 disease, and that she was coming to Lourdes to pray for 
 a cure in which she had absolute faith. The lady and 
 her husband were warmly recommended to the Abb6 
 Martignon, as they were visiting Lourdes for the first 
 time. 
 
 The Canon willingly accepted the charitable errand, 
 
243 
 
 and directed his steps towards the station in time for 
 the three o'clock train. 
 
 We will leave him for a few moments bending over 
 his Breviary, and reading his Office in the waiting-room, 
 while we reveal to the reader by what series of circum- 
 stances it happened that M. and Mme. Gnerrier arrived 
 at Lourdes on that particular day. 
 
244 
 
 . CHAPTEE II. 
 
 I. 
 
 M. Edward Guerrier, Justice of the Peace at Beaune, 
 had about fifteen years before married a most excellent 
 and Christian young lady, Mile. Justine Biver. 
 
 Mile. Biver belonged to an honourable family. Her 
 father was an eminent doctor, her brothers occupied im- 
 portant commercial positions. One of them was General 
 Director of the Company of Saiut-Gobain, the other 
 Director of the celebrated Manufactory of Looking- 
 glasses of Saint-Gobain and Chauny. 
 
 Heaven had blessed their union. Three children were 
 born in due order, all healthy and strong. They were 
 brought up beneath their mother's eye, and cherished 
 by her watchful care. She taught them their first 
 lessons of human knowledge, but above all, she taught 
 them the love of the poor, and the knowledge of God. 
 
 In this way eleven years of uninterrupted happiness 
 passed away. Eleven years of unbroken felicity is a 
 very short time, and a very long time too ! ... It 
 is short ! For happy days pass so rapidly that they 
 seem to last but an instant. It is long ! For seldom is 
 it that such a period of time passes in this vale of tears 
 without being marked, here and there, by trouble or 
 catastrophe. 
 
 But about the year 1874, this clear horizon was sud- 
 
245 
 
 denly clouded over. Mme. Guerrier's health began 
 rapidly to give way. Violent headaches were succeeded 
 by frequent fainting fits, and by a gradually increasing 
 weakness, which finally degenerated into a state of 
 general paralysis, spreading successively to all the most 
 important organs. The spine lost its strength, the legs 
 refused all movement, the sight became weak and de- 
 fective. Mme. Guerrier could not sit up in bed, and 
 was obliged to remain always in a horizontal position. 
 The lower part of the body fell, at . last, into a state of 
 absolute insensibility ; not only were the feet and legs 
 incapable of motion, but if they were pinched or pricked 
 with a needle the patient did not feel it. Several times 
 during her long fainting fits they feared she would sud- 
 denly pass away. Death stood on the threshold and 
 threw its threatening shadow on the once happy home. 
 The poor mother had been obliged to give up superin- 
 tending the education of her children, and could only 
 now be present at their intercourse with God. She 
 gathered them round her bed morning and night, and 
 heard them pray and ask for her recovery. 
 
 II. 
 
 Her illness had lasted about two years, and they 
 were in 1876. The eldest daughter Alice was to make 
 her first Communion on the 2nd of April. And that 
 great day on which the child was to receive her God 
 was the all-absorbing preoccupation of the Christian 
 mother. She thought of it for her daughter and also a 
 little for herself, for it seemed to her impossible that in 
 ■ coming to take possession of her child's heart the merci- 
 
246 
 
 ful Saviour should not bring some relief for her own 
 sufferings, and leave some royal sign of His visit . and 
 sojourn in the house. Did He not, when in the olden 
 times He entered the house of Simon Peter, order 
 Peter's mother-in-law, who was lyiag ill, to rise and 
 serve them ? "I am certain," said Mme. Guerrier, 
 " that I shall rise and walk on that day." 
 
 On the 2nd of AprU, Alice received the body and 
 blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ for the first time ; and 
 in the evening, a cordial dinner was offered to the 
 priest who had prepared the young girl, and to a few 
 members of the family. But no change had taken place 
 in the mother's state and her seat remained empty as 
 it had been for so long, when — at the very moment that 
 dinner was served — Mme. Guerrier suddenly recovered 
 her strength, rose, dressed and appeared in the midst of 
 the guests, who were bewildered with delight and as- 
 tonishment. Her sight was clear and distinct, her spine 
 straight and supple, and her legs able to bear her weight 
 as in bygone times. 
 
 The priest intoned a hymn of thanksgiving to which 
 all responded. They instinctively felt that He who 
 in the morning had given Himself in the divine banquet 
 was invisibly present at the evening repast. During 
 the night Mme. Guerrier's sleep was deep and sweet, but, 
 alas ! on the morrow when she tried to rise, her legs had 
 fallen into their former inert condition. 
 
 III. 
 
 Was it, then, nothing but a dream and an illusion 
 that on the evening before she had been in perfect- 
 
247 
 
 health, done the honours of the repast and celebrated 
 the happiest day that had ever yet dawned on her 
 daughter's life ? Was it an effort of imagination, a ner- 
 vous movement, as the doctors say ? — No, no, nothing 
 of the kind. 
 
 The Master of life and death, of health and sickness, 
 had so disposed all things that it was impossible not to 
 recognise His hand, impossible to attribute to nature 
 what was indeed the effect of His grace. 
 
 On the day of the daughter's first Communion He 
 would not disappoint the mother's hope and faith ; 
 touching her with His divine finger. He had com- 
 manded her to rise and serve the guests as he had for- 
 merly done to Simon Peter's mother-in-law. But after 
 having shown by this manifestation of His power, that 
 He was the Sovereign Dispenser of life and health, He 
 suffered it to be understood that, for some hidden reason 
 known to Himself alone. His purpose was to let her 
 stUl bear the weight of trial. And in order to mark 
 stOl more clearly that He alone had ruled these events, 
 He ordained that while the legs fell back iato their old 
 state of infirmity the upper part of the body should be 
 no longer subject to disease. The intolerable headaches 
 and alarming fainting fits had disappeared, and the sight 
 remained clear and strong. 
 
 The centurion of the gospel employed a just com- 
 parison when, in seeking to express the submission of 
 nature to the almighty power of God, he likened it to 
 the prompt and punctual obedience of military discip- 
 line. " I say to one, go, and he goeth ; and to another, 
 come, and he cometh ; and to my servant, do this, and 
 he doeth it." 
 
248 
 
 Thus Jesus had commanded in a house of the French 
 town of Beaune just as He had formerly commanded in 
 the Jewish city of Capharnaum. 
 
 Like a chief who manoeuvres his soldiers according 
 to a plan of battle of which they are ignorant, He had 
 said to the disease " Go !" He' had said to it " Come ! " 
 He had said " Do this ! " and at His word all was accom- 
 plished. 
 
 Why ? What was the reason of that partial falling 
 back after a radical cure. What was the mysterious 
 plan followed by Our Lord? He alone could tell; 
 and if the question had been asked Him with reference 
 to Mme. Guerrier, He would doubtless have answered 
 as He did about the man bom blind : " It is that the 
 works of God should be made manifest in her ". Is it 
 necessary to add that Mme. Guerrier's faith, which 
 was already great, became greater still ? Her soul had 
 received grace from on high as well as her body. The 
 clouds that had hid her husband, her children, and all 
 whom she loved, from her sight, had been dispersed by 
 a breath from heaven, and though still stretched on her 
 bed, she was joyful and glad at heart. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Since the commencement of her illness she had never 
 had the happiness of seeing her parents. She lived at 
 Beaune in the C6te d'Or. Her father and mother dwelt 
 at Saint-Gobain in the department of Aisne. A hundred 
 and forty leagues separated the two towns. The worthy 
 Dr. Biver was then in his eighty-second year, and travel- 
 ling was difficult for him ; but his daughter anxiously de- 
 
249 
 
 sired to see him, and from the first days of April to the 
 beginning of September her wish became stronger and 
 more urgent. 
 
 Vainly her friends represented to her how difficult it 
 was to move her and that so long a journey might throw 
 her into a worse state; all these considerations gave way 
 before the fihal desire of once more pressing to her heart 
 the mother who had fed her with her milk, and the 
 father who had cradled her in his arms in the days of 
 her infancy. The signal imprudence was therefore com- 
 mitted of allowing her to undertake the journey. 
 
 As the doctors had foreseen, the result was a consider- 
 able aggravation of her sufferings. The least move- 
 ment, as, for example, when they tried to carry her from 
 one room to another, produced frightful giddiness and 
 nervous attacks ; so that it was utterly impossible for 
 the sick woman to make another railway journey to 
 Beaune. She was therefore obliged to remain where 
 she was. 
 
 The consequence of such a state of things and under 
 such circumstances was the complete breaking up of the 
 family. The functions of Justice of the Peace obliged 
 the husband to stay in Beaune, the fatal bonds of infir- 
 mity and disease detained the wife at Saint-Gobain. 
 Mme. Guerrier had asked to have her children with 
 her, and every two or three months the magistrate 
 made a hurried journey over a hundred and forty 
 leagues of rail, to pass a day or two with his beloved 
 ones. About a year passed in this way. 
 
 They watched anxiously for a moment of respite when 
 a slight amelioration might -permit them to risk taldng 
 the invalid home again to Beaune ; but so far from any 
 
250 
 
 improvement, she got gradually worse, and a commence- 
 ment of paralysis manifested itself in the left arm. 
 The thought of her return was rendered still more 
 alarming by the experience of her departure. 
 
 One day in the month of August, M. Guerrier was at 
 Saint-Gobain, in despair at a situation from which there 
 seemed no way of escape, when his wife said to him : 
 
 " I want to go on a pilgrimage to Lourdes. I shall 
 be cured there." 
 
 These words startled and alarmed the husband. 
 They presented the most harassing perspective to his 
 mind, and he strongly opposed an idea which he felt 
 must infallibly result in a fatal issue. 
 
 " My dear wife," he answered, " you are asking for 
 impossibilities. See what have been the consequences 
 of yielding to your wish and letting you come to Saint- 
 Gobain, eleven months ago. You, who cannot even 
 bear to be drawn round the garden in an invalid chair, 
 would you be mad enough to risk a journey right 
 through France, to a place where we know nobody, 
 and with the probability of never being able to come 
 back ? Do not think of it for a moment. It would be 
 tempting God and rushing into unknown dangers." 
 
 "1 am certain I shall be cured at Lourdes," said 
 Mme. Guerrier, " and I want to go." 
 
 It was the struggle of reason against faith and hope. 
 A struggle that lasted several days. 
 
 Mme. Guerrier's confidence had at last influenced her 
 brothers, the Directors of Saint-Gobain. They advised 
 
251 
 
 M. Guerrier to -let her liave her own way, and the latter, 
 weary of resistance, at last gave a reluctant consent. 
 Having procured a certificate from the doctor testifying 
 to the state of his wife's health, he obtained leave of 
 absence for a few weeks to be able to accompany her 
 to the Pyrenees. 
 
 The journey was finally decided on the Saturday, 8th 
 of September, the Day of the Nativity. 
 
 What prayers rose from all their hearts to Our Lady 
 of Lourdes on the day in which her noble servant the 
 Cur^ Peyramale left this world to enter into the Eealms 
 of Justice, where the wicked receive their punishment, 
 and the good are crowned with power and glory. 
 
 M. Guerrier was, however, rendered extremely anxious 
 by the thought that in case of some painful eventuality, 
 he should find himself in a strange town without other 
 aid or help than the mercenary and careless services of 
 hotel servants. 
 
 " How I wish," he often said, " that I knew some one 
 at Lourdes, who could guide us a little. I am nervous 
 at knowing nothing of the place." This passed on the 
 10th or 11th of September. 
 
 At that time the Abbe Poindron, Cure of Saint- 
 Gobain, who often visited the family, read of Mgr. 
 Peyramale's death in a newspaper ; and in the account 
 of his last moments, he observed the name of the 
 Abbe Martignon, the former Cure of Algiers, of whom 
 we have spoken at the beginning of this narrative. 
 . Immediately he hastened to call on Mme. Guerrier. 
 
 " You will find some one at Lourdes to receive you 
 and guide you," he said to the husband ; " I know the 
 Abbe Martignon, and I will write and recommend you 
 
252 
 
 to his care. Let him know the hour of your arrival by- 
 telegram. He will be expecting you." 
 
 VI. 
 
 The exact moment of the terrible departure was fixed 
 for the Wednesday, 12th September. It was decided 
 that they should rest at Paris for four-and-twenty hours, 
 and then, if possible, go straight on to Lourdes without 
 stopping. A sleeping-car was bespoken of the railway 
 company. 
 
 In the family all was emotion and excitement. The 
 invalid declared she should be cured, and her brothers, 
 gained over by her faith, shared her confidence. Her 
 husband, while yielding to his wife's wish, trembled 
 with fear and anxiety. He saw only the material 
 difficulties, whereas Mme. Guerrier seemed to ignore 
 their existence. She looked to divine possibilities, and 
 he to human probabilities. The children accustomed 
 to hear nothing but the truth from their mother's Hps, 
 and easily disposed to believe, as one especially is at 
 that age, in the realisation of their wishes, rejoiced in 
 anticipation. 
 
 " Yes, yes, you vrill be cured," said the eldest girl. 
 
 Marie, the youngest, who never remembered seeing 
 her mother otherwise than infirm and in bed, exclaimed : 
 
 " Mamma wUl come back to us like another mamma, 
 and we shall have a mamma who can walk." 
 
 " And she wUl be able to take us on her lap," added 
 Paul, whose little heart had often longed for that unat- 
 tainable happiness. 
 
 At other times they were frightened at the long jour- 
 
253 
 
 ney, which, to their childish imaginations, seemed end- 
 less, and at the thought of the weary days and nights 
 they would pass without seeing their mother or receiving 
 her caresses. 
 
 " Mother," they said, " will you be able to send us 
 your blessing from Lourdes ? " 
 
 There are few things more painful than the doubts 
 and hesitations which precede some important decision. 
 Mme. Guerrier's aged father had been spared them all, 
 for it was only when everything had been settled and 
 his consent alone was wanting, that his daughter ac- 
 quainted him with her project of going to that distant 
 sanctuary to ask of the Mother of God a cure, that 
 human science had been powerless to accomplish. At 
 this information, and before the supreme resource of 
 turning from earthly means to resort only to heavenly 
 intervention, the old doctor was deeply moved. Tears 
 rose to his eyes. 
 
 " I consent to whatever you wish," he said. And at 
 the moment of her departure, he spread his venerable 
 hands over his daughter and blessed her. 
 
 The journey could only be made at the cost of terrible 
 suffering, and when Mme. Guerrier arrived at Paris, it 
 was with the greatest difficulty they managed to get her 
 to the apartment of her brother, M. Hector Biver. 
 
 Their brother-in-law, M. Louis Bonnel, professor at 
 the College of Versailles, had come to meet them full 
 of anxiety. 
 
 " I have been enquiring if M. Henri Lasserre is at 
 Lourdes just now," he said ; " I knew him once in a club 
 to which we both belonged, and I have brought you a 
 letter for him." 
 
254 
 
 It was by these means that he, to whom God. has 
 granted the grace of relating this history, found himself 
 naturally mixed up with its every detail. 
 
 On the morrow they resumed their journey, but not- 
 withstanding the invalid's courage, she was so exhausted 
 by the time the train entered the station at Bordeaux, 
 that her husband, justly alarmed, insisted on her resting 
 for a day before she went any further. 
 
255 
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 I. 
 
 On Saturday the 15th of September, M. and Mme. 
 G-Tierrier arrived at Lourdes. It will doubtless be re- 
 membered that the priest to whom they had been 
 recommended, the Abbe Martignon, was waiting at the 
 station to receive them. He was seated in the waiting- 
 room, saying his Office, and thinking of the supreme 
 Noveno on which he had concentrated all his hopes of 
 recovery. 
 
 He called to mind the numbers of sick persons 
 he had seen cured at the Grotto in the years he had 
 been there, and he said to himself that his turn was 
 now come, that the following day was the last of the 
 Noveno, and that the Miracle he had asked for for so 
 long would finally be accomplished. Time passes 
 quickly in the company of hope, and thus the good 
 canon had patiently awaited the arrival of the travel- 
 lers with whom our readers are already acquainted, 
 but whom he did not yet know. He had, however, 
 got everything in readiness. A large and comfort- 
 able carriage was waiting in the yard of the railway 
 station. The porters carried the sick woman and 
 placed her in it, and they drove to the house of Mme. 
 Detroyat in the Avenue of the station, where the 
 Abb^ Martignon had taken a room. But the room 
 happened to be on the first or second floor, and Mme. 
 
256 
 
 Guerrier's condition made it absolutely indispensable 
 for her to have a room on the ground floor. The Canon 
 of Algiers, not having been sufSciently informed on that 
 point, could not naturally foresee the necessity of it, 
 and therefore he found himself rather embarrassed. 
 
 " Never mind," he said to the hostess, " I will take 
 them to M. Lavigne, close by. Perhaps he will be able 
 to give us a room such as you wish for." 
 
 M. Lavigne is the owner of a pretty house embowered 
 in shrubs and flowering plants. A latticed door painted 
 green opens from the garden on to the high road that 
 passes through Lourdes and forms the principal street of 
 the town. The dwelling is situated in the lower part 
 of the road between the town and the station. 
 
 The worthy M. Lavigne put himself at the disposal 
 of the pilgrims with the best grace in the world. So, 
 instead of stopping at Mme. Detroyat's or in one of the 
 hotels, M. and Mme. Guerrier found themselves settled 
 in M. Lavigne's house, in a large room on the ground 
 floor, that opened on to the garden, and was turned into 
 a bedroom for the occasion. Idle as these details may 
 appear, they are not without use or importance, as will 
 be seen later on. 
 
 In that room, Mme. Guerrier told the Abbe Martignon 
 the story of her long sufferings, her incurable infirmities, 
 and the confident hope that had brought her to Lourdes. 
 They talked of the innumerable benefits of Our Lady of 
 Lourdes, and of Mgr. Peyramale ; the priest of Algiers 
 let drop a few words about his Noveno, asking Mme. 
 Guerrier to join in it, and cordially offering to pray for 
 her intentions. . . . After resting some time, they 
 went to the Grotto, M. Guerrier having engaged two 
 
257 
 
 temporary domestics to help to carry Mme. Guerrier 
 from the carriage to the foot of the statue of Mary. It 
 was then about five o'clock. 
 
 At that time and in that place we had the honour of 
 seeing her for the first time. M. Guerrier gave us his 
 brother-in-law's letter, and acquainted us with the 
 troubles of the family. 
 
 Mme. Guerrier's prayers were fervent and absorbed. 
 She sat motionless, with her eyes seemingly fixed in 
 ecstasy on the marble statue of the invisible Virgin who 
 had formerly appeared in that place and whom she had 
 come from so far to invoke. The expression of her face 
 and the elevation of her hands, all expressed unshaken 
 faith and hope. 
 
 II. 
 
 Before setting out on her journey, Mme. Guerrier had 
 received absolution, and had, to the best of her power, 
 disposed her soul effectually to implore the miraculous 
 grace she had come to seek. She was ready. But her 
 husband, although a sincere Christian, was a little 
 behind-hand; for having had the weight of aU the 
 temporal preparations and anxieties, he had been less 
 active in regulating, his spiritual affairs. He had made 
 all the arrangements for their departure, and regulated 
 the different details of the journey with vigilant care, 
 but he had put off preparing himself until the last hour 
 and the decisive moment. 
 
 It was at Lourdes that the hour struck. 
 
 Late in the evening, M. Guerrier asked the Abb6 
 Martignon to hear his confession ; it being his iatention 
 
 17 
 
258 
 
 on the morrow to take his place at the Holy Table 
 beside her whom he cherished ; he wished their actions 
 to be united, as were their hearts, and their prayers to 
 ascend together to God. 
 
 Thus it was, that in the mystery of the Sacrament of 
 Penance he opened his heart to the priest of Jesus 
 Christ. He confessed his faults, he told him his 
 troubles, his anxieties, the cloud that hung over his 
 home, his uneasiness for the present, his alarm for the 
 future. He wanted comfort and encouragement, and 
 experience had taught him that, what the Church 
 calls the " tribunal of Penance," is also the " tribunal of 
 Consolation". The details of his confidence are the 
 secret of God. We know, however, that the Confessor, 
 who, for an instant, holds the place of the Almighty 
 Father, and in His name utters words of mercy to all 
 His creatures, often feels in a higher degree than ordi- 
 nary men the sublime sentiment of pity, and the former 
 Cure of Algiers was moved to compassion at the trials 
 of the disconsolate husband ; at the spectacle of that 
 mother of three children condemned for so long to 
 infirmity and inaction, and that little family stiU in 
 such want of motherly care. He forgot his own iUs in 
 his sorrow for the ills of others. Wot, however, that 
 we wish it to be understood that he no longer remem- 
 bered his own sufferings and the immense hopes he had 
 founded on the morrow. On the contrary, he thought 
 of it all. But a consideration of a higher order which 
 had already presented itself to his mind, and of which 
 he had vaguely spoken to Mme. Guerrier, rose in his 
 heart and there took form and purpose. He hastened 
 to give it his adhesion. 
 
259 
 
 " Tell your wife to be full of confidence, and do not 
 let yours fail either!" said lie to his penitent, to the 
 man who, in the sacred tribunal, called him " Father," 
 and to whom he answered "My son". "I saw her 
 praying this evening at the Grotto ; she is one of those 
 who triumph over the heart of God and conquer the 
 Miracle." . . . 
 
 " I myself," he added, " am making a Noveno that I 
 began at the deathbed where my friend the revered 
 Cure of Lourdes had just expired. Prom that moment 
 I have invoked his memory, and I have prayed Our 
 Lady of Lourdes to permit that on the ninth day he 
 may himself communicate to me the answer to my 
 urgent request. We are just at the eve of that day. 
 My Noveno was begun on the Saturday, 8th of Sep- 
 tember, and will finish to-morrow, Sunday, the Feast 
 of Our Lady of Seven Dolours. To-morrow, then, I 
 shall celebrate the Mass which is my last hope. . . . 
 But do you tell Mme. Guerrier that not only will I say 
 that Mass for her, but also, if I am to have any share 
 in the manifest answer I solicit, that I give up that 
 share to her. I make her a free gift of all the anterior 
 prayers of my Noveno, and I substitute her intentions for 
 mine, so that if the sign given on the ninth day be a 
 cure, it may he her mire and Twt mine. Before she goes 
 to sleep to-night, and when she wakes to-morrow morn- 
 ing, teU her to associate Mgr. Peyramale's name with 
 her prayers ; and come both of you to-morrow morning 
 at eight o'clock to the Mass at the Basilica. I have 
 great hopes that something good will happen." 
 
 M. and Mme. Guerrier, in accepting such an offer, 
 could not measure the heroism and extent of the saori- 
 
260 
 
 flee made by the priest of Algiers. To do so they 
 would have required to know the long history of his 
 past life, and of that they were absolutely ignorant. 
 
 •III. 
 
 That evening, then, before closing her eyes, and on 
 the morrow at the dawn of day, the incurably paralysed 
 woman associated with her prayers the name of Mgr. 
 Peyramale. A little before eight in the morning she 
 was carried to the Basilica to be present at the last and 
 supreme Mass of the Noveno, in which the Abbe Mar- 
 tignon expected to receive the mysterious answer of his 
 deceased friend. 
 
 Mme. Guerrier was deeply imbued with the infallible 
 and consoling teachings of the Church on the com- 
 munion of Saints and the reversionary gift of Merits. 
 In consequence, therefore, of the act of abnegation made 
 in her favour by the Abbe Martignon, the feehng of 
 confident faith that had brought her to the Grotto of 
 Lourdes was strengthened so as to have become a posi- 
 tive certainty. Let us try to give an idea of it. 
 
 In this resort of peace and edification we are a long 
 way from battlefields and sanguinary struggles, and yet 
 we shall seek ia the midst of camps a comparison that 
 may adequately convey some idea of what was passing 
 iu a heart absorbed in prayer. 
 
 The Captain has started with his troops for the field 
 of battle. He knows the place and the hour, the eager- 
 ness of his men and the arrangements of the enemy. 
 He has encamped in the dusk of the evening, when 
 misty shadows overspread .the country, hiding every- 
 
261 
 
 thing from his sight. But the place is well known to 
 him, and he ranges his regiments and companies in 
 perfect order. On the other side of a little river a faint 
 noise of trampling and clicking of steel reveals to him 
 the presence of the enemy he is burning to conquer. 
 His heart beats, and in spite of himself he cannot help 
 thinking of the small number of his soldiers, and the 
 superior forces of the adversary. Suddenly the wind 
 rises and disperses the mist. And then, the Captain 
 perceives on the opposite bank, the army of an allied 
 Prince who is come to fight in his cause, the army of a 
 powerful Prince led to his help, through the mist, by a 
 faithful friend. "Unexpected reinforcement! Invin- 
 cible alliance ! The Great Prince is on our side ! We 
 are sure of victory !" cries the Captain, beside himself 
 with joy. 
 
