Omaha Daily Bee Newspaper, April 22, 1894, Page 10

THE OMAHA DAILY BEE: SUNDAY, APRIL 22, 18941 -TWENTY PAGES — — — = - — e ———————————————————————— CHAPTER T—(Continued.) However, Plerre, who had been listening as well as Marle, joined In the convers tion. He expressed his astonishment that the workwoman had not applied for charity on behalf of her little sick one. The Asso- clation of Notre Dame de Salut had been founded by the Augustine Fathers of the As- sumption after the war, with the object of Inboring for the welfare of Franco and the defence of the church by means of prayer in common and works of charity, and it was they who, promoting the demonstrations of great pilgrimages, had specially founded and unceasingly enlarged for twenty years the national pilgrimage which went every year to Lourdes toward the end of August. A complete, effective organization had thus, lit- tle by little, been formed, offerings to a con- slderable amount received from all parts of the world, sick people enrolled In each par- ish and contracts made with the railroad compaines, without counting the very active | ald of the Little Sisters of the Assumption and tho establishment of the Refuge de Notre Dame de Salut—a vast afliation of devout ehergies, In which men and women, most of them belonging to good soclety, placed themselyes under the orders of the directors of the pilgrimage, cared for the eick, transported them and saw that every- thing was done according to discipl The sick had to make application in writing in order to obtain the right to charity which paid for them even the smallest expenses of the rallway journey and their stay at | Lourdes; they were taken from their homes and returned there; they had only to bring with them food for the time they were traveling. But the greatest number were recommended by priests or charitable per- sons, who took care that the application was in due form and that the necessary papers, evidences of identity and the physiclans’ certificates, were properly made out. When this was done, the sick had nothing more to trouble th s with—there remained | only their sad, suffering bodies and miracles, and these were in the brotherly hands of charttable men and women. “But, Madame,” Plerre explained, ‘y would fiave hud to apply only ro- the curc s your parish. That poorchild desorved cvery athy. She wi ¥ eel J Sympathy. | She would have been' lmmedi- “I dldn’t know, Abbe." Then what did you know *“Abbe, T bought a ticket at a place that ® woman In the neighborhood who reads the papers told me about.” She referred to tickets at a very low price | that were distributed to pligrims who were abla to)pay: pllgrims who were And Marie, who had been listening ' g, be- came affected by a feeling of great pity, mingled with a degree of shame. She. Who was not absolutely without resources. had succeeded in having herself taken fre While that poor mother and her sorrowful ' child, after Laving given up their little say- ngs, were left without a sou. But a heavier jolt of the car forced from her an exclamation of pain. O, father, I beg you raise me a little. I can't lie any longer.” And when M. de Guersaint put her In a sitting position she sighed deeply. They were at Etampes, one hour and a half's ride from Paris, and they were already be- glnning to get fatigued, with a hotter sun and the dust and noise. Mme. de Jon- | qulere rose from her seat In order to en- courage the young girl by saying a kind | word to her ‘from over the partition, and Sister Hyacintho also stood up and elapped hor hands gayly in order that she would be heard and obeyed from one end of the car to_the other. ““Come, come! Don't let us think of our little allments. Let us pray and sing—f Holy Virgin will be with us, Ll Sho began the rosary herself, according to the words of Our Lady of Lourdes, and the sick and pilgrims folowed her. It was the first decade—the five joyous mysteries, the annunciation, visitation, nativity, purifi- catlon and the finding of Jesus in the tem- ple. Then all struck up together the hymn, “Let Us Contemplate the Heavenly Arche angel.” The voices were drowned in the rumbling noise of the wheels, only the deaf- ening surge of that human mass was heard, suffocating in the end of that closed car, which rolled on continuously. Although he was a practical Catholle, M. do Guersaint could never finish a hymn. He got up and sat down again. He ended finally by leaning against a partition and talking