 Thus in her secret heart was moved the Christian 
 woman who had come to Lourdes without any other 
 help than her own prayers and those of her family: 
 thus did she glow with confident fervour when she 
 found that, most unexpectedly, and at the request of a 
 friend, the illustrious Servant of Mary, the venerated 
 Cure Peyramale, would unite his powerful prayer to her 
 humble supplication, and his strength to her weakness. 
 She instinctively felt that she was on the eve of triumph. 
 
 IV. 
 
 The Basilica was almost entirely filled with the pil- 
 grims arrived from Marseilles the previous day. It 
 would have been extremely diificult to carry through 
 such a dense crowd a sick person to whom the least 
 
262 
 
 movement and the slightest shock were a source of 
 fatigue and suffering. It was therefore decided that the 
 Mass should be said in one of the two first chapels 
 nearest the door. They chose the one to the left, dedi- 
 cated to Saint Germaine Cousin ; and to that chapel — 
 whither so many unforeseen circumstances had directed 
 their steps — Mme. Guerrier was conveyed. There the 
 Abb^ Martignon celebrated the Holy Sacrifice, taking 
 care to reserve the suffrages of the Memento of the dead 
 for the beloved lost friend whose memory was present 
 to every heart. The invalid heard Mass seated on a 
 chair with her helpless legs stretched on a prie-Dieu 
 before her. 
 
 While the Abbe Martignon was reading the Epistle, 
 the thought of Mgr. Peyramale suddenly presented it- 
 self to his mind with extraordinary clearness. In the 
 last lines of the text before his eyes, he had seen the 
 following words stand prominently out, and their start- 
 ling application to actual circumstances impressed him 
 forcibly, as he slowly read them. 
 
 " The Lord hath so magnified thy name this day, that 
 thy praise shall not depart out of the mouth of men 
 who shall be mindful of the power of the Lord for ever, 
 for that thou hast not spared thy life by reason of the 
 distress and tribulation of thy people, but h.a&\, prevented 
 our ruin in the presence of our God."* 
 
 " My body will be the leaven. I must die to ward 
 
 * Hodie nomen tuum ita magnificavit ut non recedat laus tua de ore 
 hominum qui memores fueriut virtutis Domini in seternum, pro qulbus 
 non peperoiati animae tuse propter angustias et tribulationem generis 
 tui, sed subvmiati ruince ante oonspectum Dei nostri. — Epistle of the 
 Mass of Our Lady of Seven Dolours. 3rd Sunday of September. 
 
263 
 
 off ruin," had often been the words of the Man of God 
 before he descended to the tomb. 
 
 At the moment of the Elevation the congregation 
 prostrated themselves. The sick woman alone remained 
 motionless, and when the instant of the Sacred Banquet 
 arrived, her husband went and knelt at. the Holy Table, 
 while she, impotent and powerless, waited for her God 
 to come to her. And He came, borne by mortal hands, 
 to feed her hunger and assuage her thirst. But hardly 
 had she received the Sacrament of the Lord, than she 
 felt an irresistible strength urging her to rise and kneel. 
 And at the same moment she heard, in the depths of 
 her heart, a sovereign voice commanding her to do so. 
 Her husband was kneeling beside her with his face in 
 his hands, communing with his soul after receiving the 
 Blessed Sacrament, believing without belief and hoping 
 without hope. 
 
 Suddenly he heard a movement and the rustling of 
 a dress. He raised his head and looked round. Mme. 
 Guerrier had just knelt down beside him. 
 
 Eespect for the sacred edifice checked the cry of 
 gratitude, of joy, of amazement that rose to his lips. 
 Instinctively he turned his eyes to the altar, where they 
 met those of the priest, shining like his own with rap- 
 ture and thanksgiving. At that very instant he had 
 turned towards the people to utter the grand sacerdotal 
 salutation. 
 
 " Dominus vohiscum. The Lord be with you ! " 
 
 The Lord was with them indeed. 
 
 The mass was finished and the last gospel was being 
 read. Mme. Guerrier rqse from her knees, "stood up 
 without effort, and then knelt down again. . . . 
 
264 
 
 As for her husband, his legs shook under him, and it 
 was with difficulty he kept from sinking to the ground. 
 Pale and trembling, his eyes dimmed by tears, he looked 
 at his wife without daring to speak to her, and without 
 being able to believe his senses. The miraculously 
 cured woman prayed and poured forth her thanks- 
 givings in profound absorption. All the emotion feU 
 to her husband's share, she herself was absolutely 
 calm. 
 
 The priest took off the sacred ornaments and knelt 
 at the corner of the altar to offer his thanksgivings. 
 How fervent they must have been ! He had begun his 
 Noveno at the side of the deathbed of the Servant of 
 Mary, uniting with his prayers the name of him who 
 had just quitted this world, and imploring Our Lady of 
 Lourdes to permit that on the ninth day that revered 
 friend should himself give the answer. After that, he 
 had by the exercise of heroic charity transmitted to 
 another the treasure on which he had so eagerly counted. 
 
 And then, on the ninth day, at the hour iixed, neither 
 sooner nor later, at the mass that he himself was sayiTig 
 with that intention, the person indicated hy him stood 
 up, suddenly cured, like the paralytics of the gospel, 
 by the contact of an invisible hand. The answer he 
 had implored of the goodness and power of Our Lady 
 of Lourdes was sent him with divine distinctness. 
 The sign he had asked for was given him with unmis- 
 takable clearness. 
 
 Whatever might be the joy of the newly-recovered 
 paralytic, the priest's joy was greater still. His friend 
 the Cur^Teyramale, who had left this world for heaven, 
 began already to manifest his presence there. 
 
265 
 
 They none of them, however, paid any attention to 
 the different details of the little lateral chapel in which 
 they were, and to which a hand, stronger and more 
 delicate than the hand of man, had led them. And yet 
 the stones, the sculptures, the inscriptions were so many 
 mysterious voices murmuring the same name, that name 
 which the priest had thought he heard when reading 
 the last words of the epistle, resounding in his ear like 
 an echo from a higher world. 
 
 It was the first chapel on entering, and the com- 
 mencement of the Basilica : everything in it recalled 
 the origin of the divine history of Our Lady of Lourdes, 
 of whom, to use the words of Mgr. Lang^nieux, the 
 Cure Peyramale had been the witness, the confidant, and 
 the Apostle. 
 
 Beneath the window the entire wall is covered by 
 three white marble slabs, high and wide ; and on the 
 marble is engraved a brief history of the eighteen Ap- 
 paritions. 
 
 The Cure of Lourdes had been invested with his 
 great rSle here below, when the Virgin sent Bernadette 
 to him with the formal command : — " Go and tell the 
 priests that I wish them to build me a chapel here ". 
 And on that marble could be read the celebrated order : 
 — " Go and teU the priests that I wish them to build 
 me a chapel here". . . . Could it be possible to 
 bring more distinctly to mind the mission and the per- 
 son of the first labourer of the first hour, of him who 
 had hollowed out the first foundation, and laid the first 
 stone ? 
 
266 
 
 One day the Cur4 of Lourdes had asked the Appari- 
 tion of the Grotto to cause roses to blossom in the frosts 
 of February, and the Virgin had answered him by the 
 word "Penance". Up above the friezes a long line 
 composed of gold hearts runs round the nave, repro- 
 ducing by the manner in which they are disposed, some 
 of the words of Our Lady of Lourdes ; and just exactly 
 above the great arch that forms the entrance to that 
 lateral chapel, is the very word by which Mary had 
 answered the Curb's request, that word so painfully 
 realised in the life of the sainted priest : " Penance ! " 
 
 The Cure of Lourdes, in obedience to the decree of 
 Mary, had received on his shoulders the weight of a 
 terrible cross. And what was the subject of the Way 
 of the Cross that the artist had sculptured to the right 
 of the altar, over the little ogive leading to the next 
 chapel. It was the Cyrenian. The Man bearing the 
 Cross. At the altar where the Abbe Martignon had just 
 celebrated Mass, the recollections of that same period 
 stood prominently out beneath the transparent veil of 
 Allegory. 
 
 There could be contemplated, chosen amongst all the 
 legions of the Blessed, the saint who most reminds one 
 of Bernadette. A shepherdess, like her, an innocent 
 child of the South, possessing the same youth and 
 speaking the same idiom. The most pure and radiant 
 Germaine Cousin. At her side is the shepherdess's 
 crook, and on her head the covering, similar in shape 
 and name that they call cwpuchon in the region about 
 Toulouse, and capulet in the Pyrenees. " Of all my 
 lambs," Bernadette used to say, " the smallest is the 
 one I love most." The little lamb is figured at the feet 
 
267 
 
 of Germaine. Behind her stands the dog, symbol of 
 Vigilance, Fidelity, and Strength, to defend both sheep 
 and shepherdess ; and that triple virtue brings to mind 
 the energetic Pastor who would never allow the breath 
 of persecution to touch the Child of Mary. When the 
 roses were asked for, Bernadette, it will be reinembered, 
 came back empty-handed, but here over the altar the 
 Holy Shepherdess now has her apron full of roses, that 
 her pure hands scatter profusely before her. And as 
 roses must have a perfume, here again before the sacri- 
 ficial stone, a miracle takes place, embalming every soul 
 and shedding a celestial odour on the memory of the 
 Servant of Mary. 
 
 Once the Virgin had smiled as if to promise roses 
 after this life in the season of the eternal spring. . . . 
 Our Lady of Lourdes had just fulfilled the promise 
 contained in her smile. Let us stop here an instant and 
 apply to this supernatural event, and this mystic sym- 
 bolism, the simple logic of reason. 
 
 If the Blessed Virgin, in restoring Mme. Guerrier to 
 health, had not intended to specify in a marked manner 
 the manifest meaning that strikes every mind, and to 
 join with this cure the memory of her servant, is it not 
 evident that she would have chosen another moment 
 than that Noveno, which was a day marked in advance, 
 another circwmstance than that last Mass of the Noveno 
 celebrated by the intimate friend, another place than 
 that significant chapel ? She would have chosen the 
 previous day, or the day following, or any other date ; 
 the Grotto, the Piscina, or another altar, and have accorded 
 to some other priest the privilege of saying Mass at the 
 hour and place of the miracle. But it seemed to be her 
 
268 
 
 express will that the day, the priest, and the pMce, should 
 all suggest the same name and give exactly the answer 
 so eagerly solicited. Beneath the action of her all- 
 powerful will, every detail of the event, reflecting and 
 re-echoing every other detail, proclaimed and brought 
 into relief the self-same truth. No ! no ! such con- 
 cordance, such comparisons are not the fortuitous results 
 of chance ! Those delicate harmonies, those exquisite 
 details, so carefully and perfectly combined by Him 
 who directs all things, as infallibly denote the action of 
 a divine hand, as the machinery of a watch and the 
 motion of the wheels denote the action of the watch- 
 maker. Circumstances like these are the language ia 
 which God addresses men — a language, at the same 
 time as clear and as enigmatic as that of the parables 
 He once uttered to the crowds collected on the banks 
 of the Lake of Genezareth, or in the streets of Jeru- 
 salem. The simple soul listens, understands and adores. 
 " To you," said Our Lord to His disciples, " it has been 
 given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of God ; 
 but to these not. They have eyes and they see not ; 
 they have ears and they cannot hear." 
 
 For which reason it is necessary when in the presence 
 of a miraculous event or any direct act of divine power, 
 to have our eyes open and our ears attentive — that is, 
 piously to examine and meditate all the circumstances 
 of it, so as to profit by the teaching after having dis- 
 covered its real meaning. 
 
 Do you remember, reader, that touching passage in 
 Genesis, where we read how Eliezer went into Mesopo- 
 tamia to the city of Nachor to seek a wife for Isaac, and 
 stopped near a well of water without the town. Then, 
 
269 
 
 raising his heart on high, he pronounced these 
 words: — 
 
 " Lord, the God of my master Abraham, meet me 
 to-day, I heseech Thee, and shew kindness to my 
 master Abraham. Behold, I stand nigh the spring of 
 water, and the daughters of the inhabitants of this city 
 will come out to draw water. Now, therefore, the maid 
 to whom I shall say : Let down thy pitcher that I may 
 drink ; and she shall answer. Drink, and I will give thy 
 camels drink also ; let it be the same whom Thou has 
 provided for Thy servant Isaac, and by this I shall 
 understand that Thou hast shewn kindness to my 
 master." 
 
 He had not yet ended these words within himself, 
 and behold Eebecca came out, the daughter of Bathuel, 
 son of Melcha, wife to Nachor, the brother of Abraham, 
 having a pitcher on her shoulder : 
 
 And she went down to the spring and filled her 
 pitcher and was coming back. 
 
 And the servant ran to meet her and said : " Give me 
 a little water to drink of thy pitcher ". 
 
 And she answered : " Drink, my lord ". And quickly 
 she let down the pitcher upon her arm and gave him 
 to drink. And when he had drunk, she said : " I will 
 draw water for thy camels also, till they all drink". . . . 
 
 But he, musing, beheld her with silence, desirous to 
 know whether the Lord had made his journey pros- 
 perous or not. And after that the camels had drunk. . . . 
 
 "Whose daughter art thou ?" 
 
 " I am the daughter of Bathuel, the son of Melcha, 
 whom she bore to Nachor." . . . 
 
 The man bowed himself down and adored the Lord, 
 
270 
 
 saying : " Blessed be the Lord God of my father Abra- 
 ham, who hath not taken away His mercy and truth 
 from my master, and hath brought me the straight way 
 into the house of my master's brother." 
 
 By thg perfect concordance between the secret prayer 
 of his soul and the sign he had asked for, which was 
 accomplished to the very letter, Eliezer had recognised 
 the distinct answer of God and the favour extended to 
 his master Abraham. It is the same with us now, for 
 the God of those far-distant times is the God of our 
 own days. His name is Eternal, and now, as in the 
 past. He responds in the same manner to the upright 
 heart that implores His help. 
 
 But to resume our narrative. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Our Lady of Lourdes, invoked under the circum- 
 stances just related, had granted a perfect and complete 
 grace. Mme. Guerrier was radically cured. 
 
 She had prayed to obtain her cure, she now prayed 
 in thanksgiving for it. 
 
 Then she rose, calm, serene, without the least excite- 
 ment, physical or moral, but radiant with the effects of 
 the divine contact; and turning to her husband, she 
 said: 
 
 "My dear, give me your arm. . . . Let us go 
 out!" . . . 
 
 M. Guerrier could not believe his eyes. What he 
 saw accomplished before him appeared an impossibility, 
 a heavenly dream; and his unspeakable joy was checked 
 
271 
 
 by the fear of seeing the glorious vision suddenly dis- 
 appear. . . . 
 
 In his bewilderment he turned to call the porters. 
 
 " No ! no ! " said the Abbe Martignon, recalling him 
 to the consciousness of the divine and miraculous 
 reality, " Let her walk ! " 
 
 Then M. Guerrier tremblingly offered her his arm. 
 She took it, and without saying a word, silently 
 pressed it for an instant to her heart. That silent 
 pressure expressed better than any words could have 
 done the remembrance of their past troubles, and the 
 immensity of their present happiness. The happiness 
 of the wife and mother, of the children, and of all the 
 family — she thought of them all at that moment. 
 And from her own and her husband's heart, those 
 two hearts which formed but one, an immeasurable 
 burst of gratitude rose towards God and the Blessed 
 Virgin. 
 
 Mme. Guerrier went down the two steps of the chapel 
 and crossed the end of the nave. The pilgrims from 
 Marseilles were celebrating by their chants the power 
 and goodness of Our Lady of Lourdes without having 
 any suspicion that close to them, in a lateral chapel, 
 and amidst the silence of a low mass, that power had 
 just manifested itself. 
 
 On leaving the Basilica, the paralytic woman, newly 
 cured, went down the great stone flight of twenty-five 
 steps with the greatest ease. The carriage was waiting 
 at the foot of it, and the coachman, at sight of 
 her, remained rooted to his seat, motionless with 
 astonishment. At a sign from M. Guerrier he drew 
 up with the carriage and opened the door. 
 
272 
 
 "No," said Mme. Guerrier, "I want to go to the 
 Grotto." 
 
 "Yes, certainly "said her husband; "but we will go 
 in the carriage." 
 
 "By no means. — I mean to go on foot, leaning on 
 your arm." 
 
 The Abbe Martignon leant over, and, with the ex- 
 hausted voice that was but a whisper, he uttered the 
 word of faith: 
 
 " She is cured. — Let her do as she likes." 
 
 They let her have her way, therefore, and all three 
 descended to the Grotto, by the Cur^ Peyramale's 
 little paths. At the Basilica, before the altar she had 
 offered her first thanksgiving, and at the Grotto, before 
 the statue of Mary, she again lifted up her heart in 
 gratitude. 
 
 Without any help or support, she knelt down and 
 prostrated herself. Then she rose, drank a glass of the 
 miraculous water, and directed her steps towards the 
 Piscina where the sick were bathed. All cured as she 
 was, she insisted on entering the water, and her whole 
 being drew from it a new strength and a greater activity 
 in the play of the joints. 
 
 She desired to return to the town on foot. The 
 carriage went before them at a foot-pace. But when 
 they had got half-way, the Abb4 Martignon was obliged 
 to ask a little respite not for her but for himself. 
 
 " Madame," said he, " I pray you do not walk so fast. 
 You are cured," he added smiling, " but I am not. And 
 I own that I can go no further. Out of pity for me let 
 us get into the carriage." 
 
 " Very wUlingly," she replied. 
 
273 
 
 And she lightly stepped into the vehicle. 
 
 The carriage went through Lourdes, but when it got a' 
 little above the old church, it turned suddenly into the 
 street of Langelle. Had the coachman made a mistake? 
 Xot at all. He obeyed Mme. Guerrier's orders and took 
 the right road. When he stopped, Mme. Guerrier got 
 out with her husband and the former Cure of Algiers, 
 and going down a rough steep wooden staircase she 
 penetrated into the Crypt of an unfinished church. 
 
 There she found a tomb covered with a simple stone. 
 She dipped her fingers in some holy water ; and with a 
 branch of laurel that was placed there sprinkled a few 
 drops of the sacred liquid on the tomb. 
 
 Then she knelt and prayed above the remains of the 
 Servant of Mary : the Cur^ Peyramale. 
 
 And that was her third act of thanksgiving. 
 
 During the week that followed the death of Mgr. 
 Peyramale no pilgrimage had appeared in the mourning 
 town. But on that same glorious day, the first pilgrim- 
 age, that had made its entry into Lourdes, carrying at 
 its head the banner of Our Lady of Guard, went and 
 prayed before the tomb. Thus, the first garland 
 brought from a distance to be deposited on the sepulchre, 
 bears the very date of the miracle we have just related: 
 "The pilgrims from Marseilles, 16th September, 1877".* 
 
 * To inaugurate their processions by an act of gratitude towards the 
 great Servant of Mary, the pilgrimages that came to Lourdes at that 
 time, such as those of Tours, Rouergue, Piedmont, Villefranche, etc., 
 took the tomh of the Cure of Lourdes in their way in going from the 
 parish church to the Grotto, and conforming themselves to the canonic 
 prescriptions they there recited the prayers of the Church. The Bishop 
 of Tarbes, Mgr. Jourdan, fearing a premature veneration of the Car6 
 of Lourdes, interdicted the road taken by the processions. 
 
 18 
 
274 
 
 M. and Mme. Guerrier, accompanied by their friend the 
 Abb6 Martignon, at last returned home to M. Lavigne's 
 dwelling, where the sick woman had arrived the day 
 before, a prey, for so many years past, to an incurable 
 paralysis. 
 
 Their host and hostess were lost in delight and 
 astonishment. It seemed to them like a blessing 
 on their house. With what emotion they listened to 
 the account of all that had just been accomplished! 
 . . . And how heartily they entered into the mar- 
 vellous coincidences which were the special features of 
 the miraculous event. 
 
 " Madame," said M. Lavigne, after hearing all, " do 
 you know where you are, and to what particular spot 
 Providence has led you, so that, having left this house, 
 a little while ago, entirely paralysed, you should now 
 return to it completely cured ? " 
 
 " E"o, I do not ! " she replied, with a look of surprise. 
 
 " You are in the house which was the Presbytery of 
 Lourdes at the period of the Apparitions ; and you are 
 staying in the room where the Cure Peyramale interro- 
 gated Bernadette for the first time, and where, from 
 her mouth, he received the commands of the Blessed 
 Virgin." 
 
 At this supreme coincidence, at this last great light 
 thrown on the actions of Providence, and the evident 
 intention of these events, a sort of thrill went through 
 the little company.. The light was so brilliant that it 
 dazzled them. For a time they all remained silent and 
 thoughtful. 
 
275 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 M. and Mme. G-uerrier remained a few days longer at 
 Lourdes. They preferred staying at the place where 
 they had received such a signal favour and thanking 
 God for it there, to hurrying away with it immediately. 
 Then they took the train to return to the house of Mme. 
 Guerrier's parents at Saint-Gobain. The journey was 
 got through rapidly and without fatigue. 
 
 We have before our eyes a letter from M. Guerrier 
 containing some interesting details to which we leave 
 their own peculiar charm : — 
 
 "Let me try and retrace for you," he writes, "the 
 overwhelming astonishment of my dear wife's eldest 
 brother. Hector Biver, who was waiting for us at the 
 station at Paris, when he saw his sister get out of the 
 carriage without help, take his arm and walk with him 
 to the cab ; his speechless amazement when we got to 
 his house and she ran up the stairs leading to his 
 apartment ; the bewilderment and tearful joy of his 
 servants who, ten days before, had carried my poor 
 Justine, then so iU, up and down stairs with such care 
 and precaution. The next day on our arrival at Chauny, 
 her youngest brother, Alfred Biver, director of the 
 Manufactory of Saint-Gobain, was waiting for us at the 
 station, anxious, uneasy, and disturbed, for, in spite of 
 the letters and telegrams he could not believe the 
 
276 
 
 miracle possible. What, then, was his surprise when 
 my beloved wife sprang into his arms ! He could not 
 recover from it, but gave it vent in incessant exclamations 
 during the whole time of our drive along the fourteen 
 miles that separate Ohauny from Saint-Gobain. Al- 
 though the horses went like the wind, the journey 
 seemed long and we felt as if we should never arrive. 
 
 " At last about five in the evening we got in sight of 
 the house, and saw all the family, big and little, sisters, 
 sisters-in-law, nephews and nieces, and above all, our 
 dear children, looking out for us at the door with beat- 
 ing hearts, and expectant eyes, eager to convince them- 
 selves of the truth, and drink deeply at the overflowing 
 fountain of our mutual happiness. 
 
 " But when they saw their mother, their sister, their 
 aunt, coming out of the carriage alone and walking to- 
 wards them unaided, that was a picture no human 
 power could retrace : what joy ! what delicious tears ! 
 what embraces ! Justine's mother was never tired of 
 caressing the daughter that Our Lady of Lourdes had 
 restored to her love and sent back to her, strong, well, 
 and perfectly cured. 
 
 " The aged father, kept prisoner in one room by his 
 eighty-three years, was not present. We mounted the 
 few steps that separated us from his apartment, all the 
 members of the family following us and filling up the 
 staircase. 
 
 " On the threshold of his study stood the venerable 
 octogenarian, his hands trembling more from joy than 
 age, and his noble countenance bathed in tears. He 
 opened his arms and said : 
 " ' My daughter ! ' 
 
277 
 
 " Mme. Guerrier fell on her knees. 
 
 " ' Pather,' said she, ' you blessed me when I started 
 for Lourdes sick and incurable. Bless me now that I 
 am come back miraculously cured, as I told you I 
 should be.' 
 
 " He extended his arms over my dear Justine's head ; 
 then opened them afresh, and she Wept out her joy 
 on her father's breast. 
 
 " And, that nothing might be wanting to complete our 
 felicity, it happened that this very day was the feast 
 day of her who returned thus triumphant to her 
 father's house. You can imagine what a magnificent 
 celebration we made of it. But that is not all. The 
 Church reclaimed her share of the rejoicings ; and the 
 excellent and zealous Cure of Saint-Gobain, the Abbe 
 Poindron, had asked permission of the Bishop of 
 Soissons to celebrate a solemn Benediction, as an act of 
 thanksgiving for the unspeakable favour we had re- 
 ceived. 
 
 " The next day, therefore, we repaired to the parish 
 church, where an immense crowd of devout and as- 
 tonished people thronged our steps. The bells chimed 
 joyously, and the church was filled to overflowing. 
 
 " The statue of Our Lady of Lourdes was raised to a 
 place of honour, and opposite that sacred image a seat 
 had been prepared for her whom Mary had deigned to 
 cure. The priest entered the pulpit and related, simply 
 and without commentary, the remarkable event which 
 had occasioned the ceremony. Then several young girls, 
 dressed and veiled in white, placed the statue of Our 
 Lady of Lourdes on their shoulders, and the procession 
 moved on. Behind the image of our Heavenly Bene- 
 
278 
 
 factress, my dear wife walked with me, to the sound of 
 enthusiastic hymns, and the triumphant chords of the 
 organ, followed by a dense crowd of people who could 
 not retain their tears. And finally, the Te Deum broke 
 forth beneath the vaulted roof. God had taken His 
 place on the altar." . . . 
 
 What need we add to this letter. If earth ofifers such 
 sights, what must be the rejoicings of heaven ! . . . 
 
 II. 
 
 Here we would fain end our narrative, and leave our 
 readers to steep their souls in these heavenly rays. 
 But, ia this world, there is no light without its corre- 
 sponding shadow, and that we may complete our history, 
 truth compels us to turn our eyes towards a melancholy 
 horizon. 
 
 In the same letter, of which such a long extract has 
 been given, M. Guerrier speaks of the Abb^ Martignon. 
 
 " Never can we forget," he says, " that my dear wife's 
 cure was the answer he had asked the Blessed Virgia 
 to give him by the intervention of the sainted Cure 
 Peyramale. From that moment we have constantly 
 prayed for his own cure, and for the re-establishment of 
 his health. May Our Lady of Lourdes come to our 
 help, and restore to him an hundred-fold that which he 
 abandoned, with such sacred charity, and not in vain, 
 to Mme. Guerrier. We all unite our prayers, to ask 
 this favour of our All-powerful Mother; and God knows 
 if, in making our request, we do it with the deepest and 
 most fervent gratitude of our hearts." 
 
279 
 
 In the midst of her joy, Mme. Guerrier experienced 
 sometimes a feeling that troubled her like a remorse. 
 
 " Poor Abb^ Martignon," she said to us ; " it some- 
 times seems to me that I have stolen his cure from 
 him ! " 
 
 No, Madame, you have stolen no one's treasure in re- 
 ceiving the gift of God. The Almighty and the Blessed 
 Virgin have disposed all things for Their own glory, 
 perhaps also for the glory of one of their servants, 
 and most certainly for the good of all. You have 
 received a great and touching grace, and it is with tears 
 in our eyes that we have related it. But you may take 
 it for granted that the most signal grace was accorded 
 to the priest of whom you are speaking, when it was 
 given him to raise himself to such sublime heights by 
 an act of devoted unselfishness, when it was given him 
 to have that point of resemblance with the Divine 
 Master who has said in His Gospel, and proved in His 
 own person, that there is no greater charity than to give 
 one's life for one's friends. The good Samaritan suc- 
 coured the wounded man ; the Good Shepherd has given 
 His life for one sheep of the fold. ... Be grateful 
 then, but do not pity him. He has chosen the better 
 part. 
 
 A few weeks later, the Abb6 Martignon left Lourdes, 
 where his friend the Servant of the Virgin no 
 longer was. He was too ill to follow the inclinations 
 of his heart, and cross the Mediterranean to rejoin 
 his paternal Archbishop in Africa. Towards the be- 
 ginning of winter, he went to Hy^res, where the 
 mUd climate prolonged for him the warm days of 
 Autumn. " May the sea-breezes revive him ! " we 
 
280 
 
 prayed to God, " and may the genial rays of the sun 
 restore him ! " 
 
 III. 
 
 What was foreordained to happen, however, took 
 place in a short time. God did not long defer His ser- 
 vant's reward. Winter had passed and the Abbe Mar- 
 tignon, weaker than ever, left Hy^res to go to Poitiers 
 on a visit to some friends. In a church close at hand 
 he could still celebrate the divine Mysteries every day. 
 
 " I am here," he wrote to us, " like a bird on a branch 
 — waiting for it to break ! " 
 
 And soon, indeed, it did break, and the soul took its 
 flight towards the eternal heavens. 
 
 Eight months and a half after Mme. Guerrier's cure, 
 the 27th of May, 1878, between three and four in the 
 evening, the Abb^ Martignon was taken with a strange 
 shivering. He soon understood the meaning of that 
 supreme warning. 
 
 " Magister adest et vocat te, . . . Mary," said 
 Martha to her sister, " the Master is come and is asking 
 for thee." 
 
 As the last rays of the sun disappeared behind the 
 horizon, the Priest of the Lord drooped his head, and 
 his eyes closed for ever on earth, to open again in that 
 radiant coiintry where the Light ever shineth. 
 
 Thus lived and thus died Mgr. Peyramale's second 
 friend. Like the Abb6 Lafont, on the day after the 
 obsequies of the Servant of Mary, the Abb^ Martignon 
 had entered into eternal life by the door of devoted 
 charity, and self-sacrifice.* The inscription engraved 
 
 * For proofs, see Appendix, Note V. 
 
281 
 
 on the master's tomb is equally applicable to the two 
 disciples : " Zelus comedit eos ". Love had eaten them 
 up. May they all three repose in Peace ! And if God 
 has received them into His Gloiy, as we firmly hope, 
 may they remember, in Heaven, the friends who loved 
 them here on earth. 
 
THE WITKESSES OF MY CfJRK, 
 
 A FKW MVOliDH OF JNTIiOUUOTfON. 
 
 It w now twenty yeara ago Hin(^; I wa» the fA^6Ct of 
 an extraordinary cure of which J gave a Md account 
 in my book entitled " Our Lady of Iourde«", 
 
 For the (rapematural work of iny cur*; it pleaded Ood 
 t*^; cmj^loy tiin;<j instruments, thrw; Tri«!f» who at tiiat 
 period wero in obscurity Vmt mm are publicly known. 
 
 The first was a young l'ol« wliose ac^iuaintance I had 
 made in IUi.\y. TUa second, a |m/tcstant who had fi'i'm 
 the friend (A. my boylwKxl, 'Hi*; ifiirr], a saintly ol/J 
 man wliose life was \mmA in adoring the Saviour'* 
 face. 
 
 It is orily of late years and by the lij^it of w»-Tit«» I 
 could not then f//rc«ec, that I iiavf; understood the pro- 
 yUUattul \n\hmi(A; which the j/resence and action cHTthc 
 young I'ole iri (question had ha/l in the tj/m</my of that 
 miraculous event, If>.'nw! results, in the narrative for- 
 ttierly written Tr/y me, a first and (^ittrnderahh lacune 
 that / now think it '/f/j-'/rlime to fill up, >ro tliat the 
 haml of Of/1 may be rfmiifttnUfi witJi still greater clear* 
 
m>ssi Haul »»tiU mow invfutoMo disstiuotmv^s, diivotiiig 
 Mid vHuvtivlUn^ij tho ovvuts v>r vniv livos*, 
 
 I luui ivl!»tov(, with tUo ovMisout of \n\- juvtv^^taut 
 IViouvl. tho j'lvuuuout imvt he Imd t<»ko» iu tlio ovv>nt> 
 Imti his Ma»»vv> ttt thsvt i>oviv>vt boiii^' without «uy publio 
 iut\vi\Nst> I h«d not thv>»^«;ht it t\i>v\^S4»<uy to publish it, juid 
 iu ui;*- tiurv^^tiou h«d s^vu>i»l\- sipokou of hiux us " M. do 
 
 It hrts haji^HUtwl. howwoi\ Umt this* uauvo, so oaivfvdl\- 
 lw>pt svvivt l\v uio. h«s siuoii Kvu divulgvHi by tho Fivuoh 
 awd IKwsnigu i>i\v<s. so thut it has Ihwu\o |>ubUo piv^orty. 
 WkI thut with tho «vlditiou of uuiuv- *u apoory^vhal dotail 
 which «uv«v>t K> allowed t\> gain ovWit, This \>Uk-os uio, 
 «t ixv\>sout, UttvW tho «bsivluh> uiw^ty of iutov\\>niug 
 in tlie u«k.ui<^ of IVuth, ajul suWtitutiug for th« oviw^; of 
 U'gvud tho puw swui s^iu^do wndity of lUstoiy, 
 
 Ko««i>g, dottbttosj^ th«t s^nuo ray of humuu glory 
 migt\( mttoot vui hi»tt *wd alttiet his humility, tho s^dutly 
 olvl i««tt whoui IVvidonoo had also $>s*vviah.\l with tho 
 history »xf uvy vnm\ ivt\isr\l, notwithstaudiug tt»y pivss- 
 v«g svdvoitatious. h> allow nnf to sjH?ak of that piM* of it 
 iu xrhioh h* havl Vhvw uuvrt* vUrov>tl>.- cwiKvruovi Th«? 
 (HdiUo^vtivMi, vrithvHil uvy v^\xusout, of ditVotvxut fltagmexitsi 
 v>f )ua)m$!L^n|t^t that I had loft with him aiid \rlu*jh \wro 
 fvmud MMOt^ hiis |>!;>\vt^ aftiMf his d«LVjkthx roWsos^ nw? 
 lit(L>«A:!«&«th ftvm u\Y ohli^tioa. I c«tt thowfi>w «x«tt- 
 )>l«ti» tuy nawatixv atid )t«p>aitlh« fk^i^wl aitd invoilttutatx 
 otuisisioti I ha^l 6xr«shadovr«d to tho iwadnyr iu aU th^ 
 ««.fiUMk$ of (W JL»^f «^'' i>«i'\sv^ by a do«hl« liuo of 
 «k4$ «t ^ la$t ^vMN^ra^>h of Uiii «:^(>tt^r Mating tv^ my 
 
 Allhoi^ thi» $tthsfeui«« of ^ 1iit$t it^tion is iu ik> 
 
284 
 
 way modified by these important additions, still they 
 give to the whole, and to the different episodes of the 
 narrative, an entirely new character, the special nature 
 of which, we think, will not fail to strike anyone who 
 has ever meditated on angelic interference, and divine 
 intervention in the things of this lower world. 
 
 Les Bbetoux, SBth March, 1883. 
 
THE WITNESSES OF MY CUBE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 FRIENDS AND ANGELS. 
 
 I. 
 
 . On the 31st of October, 1861, the eve of All Souls' 
 Day, as the bells of the numerous churches and basilicas 
 of Eome rang out to announce the Feast of the follow- 
 ing day, I entered the Eternal City for the first time in 
 my life. I was then thirty-three years of age, 
 
 I shall say nothing of my religious emotion at find- 
 ing myself in the midst of the glorious monuments that 
 greet the eye on every side in the capital of the Christian 
 world; of the long audience that the Pope, Pius the 
 Ninth, deigned to grant me, nor of my interviews with 
 the Cardinal Antonelli, all those events being foreign to 
 the circumstances I am about to relate. 
 
 A few days after my arrival I had the honour of 
 being introduced to the Princess Sophia Odeschalchi. 
 That great Eoman lady was of Lithuanian origin, and 
 belonged to the illustrious family of the Branickis of 
 Bialystok. 
 
286 
 
 The Princess Sophia had a nephew staying with her, 
 a young Polish Count about twenty-six years of age, for 
 whom the doctors had recommended the climate of 
 Rome. I have seldom heard a more fascinating talker 
 than Wladimir. His conversation was witty, sparkling, 
 and often profound, and it acquired an additional charm 
 from the high-bred turn of his head, and the play of his 
 features, which were the most expressive I ever saw. 
 His clear, soft eyes were penetrating as the point of a 
 sword, his forehead broad, intellectual, and thoughtful. 
 His mind, in the form of subtle remarks, keen observa- 
 tions, or powerful theses, had so often passed through 
 his delicate and sensitive lips, that they had, as it were, 
 retained the permanent impression of it, and were ex- 
 pressive even when silent. The irradiations of life were 
 all the more closely concentrated in the delicate lines of 
 his aristocratic face, that the rest of his body was 
 afflicted with untimely infirmities. The Count "Wladi- 
 mir had been weak and sickly from his childhood, 
 and could only stand upright and move about in a 
 sort of artificial or mechanical way. His bones, im- 
 perfectly attached, would have been out of joint at 
 every step but for the support of a surgical apparatus 
 of steel springs fitted to the knees, by means of which, 
 and the help of a cane, he succeeded in walking pretty 
 easily, though with rather a jerking gait. He used, 
 nevertheless, to take a walk every day along the Corso, 
 or on the shady heights of Mount Pincio. 
 
 His painful condition was often complicated by pains 
 in his limbs and violent headaches, but he supported 
 all with admirable fortitude and cheerful resignation. 
 He had sought and found in the vivifying practices of 
 
287 
 
 Christian piety the source and principle of enduring 
 patience. 
 
 This young Pole, who had grown up beneath the sun 
 of Italy, united in his person all the captivating grace 
 of the Slavonic race, and the vivacity of the children of 
 the South. His powerful and supple intellect was apt 
 in understanding and assimilating; and he was alike 
 familiar with history, philosophy, politics, and theology. 
 
 But his most irresistible attraction was the charm of 
 his conversation. On that field of battle he excelled 
 in the conquest of men ; he knew its strategy by heart, 
 its marches and the counter-marches, its evolutions and 
 circumvolutions, its calm demonstrations, its sudden 
 surprises, nay, even its very ambushes. 
 
 Possessing the enviable art of talking to a supreme 
 degree, he was also an adept in the more difficult art of 
 listening. He knew how to enter into the feelings of 
 others, and bring them into harmony with his own ; 
 he won his interlocutor by the way in which he lent 
 him his attention and interested himself in what he was 
 saying. Often when he wished to convince, he appeared 
 to yield, he combatted by flight and vanquished by 
 escaping. Everything served him for an arm ; decisive 
 reasonings, clever jokes, subtle retorts, or well-turned 
 compliments. When he could not immediately over- 
 come an adversary, he undertook to gain him, or rather 
 he tried both ways, and always succeeded, at least with 
 the second, for though one might leave him without 
 • being convinced or vanquished, none could see or hear 
 him without being captivated. 
 
 He expressed himself with equal facility in the 
 Polish language, in Eitssian, Italian, English, and 
 
288 
 
 Prench; and indulged in a sort of cosmopolitan 
 coq^uetry, that consisted in addressing his different 
 friends in their national idiom. He spoke French, 
 especially, with exquisite perfection, shading off his 
 words, and turning his sentences with as much 
 art and delicacy as Chamfort or Eivarol. He did not 
 write it nearly so well. His pen, powerless to follow 
 the rapid impromptu of his mind, stumbled, hesitated, 
 and groped heavily along in vain efforts to keep pace 
 with his thoughts. He was a conversationalist rather 
 than a writer. 
 
 We have already said that Count Wladimir was pro- 
 foundly religious. He communicated every day, and, if 
 my memory does not deceive me, he acquitted himself 
 of the strict obligations of a third order, either that of 
 Saint Francis, or Saint Dominic. Indeed, it was not 
 necessary to frequent his society for very long to dis- 
 cover that in his heart dwelt the Peace of the true 
 believer; no earthly instinct seemed ever to have 
 dimmed its purity, it appeared inaccessible to any 
 but intellectual or spiritual sentiments. None had 
 examined more deeply than he into the treaties, the 
 revolutions, the wars, and the international events which 
 constitute the history of modern Europe, and he disser- 
 tated on them all with a superiority of judgment and a 
 depth of thought, that recalled involuntarily to one's 
 mind the Talleyrands and Metternichs and other great 
 diplomatists of the beginning of the century. 
 
 His exceptional piety, and his regular reading of cer- 
 tain Offices, his wonderful intelligence, his extensive 
 knowledge, his intimate acquaintance with all the moves 
 of the political chess-board, his sparkling conversation, 
 
289 
 
 the native distinction of his manners and sentiments, all 
 combined to form a most remarkable personage, a 
 diamond cut in several facets. He at one and the same 
 time, in him had something of the Priest, the Statesman, 
 and the Nobleman. 
 
 The portrait I have traced will explain my sudden 
 friendship for him. To explain why he loved me in 
 return would not be so easy; indeed, I shall not 
 undertake to do so. Count Wladimir being a man of 
 the world, and living in the world, was too prominently 
 in view not to give rise to very opposite judgments 
 and appreciations ; and if he had his enthusiasts he was 
 also not without his contradictors. Not being able to 
 deny the bright side of his highly-gifted nature, some 
 few disenchanted people, sceptics (we wUl add envious 
 persons too, that no one may be forgotten), kept obsti- 
 nately whispering in my ear : 
 
 "Are you sure that, like everything human, your 
 gold medal has no reverse ? Does this gracefully at- 
 tractive Pole possess as much firmness as grace, as much 
 solidity as brilliance? He is an admirable theorist, 
 would he be as strong in practice ?" 
 
 " Has not the fascinating charm he exercises on all 
 who approach him deluded him with the idea that if he 
 gain an enemy to his person, he is more than half 
 gained to his cause ? And does not the pursuit of such 
 a result incline him sometimes to that extreme courtesy, 
 and those too amiable advances which constitute what 
 might be called the diplomacy of condescension, and 
 the art of political politeness ? " 
 
 " And does not that marvellous delicacy of analysis 
 which, like a magnifying-glass, increases a hundred-fold 
 
 19 
 
290 
 
 the strength of his intellectual powers, contribute also 
 to deceive himself precisely by the exaggerated relief 
 it gives to the details he examines ? Just as the mic- 
 roscope shows us the finest skin as rough as a file, or a 
 hair enlarged to the size of a cable, may not Wladimir's 
 perspicacity, in a similar way, occasionally expose him 
 to error in the view he takes of persons or things, 
 whether he consider their qualities or their defects? 
 May it not lead him sometimes into excess of infatua- 
 tion, sometimes into sudden defiance and abrupt change 
 of opinion ? He who is so supple with his adversaries 
 the more easily to ensnare them, would he accept a 
 frank and sincere contradiction, without immediately 
 taking offence as at an act of hostility ? Is the con- 
 stancy of his friendship in proportion to its vivacity and 
 warmth ? And is one sure with him of a lasting 
 affection ? Or rather, as with his' ancestors, the Scy- 
 thians, may not what appears a solid house, a secure- 
 habitation, turn out to be simply a tent pitched in some 
 halting-place, stationary sometimes for years together 
 on the same spot, but always ready to disappear from 
 one minute to another, at the least noise from afar that 
 may strike on the Slav's ever anxious ear ? " 
 
 I heard these rumours and depreciations without 
 listening to them. Perhaps those who uttered them 
 employed the magnifying-glass they spoke of to meta- 
 morphose minute things into enormities, and impercep- 
 tible blades of grass into forest trees ! 
 
 But there is no love without faith. I listened only 
 to the voice of deep attachment and the inclination of 
 my heart, and I can render myself this justice that I 
 believed in Wladimir without limit, and loved him 
 
291 
 
 without restriction. Our intimacy of the heart and 
 mind soon became closer and closer. 
 
 We generally met three times a-day. In the morning 
 I went to see him, and have a few moments' chat, at 
 mid-day we met for the second time in a restaurant of 
 the Place d'Espagne, where we lunched together ; and 
 after, if it was fine, we took a stroll, chatting the whUe 
 on a thousand topics, beneath the warm winter sun that 
 bathes Eome in its rays. In the evening I saw him 
 again in the drawing-room of the Princess, his aunt. 
 
 He was particular to accommodate the form of his 
 language to the feelings that animated him, and the 
 faniiliarity of our appellations clearly manifested the 
 progress of our friendship. At the beginning of our 
 acquaintance I naturally greeted by the name of " Mon- 
 sieur le Comte" him whom everyone at the Palazzo 
 Odeschalchi, his relatives excepted, called "II segnor 
 Comte". But soon he objected to that, and I had to 
 substitute " Man cher Comte " for the more ceremonious 
 form. Before long that displeased him also ; and taking 
 the opportunity offered by a note I had written him, he 
 replied that he would receive no more letters from me 
 unless they commenced " Mon cher ami " ; a condition 
 too much in keeping with my own feelings for me to 
 make any objection. But the expression " Mon cher 
 ami " had soon to be replaced by the still more familiar 
 one of " Wladimir ". Finally as the Princess Odes- 
 chalchi and the, members of his family often called 
 him by the pet name of his childhood, " Wladimiro " or 
 " Miro" I also was required to make use of the diminu- 
 tive, which I did aU the more willingly as in the archaic 
 Latin of Plautus Miro means T admire, and indeed I 
 
292 
 
 admired the pure soul, the delicate and charming mind, 
 and the radiant intellect as much as I loved their pos- 
 sessor. If I thus allow my pen to linger over these 
 memories it is because they are sweet to me and make 
 my old heart glow when I recall them, even after an 
 interval of twenty years ; and, in short, because it was 
 necessary distinctly to point out from the beginning, in 
 the interest of what is to foUow, how Providence had 
 brought me, at that time, into connection with the 
 young Count Wladimir, and how I had loved him sin- 
 cerely and tenderly in those bygone days of our youth. 
 
 I left Home in the beginning of 1862, with the in- 
 tention of returning there the following autumn, and 
 Wladimir and myself looked forward with pleasure to 
 that time. 
 
 But very soon after my return to Paris I was threatened 
 with a calamity that appeared likely to upset all our 
 plans. My eyes became alarmingly weak. 
 
 II. 
 
 I had always enjoyed excellent sight. I could dis- 
 tinguish objects at an immense distance ; and could 
 read any manuscript or print with the greatest facility, 
 however close it might be. Whole nights of study had 
 never caused me the least fatigue ; I was even amazed 
 and delighted myself at the clearness and strength of 
 my sight, which was at the same time so powerful and 
 keen. I was therefore greatly surprised and cruelly 
 disenchanted, when in the course of June and July of 
 1862 I felt it getting gradually weaker, drooping heavily 
 at night work, and at last becoming so useless that I 
 
293 
 
 was obliged to give up reading and writing. If I opened 
 a book, I had no sooner read one or two lines, than ex- 
 cessive fatigue and pain in the upper part of my eyes 
 forced me to lay it down. I consulted several doctors ; 
 amongst others two celebrated oculists, M. Desmares 
 and M. Giraud-Teulon. Both declared that I was suffer- 
 ing from hypersemia of the optic nerve. 
 
 The prescriptions I followed did me no good what- 
 ever. After a ferruginous regimen and a long period of 
 rest, I was at last enabled one day to read and write for 
 an hour or two in the afternoon, but on the following 
 day I had fallen back into my previous state. Then I 
 employed local remedies, cold douches on the eye-ball, 
 cupping on the nape of the neck, a general hydropathic 
 treatment and application of alcoholic lotions on the 
 parts near the eye. All was useless. If, from time to 
 time I obtained a little relief, it only lasted a few 
 minutes; in short the disease began to assume the 
 chronic character peculiar to incurable infirmities. 
 
 I could use my eyes for nothing. I was ordered to 
 avoid too great a light and the sight of too many colours. 
 I never went out without taking the precaution of put- 
 ting on blue spectacles with dark shields at the sides, 
 and in short, in obedience to the doctor's advice I left 
 Paris for the country, and went to stay with my mother 
 at Coux on the banks of the Dordogne. A young lad 
 whom I had taken for my secretary read books and 
 newspapers to me and wrote at my dictation. 
 
 III. 
 
 It was now September, and I had been for three 
 months in a state that was every day becoming more 
 
294 
 
 alarming. I was a prey to extreme despondency and 
 lowness of spirits, which, however, I carefully concealed. 
 My parents and friends on their side were full of 
 serious apprehensions that they would not let me sus- 
 pect ; we were all persuaded that my sight was lost, but 
 we each tried to instil into the other a hope that we none 
 of us entertained, and kept our secret fears in our own 
 bosoms. 
 
 With the exception of a few rare instants of illusion 
 such as one has sometimes, even in the most desperate 
 cases, I no longer counted either on scientific help or on 
 natural reaction. The crushing conviction that I was 
 beyond'cure gradually took possession of my mind, and 
 though I prayed, I asked nothing more of God than 
 grace to be resigned to the trial He had sent me ; the 
 bare idea of imploring a special intervention in my 
 favour never even occurred to me. I was, besides, in- 
 clined to think, with Blaise Pascal, that the time of 
 those exceptional manifestations of divine power called 
 miracles, was passed and gone; and. I often repeated 
 to myself the melancholy lines of a blind poet of our 
 parts : — 
 
 " Comme la propMtie et comme les oracles, 
 H4las ! il est pass6 1'heureux temps des miracles. 
 Christ ne dit plus awx, morts : ' Levez-vous et marcJuz! 
 Par Lui les yewc 4tein,ts ne seront plus touch&."* 
 
 But around me and above me, a hidden Benefactor, like 
 the angel Eaphael who protected Tobias, had taken pity 
 on my anguish. 
 
 * Lafon-Labatut. liisomnies et Regrets. 
 
295 
 
 IV. 
 
 Have you ever thought, dear reader, on the part 
 taken by our Guardian Angels in the different actions of 
 our lives. With what indefatigable perseverance that 
 mysterious companion follows us from the cradle to the 
 tomb ; from our first cry to our last breath. He has 
 neither the right nor the power to violate our liberty, 
 which is one of the indispensable conditions of our 
 merits, but he concentrates all his efforts on directing 
 our feelings in the right way, illuminating our thoughts, 
 dissuading us from evil paths, showing us the right 
 road, from which we were diverging, and bringing about 
 circumstances that induce us to walk in it. 
 • Sometimes our radiant Protector does all this alone, 
 of himself, rousing in us a sudden intuition, inspiring 
 us with some happy idea, inciting us to write such and 
 such a letter, to make such and such a remark, to 
 take such and such measures, things, in short, which 
 may of themselves appear insignificant, but of which 
 he knows the future bearing, and how they will be the 
 first link in the chain of events and secondary causes 
 that are to extricate us from our difficulties. At other 
 times, this invisible brother of our souls calls on other 
 Guardian Angels to come to his help, and together they 
 concert the plan of a campaign divinely elaborated, 
 having for its object the benevolent victory they hope 
 to gain. Then it is that the fortunate inspiration occurs 
 to us by the advice of a friend, by the reading of a 
 borrowed book, by an unexpected meeting, or by the 
 necessity of a journey which brings us, contrary to all 
 
296 
 
 previsions, at a certain place, at a certain hour, in con- 
 tact with a certain person, whose influence must 
 infallibly affect our own wills. 
 
 And thus are these pure spirits ceaselessly working in 
 the world to check the advance of Evil, enlarge the 
 limits of Good, suggest fruitful resolutions, solicit our 
 wills, and, when our wills resist, prepare favourable 
 conjunctures, decisive incidents which, by a series of 
 varied impulsions and indirect means, lead the mortal 
 committed to their care towards the general or special 
 event that God has foreordained. 
 
 One of the most usual characteristics of the influence 
 of our Good Angels, is that it is carefully hidden under 
 natural appearances; the ordinary course of life, the 
 fortuitous chances of business, or the eventualities of 
 social intercourse. All that those divine messengers 
 accomplish seems to be done of itself, so delicately do 
 they touch the springs that determine us. While they 
 are in reality everywhere, and mixed up with every- 
 thing, one is conscious of them nowhere and in nothing. 
 Their essence, superior to ours, is invisible, their power- 
 ful arm is impalpable; their immense benefits are 
 anonymous. Mingling with our humanity, these forces 
 of the Almighty govern, direct, and dispose all things 
 in silence and incognito. 
 
 Afterwards, however, when their work is finished, it 
 happens sometimes that the harmonious unfolding of 
 successive events, the surprising concordance of every 
 incident towards the same end, the minute juxtaposition 
 of circumstances, the extraordinary choice of certain 
 individualities as instruments and means, the rigorous 
 precision of certain pre-ordained dates, in short, a thou- 
 
297 
 
 sand striking peculiarities reveal their secret interven- 
 tion as surely as the regular and simultaneous movements 
 of an army denote the presence of the of&cers and the 
 general; or as the aspect of a building betrays the 
 hand of the workman and renders evident the plan of 
 the architect. The recalling of these truths, perhaps too 
 little known or too often forgotten, is not a vain 
 digression. It is a torch lighted and placed in the 
 hands of the reader, that its rays may guide him on the 
 road we are about to pursue. 
 
 It is now time to speak of another friend, besides 
 Wladimir. This friend is a compatriot, and our close 
 intimacy dates from childhood. It was formed at college 
 and continued through our youth. If my warm affection 
 for Wladimir was at the enthusiastic period of all 
 beginnings and all dawns, my friendship for Charles de 
 Treycinet (for that was his name) had attained to the 
 glowing hour of mid-day. He ignored none of my 
 thoughts and feelings, and the secrets of his heart were 
 not concealed from me. Our minds and dispositions, 
 which in their nature were widely opposite, harmonised 
 marvellously together, and fructified each other by their 
 contact. More than once his heart has burned at my 
 words; often my mind has been enlightened by his con- 
 versation. How many evenings have we passed together 
 on opposite sides of the hearth, discussing in their turn 
 the different and redoubtable problems that for six thou- 
 sand years have preoccupied the children of Adam, until 
 time has been forgotten, and approaching day causing 
 
298 
 
 our lamp to pale, has surprised the two friends in 
 earnest conversation on the mysteries of the present 
 existence' and those of the life to come! 
 
 My natural inclinations disposed me to retreat and 
 solitude, his tendencies and aptitudes drew him amongst 
 men and their more engrossing interests ; yet Charles 
 could not imagine that we should ever be separated, 
 either in our destinies or our roads through life ; and in 
 his dreams of the future, my place was always at his 
 side. 
 
 Divergence of opinion, change of country, distant 
 journeys, long absences, marriage, in short all the crises 
 to which ordinary friendships so often succumb, had 
 never affected ours. He was a Protestant, I a Catholic. 
 He had known me at college when I had. lost my faith, 
 and he had seen me become a believer again from my 
 twentieth year. I was then single, and he married; 
 his wife like himself, was a Protestant, and they lived 
 at Bordeaux, where he was director of the works of the 
 Southern Eailway. I lived sometimes in Paris, and 
 sometimes in P^rigord. He was an eminent engineer 
 and a distinguished mathematician, and he published 
 volumes bristling with figures on the inclines and curves 
 of the railroad, or on the metaphysics of mathematical 
 calculations, whereas I was irresistibly drawn towards 
 religious and literary studies. . . . But neither time, 
 distance, diversity of opinion, nor opposition, had weak- 
 ened our intimacy, and far or near, we were still the 
 same old friends. 
 
 So I wrote him from Coux, by the medium of my 
 little secretary, a few melancholy lines, in which I con- 
 fided my trouble to him, and expressed my fears of 
 
299 
 
 becoming quite blind. He happened at that moment 
 to be at his father's at N^grepelisse in Tarn-et-Garonne. 
 His answer was prompt. It reached me the loth of 
 September, and surprised me extremely. This is what 
 it contained : — 
 
 ' ' Mt dbae Friend, — Your few lines gave me great pleasure ; but 
 as I have already told you, / long to see your own viriting. A few days 
 ago, I passed tlirougli Lourdes (near Tarbes) on my way from Cauterets, 
 and there I visited the celebrated Grotto ; I also heard such marvellous 
 things about cures obtained by the water there, principally cures of 
 diseases of the eyes, that I advise you very seriously to try it. Were I 
 a Catholic and a believer like you, and suffering as you are, I should 
 not hesitate to try the chance. If it is true that the sick have been 
 suddenly cured there, you might hope to be one of the favoured num- 
 ber ; and if it is not true, what do you risk in making the trial ? I 
 may add that I have a little personal interest in the experiment. If it 
 should succeed, what an important fact it would be for me to record. 
 I should be the witness of a miraculous event, or at least of an event in 
 which the person chiefly interested would be above suspicion. . . . 
 Good-bye, dear friend let me know how you are, and try to arrange 
 that we may soon meet. 
 
 " Your old friend, 
 
 " C. DB Fkbycinet. 
 " Negkepemsse, ISfh Septemier, 1863." 
 
 " It appears," he added, in a postscript, " that it is not 
 necessary to go to Lourdes to take this water, you can 
 have it sent to you. All you have to do is to write to 
 the Cure of Lourdes. You must, of course, previously 
 accomplish certain devotions; those naturally, I cannot 
 indicate to you, but the Cur^ of Lourdes will tell you. 
 Ask him, at the same time, to send you a little pamphlet, 
 written by the Vicar-General of Tarbes, and relating 
 such of the miraculous facts as have been authentically 
 proved." 
 
 Such a letter from my friend was certainly calculated 
 
300 
 
 to astonish me. Charles de Freycinet was a man of 
 a clear, positive, mathematical and naturally elevated 
 mind, but, at the same time, very little inclined to fana- 
 tical illusions ; with that he was a protestant. . . . 
 Such advice as he had given me, therefore, coming from 
 him, filled me with amazement. I resolved, however, 
 not to follow it. 
 
 " I almost fancy," I answered him (still through the 
 medium of my little secretary) " that I am a little better 
 to-day. If the amelioration continues I shall not, this 
 time, have recourse to the extraordinary remedy you 
 suggest, and for which, besides, I should not have the 
 faith necessary." 
 
 I must now confess, not without confusion, the secret 
 motives of my resistance. 
 
 VI. 
 
 De Freycinet's letter had had more effect on me than 
 I was willing to acknowledge. His appeal to the logical 
 consequences of my Catholic belief had roused my mind 
 to a series of reflections and arguments which shook 
 my scepticism and, by degrees, dispelled my faith in 
 Pascal's ideas on the subject of contemporary miracles. 
 
 "Why indeed," I asked myself, "should God's arm 
 refuse to accomplish in our days the wonders that it 
 wrought of old ? Is the Almighty's power weakened 
 or His heart less compassionate for the sufferings of 
 humanity ? According to Pascal the heathen nations 
 required this proof. ... Is it, then, less necessary 
 at the present time, when immense multitudes are daily 
 rushing headlong into the abyss of impiety ? " 
 
301 
 
 Thus my thoughts were profoundly modified under 
 the influence of considerations that an inward voice was 
 constantly whispering to me ; and whatever T might plead 
 as a pretext, my faith did not fail me, or rather failed 
 me no longer. Without very well knowing what was 
 meant by the Grotto and the Spring of Lourdes other- 
 wise than by the hostile notices of some anti-christian 
 newspapers, I felt convinced that God could manifest 
 His power by miracles there as well as in many other 
 places. Nay, more : after having frequently commented 
 in my own mind on my friend's surprising letter, I began 
 to feel, a sort of mysterious presentiment that if I had 
 recourse to that water (said to have sprung up at the 
 commands of an Apparition of the Blessed Virgin) I 
 should be cured. But I own that what I dreaded was 
 the responsibility of such an exceptional grace. " If 
 ordinary medicine succeeds in curing me," I thought, " I 
 shall be quits when the doctor is paid, that is, I shall 
 find myself in the same position as everyone else. But 
 if God delivers me by a miracle, by a direct and per- 
 sonal intervention, that will be quite another affair. I 
 shall be obliged to amend my life seriously and become 
 a saint. Oh, that is impossible ! " 
 
 And my miserable heart dreading its own weakness, 
 refused the grace of God. 
 
 Such was my reason for obstinately resisting the 
 counsel that Providence, in its inscrutable designs, had 
 sent me by a protestant, a heretic without the pale of 
 the Church : to address myself directly to Heaven and 
 implore the favour of a miracle. But my restlessness 
 and resistance were in vain. In my own heart I felt a 
 secret certainty that the science of man was powerless 
 
302 
 
 to cure me, that the Master I had so often offended 
 would Himself restore my sight, and that in thus making 
 me the gift of a new life, He would put me to the proof 
 to see if I should employ it better. 
 
 In the meantime my state remained the same if it 
 did not get worse. 
 
 I was just now speaking of good Angels and their 
 celestial diplomacy in exciting and preparing occur- 
 rences and meetings intended to overcome rebellious 
 wills and dogged obstinacy. De Preycinet's letter not 
 having decided me, they had now to lead me in some 
 otlaer way to the distant spot and the exact hour ia 
 which the divine trap was to be set. 
 
 Let us watch their movements. "Were they desirous, 
 this time, that their work should one day be revealed, 
 and was it for that reason that they, so to speak, set 
 their seal to it ? 
 
 Perhaps. . . . 
 
 VII. 
 
 The most expansive and communicative friendships 
 and intimacies when together, are often the least 
 inclined to correspondence when apart. From the 
 very beginning of my malady, I had deferred having 
 "Wladimir written to, because I felt a certain repug- 
 nance in corresponding with hirn through a third person. 
 It was Wladimir, therefore, who, the first, affectionately 
 reproached me for my long silence, which he found in- 
 explicable. His letter, received a week after Freycinet's, 
 was dated from a German watering-place whither he 
 had gone to follow a treatment. Unaware that I was 
 m and in P^rigord, he expressed his joy at the prospect 
 
303 
 
 of seeing me when passing through Paris on his way 
 back to Italy. He fixed no date for his return, but I 
 presumed it would take place about the beginning of 
 November. I have already related to what a degree 
 this young Slav had attracted me, and how much I 
 was attached to him. So that, although Coux is about 
 a hundred and forty leagues distant from Paris, and a 
 great part of that distance had to be done by coach, I 
 resolved to undertake the journey that I might have 
 the happiness of pressing his hand and cordially em- 
 bracing him on his passage through Prance. 
 
 My answer caused him both joy and pain, — joy, for 
 the hope of meeting again delighted his heart, — pain, 
 for though I touched but lightly on my condition and 
 said nothing of its gravity for fear of making him 
 anxious, the fact of my letter being written by the hand 
 of another filled him with alarm. 
 
 "My dear friend," he wrote uneasily, "what is the, 
 matter with your eyeal It must ie something serious 
 since it prevents your writing. Is it the same for 
 reading ? 
 
 " You cannot imagine how delighted I am at the 
 thought of seeing you again ! And soon now : for I shall 
 be in Paris towards the 25th of September, and shall 
 remain about ten days, but cannot answer for longer. 
 
 " I have not been well myself for the last fortnight. I 
 suffer- from violent headache which makes me good for 
 nothing. I recommend myself and all that is dear to 
 me in this world to your prayers ; those I reserve for 
 you are not my least fervent ones. May God keep us ! 
 
 W." 
 
 In consequence of the slowness of the post at that 
 
304 
 
 time, this letter, which left Baden-Baden the 20th of 
 September, did not reach me till the 24th or 25th, that 
 is, not till the time when Wladimir was doubtless 
 already in Paris. It rather upset my plans ; for having 
 calculated that he would pass all the month of October 
 at his watering-place, I thought I had five or six weeks 
 before me ! whereas, if I wanted to see him, I must now 
 start at once, to the great prejudice of certain impor- 
 tant family affairs which detained me in P^gord. . . . 
 Under different circumstances I should not have hesi- 
 tated to remain there, but my friendship for Wladimir 
 was stronger than all other considerations, and I in- 
 formed him that I would surmount every personal 
 obstacle, asking him for a delay of three or four days 
 only, to arrange all that was most urgent. 
 
305 
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 
 THE TWO LETTERS OF THE 2nd OF OCTOBEE. 
 I. 
 
 I arrived at Paris by the mail train, at about half -past 
 four in the morning. The date was the ^nd October, 
 1862, and the Feast of the Holy Guardian Angels : a 
 circumstance to which I paid no attention whatever. 
 Indeed, I did not give those invisible spirits a single 
 thought. 
 
 But although I forgot them, they remembered me. 
 On that day in which the Church especially honours 
 and invokes them, they directed my every step and the 
 steps of those whom God had chosen to employ, in His 
 work of mercy. 
 
 And if I retrace these different peculiarities with 
 such minute and apparently useless precision, if I have 
 shown that my friendship for the young Polish Count 
 and our mutual desire to meet again was the sole cause 
 of my journey ; if I have quoted his letters ; and if I 
 still continue my infinitesimal analysis some little time 
 longer, it is because these details were the hidden and 
 imperceptible threads that, moved by the hands of the 
 Divine Messengers, brought me infallibly to the point 
 determined by them. 
 
 My long coach journey, followed by a fatiguing night 
 in the train, had thoroughly tired me out. I went to 
 bed immediately on reaching my apartment in the rue 
 
 20 
 
306 
 
 de Seine, and did not wake till twelve o'clock the 
 following day. Then only did I notice on the mantle- 
 piece a note from Wladimir, which had been waiting 
 for me two or three days. It ran as foUows : — 
 
 "My Dbae Fkiend, — I received your letter on Saturday, too late 
 to write to you at Coux. I hasten therefore to send you a word of 
 gratitude to your lodgings. Thank you a thousand times for coming 
 so soon. ... I will not write more now, but shall expect you at 
 9 o'clock the morning of your arrival. I embrace you and pray for 
 you. "W. 
 
 "Hotel Eastadt, rue Neuve St. Augustin.'' 
 
 I dressed hastily, breakfasted in five minutes ; and 
 springing into a cab, hurried the. coachman to the rue 
 Neuve Saint Augustin, hoping Wladimir would still be 
 there and that I should find him after his luncheon. 
 
 I was disappointed. Not having had any news of 
 me, and not seeing me come in, after having vainly waited 
 for me all the morning, he concluded that I was still in 
 Perigord, or on the road ; and had gone out about one 
 o'clock. They did not think he would come back to 
 the hotel before night. He usually, they said, stayed 
 out all day, dining and spending the evening with his 
 friends. That did not surprise me. The young Count 
 knew all the Polish colony in Paris; and I had no 
 doubt he was, in all probability, wearing himself out in 
 visits amongst his numerous acquaintances. I left my 
 card, therefore, with a few words written on it, and 
 turned my steps towards the Boulevards. It was then 
 about half-past one. 
 
 I had hardly left the Hotel Piastadt when Wladimir 
 returned, contrary to his custom, after a short walk. 
 He thought I might have arrived in Paris without having 
 had the time to inform him, and he had come back in 
 

 
307 
 
 the vague hope of meeting me. Vexed at having missed 
 me, he lost not a second in writing me the following 
 hasty lines, scribbled so hurriedly that a few letters 
 stuck fast, here and there, in the pen. That little note, 
 apparently so insignificant, was destined to become in 
 after years an historical document. In that character 
 we reproduce it here by photogravure ; first giving the 
 printed text to help the reader to decipher it. 
 
 " Deak Fkiend, — How unlucky ! Paris drives me distracted, and 
 I hardly know what I am doing. I embrace you, which is the only 
 proof I can offer that I am still in my senses; ;I expect you at half- 
 past one to-morrow. If you cannot comie,-'let us say the day after 
 to-morrow at nine in the morning. That will suit you, I hope. 
 
 "Sens nobiscum. 
 
 " a rue Neuve Saint Augustin, Eastadt." 
 
 "Chek ami, — Quel guignon ! Paris me rend fou, je ne sais y 
 sufBre. Je vous embrasse, ee qui est la seule preuve oontraire au 
 manque de sens commun. 
 
 " Je vous attends a une heure et demie, demain. Si vous ne le 
 pouviez pas, alors aprfes-demain neuf heures du matin, n'est ce pas ? 
 
 "Dens nobiscum, 
 
 "44 rue Neuve Saint Augustin, Eastadt." 
 
 This hasty autograph, in which even the signature was 
 forgotten, was simply dated thus : Paris, the Snd, and 
 bore neither the indication of the month nor the year. 
 
 But as, in the designs of Providence, that indication 
 was necessary and important, it happened that, in his 
 room at the hotel, Wladimir could not find a single 
 envelope. He was therefore obliged to fold his letter in 
 the old-fashioned way, so that, at the post ofiice (as can 
 be seen in the facsimile oh the opposite page), the 
 irrefutable stamp was of&cially set on the very paper of 
 the letter, witnessiag to the place, the year, the day, 
 and the hour. Paris, 5" lev4e, 2 Octdbre, 62. The fifth 
 
308 
 
 distribution of the Paris Post includes the letters posted 
 between the hours of half-past one and half-past three. 
 It was, then, the 2nd October, 1862, and the Feast of 
 the Holy Guardian Angels. Over the whole surface of 
 the Christian world, the Catholic Church, in her 
 admirable Liturgy, had renewed, during the Holy 
 Sacrifice, the promise of the sacred books : — 
 
 " Thus saith the Lord : Behold I will send my Angel, 
 who shall go before thee and keep thee in thy journey, 
 and bring thee into the place thai I have prepared." * 
 
 At that very moment those prophetic words were 
 being accomplished for me without my knowledge. 
 
 II. 
 
 While Wladimir was writing the letter just quoted 
 and reproduced, I sauntered with melancholy step along 
 the Boulevards, in the direction of the Madeleine. 
 Seeing that I had a long afternoon before me, it 
 occurred to me that I might go and enquire if my friend 
 Preycinet happened to be in Paris. I therefore followed 
 the quays towards the quarter of the Gros-CaiUou, 
 where his sister lived. 
 
 Freycinet had just arrived the previous evening, or 
 that very morning, and was in the drawing-room when 
 I entered. His first words were to enquire after my 
 eyes. 
 
 " Alas ! my eyes are still in the same state, and I 
 begin to fear that they are lost for ever." 
 
 * Scec didt Dominus I)e,us : Ecce ego mittam Angelum meum, qui 
 prcecedet te et custodial in via et introducat in locum quern paravi. 
 Roman Missal. 2nd Ootoljer. Feast of the Guardian Angels. Epistle 
 of the Mass. 
 
309 
 
 " But why do you not give my remedy a trial ? " asked 
 my friend. " Something tells me you will be cured." 
 
 " Bah ! " replied I. " I must own that, without 
 exactly denying the fact, and without being hostile to 
 it, I have no great faith in all these miraculous waters 
 and pretended Apparitions. They are possible, and I 
 have no objection to make to them ; but, not having 
 examined the question, I can neither affirm nor dispute 
 it : it is beyond me. And, in short, I do not wish to 
 have recourse to the means you propose." 
 
 " Your objections are worth nothing," he said. " Ac- 
 cording to your religious principles you ought to believe, 
 and in point of fact you do believe, in the possibility of 
 such things. Why should you not try the experiment ? 
 What difference can it make to you ? In any case it 
 can do you no harm for the water is natural, chemically 
 composed like ordinary water. Does it not strike you 
 as singular that recourse to the Blessed Virgin should 
 be thus persistently urged on you by a Protestant ? I 
 declare to you beforehand : should you be cured, it will 
 be a terrible argument against me." 
 
 De Freyeinet's sister, who is a fervent Catholic, added 
 her persuasions to his. I was driven to my last en- 
 trenchments. 
 
 " Well," I said, " I will now honestly reveal the whole 
 truth to you, and take you into my most secret confi- 
 dence. I am not wanting in faith ; but I am a prey to 
 all sorts of contradictions and weaknesses, which are, 
 alas ! part and parcel of the most vital and sensitive 
 fibres of my frail nature. For example, a miracle of 
 which I might be the object, would oblige me to 
 sacrifice everything and become a saint. It would be 
 
310 
 
 a terrible responsibility, and I am so cowardly that the 
 thought of it makes me tremble. With a doctor, I 
 should be quit for a little money ; but if God cures 
 me, what may He not exact of me in return ? I know 
 that all this is contemptible, but such is the wretched 
 pusOlanimity of my heart. You thought my faith 
 wavered; that I feared not to see the miracle take place. 
 Do not deceive yourselves, my only fear is that it 
 should succeed." 
 
 My friend strove to convince me that, on one hand, I 
 exaggerated the responsibility of which I spoke, and, on 
 the other, made too light of it. 
 
 " Virtue is not less compulsory for you now," he said, 
 "than it would be after the miracle. Besides, even 
 if a doctor cured you, it would be equally by the grace 
 of God, and thus your scruples would have the same 
 reason for struggling against your weaknesses or your 
 passions." 
 
 All that did not seem to me very clear, and Freycinet 
 probably well knew that his reasoning was specious; 
 but he wished to calm my apprehensions to the best of 
 his power, and get me to follow his advice, reserving to 
 himself the faculty of reminding me later on of the 
 grave responsibility concerning which he now exerted 
 himself to reassure me. Vainly I tried to struggle 
 against the pressure brought to bear upon me. Weary 
 of resistance, I at last gave way. 
 
 " As soon as I can get a secretary," I said to de Frey- 
 cinet, " I will write to Lourdes. I only arrived to-day, 
 and I have not had the time to look for one." 
 
 " I will be your secretary ! " cried he. 
 
 " Very well. So be it. To-morrow we will breakfast 
 
311 
 
 together at the Caf^ Foy, and I will dictate a letter to 
 yoii after dejeuner." 
 
 "Why not at oncd ?:" replied he, "we shall gain a 
 day." 
 
 Pen, ink, and paper were lying on a table hard by. 
 Freycinet took up the pen. 
 
 " Well," said he, " I am waiting for you. But first, 
 what is the day of the month 1 " 
 
 " The 2nd October," I replied. 
 
 The Snd October, 1862. Feast of the Holy Guardian 
 Angels ! It was part of the economy of the divine 
 plan, that the letter we were about to send to the Cur^ of 
 Lourdes should bear exactly the same date as Wladimir's 
 letter already given. . . . Why ? . . . 
 
 I began to dictate and Freycinet to write. 
 
 " Paeis, Stid October, 186Z. 
 
 "MoNsiEUK LE CUE^,— I have heard that the water of Lourdes 
 works miracles, and it will not much surprise you if I now ask it to 
 add one more to the list. For the last two or three months my sight 
 has been growing excessively weak, from what cause I cannot tell, hut 
 suppose it to result from over-anxiety about family and business affairs. 
 I find it impossible to read or write two lines at a time without imme- 
 diately experiencing an excessive fatigue, which obliges me to stop. 
 
 " I have consulted the- most eminent oculists of Paris, Dr. Des- 
 mares and M. Giraud-Teulon ; the remedies they have prescribed, so 
 far from doing me any good, have, I almost think, aggravated the evil. 
 
 " In this state. Monsieur le Gwi, I write to beg you to send me, at 
 your earliest convenience, the quantity of water from the Grotto of 
 Lourdes that you may consider necessary for my malady. I am pre- 
 paring myself to use it by the efforts that the Almighty requires of us, 
 when we seek to obtain at His hands some signal favour. May this 
 privileged water, in restoring my sight, cure my soul also of more 
 than one blindness that I deplore without knowing how to remedy it. 
 
 "You will oblige me much by adding to the pajcel the pamphlet 
 published at Tarbes, and by letting me know what I am indebted to 
 you. The amount shall then be remitted by return of post. 
 
312 
 
 ' ' I beg you, Monsieur U Curd, to receive my thanks in advance, 
 and the assurance of my most respectful sentiments. " 
 
 " And now," cried de Freycinet, " the letter is written ! 
 You have but to sign it." 
 
 I took the pen, and wrote my name and address : — 
 
 " Henei Lasseere, 
 
 " Eue de Seine, 95, k Paris." 
 
 I give here a reproduction by photogravure, of the 
 fac-simile of a document which proves, with irrefutable 
 authenticity, the deplorable state to which I was re- 
 duced. 
 
 Mpondu. 
 
 " Pabis, 2 SJrc, 186S. 
 
 " Monsieur lb Cub^, — L'eau de Lourdes fait des miracles, et vous 
 ne serez point surpris que je vienue lui en demander un de plus. Depnis 
 deux on trois mois ma vue s'est excessivement affaiblie, je ne sais par 
 q^uelle cause ; je suppose pourtant que c'est par suite de vives prfoccu- 
 pations d'S.me et d' esprit. II m'est devenu impossible de lire ou d'ecrire 
 saus ^prouver dte les premieres lignes une . insurmOntable fatigue qui 
 m'emp§che de continuer. 
 
 " J'ai consults i Paris les spdoialistes les plus ^miuents, Mr. le Docteur 
 Desmares et M. Giraud-Teulon ; leurs remedes ne m'ont rien fait et 
 parfois m§me U me semble qu'ils ont aggravd le mal. 
 
 "C'est dans cet etat que je viens, Monsieur le Cur^ vous prier de 
 m'envoyer le plus t6t possible la quantite d'eau de la Grotte de Lourdes 
 que vous jugerez necessaire pour ma maladie. Je me prepare a en faire 
 usage dans les dispositions ou' Dieu veut que nous soyons pour obtenir 
 une si grande favour ; et je souhaite que cette eau privilegiee, en me 
 rendant I'usage de mes yeux, gu&isse aussi plus d'un aveuglemeut de 
 mon S,me que je deplore saus y pouvoir porter remede. 
 
 " Je vous serai reconnaissant en me faisant cet envoi, d'y joindre la 
 brochure publiee par I'Ev^ch^ de Tarbes et de m' indiquer le montant 
 des frais que vous aurez faits pour moi et dent jo vous enverrai le rem- 
 boursement par le retour du courrier. 
 
 " Veuillez agr^er. Monsieur le Cur^ aveo mes remerciments anticip^s 
 I'assurance de mes sentiments tris-respectueux. 
 
 "Rm de Seine, 95, a Paris." " Henei Lessberb. 
 
"<-«- "Ml-Ot^ t.4jL40Cj *-*j«JOl_ 'J* ^.<je_ / C-* 
 
 ttx. eW^ i^'Oe.i.Ltx. <j.K.t.AO)oc^cL £>yL^ uUtA. act- ^C'«-«4x,fez_ 
 ^c^ e^ t.t-.'UZA.KtjLnl- y^:^ COCKi u-^^ <»-' ^'OtJ'OiJ 
 

 y^'-iUL ^'Ct-tJLff «. cite/ ^^'^•-^'^~/'' *■«-*>" <"4»^ <3<^<iV^u.^ 
 
313 
 
 That letter, written by rreycinet and signed by me, 
 was immediately taken to the post.* 
 
 Thus ended the day of the 2nd of October, 1862, and 
 the mysterious Feast of the Guardian Angels. They 
 had attained their end, which was to place me straight 
 into the hands of Our Lady of Lourdes. 
 
 On the morrow Freycinet came to see me. 
 
 " My dear Lasserre," he said, " since the die is cast, 
 and you have made up your mind to try and obtain a 
 miracle, you must bring yourself into the necessary 
 state of grace without which the attempt will be vain. 
 Pray go to confession ; let your soul be properly pre- 
 pared; accomplish the devotions commanded by your 
 religion. You must quite understand that these things 
 are absolutely indispensable." 
 
 '■ You are undoubtedly right," I replied, " and I am 
 quite of your opinion. But you must own that you are 
 a singular protestant. A few days ago you were preach- 
 ing faith to me ; now you are preaching rehgious prac- 
 tices. Our parts are strangely reversed, and anyone 
 who could hear us, you the Protestant and me the 
 Catholic, would be mightily astonished. I cannot con- 
 ceal, alas ! that the impression produced would not be 
 in my favour." 
 
 "I am a scientific man," returned Freycinet, "and 
 since we are trying an experiment we must strictly 
 observe all its rules. I reason as in Natural Science or 
 Chemistry." 
 
 * Fifteen years later, in 1877, after the death of Mgr. Peyramale, 
 Cure of Lourdes, the original of the letter was found amongst his papers 
 and returned to me. Thus I have now been able to publish the text 
 of which I had forgotten the exact terms. The word ripondu written 
 across the top of the first page is in the handwriting of Mgr. Peyramale. 
 
314 
 
 To my shame be it said, I did not at all prepare 
 myself as my judicious friend had so wisely advised me 
 to do. I was in a moral crisis and the state of my soul 
 was bad. My mind was deeply troubled, agitated, and 
 inclined to evil. 
 
 Still I recognised the necessity of going and throwing 
 myself at the feet of the Priest ! But not having com- 
 mitted any of those gross and material faults against 
 which the mind suddenly revolts, I put it off from day 
 to day. Human nature rebels more easily against the 
 sacrament during the temptation than when it has com- 
 mitted the fault by which it is abased and humiliated. 
 It is more difficult to struggle and resist than to ask 
 pardon after the defeat. Who has not experienced 
 this? . . . 
 
 III. 
 
 I divided my time between Wladimir and Freyciuet. 
 But although I had come to Paris expressly to meet 
 the former, it was of the latter I saw the most; for 
 Wladimir was unfortunately taken up, to his own annoy- 
 ance as much as to mine, by the duties and obligations 
 of social intercourse. 
 
 " Mon trfes cher " (it was thus he usually addressed 
 me), " Mon tr^s cher," he would say, " I am like Saint 
 Paul, I do not do what I would, and what I do, I detest. 
 I should like so much to pass all my time with you and 
 enjoy something of the delights of intimacy, but instead 
 of that, I am obliged to lavish and waste the greater 
 part of my time with a crowd of uninteresting people 
 most of whom are mortally dreary." 
 
 " Those are the pleasures of the world," I answered 
 
315 
 
 laughing : " according to my friend Freycinet, they 
 generally consist in ' horing oneself with people that 
 one bores '." 
 
 " Who is your friend Freycinet ? " 
 
 " He is a man a hundred times cleverer than I, and 
 almost as clever as you. Of a clear, penetrating intel- 
 lect, and in search of the Truth." 
 
 " In search of the Truth. Does he not, then, possess 
 it?" 
 
 "Not altogether. But he is seeking it. He is a 
 Protestant, or rather, simply a philosopher. Shall I in- 
 troduce him to you ? Unless I am much deceived you 
 would be delighted with each other." 
 
 " Impossible, mon tres cher, I am but passing through 
 Paris, and I am already crushed under the weight of 
 my social obligations. If your friend is such as you 
 describe him to be, I shall gain nothing by knowing 
 him, but an additional regret in leaving you." 
 
 " Look here," resimied Wladimir. " Could you not 
 come to Eome in spite of the bad state of your eyes ? 
 You could easily find a secretary there." 
 
 " Alas, dear Miro, how I should like it, and how I 
 should enjoy resuming our delightful life of last winter ! 
 But that wish is only a dream. Yes, a dream ! Unless, 
 indeed, I obtain a miracle, which, by the advice of my 
 friend Freycinet, I have resolved to solicit of the Blessed 
 "Virgin." 
 
 " What ! Why, you told me he was a Protestant ! " 
 
 " And so he is." 
 
 " And he gives you such advice as that ? " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 I told him all about the trial I proposed to make. 
 
316 
 
 at the same time recommending myself to his fervent 
 prayers. 
 
 But Wladimir knew that miracles are rare, and, not- 
 withstanding his sincere piety and lively faith, he did 
 not seem to build up any great hopes on this recourse 
 to Our Lady of Lourdes. The Apparitions of Mary at 
 the Grotto of Massabiella, and the miraculous cures 
 already obtained, were not yet generally known, and it 
 was only later on, that universal rumour spreading 
 through the entire universe, incited people to hope in 
 that blessed name. No pilgrimage had as yet answered 
 the voice of Our Lady of Lourdes, asking for proces- 
 sions ; and the pious crowds which now flock to the 
 celebrated Spring did not direct their steps thither till 
 some years afterwards. 
 
317 
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 DIVINE ACTION. 
 I. 
 
 About a week passed in this way, and then Wladimir 
 set off on the road to Eome. 
 
 Every time Ereycinet saw me, he enquired if I had 
 had any news of the miraculous water. A letter from 
 the Cur4 of Lourdes soon arrived, informing me that 
 the water of the Grotto had heen forwarded, and would 
 reach me before long. 
 
 We waited impatiently for its arrival ; but, wUl it be 
 believed that my Protestant friend's anxiety was far 
 greater than my own ? One morning — it was the Friday, 
 10th October, 1862 — I was waiting for Ereycinet in the 
 Gal^rie d'Orleans at the Palais-Eoyal. We were going 
 to lunch together. 
 
 As I was first on the spot, I looked in at the different 
 shop windows of the GalMe, and read on the shop- 
 front of Dentu's library, two or three advertisements of 
 new books. My eyes immediately began aching at the 
 sight of the large print and were overwhelmed with 
 fatigue. This little incident depressed me extremely, 
 for it showed me more clearly than ever the extent of 
 my misfortune. 
 
 In the afternoon, I dictated two or three letters to 
 Ereyciaet, and left him at four o'clock to return home. 
 As I was going upstairs, the concierge called me. 
 
318 
 
 " Here is a parcel for you from the railway," lie said, 
 showing me a little white wooden box, on which was 
 written my address and the words, " l^atural Water," 
 added probably for the information of the Custom 
 House. It was the water from Lourdes. 
 
 My heart beat wildly, but I maintained an outward 
 calm. 
 
 " Very well," I said to the concierge, " I will take it 
 presently." I went out again into the street, where I 
 walked up and down for some time in great agitation. 
 
 " The matter is becoming serious," I thought ; " Frey- 
 cinet was right, I must prepare myself. Unless I purify 
 my conscience, I really cannot ask God to work a 
 miracle in my favour ; for it is not possible to implore 
 such a grace of Him, when my heart is filled with 
 voluntary sins, — I must make an effort to heal my soul, 
 before I beseech him to cure my body." 
 
 Turning over these grave considerations in my mind, 
 I directed my steps towards the house of my confessor, 
 the Abb^ Ferrand de Missol, who lived in my neigh- 
 bourhood. Fortunately, I was sure to find him, for it 
 was Friday, and I knew he always remained at home 
 on that day. 
 
 At home he certainly was, but a number of people 
 were already waiting for him in his ante-room, and 
 would naturally see him before me. Besides which, a 
 member of his family had unexpectedly arrived. His 
 servant gave me all these details, and advised me to 
 come back after his dinner, about seven o'clock. 
 
 I resigned myself to that course. 
 
 On the step of the street door I stopped. My mind 
 under the influence of a singular reaction, was a prey 
 
319 
 
 to a hundred worldly ideas. The evil spirits were 
 working on their side, and I wavered between the wish 
 to go and make a visit and the thought of going back 
 home to pray. My inclinations were strongly on the 
 side of the amusement, but a sacred and paternal voice, a 
 voice that seemed weak only because I was so little 
 accustomed to heed it, called me to meditation and 
 prayer. I hesitated several minutes. . . . 
 
 Finally the right inclination was the strongest, and I 
 turned down the rue de Seine. 
 
 I took the little box, to which was attached a notice 
 on the Apparitions, from my concierge, and ran up- 
 stairs. 
 
 When I got into my room I knelt at the side of my 
 bed, and, all unworthy as I was to turn my eyes to 
 heaven or speak to God, I prayed. 
 
 Then I rose. On coming in I had placed the box 
 and the little book on the chimney-piece. Every 
 minute I turned to look at the case containing the 
 mysterious water, and I had a presentiment that some- 
 thing great was about to happen in that solitary room. 
 I was afraid' to touch with my unsanctified hands the 
 box which held the sacred liquid ; on the other side, I 
 was strangely tempted to open it and ask for my cure, 
 even before the confession that I intended making that 
 evening. The inward struggle lasted a certain time, 
 how long I could not precisely say; it ended by a 
 prayer. 
 
 " Yes, Lord ! " I cried, " I am a miserable sinner, 
 unworthy to raise my voice to You or to touch a thing 
 that You have blessed. But the very excess of my 
 misery must excite Your compassion. Lord! I fly to 
 
320 
 
 You and to the Blessed Virgin Mary full of faith and 
 confidence, and out of the depths I cry to You. This 
 evening I will confess my sins to Your minister, but my 
 faith cannot and will not wait. Pardon me, Lord, 
 and heal me. And you, Mother of Mercy, deign to 
 come to the help of your unhappy child ! " 
 
 Having comforted myself by this appeal to the 
 Divine goodness, I dared to open the little box. Inside 
 I found a bottle of limpid water, carefully packed. I 
 took out the cork and poured some of the water into a 
 cup, then I took a towel from my drawer. All these 
 ordinary preparations that I went through with minute 
 care were marked, I remember, by a secret solemnity 
 that struck me at the time, as I came and went in my 
 room. I was not alone in that room, manifestly the 
 presence of God was there, and the Blessed Virgin 
 whom I had invoked was probably there too. 
 
 A warm and vivifying faith had descended into my 
 heart and inflamed my soul. 
 
 When all was ready I knelt down again. 
 
 " Blessed Virgin Mary, have pity on me, and heal 
 me of my blindness, moral and physical ! " 
 
 And in pronouncing these words with a heart fuU of 
 confidence, I rubbed my eyes and forehead with the 
 towel I had dipped in the water of Lourdes. The 
 action did not occupy thirty seconds. 
 
 Judge of my amazement, I might almost say my 
 terror! I had hardly touched my eyes and forehead 
 with the miraculous water when I felt myself cured, 
 suddenly, abruptly, without transition, and with such 
 rapidity, that in my imperfect language I can only 
 compare it to a flash of lightning. By a strange contra- 
 
321 
 
 diction of human nature, I had believed my faith which 
 promised my cure, and now I could not believe my eyes, 
 which assured me that my cure was accomplished! 
 No ! I could not believe my senses. So much so, that 
 I fell into the sin of Moses and struck the rock twice. 
 I continued to pray and bathe my eyes, not daring to 
 put my cure to the proof. In about ten minutes, 
 however, the vital energy that flooded my eyes left 
 me no longer in doubt. 
 
 " I am cured ! " I cried. 
 
 And I ran to my book-case to reach a book and read 
 — but I stopped. 
 
 "No! no! it is not any book I can read at this 
 moment ! " 
 
 I took from my mantelpiece the pamphlet relative 
 to the Apparitions of Our Lady of Lourdes, which 
 had been sent with the case containing the water. 
 Surely that was but justice. I read a. hundred and four 
 pages without stopping, and without experiencing the 
 least fatigue ; whereas twenty minutes before I could 
 not, have read three lines. 
 
 And if I was obliged to stop at the hundred and 
 fourth page, it was because it was five-and-twenty 
 minutes to six in the evening, and at that hour on the 
 10th of October, it is almost night in Paris. When I 
 shut the book they were lighting the gas in the shops. 
 That evening I went to confession and told the Abb^ 
 Ferrand de Missol of the amazing grace the Blessed 
 Virgin had vouchsafed me. He allowed me to com- 
 municate the following morning in thanksgiving to God, 
 and in view of strengthening the resolutions with 
 which such an event would naturally inspire me. 
 
 21 
 
322 
 
 II. 
 
 As I have already said, Wladimir had left Paris. 
 
 Astonishing consequences ! It was because Wladi- 
 mir, returning from the German Grand Duchy had to 
 pass through Paris, that I hastened up from the coimtry 
 to see him. If Wladimir's journey had not called me 
 to the Capital I should have remained in P^rigord and 
 should not have been brought into the way of that 
 interview with my old friend Freycinet, which was to be 
 so fraught with extraordinary results. That is not all. 
 If on the day of my arrival, the 2nd October, I had 
 found Wladimir at his hotel at half-past one ; if just at 
 that moment he had not gone out for a turn of twenty 
 minutes or half an hour, I should not have thought of 
 enquiring about Freycinet and should not have gone 
 (almost to kill time) to the house where I met him and 
 where his conversation decided me. ... In a word, 
 I should, in all probability, have allowed the moment of 
 grace and the divine opportunity to escape me. 
 
 And the date of the 2nd October is precisely, in the 
 Catholic calendar, the universal feast of the Guardian 
 Angels, and the day of their greatest influence on 
 earth. . . . 
 
 In the delicate arrangements of all these conjunctures, 
 — in the marvellous disposal of all the details, — the 
 long and gradual preparation of circumstances which 
 were to lead me on the road to the Miracle, — the 
 masterly dovetailing of aU the incidents and their 
 constant tendence to the same object — the careful 
 elaboration of hours and midutes, — the strange choice 
 
 l^QV, 
 
323 
 
 of the day for the decisive action on my rebellious will ; 
 who, Lord, would not recognise the hand, celestially 
 intelligent, and tenderly maternal, of Your heavenly 
 messengers, invisibly mixed up with the life and actions 
 of Your human creatures ? . . . Yes, truly, Lord, 
 the intervention of Your holy angels is evident to the 
 simplest regard of believing reason : — but, beyond the 
 material benefaction of my sight restored, had You not, 
 Lord, another object and other inscrutable intentions 
 far above the powers of my mind to investigate ? 
 
324 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 SOLESMES.- 
 
 I. 
 
 During the two days that succeeded the Miracle, 
 I continued to bathe my eyes with the water of 
 Lourdes, expressing, at the same time, by a vocal prayer 
 my feelings of gratitude. But, by degrees, I came to 
 consider the excellent state of my sight as an acquired 
 fact, a clear profit in my favour requiring no more 
 prolonged thanksgivings or unlimited prayers. I had 
 confessed and communicated, I therefore soon began to 
 consider myself quit, and resume the usual indifference 
 of my customary way of life. In full possession of the 
 benefit, I began, alas ! to be ungrateful towards the 
 Benefactor. 
 
 rive days after my cure, on the 15th October, I 
 made, in the afternoon, a rather long visit ; and it 
 happened that in the heat of animated conversation, 
 something like a bad vapour, a moral miasma, rising up 
 in my heart, tempted me to say things, on the subject of 
 which my duty imposed the most absolute silence. 
 
 At that moment, the grace which God had so 
 marvellously and so recently granted me presented 
 itself to my memory. " Wretch ! " I thought, " will you 
 now deliberately offend God ? " 
 
325 
 
 A secret but terrible struggle took place in my 
 trembling soul while I continued talking. Good and 
 evil assailed me with equal force. For a few words to 
 be uttered or not, an invisible and desperate combat 
 was going on within me between the heavenly armies 
 and the infernal legions. We read sometimes in history 
 of two opposing forces concentrating all their efforts, 
 and fighting desperately for some old ruined barn or 
 barren hill, or clump of trees ; the fate of two great 
 nations being decided by the victory gained on a spot 
 apparently so narrow, so insignificant, so valueless. In 
 one of Napoleon's great battles where his fate was at 
 issue, all depended on the storming of a mill occupied 
 by the enemy. To leave them that mill was to lose the 
 empire; on the other hand, to get possession of it was to 
 conquer the world. 
 
 A similar and equally formidable battle was raging 
 in my heart at that instant. That word to be uttered 
 or rejected had roused all the powers of heaven and hell 
 to mortal combat in the lists of my soul. And my 
 will, master of itself in every way, independent and 
 calm in the midst of my conscience that God had stirred 
 up against myself, and my passions that the arch-fiend 
 was lashing to a fury ; my will, free and tranquil, could 
 decide the victory as it pleased. I had the baseness to 
 give that victory to my passion — to drive God away. 
 I spoke. 
 
 The struggle had lasted so long that my fault was 
 not the result of a surprise or a sudden thoughtless 
 movement. It was committed coldly and dehberately. 
 In perpetrating it I measured all the extent of its 
 gravity, but I would do it. 
 
326 
 
 II. 
 
 A man of Freycinet's elevated mind would naturally 
 be much struck loj the miracle of my cure in which 
 Providence had given him so direct a share ; and I 
 regret that motives of discretion and delicacy prevent 
 my stopping an instant, at this point of my narrative, to 
 contemplate the image evoked in my memory of the 
 friend of my youth meditating on the extraordinary 
 event which had taken place under his eyes. I regret 
 to be obliged to limit myself to my own history. 
 
 I must, however, restore to its true proportions an 
 incident revealed since that time and most erroneously 
 related by the newspapers. 
 
 A few days after the miraculous event of which I 
 had been the object, Freycinet expressed a desire to 
 make the acquaintance of an eminent Eeligious of whom 
 I had often spoken to him, the illustrious Dom Gu^ran- 
 ger, Abbot of Solesmes. I had several times been, for 
 weeks together, the guest of the Benedictines, and the 
 E. F. Abbot honoured me with a paternal affection. I 
 was therefore delighted to accompany my friends M. 
 and Mme. de Freycinet and introduce them to him. 
 
 We left Paris on the Wednesday evening, 15th of 
 October. 
 
 Among the buildings of the Abbey of Solesmes is a 
 tower reserved for guests which I was in the habit of 
 occupying during my visits to the Benedictines. This 
 time 1 had my usual room in it, but, the monastic rule 
 forbidding the reception of women within the cloister 
 walls, my friends could not lodge in the tower with me. 
 
327 
 
 Dom Gu^ranger, however, would not permit them to 
 go to the village inn. He hospitably placed them in a 
 house near at hand belonging to the Monastery. Every 
 day the Brother Cellarer sent them their meals prepared 
 in the Monastery kitchen at the same time as those of 
 the monks. 
 
 The Father Abbot had long and frequent conversa- 
 tions with them. He was delighted with them, and 
 they with him. By the elevation of his thoughts, 
 his prodigious knowledge, his amiable simplicity and 
 the distinction of his manners, that Monk, so austere 
 with himself, so strict according to report and so 
 inflexible in his orthodoxy, produced on Freycinet an 
 impression of admiring surprise. Notwithstanding the 
 description I had given of him, he had expected to find 
 in Dom Gueranger a rather severe rigorist wanting to 
 force his belief on everybody; and he met instead, 
 a man full of cordial tolerance and scrupulous respect 
 for the liberty and opinions of others. In accepting 
 the hospitality of the Monastery, my Protestant friend 
 had naturally expected to live as the Monks did; 
 if not according to all the observances of that modern 
 Desert, at least in obedience to the Catholic precepts 
 relative to abstinence from meat on certain fixed days. 
 But on the morrow of his arrival, which was a Friday, 
 he saw a Lay-Brother place a roast fowl on the table, 
 . . . Dom Gueranger entering towards the end of 
 the meal, Freycinet expressed his surprise, considering 
 in what place he was staying, at seeing such a dish on 
 such a day. 
 
 "The Commandments of the Church only oblige 
 those within the pale of the Church," replied the old 
 
328 
 
 man with a gentle smile ; " in becoming my guests you 
 have not ceased to be your own masters. Por which 
 reason I gave orders that you should be served as you 
 would have been in your own house." 
 
 What were Freycinet's impressions at Solesmes ? 
 What thoughts were at work in his mind during his 
 confidential talks with the old Benedictine Monk? 
 Why did he not penetrate further on the road in which 
 it seemed to me that God was then leading him ? What 
 passed in the depths of his soul ? That is his inviolable 
 secret, and the secret of God. I have no right to reveal 
 what I may know of it. 
 
 When my friends left, the house of the Benedictines 
 to return to Bordeaux, Dom Gueranger murmured these 
 words : " Spiritus jwi, uU vult ! We must pray and 
 wait ! " 
 
 Let us go back a little. 
 
 III. 
 
 It was precisely on the afternoon preceding my 
 departure from Paris for Solesmes that I committed the 
 fault of which I spoke a little whUe ago. . . . The 
 sharp point of remorse had immediately entered my 
 heart, and I was preparing to relieve my troubled con- 
 science by confessing my weakness to the venerable 
 Father of the Benedictines, when, on awakening from 
 sleep the day after my arrival, I felt the supercHiary 
 arch and the axes of the eyelids attacked anew by 
 the well-known heaviness which had been one of 
 the symptoms of the terrible disease from which 
 
329 
 
 Our Lady of Lourdes had delivered me six days 
 before. It was not the disease itself come back, for my 
 sight remained clear and strong, but the permanent 
 weight seemed like a warning and a threat, the hand of 
 God stretched over me ready to strike ; it was a sign 
 from heaven which said " Take care ! " 
 
 I was terrified : but I thought of my fault, my base- 
 ness, my ingratitude, and I was not deceived as to the 
 cause of what had happened to me. 
 
 "My worthy friend," I said to myself, employiag a 
 familiar expression, "you have only got what you 
 deserve." 
 
 IV. 
 
 While I was in this state, and just as my friends the 
 Preycinets left the Abbey, where I prolonged my stay 
 for another week, I received a letter from the E. F. 
 Gratry. He had been greatly impressed by what he had 
 heard of my supernatural cure, and had written to ask 
 me if it was true, requesting me, at the same time, to give 
 him all the details. His letter was dated from Tours. 
 
 I replied by sketching him an outline of what had 
 happened : — the Miracle, testifying to the All-powerful 
 mercy of Our Lady of Lourdes: — my prompt forget- 
 fulness of the benefit : — the fault of which I had been 
 guilty, and the present threat of punishment testifying 
 that the God of Goodness is also the God of Justice. 
 
 " At the same time," I added, " it is but a threat 
 which has in no way affected the reality and com- 
 pleteness of my miraculous cure. I continue to be 
 able to read or write for hours together, by daylight 
 or lamplight, without effort, difficulty, or fatigue. 
 
330 
 
 Only now, there is a dull heaviness in the upper part 
 of the eyelid which makes it feel every minute as 
 if it was going to fall over the eyeball. I am, as you 
 may suppose, in a constant state of alarm. I might 
 compare myself to Damocles. Nothing is changed, 
 yet all is changed. Not one dish has been removed 
 from the royal feast, but a sword is hanging over my 
 head by a single thread, which will fall, for certain, 
 at the first moral backsliding. I did not think to 
 bring any of the water of Lourdes with me; so that 
 I cannot bathe my eyes in it again before my return 
 to Paris. I shall do so then, praying the Blessed Virgin 
 at the same time to have pity on me once more. Do 
 you pray for me also that she may be favourably in- 
 clined towards me. 
 
 " But, since you are at Tours, my dear, good Father, I 
 shall come round that way to-morrow or the day after, 
 on my return to Paris, so as to see you and tell you in 
 detail what I am now briefly writing." 
 
 Two days after, I stopped at Tours, in the interval 
 between two trains, and climbed, on the banks of the 
 Loire, the hill which leads to the country-house of the 
 Oratorians. 
 
 In the course of my long talk with the E. F. Gratry, 
 he happened to mention the name of M. Dupont. 
 
 " M. Dupont ! " I cried, " why, it is at Tours that he 
 lives ! How could I be here ever since this morning, 
 and never once remember that remarkable man ? I 
 shall certainly not lose the opportunity of paying him a 
 visit. Where does he live ? " 
 
 " Eue Saint Etienne 10." 
 
 I went to the street, which is close to the cathedral. 
 
331 
 
 One word will suffice to explain my eagerness. M. 
 Dupont was reputed to have received the gift of miracles. 
 The blessing of heaven was upon his house, the words 
 of the Gospel and the prophecy of Isaias were there 
 literally realised : — " Gceci indent, claudi ambulant, leprosi 
 mundantur, surdi audiunt. The blind see; the lame 
 wallc, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear." And that 
 simply by his anointing them with a miraculous oil. 
 
332 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE SACRED FACE. 
 
 M. Dupont was at home when I arrived. I was 
 shown into a large room on the ground-floor, and while 
 waiting for the master of the house, I looked curiously 
 around me. The furniture was very simple ; here and 
 there ex-votos were hanging on the wall ; beside a large 
 table covered with papers, stood a reading-desk in the 
 form of a lectern, supporting a large open in-folio. I 
 recognised the Bible. But what chiefly attracted and 
 fixed my attention and thoughts, was an engraving of 
 the Sacred Face, representing the visage of Our Lord 
 as the impression of it was left, the day of the Passion, 
 on the veil of Veronica. This engraving was hanging 
 over the writing-table, and before it burned a lamp, 
 whose soft light floated on the limpid oil contained in a 
 crystal cup. 
 
 The door opened and M. Dupont entered. He was a 
 tall, handsome old man, of p,bout sixty or sixty-five, 
 still vigorous and upright. 
 
 I looked at him with religious curiosity. 
 
 At first sight the aspect of the man, whose beneficent 
 hands had cured so many diseases, and succoured so 
 many miseries, had something austere in it which almost 
 approached severity. His countenance was fuU of an 
 
333 
 
 august dignity that inspired respect, and the grand lines 
 of his face, regular, but perhaps a little cold, tempered 
 with a touch of fear, the irresistible veneration which 
 his presence inspired in the beholder. His fine eyes 
 were at the same time calm, powerful, and penetrat- 
 ing, but, if I remember well, overshadowed by thick 
 bristling eyebrows. His nose well-shaped, but a little 
 large, the outline of his mouth pure but firm, his fore- 
 head high and wide and shaped in a magnificent mould, 
 completed the royal air of authority that characterised 
 the whole face. 
 
 This imposing personage stood before me while I 
 tried to control my embarrassment. 
 
 " I have no other object in calling on you," I said, 
 " but to make your acquaintance. And that wish has 
 its origin in the reports I have heard of the marvels and 
 miracles accomplished here." 
 
 "Yes, sir," he replied, with an indescribable accent and 
 a familiarity of language, that seems especially to be- 
 long to the friends of God. " Yes sir, it is now eleven 
 years ago, since in this room, and before that Sacred 
 Face, Our Lord began to show His power. And He 
 deigned to manifest it in the house of a wretch like me, 
 to show that human merit had no part in it, but that He 
 alone accomplislies all." 
 
 He had hardly begun talking to me of the things of God 
 when the rigid expression of his countenance changed, 
 as the cold mists of night vanish, and the aspect of 
 nature brightens before the glad rays of the May sun 
 rising above the mountains. 
 
 The apparent severity which had intimidated me for 
 an instant had quite disappeared. M. Dupont talked 
 
334 
 
 with unreserved cordiality; he had all the charm of 
 ripe experience, extreme affability, and child-like sim- 
 plicity ; and it was with difficulty I retraced the im- 
 pression of masterly power, which had struck me so 
 much at first. Strength was transformed into grace. 
 The inner life and thoughts of the heart in animating 
 the cold lines and strong features, lighted them with the 
 reflection of heavenly goodness. It was as if the soul 
 of Vincent de Paul had suddenly transformed the ex- 
 pression of the face of a Joseph de Maistre ; as if 
 Mercy had shed the radiance of her divine benignity 
 on the marble features of Justice. When I saw him 
 enter, firm and dignified, I said to myself : — " He is a 
 just man ". Now I added : " He is a Saint ". 
 
 " What," I asked him, " was the origin of these 
 wonders ? I only know them by general report, and 
 that is always confused." 
 
 " I never thought," he replied, " I could not possibly 
 foresee that the room we are in would become a place 
 of pilgrimage, where numberless miracles would be 
 accomplished. But such were the designs of the 
 Almighty." 
 
 At these last words, his voice slightly trembled. He 
 resumed : — 
 
 " In 1851, on Palm Sunday, I went to see the Mother 
 Prioress of the Convent of the Carmelites. That very 
 day she had received from Eome ten engravings of the 
 Sacred Face. ' If you would like some,' she said to 
 me, ' take those you prefer.' I chose two, one for my- 
 self, and one for the Perpetual Adoration. On the 
 following day, which was Holy Monday, I gave the 
 sacred engraving to be framed immediately, but the 
 
335 
 
 workman did not bring it home till the Wednesday 
 morning. I then placed it over the bureau just as you 
 see it now." 
 
 "While I was looking at it a kind of imperative 
 feeling rose in my heart, and I asked myself : ' Can the 
 Divine Face of our Lord remain exposed in the house 
 of a Christian during the great week of the Passion 
 without being honoured by some outward sign of adora- 
 tion and love ? ' No, truly, that must not be. It 
 occurred to me that I might place a lamp before it, and 
 immediately I did so. 
 
 The fear of "what will people say," however, is 
 always present in our poor nature ; and hardly had the 
 lamp been lighted when that scruple began to excite 
 my cowardice. It was in this room I received every- 
 one who came to see me, my bureau was here, and I 
 thought with a certain secret shrinking that people 
 would all be asking me the meaning of a lamp burning 
 in full day-light. 
 
 For a long time I meditated on the answer I could 
 give ; and at last I found one to my mind. To those 
 who might be curious to know the meaning of that 
 lamp burning in the day-time, I would reply : " It is to 
 teach those who do me the honour of coming to my 
 house that, when the business that brings them here is 
 settled, there remains nothing to do but to talk of God 
 or go away ". 
 
 That day and the day following nobody asked me the 
 question I was expecting. Some did not even see the 
 lamp, others noticed it, understood and approved. 
 
 But on the Good Friday, a commercial traveller, 
 having insisted on seeing me, to offer me some Bordeaux, 
 
336 
 
 gave me an opportunity of answering as I proposed ; he 
 was so surprised that he did not seem to understand 
 my observation, and I had to repeat it to him over 
 again. I took it as my starting-point, and gave him 
 some Christian counsel, which I hope was profitable to 
 him — I sometimes think it was. 
 
 Four and twenty hours after, during the morning of 
 Easter Eve, a pious lady of my acquaintance, who was 
 suffering from a very bad disease of the eyes, came to 
 see me. I showed her the Sacred Face and we said a 
 prayer together before the Blessed Image. 
 
 On rising from our knees, the idea occurred to me 
 (how I cannot tell) to say to my friend : " Eub your 
 eyes a little with a drop of the oil burning in honour of 
 the Divine Visage ; perhaps it wiU. do you good ". 
 
 She dipped her finger in the oil, rubbed her eyes with 
 it, and was suddenly cured. 
 
 From that day, cures and miracles have never ceased, 
 and here am I, the privileged witness of continual 
 marvels. The oil, which has been sent to a distance, 
 has also cured a number of diseases in France and in 
 foreign countries. 
 
 " Ah, sir," cried M. Dupont, as he finished, " God is 
 great ! God is good ! " 
 
 II. 
 
 " Yes, truly," said I, after a moment's silence. " Yes, 
 truly, God is good. These wonders do not surprise me, 
 for I have lately been favoured with a similar grace 
 myself ; but I did not prove myself deserving of it, and 
 now I feel the hand of God threatening me and ready 
 to throw me back into my former state." 
 
337 
 
 I then told him all about my disease, my cure, and 
 the half-relapse, of which I explained the cause. 
 
 " Accidents of that kind often occur," he said, " or 
 even more complete relapses, and I have noticed that 
 they generally proceed from one of two causes : either 
 having shrunk from bearing witness before men; or 
 having neglected to return thanks to God." 
 
 " It was not the first cause with me," I replied, " for 
 I never hesitated to witness to the Miracle that had 
 been worked in me ; but, alas ! I did not return thanks. 
 Out of the ten lepers healed, spoken of in the Gospels, 
 only one returned to give thanks to the Lord ; I was 
 amongst the nine others. Forgetful and ungrateful, I 
 resumed my usual way of life, and at the moment of 
 trial I failed." 
 
 " All faults can be repaired," said M. Dupont. " We 
 wUl invoke the Lord, we will pray before the Sacred 
 Pace, and anoint your eyes with the miraculous oil. 
 Let us hope that some good will come of it." . . . 
 
 ."No! no!" I interrupted, . quickly ; "I have been 
 cured once by the Blessed Virgin honoured at Lourdes. 
 I have slighted her goodness; but I have the conviction 
 that she will obtaia my forgiveness. I feel as if I 
 ought not to have recourse to any intercession but hers ; 
 and it almost seems as if I should be wanting in respect 
 to the Queen of Angels if I asked help from any other 
 power." 
 
 M. Dupont smiled. 
 
 "Heaven has no such jealousy as that," he said, 
 gently ; " however, if such is your feeling, I have here a 
 medal given me by the P^re Hermann, he dipped it 
 himself into the water of Lourdes. It has already been 
 
 22 
 
338 
 
 used to obtain several cures. Will you try it ? Lay it 
 successively on each eye, and let us say together: 
 ' Blessed Virgin Mary, show yourself as powerful at 
 Tours as you have been in the Grotto of Lourdes ! ' " 
 
 I knelt down and did as he said ; but I felt no relief. 
 We renewed the attempt several times, without any 
 result. 
 
 " Well," said M. Dupont quietly, raising his eyes as 
 if he were speaking to some one present, " Well, Holy 
 Virgin Mary, since you refuse us this favour, we will 
 now apply to your Son ". 
 
 He then dipped his finger in the oil burning before 
 the Sacred Face, and anointed my eyelids, my brow, 
 my eyebrows, every part affected by the painful and 
 threatening heaviness. His face had suddenly assumed 
 a striking and majestic expression of authority. . . . 
 He reminded me of Moses, . . . and it no longer 
 surprised me that nature should sometimes obey him. 
 
 " Do you feel no relief ? " he asked me. 
 
 " Alas ! none," I replied. "But perhaps as the heavi- 
 ness and dull weariness do not compose a sharp suffering 
 nor an obstacle to my using my eyes and seeing very 
 well, my deliverance may come without my knowing it. 
 For the moment, however, I cannot perceive any 
 change." M. Dupont appeared surprised at the resist- 
 ance of the evil. 
 
 " You must dine with me, and this evening we will 
 renew our supplications to God." 
 
 I shared M. Dupont's repast. His delightful con- 
 versation was that of a man of the world who might 
 have travelled amongst a people of saints in the 
 company of angelic spirits. 
 
339 
 
 After dinner he anointed my eyes afresh ; still with- 
 out effect. But although he seemed distressed, neither 
 his faith nor his firm hope were disturbed by the 
 appairent rigour of Divine Mercy. 
 
 " Do not be anxious," he said ; " here is a little bottle 
 of oil from the lamp before the Sacred Face. We wUl 
 consider what has just passed as the commencement of a 
 Noveno. You must anoint your eyes yourself and 
 joiQ in the prayers that are recited here from eleven till 
 two. I will pray for you every day." 
 
 When we separated he allowed me to embrace him, 
 and the same evening I returned to Paris. 
 
 III. 
 
 On getting up the next morning I anointed my eyes 
 before going out. 
 
 Towards the beginning of the afternoon as I was 
 walking in the street on my way to business, I suddenly 
 became aware that the feeling of heaviness had disap- 
 peared, and that the potent fluids of health had 
 penetrated beneath my eyelids, revivifying the nerves 
 and muscles in the region of the eyes. 
 
 The heavenly favour had come upon me all at once 
 in a torrent, like summer rain long desired, and which, 
 when least expected, pours out its grateful flood upon 
 the thirsty earth. 
 
 I instantly thought of M. Dupont's promise, and I 
 had an intuition that the servant of God was then on 
 his knees praying for me. 
 
340 
 
 CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 THE TESTIMONY. 
 
 I. 
 
 In the brief letter I had written to the Abbd Pey- 
 ramale informing him of my iniraculous cure, I said 
 that a little later on, I would send him as complete a 
 narrative as possible of the different circumstances under 
 which it had taken pface. ' I now wrote the narration. 
 But human events are like undulating hills and wide- 
 spread landscapes. Only at a distance can we properly 
 seize the fine outlines, the real place of everything, the 
 importance of certain details and the striking harmony 
 of the whole. Besides which, the progressive lapse of 
 time often produces new circumstances which throw an 
 unexpected light on past events and determine their 
 actual character. 
 
 It was only by the light of his future destiny that I 
 at last understood with perfect clearness the formal in- 
 tentions of Almighty God in employing the young Pole 
 Wladimir as the cause and instrument of my journey 
 to Paris, and in consequence, as the occasion of my 
 meeting Freycinet on the Blessed Feast of Guardian 
 Angels. For which reason I did not even think of 
 going back in my narrative to that starting-point, con- 
 sidering it without interest or importance. 
 
341 
 
 I confined myself to relating the direct action of 
 Freycinet as it has just been read, and the episode of M. 
 Dupont. It is superfluous to add that I made my written 
 deposition with the scrupulous care necessitated by the 
 gravity of the- important event of which I was giving 
 an account. But for greater certainty I submitted 
 the text, sentence by sentence, to Freycinet and M. 
 Dupont. 
 
 " It is all accurate," said Freycinet, " there is nothing 
 to add or to take away ; it is quite a photograph. But 
 I notice a few words here and there that I should like 
 you to suppress ; they add nothing to the relation and 
 appear to me useless or beside the question." 
 
 I hastened to oblige him by crossing off all he ob- 
 jected to. And although his share in my extraordinary 
 cure was no secret for anyone, although, in the exten- 
 sive circle of our mutual friends, he liked to relate the 
 event, or make me relate it, I did not think fit to 
 write his name, but designated him by the appellation of 
 "M. de ". 
 
 The name is ever dear to me, and in spite of many 
 divergences in our ways of seeing, judging, and acting, 
 will never cease to arouse a feeling of eternal gratitude 
 in my heart. If I print it now, it is because it has been 
 divulged, since that time and without my consent, by 
 the press of the two continents, and, in consequence, 
 published millions of times. Besides that, the imagi- 
 nary circumstances and inventions with which that 
 period of my life has been embellished have imposed 
 on me the duty, as a man and a historian, of re-estab- 
 lishing every detail in its primitive form. 
 
342 
 
 II. 
 
 I went with my manuscript to Tours to communicate 
 it to M. Dupont. 
 
 In reading it aloud to my venerable listener, I sup- 
 pressed, as may be supposed, all those parts relating to 
 the portrait I had given of himself, and such reflections 
 as might have wounded his humility. . . . But he 
 probably guessed what I concealed from him. After 
 listening with great attention, the saintly old man 
 said: 
 
 " Nothing can be more rigorously exact than the 
 incident you relate. I have recognised in listening to 
 you, the very words we employed in our conversation. 
 You have truthfully repeated everything that passed 
 here." 
 
 Such complete approbation would have given me un- 
 mixed pleasure, if M. Dupont's accents in thus expressing 
 himself had not made me anxious for what was to follow. 
 
 " And yet," he added, " I must beg you to cross out 
 all mention of this last incident from your narrative. 
 You must teU of nothing but the miracle accomplished 
 by Our Lady of Lourdes." . . . 
 
 " Impossible ! " I cried. " Although it is true, that 
 Our Lady of Lourdes has cured me, and that without 
 any relapse, it is none the less true that the dark threat 
 immediately following my fault, and the sudden disap- 
 pearance of that threat the day after my visit to you, 
 are supernatural facts too closely connected with the 
 principal event for me to have the right to omit them, 
 even at your urgent req^uest." 
 
343 
 
 " Still you must," he replied firmly. " Your narration, 
 which cannot fail to be published, will do great good, 
 and spread far and wide the glory of Our Lady of 
 Lourdes." 
 
 "Yes, but then, why should I not include in this 
 statement my station before the Sacred Face venerated 
 here ? Is not that also the truth, and might not that 
 truth also do good to a great number of souls ? " 
 
 " The Lord has His own ways," he replied. " The 
 Apparitions of Lourdes have attracted public attention 
 from the beginning. The Christian press, and later oa 
 the Charge of the Bishop of Tarbes, have made them 
 known ; polemics have been engaged. . . . But it 
 has been otherwise with what, has passed in my own 
 poor house. That has been quite outside newspapers or 
 books. Devotion to the Sacred Face has been gradually 
 spread by personal confidences from one to another, 
 amongst the humble and those of no account. I 
 desire, and I believe it to be God's will, tliat things 
 should continue thus ... at least for the present. 
 There is, says the Scripture, a time to keep silence, 
 and a time to speak. At present we are at the first 
 time." 
 
 As I still insisted, he raised his hand, and pointing to 
 the soft, fair light burning before the Sacred Face — 
 
 "Publicity would extinguish that lamp," he said 
 quietly. 
 
 " God forbid ! I will suppress whatever you like. 
 . . . But I hope there will come a time, when I 
 shall be able to re-establish in its place all that -to-day 
 you oblige me to bury in silence." 
 
 " Yes. And when that hour comes, you wUl be free ; 
 
344 
 
 but, until then, be content to indicate by typographic 
 signs, that something is suppressed and wanting in your 
 original text." 
 
 This, then, is the reason why, in every edition of " Our 
 Lady of Lourdes," the long paragraph relating to M. 
 Dupont was replaced by a double line of dots, showing 
 the reader that a voluntary blank existed in that chapter 
 of my book. The moment is now come to fiU it up. 
 
 III. 
 
 Having left a copy of my manuscript with the " Holy 
 Man of Tours," I sent my authentic narration to Lourdes, 
 revised and verified successively by Freycinet and M. 
 Dupont.* 
 
 It appears that the Cur^ Peyramale was greatly 
 moved by the narrative ; and while still under the im- 
 pression caused by his emotion, he had a sort of pre- 
 sentiment of the future. When he went, that day or 
 
 * The copy that I gave to M. Dupont was found amongst his papers 
 after his decease, by his biographer, the Abbe Janvier, who published 
 a long fragment of it four years ago, in his Life of that Man of 
 God, Volume II., pages 309 to 315 (edition of 1879) ; p. 289 to 295 
 of the 12mo edition of 1882, and pp. 334 to 342 of the abridged edi- 
 tion. The Abb6 Janvier has quoted the fragment very correctly, but 
 he has committed a considerable and complete en'or in calling my state 
 a relapse ; an error that he proposes to rectify in future editions. No 
 relapse, thank Heaven, had taken place, and my narration indicates 
 with the most scrupulous precision that all-important shade. The 
 alarming heaviness which manifested itself after a fault, in no manner 
 prevented my reading and writing, and did not in the least affect my 
 sight. It was only, as I said further back, a sort of threat intended to 
 rouse my fears and prevent my falling again into any act of ingratitude. 
 My disease was completely cured by Our Lady of Lourdes, and it has 
 never reappeared. 
 
345 
 
 the day following, to the hospital of Lourdes to visit 
 the "Sisters of Nevers," who nurse the sick and in- 
 struct the children, he read the pages of my relation to 
 them. 
 
 ■ Then, after a moment of silence, he pronounced the 
 following words in his grave firm voice : — 
 
 " That man wUl be the historian of Our Lady of 
 Lourdes! The Blessed Virgin has chosen him and 
 restored his sight for that." 
 
 IV. 
 
 A few days after my return from Solesmes and my 
 journey to Tours, I started for Eome to rejoin my 
 friend Wladimir. What delightful months we passed 
 together. What thoughts we exchanged! What in- 
 timate confidences ! What exquisite animation and 
 charm, what grace and affability on his part ! What 
 pleasure and enjoyment on mine ! Why, alas ! must 
 the fairest dreams have a waking, and the brightest 
 days remain sometimes without a morrow ? Why are 
 minds the most harmoniously united jarred in a fatal 
 hour by some discordant chord ? Why does it happen 
 that youthful friendships are not always proof against 
 time and long separation ? Why are some broken and 
 others abandoned? Had Providence brought iis so 
 closely together simply that my friend at Eome might 
 perform in the miraculous event the part traced out 
 for him ? I cannot tell. 
 
 The summer heat brought me back to France, and I 
 left the capital of the Christian world. 1 have never 
 returned there since. Wladimir and I maintained a 
 
34:6 
 
 profound affection and esteem for each other, but the 
 delightful intimacy that had lent such a charm to our 
 intercourse chilled and perished untimely. It was a 
 Spring without a Summer; a dawn without a day. 
 Thus, in the vast plains of the country of the Slavs, 
 the horizon grows gradually clear, night disappears 
 and morn begins to dawn. The pleased traveller 
 starts on his way, rejoicing in the prospect of daylight. 
 Undeceive yourself, traveller ! The shadows fall afresh 
 — it was the Aurora-BoreaUs ; and what you took for 
 the first rays of the rising sun were but the fleeting 
 meteors of the frigid zone. . . . 
 
347 
 
 CHAPTEE Vir. 
 
 DIGITUS DEI. 
 
 I. 
 
 Twenty years have passed away. 
 
 Since the day of my cure by Our Lady of Lourdes, 
 my sight has never ceased to be excellent. Since the 
 last time I anointed them with the oil from before the 
 Sacred Face during the prayer of M. Dupont, the alarm- 
 ing threat that for a brief period had weighed down my 
 eyelids has entirely disappeared, and I have never 
 had any return of it. Neither assiduous reading, nor 
 the volumes I have written, nor the artificial light of 
 lamps or candles, nor the dazzling rays of the sun have 
 ever fatigued my eyes. Miraculously restored to their 
 natural condition they have since followed the ordinary 
 and regular course of all things relating to the human 
 organization. When I had reached my fiftieth year, 
 and had entered my second half-century, I could see at 
 a distance better than before, but not quite so well 
 close to : therefore, like most people of my age, I took to 
 wearing glasses for my literary work. In curing me by 
 a miracle the Blessed Virgin did not dispense me from 
 growing old. 
 
 Twenty years have passed away. And Time, raising 
 by degrees in his progress the thick veil which at first 
 
348 
 
 hid such and such lines in the divine plan, has replied 
 in a manner at once clear and enigmatic to the ques- 
 tions I had so often asked myself. 
 
 In the supernatural event of which the history has 
 just been read, four men, seemingly taken at hazard in 
 the crowd, had unexpectedly been brought together — four 
 men having each his personal part and special share — 
 four men placed in order, so to speak, to be the instru- 
 ments of God's power and the successive witnesses of 
 His intervention. The reader is acquainted with 
 them. 
 
 The first was myself — the object of the Miracle ; 
 
 The second was the protestant — Charles de Preyoinet; 
 
 The third was the Pole — ^Wladimir ; 
 
 The fourth was M. Dupont. 
 
 Why, Heavenly Father, did You choose those four 
 individualities ? Why did You associate and group 
 them for a moment around the Miracle accomphshed 
 by Our Lady of Lourdes, and then let them separate 
 afterwards to follow their different paths ? . . . . 
 
 In the silence of my heart, I wait and watch. 
 
 St, •y, jif -•jf- ^ ■jig- 
 
 Twenty years have passed away. What has become, 
 Lord, of the most unworthy of those four witnesses of 
 the Miracle ? What has become of him whose diseased 
 eyes and lost sight were restored by the all-powerful 
 compassion of Your Immaculate Mother ? 
 
 He who was cured, Henri Lasserre, has become the 
 historian of Our Lady of Lourdes, and You have so 
 amply blessed the humble book — the ex-voto of his 
 gratitude — that it decided Eome — silent till then — 
 to proclaim "the luminous evidence of the Apparitions of 
 
349 
 
 Mary," and the infallible Chief of the Church, investing 
 with his solemn approbation the work of an unknown 
 author, hailed its publication in these terms : — " We 
 believe that SHE, who hy the miracles of her power and 
 goodness draws from all parts multitudes of pilgrims to 
 her sanctuary, will also make use oe this book to 
 
 PROPAGATE PIETY AND CONEIDENCE STILL MOKE WIDELY 
 AMONGST MEN and ATTRACT THEIR HEARTS TOWARDS HER, 
 
 SO that all may participate in the plenitude of her 
 graces."* And in conformity with his prophetic words, 
 the editions have, in fact, been multiplied in a propor- 
 tion and with a rapidity out of all comparison with ordi- 
 nary human success. The book has penetrated every- 
 where, among all classes, the rich, the poor, the faithful, 
 and the unbeliever ; even into the churches, where it 
 has been publicly read in the pulpits of innumerable 
 parishes, in the form of a Month of Mary ; it has been 
 spontaneously translated into every language, English, 
 German, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Flemish, Dutch, 
 Breton, Polish, Hungarian, Slavonic ; even into the 
 Eastern dialects, Chinese and Tamoul; it has been printed 
 and reprinted in Paris, London, Madrid, Barcelona, Lisbon, 
 Amsterdam, Ghent, Luxembourg, Fribourg in Brisgau, 
 Trent, Modena, Buda-Pesth, Warsaw, Laybach, New 
 York, Bogota, Eio-Janiero, Pondichery, and Chang-Hai. 
 The book, as popular in America as in the Old Continent, 
 has penetrated into every country, and, by the grace 
 of God, accomplishes its apostolic work, repeating, in 
 the name of the Queen of Heaven, the echo of our Lord's 
 words : "Come unto Me, all you that labour and are bur- 
 
 * See Appendix, Note VI., the Latin text and ti-anslation of the 
 Brief of His Holiness. 
 
350 
 
 dened, and I will refresh you". And nations, moved by 
 the reading of that simple history of the Apparitions and 
 Miracles, have hastened to send pilgrimages from all 
 parts of the world, to the Grotto of Lourdes. A magni- 
 ficent Basilica has been raised by the gold of the 
 universe and dedicated to Our Lady of Lourdes, and 
 beneath its shadow, in that land of marvels, thousands 
 of wonders have been accomplished. 
 
 Thus, from an imperceptible seed that a child's hand 
 drops into the earth, You raise, O Father of Love, a 
 stately tree, in whose branches myriads of birds find 
 shelter, and beneath whose shade generations to come 
 shall seek coolness and repose. Non nobis, Domine, sed 
 nomini tuo de gloriam. 
 
 Such has been the mission to which, notwithstanding 
 his defects and shortcomings. You have deigned to call 
 him who was the Object and consequently the first 
 Witness of the miraculous act. 
 
 ****** 
 
 Twenty years have passed. What has become. 
 Lord, of the second Witness, whom it pleased You 
 then to employ as the conscient instrument and direct 
 cause of the Miracle; of him whose urgent initiative, 
 and earnest persuasion forced me, so to speak, to have 
 recourse to Our Lady of Lourdes ; of him whose hand, 
 at my dictation, traced the letter to the Cur^.Peyramale, 
 that letter requesting a small quantity of the miraculous 
 water, and so singularly dated, the 2nd October, 1862 — 
 Feast of the Holy Guardian Angels ? 
 
 Charles de Freycinet has been carried by the whirl- 
 wind of Eevolutionary storm to the highest functions of 
 the state in the tempestuous government of France ; 
 
351 
 
 first as Delegate of War, then Minister of Public Works, 
 Minister of Foreign Affairs and President of the Council. 
 Such has been the remarkable destiny of the second 
 Witness of the Miracle. 
 
 Oh ! what tumultuous and agitated thoughts crowd in 
 my mind, what questions arise as I compare certain 
 important facts of contemporary history with the 
 memories I have just evoked!- But an imperative 
 reserve, easily understood, checks all reflection on my 
 lips. He alone is the Judge, who, knowing the final 
 destiny of men, and the ultimate consequences of 
 earthly things, rules and regulates aU to His own glory. 
 To borrow the very expressions of my early friend, 
 Freycinet himself, I exclaim ; " There is in all this such 
 an uniformity of coincidence that, in considering it, one 
 is almost prompted to recognize the workings of some 
 superior power, and listen without surprise when pious 
 souls exclaim : Digitus Dei est hid " * 
 
 if^ 7^ yp y^ yp tp 
 
 Twenty years have passed away. What has be- 
 come, Lord, of the third witness ; he who was the 
 unconscious yet decisive cause of my supernatural cure? 
 Of the young Slav whose rapid passage through my 
 native land called me to Paris on the day fixed, and 
 
 * It is in his work on the war of 1870, that M. de Freycinet wrote 
 the lines to which I refer. They are as follows : — '' A succession of 
 unfortunate coincidences was added to the organic weakness of France 
 and frustrated all her efiForts. And that wniformity was such, that 
 really in cimsidering it one is prompted to enquire if it has not been guided 
 iy some power superior to that of physical causes ; a sort of expiation of 
 national sins, or the relentless goad urging on to an indispensable effort. 
 In the face of such immense misfortunes it is not surprising that pious 
 souls should exclaim : " Digitus Dei est hie ! " (Charles de Freycinet, 
 La Querre en Province, p. 350-351.) 
 
352 
 
 whose providential absence from the hotel Eadstadt 
 decided me to go, in the belief that I was acting of 
 myself, towards the house where I was to find Freycinet, 
 and where Your grace was invisibly awaiting me? 
 What has become of that friend of the past, who 
 then wrote me the hurried letter of which the fac-simUe 
 has already been given, with the Post Ofi&ce stamp, 
 marking the year, the month, the day of that same Feast 
 of the Holy Guardian Angels ? The noble Pole has 
 abandoned the life of the layman and taken holy 
 orders. And at the time when Charles de Freycinet 
 was Minister of Foreign Affairs and President of the 
 Council of France, Count Wladimir Czacki, Eoman 
 Prelate, and Archbishop of Salamis arrived in France as 
 the Pope's Nuncio. After which, rising stiQ higher, he 
 took his seat as Cardinal of Holy Church, on the steps 
 of the Pontifical throne. There, on the supreme heights 
 of ecclesiastic hierarchy, we find the third witness and 
 instrument of the miracle accomplished by Our Lady of 
 Lourdes on the man who was to be her historian. 
 m * * * * * 
 
 Twenty years have passed away. What have You 
 done, Lord, with the fourth witness and last instru- 
 ment of the supernatural action ? with that saintly old 
 man of the town of Tours who, by anointing my eyes 
 and praying before the Sacred Face of the Crucified, 
 obtained my deliverance from all threat of relapse, and 
 so mingled with the benefit of the Blessed Virgin, and 
 the events which had marked it, the direct sanction of 
 Jesus Christ ? To that one, Lord, You have assigned 
 a place far higher than all the seats of honour in this 
 mortal world ; higher than the Benches of Prime 
 
353 
 
 Ministers or the thrones of the Princes of the Church. 
 Hardly had M. Dupont fallen asleep in the peace of 
 the just, when the voice of the people was heard saying, 
 " A Blessed One has ascended into heaven ! " 
 
 The Archbishop of Tours has proclaimed the glory of 
 the Servant of God, "who died," says the episcopal 
 ordinance, " in the odour of sanctity ". The house filled 
 with his memory has been transformed into a sanctuary, 
 and it is said that Eome is about to introduce the cause 
 of his Beatification. Such was the glorious end of the 
 fourth witness of the Miracle. 
 
 Lord, Lord, why in the mysterious economy of Your 
 unfathomable designs have You placed these four men 
 side by side ; the first, future historian of Our Lady of 
 Lourdes ; the second, future Minister of France and 
 President of the Council ; the third, future Nuncio and 
 Cardinal; the fourth, a future Saint? A quadruple 
 coincidence such as chance could never have produced. 
 
 For what purpose was Your finger mysteriously laid 
 on those four persons at the time of the Miracle? 
 What is the meaning of those four names being thus 
 associated with the History of Our Lady of Lourdes, 
 and henceforth engraved in its very foundations and 
 comer-stone ? 
 
 IL 
 
 Sometimes, in crossing the deserts of Egypt, the 
 explorer perceives on the pedestal of an obelisk or 
 the base of a pyramid certain hieroglyphic signs as 
 distinctly traced in the granite, after a lapse of three 
 
 23 
 
354 
 
 thousand years, as if the engraver had just finished 
 them that moriiing. He stops astonished and thought- 
 ful. On one hand those characters prove that at some 
 distant time a man had been employed in carefully and 
 mathematically forming their curves and angles; on the 
 other, the very thoughts they express escape his investi- 
 gation. The -words, so clear in their outline, are in an 
 unknown writing and an unknown tongue. They remain 
 an unfathomable mystery. 
 
 Thus do I contemplate with admiration the evident 
 signs of the Omnipotent hand ; and thus, at the same 
 time, do I vainly seek to penetrate more deeply into 
 the intentions of the Almighty. The mystic hieroglyphic 
 has not yet revealed its secret to my baffled gaze. 
 
 But in proportion as I discerned the amazing inten- 
 tions of Sovereign Wisdom ; in proportion as I saw the 
 book written by my unworthy pen scattered abroad in 
 all nations like an apostolic seed; in proportion as those 
 four names emerged from obscurity one after another ; 
 in proportion as all relating to that supernatural history 
 was brought into ever-increasing relief, and providential 
 colouring, I felt myself disappearing in the consciousness 
 of my own misery, insignificance, and nothingness. 
 
 Minute and helpless grain of dust, carried hither and 
 thither without knowing whither I go, or what I do, 
 and hardly what I want; drifted about at the will 
 of heaven in the formidable whirlwind of the divine 
 labour, I have ever felt, and I still feel at every hour, 
 an indescribable religious terror before such manifest 
 signs. What am I, and who am I ? How well I 
 understand Simon Peter's cry of alarm, " Depart from 
 me for I am a sinful man, Lord ! " What have 
 
355 
 
 I done, alas ! with the many graces I have received ? 
 and what shall I answer when You say to me, " What ! 
 you were employed to convert others, and you yourself 
 are still unregenerate ; to bring back many wandering 
 souls into the way of holiness, and you have not yet 
 entered therein ?'• . . . Mary, Our Lady of 
 Lourdes, 0, Mother, save me in that terrible moment ! 
 
 Yes, I feel crushed beneath the weight of my responsi- 
 bility before my Judge; and often, when perhaps others 
 are envying me, in my turn I envy the obscure peasant 
 ploughing underneath my window, for he will only 
 have to give account of the progress of his plough, and 
 the line of his furrow. But, at the same time, if these 
 indications of a superior action on my person and my 
 work, fill me, as a man, with a terror readily under- 
 stood ; on the other hand, they console me as historian 
 of Our Lady of Lourdes, and maintain me in profound 
 peace notwithstanding the attacks of which I may be 
 the object, notwithstanding pubhc or dissimulated 
 calumnies, and no matter who or what the calum- 
 niators. 
 
 When, in spite of myself, my soul trembles with 
 indignation, the heavenly voice of Our Lady of Lourdes 
 whispers in my ear : — 
 
 " Be not troubled, neither be afraid. You have none 
 to fear but yourself, your own extreme frailty, your 
 passions and temptations. See how I have guided you 
 and led you by the hand. Eemember the miraculous 
 cure of your eyes which was my first call to you, to 
 induce you to write this History of my Apparitions and 
 benefactions. And see how I have blessed it. Eecognise 
 the finger of God in the choice of the men He employed 
 
356 
 
 as His instruments. Consider the summits on which 
 it has pleased Him to place them, so that without 
 any possibility of contradiction you can produce them 
 in testimony to the unbelieving world, to Christian 
 sacerdoce and to the whole Church. Publish all these 
 things in the face of day, that all upright hearts may 
 perceive in their marvellous harmonies the intervention 
 of the Holy Angels and the guidance of the Lord. 
 Those who deny and insult, deliberately and obstinately, 
 win continue to insult and deny for their greater con- 
 demnation. Those who are sincere but wandering will 
 return to the fold." 
 
 Wherefore we have thought it our duty to break 
 silence and throw a light on certain unknown details 
 which formerly appeared in our eyes of no value ; but 
 of which successive events have taught us the im- 
 portance. ^ 
 
 III. 
 
 We shall perhaps relate, some day, the new calls by 
 which Our Lady of Lourdes incited us, notwithstanding 
 our resistance, to fulfil our mission of historian; the 
 obstacles suscitated by the Evil One, the blessings and 
 the trials, the sympathy and the enmity which accom- 
 panied, followed and still follow, the accomplishment of 
 that work. And then, the reader also discerning in a 
 no less manifest manner the secret action of Providence, 
 may recall to mind Bossuet's grand words : " Man moves, 
 but God leads him ". 
 
APPENDIX AND PEOOFS. 
 
APPENDIX AND PKOOFS. 
 
 NOTE I. 
 (Page 130.) 
 
 "I, the undersigned, declare that for about thirty years M. 
 Macary (Fran9ois), joiner, has beenjsuffering from varicose veins 
 in the legs. The varices, which were of the thickness of a fmger, 
 were complicated with knotty flexions cords strongly developed, and 
 required to be methodically compressed, up to the present, by the 
 help of bandages and dog-skin gaiters. But notwithstanding 
 these precautions ulcerations were frequent in both legs, and 
 necessitated, whenever they appeared, absolute repose and a long 
 and careful treatment. I have examined him to-day, and, al- 
 though his lower members were free from all dressing or 
 bandages, I could only perceive some few traces of his enormous 
 varices. 
 
 "This case of spontcmeons cure appears to me all the more 
 surprising that the annals of science make no mention of any 
 
 fact of a similar nature. 
 
 " Sj^que, 
 
 "Consulting Physiciam of the Mutual Aid 
 
 Society of Samt Louis. 
 
 "Lavaite, 16th August, 1871." 
 
 "I, the undersigned, certify that for about thirty years M. 
 Macary, joiner at Lavaur, has suffered from varices in the legs, 
 accompanied with enormous nodosities and frequently compli- 
 
360 
 
 / 
 cated by large ulcers, notwithstanding a constant compression by/ 
 suitable bandages or gaiters. That now those varices havf 
 suddenly disa/ppewred, leaving no other trace of their presence tha4 
 a nodosity, sensibly diminished, on the. inner and upper part of 
 the right leg. 
 
 " EOSSIGNOL, M.D. 
 "Lavaue, S5th August, 1871." 
 
 "Macary (Frangois), sixty years of age, joiner at Lavaur, 
 member of the Society of Saiat Louis, consulted us about twenty 
 years ago, for varices situated in the poplited hollow and the 
 inner part of the left knee and leg. A varicose ulcer was then 
 observed in the lower part of the leg, with callous edges, and 
 considerable obstruction ; it was also most painful to the touch. 
 There existed besides, outside and inside the upper part of the 
 calf, two large scars, in no way connected with the affection we 
 are treating of at present, but resulting from a gun-shot received 
 by the , patient twenty years previously. The veins were so. 
 numerous, and dilated to such an extent, that, iti our opinion, the 
 surgical means usually adopted in such cases were quite out of 
 the question. 
 
 "Macary seemed to us condemned to a life-long infirmity, 
 and we could only prescribe palliative remedies such as had 
 already been recommended by several of our colleagues. 
 
 " Eighteen years later, that is, two years ago, Macary came to 
 consult us again. The already bad state of his leg had become 
 much worse. We were confirmed in our first opinion, and we 
 assured him that if he wished the ulcer to cicatrise he must 
 submit to a prolonged and absolute period of rest in bed, and a 
 course of regular dressings. 
 
 "To-day, 15th August, 1871, Macary has presented himself 
 for the third time. The ulcer is perfectly cicatrised. The leg is 
 not compressed in any apparatus, and yet there does not exist a 
 shadow of obstruction. What particularly strikes us is that the 
 va/rieose lumps have entirely disappeared; and that in their place 
 nothing is perceptible to the touch but small, hard cords, void of 
 blood and rolling under the finger. Tlie inner saphena vein is of 
 
361 
 
 the usual volume, and follows its regular course. The most atten- 
 tive examination has not resulted in the discovery of any trace of 
 a surgical operation. 
 
 "According to Macary's account, this radical cure has been 
 produced in the space of one night, and under the unique 
 influence of the application of compresses of water taken from 
 the spring in the Grotto of Lourdes. Whence we conclude, that, 
 putting Macary's account out of the question, science is powerless 
 to explain the fact ; for no author has ever quoted amy simdlajr or 
 analogous observation. Doctors are all agreed on one point, 
 namely: that neglected varices a/re incurahle, that they cannot he 
 cured by palliative treatment, and still less are they cured spon- 
 taneously, on the contrary, they continue to get worse and worse ; and 
 in short, a radical cure cannot be hoped for, even by the patient 
 running serious risks, without surgical aid. Thus, even if the 
 facts attested by Macary were not proved by authentic witnesses, 
 besides himself, it would be none the less for us a most extra- ■ 
 ordinary and, to speak frankly, a supernatural event. In 
 testimony of which we sign the present statement. 
 
 " Bernet, 
 "M.D. of the Faculty of Paris. 
 
 " Lavaub, 15th August, 1871. 
 
 " Seen, for the legalisation of the above signatures. 
 
 " The Mayor : Et. de Voisin. 
 " Lavaur, 3rd September, 1871. 
 
 "Seen, for legalisation of the signature of M. Etienne de 
 Voisin-Laverniere, Mayor of Lavaur, hereto set. 
 
 "The Sous-Prbpet: CelliIires. 
 " Lavaur, 4ih September, 1871." 
 
 NOTE II. 
 (Page 196.) 
 
 The rustic Rotunda now no longer exists (1883). 
 For such of our readers as had not visited Lourdes at that time, 
 we will explain that the rustic Rotunda, covered with thatch. 
 
362 
 
 like the Swiss cottages of Versailles and Trianon, was a gratuitous 
 shelter for pilgrims, with marble tables for their meals and a 
 supply of water. It could contain an entire pilgrimage of about 
 seven hundred persons, and was founded by the Donor, as a per- 
 petual testimonial of his gratitude to Our Lady of Lourdes. It 
 ■was established in 1872, during the episcopate of Mgr. Pichenot, 
 and presented to the mission of the Grotto, with the condition 
 that they should keep it in repair. In 1877, under the direction 
 of Father Sempi, and during the episcopate of Mgr. Jourdan, it 
 was destroyed to make way for extensive and handsome buildings, 
 stiU in course of construction, which completely change the primi- 
 tive aspect of the place where the Blessed Virgin appeared. 
 
 NOTE III. 
 (Page 221.) 
 
 It is necessary here to recall, in the interests of historical pre- 
 cision, that the Bishops' Cottage in question is not the actual 
 Episcopal Palace erected on the plateau des EspSlugues, in 1874, 
 with the funds of the Pilgrimage, during Mgr. Lang§nieiix's 
 brief passage in the diocese of Tarbes. 
 
 The " Bishops' Cottage " was situated at about two hundred 
 metres from the Grotto, in the field of Savy, between the Gave 
 and the brook (now turned aside and filled up) that Bemadette 
 crossed at the time of the first Apparition. Wishing that the 
 good works they had accomplished during their lives might sur- 
 vive them, those noble and pious Christian ladies of Lyons, Mes- 
 demoiselles de Lacour, who had already presented the statue of 
 the Grotto, caused the graceful building to be erected, and sur- 
 rounded it with a large garden, fine trees, and sparkling fountains. 
 All this was done under the direction of the Cur6 Peyramale, 
 whom they profoundly venerated. After having built and com- 
 pletely furnished the villa, MesdemoiseUes de Lacour made a 
 gift of it, by notarial act, dated the 29th March, 1868, for the 
 residence, near the Grotto, of the Bishops of Tarbes. Mgr. 
 Laurence and Mgr. Pichenot stayed in the Bishops' Cottage, and 
 
363 
 
 for many years it was the residence of the prelates of every 
 country, when they came on pilgrimage to the Fountain of 
 Miracles. Mesdemoiselles de Lacoxir were thus the first bene- 
 factresses of the work, and their names should be engraved in 
 letters of gold in the annals of the Pilgrimage. 
 
 That Foimdation, which had cost the generous donors forty 
 thousand francs, exists no longer. In 1878, about a year after 
 the death of Mgr. Peyramale, it was destroyed under the adminis- 
 tration of the R. F. Sempe, to make way for certain works of 
 transformation undertaken by Mgr. Lamgenieux, and continued 
 under Mgr. Jourdan, his successor. The stones, ready prepared, 
 were used to build, at the corner of the old and new roads, 
 near the square where the horses and carriages stand, a house 
 of similar appearance, occupied at present by a retired tradesman, 
 M. Berger, and a rich widow of Lourdes, Mme. Lacrampe. . . . 
 
 The disappearance of the Foundation of Mesdemoiselles de 
 Lacour imposes on us here the duty of mentioning their signal 
 good work, and rendering, in passing, a pious tribute of respect 
 to their memories. 
 
 NOTE IV. 
 (Page 228.) 
 
 Although, according to our opinion, the miraculous character 
 of an event is proved rather by the circumstances under which 
 it takes place, than by medical certificates ; although, in such 
 cases, we admit no other judgments than that of the Church, we 
 should consider ourselves wanting in respect to Science, and we 
 should be suppressing important documents, if we did not here 
 insert, as proofs, the formal declarations of Doctor Lagoutte, of 
 Autun, and Doctor Mangin, of Baccarat. We will begin by Dr. 
 Lagoutte : — 
 
 " I, the undersigned. Doctor of Medicine, dwelling at Autun 
 <Sa6ne-et-Loire), certify that Mile, de Fontenay (Jeanne-Marie), 
 who has been ill for a very long time, has of late years consulted 
 Drs. Courty, at Montpellier ; Bennet, at Cannes; Bouchacourt, 
 
364 
 
 at Lyons ; and has been attended by them ; that they have all 
 declared her to be suffering from a uterine aflfection, resulting 
 in a nervous condition, characterised by great debility and 
 acute pain whenever she tried to make any sustained use of her 
 limbs ; from which cause, walking had become almost an im- 
 possibility ; that since her pilgrimage to Lourdes, in the month 
 of August last, Mile, de Fontenay has recovered her health, 
 completely aiid, instantaneously, and that she can now use her limbs 
 freely and without pam. 
 
 " Dr. Lagoutte. 
 " AuTUN, Slst January, 1875." 
 
 Here, now, is Dr Mangin's declaration. We beg the reader at- 
 tentively to weigh the terms (so conclusive beneath the doctor's 
 pen) that are printed in italics. 
 
 " I, the undersigned, Joseph- Auguste Mangin, Doctor of Medi- 
 cine, domiciled at Baccarat, certify that for many years I attended 
 Mile. Jeanne-Marie de Fontenay, during her residence at Bac- 
 carat (she is at present living at Autun), for frequent indispositions, 
 from which she suffered at fixed times, and which, after many 
 years of acute suffering, resulted in a serious and alarming ktate of 
 health. 
 
 " She then consulted several celebrated doctors of the faculties 
 of Strasbourg and Paris, and lastly, Dr. Courty of Montpellier. 
 The latter, after a careful examination, acquired the certainty of 
 an organic lesion of the interior viscerce, which necessitated a pain- 
 ful treatment and several operations. This aflfection must evi- 
 dently be considered as the beginning of aU the nervous 
 phenomena experienced by the patient, including the weakness 
 of the lower members, which, for a long time, had rendered it 
 impossible for her to walk, and had obliged her to keep her room, 
 extended on a sofa or in bed. After having followed, without any 
 apparent amelioration, different medical and surgical treatments, 
 despairing of being cured, and animated by a lively faith and an 
 absolute confidence in the help from On High, she undertook a 
 pilgrimage to Lourdes, and there, in the presence of a great 
 number of witnesses, she was, on the IBth August, of the year 
 of grace 18'74, instantaneously cured. 
 
365 
 
 " This sudden, unusual, and-unexpected cure is, in my opinion, an 
 event positively marvellous, and extraordinary. There is in it a 
 Quid divinvm — a supernatural, visible, cmd vncontestihle interven- 
 tion, that confounds reason, and vanquishes the obstinacy of incredu- 
 lity. For nature does not generally proceed in this manner, but 
 always operates by slow degrees. 
 
 " At Lourdes, and contrary to all prevision, that which doctors 
 had not been able to accomplish after years of trial, was done in an 
 instant. 
 
 " Given at Baccarat, the 16th December, 1874. 
 
 "A. Mangin." 
 
 NOTE V. 
 (Page 280.) 
 
 I. 
 
 The facts contained in the narrative entitled " The Noveno of 
 the Cure of Algiers," and of which the rigorous exactitude has 
 been affirmed by the letter of M. and Mme. Guerrier, given in 
 page 229, are fully borne out : — 
 
 (1.) As to Mme. Guerrier's state of ill-health and as to all that 
 passed at Saint-Gobain : — by M. Biver, the father, doctor of medi- 
 cine ; — M. Hector Biver, Director-general of the Manufactory of 
 Looking-glasses at Saint-Gobain ; — M. Alfred Biver, Director of 
 the Manufactory of Looking-glasses at Saint-Gobain ; — M. Louis 
 Bonnel, professor at the Lyceum of Versailles ; — the Abbe Poin- 
 dron, Cure of Saint-Gobain ; — M. Danre, druggist in the same 
 town ; — and M. Viennot, formerly clerk at the War Office ; who 
 all at the same time depose that Mme. Guerrier returned from 
 Lourdes completely cured. 
 
 (2.) As to the fact of the sudden cure accomplished the leth of 
 September at the sanctuary of Lourdes, in the Chapel of Sainte 
 Germaine-Cousin, at the last mass of the Noveno of the Abbe 
 Martignon, and as to the different details of all that passed at 
 Lourdes : — by the K. F. Thuet, missionary of the Holy Spirit, at 
 
366 
 
 present (1877) at the House at Bordeaux, rue Parmentade, 65, 
 wlio served the Abb§ Martignon's mass ; — by M. Lavigne, collector 
 of the excise revenue at Lourdes ; by Mme. Detroyat ; by the 
 Rev. Edwards, Priory of Saint Augustin, Newton,. Devonshire 
 (England) ; and by the Baron and Baroness de Eerussac, rue 
 d'Anjou, 3, Versailles, who were at Lourdes at that time. 
 
 (3.) As to Mme. Guerrier's state of ill-health, previous to her 
 stay at Saint-Gobain, and as to all that passed at Beaune : — by 
 the same members of her family as had seen her at Saint-Gobain ; 
 and, besides : by MM. Leboeuf, Oure-archpriest of Notre-Dame 
 of Beaune ; — Bouhey, curate ; — Monmont, Procureur of the Re- 
 public ; — Noirot, honorary judge ; — A. Larcher, juge d! instruction; 
 — L. Lagarde, retired recorder, and assistant Justice of the 
 Peace ; — Henri Morelot, etc., who at the same time bear witness 
 to her present state of perfect health. 
 
 II. 
 
 Although it was extremely painful to the Abbe Martignon to 
 give an account of an event in which he had accomplished an 
 act of self-sacrifice that he would have wished to keep inviolably 
 secret, he still considered it his duty, at Mme. Guerrier's formal 
 request, to address to the R. P. SempI, Superior of the Mission- 
 aries of Our Lady of Lourdes, a brief notice of what had hap- 
 pened. He wrote it with great exactness, but it was clear that 
 he took pains to keep in the background whatever could be 
 turned to his own praise. As to the striking and characteristic 
 details of the chapel where the miracle took place, they can be 
 verified by anyone and everyone, for this sacred remembrance 
 will doubtless render them henceforth inviolable to change. 
 
 We here give the report that Mme. Guerrier has lent us and 
 from which, as the reader will perceive, we have borrowed a good 
 many textual details. 
 
 " Lourdes, 19th September, 1877. 
 
 "Reveeend Eather, 
 
 " Mme. Guerrier requests me to help her Id the narra- 
 tive you wish her to give you of the principal circumstances of 
 her illness and miraculous cure, by acquainting you precisely, in 
 what way and to what extent the name and thought of Mgr. 
 
367 
 
 Peyramale were mixed with that happy event. I consent all the 
 more willingly to her request as, in that respect especially, it is 
 desirable that the exact value and real character of the fact should 
 be maintained. 
 
 " For a long time I had resolved to make a fresh Noveno to 
 obtain the recovery of my voice. I had fixed on the Feast of 
 Our Lady of Seven Dolours as the term of it ; not being then 
 aware that, through its being a movable Feast, the first day of the 
 Noveno would coincide this year with the Nativity of the Blessed 
 Virgin. When Mgr. Peyramale died, I had the idea, which I 
 communicated to several friends, of beginning my Noveno beside 
 the sacred remains of that great Servant of Mary, and of asking 
 Our Lady of Lourdes to permit that, on the ninth day, he should 
 transmit me the answer himself in the name of her who was so 
 justly called his heavenly parishioner. 
 
 " The choice made by Almighty God of the 8th of September 
 as the day on which He took to Himself the venerable Curi was 
 a sufficient authorisation for me to associate his memory with 
 my humble supplications. On Friday the 14th, I received, as 
 also did you, Reverend Father, a letter from the Abbe Poindron, 
 CurS of Saint-Gobain. He urgently recommended to my care 
 M. Guerrier, Justice of Peace at Beaune, and his wife, who for 
 three long years had been suffering from a serious illness and 
 was coming to Lourdes to seek a cure that her boimdless confi- 
 dence made her sure of obtaining. 
 
 " On Saturday the 15th, I went to the station to meet them on 
 their arrival by the three o'clock train. Madame Guerrier had to 
 be carried from the train to the carriage by the railway porters, 
 who on that occasion, as always, were most delicately oblig- 
 ing and serviceable. The patient, being paralysed in all the 
 lower part of her body, could not make the slightest movement. 
 In this painful situation it was indispensable to find her a lodging 
 on a ground-floor. The excellent M. Lavigne came to our help 
 and extricated us from our difficulties by offering us the use of 
 his own drawing-room. Thus the two pilgrims, without suspect- 
 ing it, received the most cordial hospitality beneath the very roof 
 that had sheltered the good Cur§ of Lourdes at the time of the 
 Apparitions. 
 
368 
 
 " From the first moment I saw clearly, by the calm energy 
 with which Mme. Guerrier spoke of her cure, that her confidence 
 came from on high. 
 
 " I then told her of the conditions in which 1 had begun my 
 Noveno, asking her to join in it, and offering to substitute her 
 intentions for mme. After a short rest, we all three made a first 
 visit to the Grotto. All those who then saw the invalid carried 
 in her chair, remarked the almost ecstatic character of her prayer. 
 
 " On her return to the house she continued praying, mixing 
 with her devotions the memory of Mgr. Peyramale ; and she 
 continued to do so on the morrow at her waking. I had fixed 
 eight o'clock as the hour when I should sa/y the Mass for her, in 
 which I expressly reserved the Memento of the dead for him whom 
 we mourned. She arrived at the church, carried as usuaL 
 
 " For the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice I had given the pre- 
 ference to the chapel of Saint Germaine placed near the entrance 
 on the left of the Basilica. This precaution was rendered indis- 
 pensable by the crowd of pilgrims who encumbered the crypt and 
 the upper church. 
 
 " Mme. Guerrier heard Mass seated on her chair ; in that posi- 
 tion she also received Holy Communion. But hardly had the Host 
 been placed on her lips when she felt herself, as she told us 
 afterwards, urged to kneel down. Yielding to the secret impul- 
 sion she rose and knelt down without any difficulty. Her husband 
 who had just communicated at her side looked at her with tears 
 in his eyes, not daring to speak to her. After Mass her thanks- 
 givings lasted some time before those near her felt convinced of 
 the certainty of the Miracle. 
 
 " It was, however, necessary to leave the church. In a 
 moment of bewilderment easily imderstood, M. Guerrier turned 
 to call the porters. " Wait a moment," I said to him, " let her 
 walk." And she set off with perfect liberty of movement and 
 like a person who had never suffered in her legs. She went 
 down to the Grotto by the winding paths, leaning on her husband's 
 arm. There she knelt without help, and after praying a few 
 moments went and bathed in the Piscina, where she left what 
 little stiffness remained ia her joints. She returned to Lourdes, 
 walking most of the way that separates the town from the Grotto. 
 
369 
 
 Her first care was to go and pray at the tomb of Mgr. Peyramale. 
 From that moment, Eeverend Father, as all have been able to 
 prove, the cure has been absolute, and it only remains to thank 
 Our Lady of Lourdes for it. 
 
 " Mme. Guerrier having expressed a wish to have a copy of 
 these lines, I have thought it my duty to accede to her desire. 
 
 " Receive, Eeverend Father, the assurance of my most respect- 
 fully devoted sentiments in Our Lord. 
 
 " M. Maetignon." 
 
 III. 
 
 In consequence of this report, and after the R. F. Sempe had 
 made himself acquainted with the facts by interrogating M. and 
 Mme. Guerrier, the Eeverend Fathers published the cure in the 
 number of the " Annals of Our Lady of Lourdes " of that same 
 month (30th September, 1877), and mentioned it in these terms : — 
 
 " Mme. Guerrier of Beaune (Cote-d'Or) had suffered for three 
 years from paralysis in the lower part of her body, caused by an 
 affection of the spinal marrow. She was carried to the Basilica, 
 where she heard Mass seated, and received Holy Communion in 
 the same posture. Immediately after communicating she rose 
 without help, and taking the arm of her husband, M. Guerrier, 
 Justice of the Peace at Beaime, she went down to the Grotto on 
 foot." 
 
 But through a mistake in the printing, the date indicated by 
 the Annals was the 18th instead of the 16th. That error, 
 rendered serious by the circumstances (since it is the date that so 
 powerfully contributes to give its true character to the event), 
 was rectified in the next number of a newspaper of Lourdes. 
 The real date had been, besides, printed, on the day itself, by 
 the same newspaper, and by the Semaine Utwgique de Marseille, 
 which, in the account given of the Marseilles pilgrimage, related 
 in two words how the wife of M. Guerrier, Justice of the Peace 
 at Beaune, had been miraculously cured on the Sunday, 16th 
 September, at a mass in the Basilica, and that the pilgrims of 
 Marseilles had seen her at the Grotto, walking like everyone 
 else, after having seen her the evening before carried in a chair 
 and placed before the statue of Mary. 
 
 24 
 
370 
 
 IV. 
 
 On hearing of the death of the Abbe Martignon (too late, 
 unfortunately, for him to arrive at Poitiers), M. Henri Lasserre 
 made it his duty immediately to communicate the event to the 
 family in whose favour that admirable priest had, eight months 
 previously, accomplished his heroic sacrifice. He received in 
 reply from M. Guerrier, a touching letter, of which the following 
 are a few extracts : — 
 
 "Dear Sir, 
 
 "I received your telegram yesterday informing 
 me of the death of our good and revered friend, the Abbe Mar- 
 tignon. I need not tell you that we were moved to the depths of 
 our hearts on receiving news for which nothing had prepared us. 
 We had heard from our excellent friend on the 14th of this 
 month. His letter, written with a firm hand, was like all those 
 which had preceded it, and perhaps even in a greater degree full 
 of delightful gaiety and warm, sincere affection ; he spoke in it of 
 you, and complained that he had not heard from you for some 
 time. He was going to write to you. How little we thought that 
 his time was so near. 
 
 "We mourn for him as for a benefactor who has left us, but 
 at the same time we rejoice in his happiness. . . . Is he not 
 gone to the eternal home where God rewards souls like his with 
 divine felicity ? Did he not love God above all else, and his 
 neighbour more than himself even, in his ardent charity, going 
 beyond the Divine precept? Mme. Guerrier and I can bear 
 witness to that, and never shall we forget it, as our prayers will 
 prove to him. 
 
 " It seems to us, since yesterday, that our sadness is tempered 
 by a sentiment of peace and joy similar to what is experienced . 
 by the certainty that one has another protector near the throne 
 of God and the Immaculate Mother ! He loved the Blessed 
 Virgin so much, and she gave such a special proof of her love 
 for him on the 16th September, 1877 ! She has opened the gates 
 of heaven to him in the month especially devoted to her. 
 
 " There is, however, one thing we regret. Canon Martignon 
 
371 
 
 is gone without leaving us a remembrance that I asked him for 
 in all my letters, and of which he never spoke in reply, evidently 
 not intending to comply with my request. 
 
 " We do not possess his portrait. "We could have wished to be 
 able to bequeath it to our children, that they might never forget 
 the features of him ly whose sacrifice their mother was cured. 
 Perhaps you have a photograph of him 1 Or you might know of 
 one that we could have reproduced 1 We would give anything 
 to have in one way or another a portrait of our dear Canon. 
 
 "Ed. Guerkiek. 
 "Bbatjnb, S8th May, 1878." 
 
 NOTE VI. 
 
 Text and translation of the Brief of His Holiness Pope Pius the 
 Ninth, relative to the Boole entitled " Our Lady of Lourdes ". 
 
 DiLECTo FiLio Henrico Lasserre. 
 
 " Dilecte fill, Salutem et Apostolicam Benedictionem. 
 
 " Gratulamur, .tibi, Dilecte Fili, quod, insigni auctus bene- 
 ficio, votum tuiun accuratissimo studio diligentiaque exsolveris, et 
 novam clementissimse Dei Matris Apparitionem ita testatam faoere 
 curaveris, ut oonflictu ipso humanae malitiae cum coelesti miseri- 
 cordia claritas eventus firmior ac luculentior appareret. 
 
 " Omnes certe in proposita a te rerum serie perspicere poterunt: 
 Eeligionem nostram sanctissimam vergere in veram popoporum 
 utiUtatem ; confluentes ad se omnes supernis juxta et terrenis 
 cumulare beneficiis ; aptissimam esse ordini servando, vi etiam 
 submota, concitatos in turbis animorum motus, licet justos, 
 compescere ; iisque rebus sedulo adlaboiare Olerum, eumque adeo 
 abesse si superstitione fovenda ut imo segniorem se prasbeat ao 
 severiorem aliis omnibus in judicio edendo de factis, quse natures 
 vires excedere videntur. 
 
 "Nee minus aperte patebit, impietatem incassum indixisse 
 Religioni helium, et frustra maohinationes hominum divinse 
 
372 
 
 Providentiae consiliis obstare ; quae imo nequitia eorum et ausu 
 sic uti consuevit, ut majorem inde quserat operibus suLs splen- 
 dorem et virtutem. 
 
 " Libentissime propterea excepimus volumen tuum cutitulus 
 NoTEE Dame db Lourdes; fore fidentes, ut quas per niira 
 potentise ac benignitatis suae signa undique frequentissimo 
 advenas aocersit, scripto etiam tuo uti velit ad propagandam 
 latius fovendamque in se pietatem homiuum ac fiduciam, ut de 
 plenitudine gratias ejus omnes aocipere possint. 
 
 "Hujiis, quern ominamur, exitus labori tuo auspicem accipe 
 Benedictionem Apostolicam, quam tibi grati animi Nostri et 
 paternas benevolentise testem peramenter impertimus. 
 . "Datem Komae, apud S. Petrum, die 4 Septembris, 1869, 
 Pontiflcatus Nostri anno XXIV. 
 
 "Pius, Papa IX." 
 
 To His well-beloved Son, Henry Lasseebe, 
 PiDS IX., Pope. 
 
 " To our well-bdoved Son, greeting and apostolic benediction. 
 Receive our congratulations, very dear Son. You, who were" 
 formerly favoured by a signal benefit, now scrupulously and 
 lovingly accomplish the vow you then made ; you have taken 
 the utmost care to prove and establish the recent Apparitions of 
 the most clement Mother of God ; and that in such a manner 
 that the very struggle of human malice against divine mercy only 
 serves to bring into stronger and brighter relief the luminous 
 evidence of the fact. 
 
 " In your exposition of the events, and in their connection and 
 logical succession, all men may perceive with clearness and 
 certainty how our most holy Religion turns to their real advan- 
 tage ; how it lavishes on them, not only heavenly and spiritual 
 benefits, but also temporal and worldly advantages. They 
 will see how Religion, even in the absence of material strength, 
 is all-powerful in maintaining order ; how, amidst excited mul- 
 titudes, its influence restrains within just limits the outbursts of 
 righteous indignation in the public mind. They will see, in 
 short, how the clergy co-operate by their zeal and loyal efforts 
 
373 
 
 in producing such results, and how, so far from favouring super- 
 stition, they are more circumspect and severe than the rest of the 
 world in giving judgment on facts that apparently surpass the 
 limits of natural power. 
 
 " Your narrative will throw an equally brilliant light on the 
 evident truth that in vain does impiety make war on Religion, 
 and in vain do the wicked strive to trammel, by human machina- 
 tions, the divine counsels of Providence. The perversity of men 
 and their criminal audacity serve, on the contrary, as means by 
 which Providence sheds greater power and splendour on its 
 works. 
 
 " Such are the reasons for which we receive with unfeigned 
 joy your book entitled. Our Lady of Louedes. We believe 
 that she, who by the miracles of her power and goodness, draws 
 from all parts multitudes of pilgrims to her sanctuary, wOl also 
 make use of this book to propagate piety and confidence still 
 more widely amongst men, and attract, their hearts towards her, 
 so that all may participate in the plenitude of her graces. As a 
 pledge of the success we predict for your work, receive Our Apos- 
 tolic Benediction which we send you most aflfectionatelj', in tes- 
 timony of our gratitude, and our paternal good wishes. 
 
 " Given at Rome, at Saint Peter's, the 4th September, 1869, 
 
 of our Pontificate the 24th year. 
 
 "Pius IX., Pope." 
 
 NOTE VII. 
 
 List op the different Languages into which the work, 
 
 OUR LADY OF LOURDBS, and its abridged form 
 
 The month of MARY of OUR LADY OF 
 
 LOURDES, HAS BEEN translated. 
 
 EUROPE. 
 
 England. 
 Our Lady of Lourdes, translated from the French of Henry 
 Lassbrre, by the Rev. F. Ignatius Sisk. London : Thomas 
 Richardson & Son. 
 
374 
 
 The Month op Mary of Oue Lady of Loukdes, by Heney 
 Lassekre, translated from the French by Mrs. Croziee. 
 London : Burns & Gates. 
 
 Germany. 
 
 Unseee liebb Feau von Lourdes, herausgegeben von Heineich 
 Lasseree, von M. Hoffmann. Freiburg in Breisgau, 
 herder' sche Verlagsbuchhandlung. 
 
 Maribn-Monat Unserer lieben Frau von Lourdes, von 
 Heineich Lasseree Mit Genehmignng des Verfassers in's 
 Deutsche iibersetzt. Luxemburg : Druck und Verlag von 
 Jacob Heintze. 
 
 Belgium. 
 
 O. L. Veouw van Lourdes, door Hbndeick Lasserre, Gent 
 (Gand). Boekdruklcerij van J. en H. Vander Schelden. 
 
 Brittany. 
 
 Miz Maei an iteon Vaeia Lourd, skrivet e gallek, Gant an 
 aotrou Herry Lasserre, Ha Lakeet e Brezonek dre he aotre 
 gant Anna a Jesus, leanez ar speret-santel. Brest : J. B. 
 Lefournier. Kemper : E. Ty. lann Salaun. 
 
 Spain. 
 
 NuESTRA SeSoea de Louedes, por Eneique Lasserre Traduc- 
 
 cion de D. Francisco Melgar. Madrid libreria de D. 
 
 Miguel Olamendi. 
 NuESTRA Senora DE LouRDES, por Eneique Lasserre. Paris : 
 
 Jouby y Roger, editores. 
 Mes de Maria de Neustra Sekoea de Lourdes con oraciones. 
 
 por Enrique Lasseehe. Paris : A. Jouby y Eoger, editores. 
 
 Holland. 
 (Low Dutch Language.) 
 
 Maand van Maria onze lievb Veouw van Lourdes, door 
 Hendrik Lasserre. Mei vergunning van den Schrijver 
 vertaald door Vanwersch, S. J.— Amsterdam, J. Beerendonk. 
 
375 
 
 Hdngaey. 
 
 Fkanciaoeszag Lourdesi Kegyhelye, irta Lassere Heneik, 
 utan. Talaber Janos. Buda— Pesth : Nyomatott a Hunyadi 
 Matyas Irodalmi Int^zetben. 
 
 Illyria. 
 (Slavonic Language.) 
 
 Ldrska Mati Bozja, francoski spisal Henrik Lassere ki je 
 zavoljo te knjige dobil pohvalo in blagoelov od svooe ta, 
 papeza Pija IX., poslovenil Frenjo Maresie. 
 
 Italy. 
 
 Nostra Signora di Lourdes, per Enrico Lasserre, versione 
 italiana per un Padre, D.C.D.G. Modena Typ. dell Imm. 
 Concezione. 
 
 Mese db Maria di Nostra Signora de Lotjrdes, con preg- 
 Mere durante la S. Mess., de Enrico Lasserre, versione 
 dal francese. Trento, Libreria di Eugenio Bernardi. 
 
 Poland. 
 
 MiESAc Maryi, Nabozbnstwo do matei boskibj z Lotjrdbs, 
 przez Henryka Lassbrre. Warszawa (Warsaw) : Nakladem 
 Ksiegarni Gebethnera i Wolflfa. 
 
 Portugal. 
 
 NossA Senhora de Lotjrdes, tradugao do francez de Henrique 
 Lasserre. Lisba (Lisbon), Typographia universal. 
 
 NORTH AND SOUTH AMERICA. 
 
 Two Translations for America and two for Spain have been 
 published in France with the authorisation of the Author : — 
 NuBSTRA Sbnora DE LouRDES, por Enriqub Lasberre, traduc- 
 
 cion hecha con autorizacion y bajo la direccion del autor. 
 
 Paris,/ouby y Roger, libreros-editores. 
 Mes db Maria db Nuestra SbSora db Lourdbs, con oraciones, 
 
 por Enrique Lasserrb. Paris, Jouby y Roger. 
 
376 
 
 Besides these Translations, the following have' appeared in 
 America : — 
 
 Chili. 
 
 NuESTRA Sehoea db Luedes, obra escrita en frances per 
 Enrique Lasseere, i traducida por Casanova i Errazuriz. 
 Imprenta del correo, Santiago de Chile. 
 
 Brasil. 
 
 Ndestra Senoka de Ldrdbs, por Enrique Lasseere, Kio-di- 
 Janeiro. 
 
 Republic of New Grenada. 
 
 Ndestra SeSioea de Lodrdes, por Enrique Lasserrb Bo- 
 gota. 
 
 United States. 
 
 Our Lady of Louedes, by Heney Lasseere, translated from 
 the French. New York :' D. & J. Saddler & Co. 
 
 This list, though numerous, is still incomplete. There exist, 
 besides those already noted, translations that we have been 
 unable to procure. Besides which, the printing characters for 
 the translations into oriental languages published at Pondichery 
 and Shanghai are wanting. 
 
 Most of these translations, like the original work, have passed 
 through several editions. Faith in Our Lady of Lourdes has 
 spread through the whole world, and has become one of the 
 treasures of the Church. 
 
 BURNS AND GATES, PRINTERS, LONDON. 
 
377 
 
 The following are the letters which serve as intro- 
 duction to " The Joinek of Lavaue," and were acci- 
 dentally overlooked in translating the book : — 
 
 "We, the undersigned : Charles Macart, joiner, son of 
 Fran9ois Macary ; Marie Bonapous (n^e Macary), his sister ; 
 P. BoNAPOTis, priest, professor at the Little Seminary, his 
 nephew ; having read the narrative entitled " The Joiner of 
 Lavaur," do hereby attest its absolute authenticity. The facts 
 are therein related precisely as Frangois Macary used to tell 
 them, — as we, the members of his family have witnessed them, 
 and as they are publicly known to all the town of Lavaur. , 
 
 C. Macart. 
 
 P. BONAFOUS. 
 
 Lavaur, 7th June, 1882. Marie Bonafous. 
 
 I, the undersigned, Curg-Archpriest at Lavaur, add my testi- 
 mony to that of the family Macary, in proof of the authenticity 
 of M. Henri Lasserre's narrative. 
 
 EoQUES, Cure-Archpriest of Lavaur. 
 
 Lavaur, 16th June, 1884. 
 
 Lagrave, 25th January, 1883. 
 To Monsieur Lassbrre. 
 Honoured Sir, 
 
 As you desire to have the witness of my testimony, 
 I send it you most willingly tmd with all my heart. Your 
 narrative is the truthful account of an event which will ever 
 remain one of the most cherished remembrances of my life as 
 a priest. You have made a really living portrait of Fran5ois 
 Macary. In reading the history I exclaimed, " It is himself ! his 
 ardent, figurative language ; his intelligent and energetic charac- 
 ter". ... I feel convinced that the pages you have devoted 
 to him will do good to those who may be fortunate enough to 
 read them, and that the Holy and Immaculate Virgin will re- 
 ward your eflforts. 
 
 Receive, Monsieur, the homage of my profound respect, 
 
 J. Coux, 
 Cur^ of Lagrave (diocese of AIM). 
 
BURNS AND GATES, 
 
 ^uUisiim to ffionttartora to 
 
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