in a low tone with a sick person who was scated on the other side of the same_ partition in the next compartment. M. Sabathier was a man 50 years old, dumpy, and with a large, well shaped head, completely bald. Fifteen years before he had beer attacked with ataxy. He suf- fered only from relapses of the disease, but he had lost the entire use of his legs, which were affected by it, and his wife, who ac- companied him, moved them about for him as if they were dead limbs, until they be- gamo oo heavy for hor, like two Ingots of cad. . “Yes, sir, such as you see me. I am a former professor of the fifth grade at the Lvcee Charlemagne. At first 1 thought it was simply a case of sciatica. Then I had darting pains, like sharp sword thrusts, you know, in the muscles. During nearly ten years' my whole body became little by little affected by the discase. 1 consulted all the doctors, went to all the health springs imaginable. Now I don’t suffer as much a3 T did, but I can no longer move from my chair. Then I, who have lived without religion, was led back to God by the idea that being o very unfortunate our Lady of Lourdes could not do otherwise than take pity on ma, Plerre, who was Interested, also got up, Teaned against the partition and listened. “Is 1t not so, Abbe, suffering Is the best means of awakening souls? This is the seventh year I am going to Lourdes without despairing of a cure. This year I am con- vinced the Holy Virgin will heal me. Ye I indeed intend to walk again, and I live only In that hope, M. Sabathler broke off his conversation to have his wife move his legs more to the left, and Pierre, who was observing her, was as- tonished to find that obstinacy of faith in an_intellectual person, in one of those uni- versity graduates that are ordinarily so Voltairlan In their deas. How had the be- lief in miracles come to germinate and ba- come Implanted in that brain? But as he sald himself, only somo great suffering ex- plained that need of illusion, that blossom of the Eternal Consoler, *“And, you sce, my wife and I are dressed like the poor, for I desired this year to bo only a poor person, and 1 have through humility had myself registered as entitled by poverty to charity, in order that the Holy Virgin might think I was one of the unfortunates, her children. * ¢ Only not to take the place of a real poor person [ paid 60 francs to the Hospitalite, which, you are aware, gives the right to accom- pany a sick person on the pilgrimage. * * * [ knew him, even—my sick one, I was in- troduced to him a little whilo ago at the station. Ho is a consumptive, it seems, and he appeared to me to be far gone, very far gone." They lapsed into silence again. “Well, may the Holy Virgin save him, too, and I would be 30 happy. She would overwhelm me with joy! h, Plorre," she repeated, “how beauti- tull 'How beautifull ~ And what a glory it the Holy Virgin would bo pleased to troublo herself for me! * ¢ ® Really, do you believe I am worthy of it Certainly,” he exclalmed, “your heart s the best and purest—all spotless, as your father sald—and there are not enough good angels in paradise to guard you." But all had not been told. Sister Hya- cinthe and Mme. Do Jonquiers related all the miracles they knew of—the long st of miracles that for more than thirty years oennertf e FIRST DAY -5 18 to yield to the heavy and enervating air of the rallway carriag ecstacy was spreadin, far from the they were rushing at s brightened looks filled him with joy. constant | gaz blooming of roses They were counted by thousands, they reflow- the freshness due to their ture, more brilliant each s who_listenod heightening fever taking its oc ality, through which bountiful ‘mo » rapid a pace, Marie's when he longed for her recover: Lo held with an infinite tenderness that lit- little children anity, trying to believe in the fitness of things and the superfor wis- at tempered sorrow to the most hope- the wicked reality is 1, unjust nature | who laughs at £ood In his own way. the supréme men continued to talk ssion upon Roman archi- 1 clock tower seen on a sing into a disc suggestod by curable with crushed tympanum harmonicum dumb for forty-five years, who, In the midst of others that are completely drops of water_in Then tfe bifnd pa companions their tongues. An hour pass | hand of the Virgin raise the before his cyes; e loss of her two eyos sight than b tion upon lies r Hyacinthe say h ining better by saying a | self, after clapping mbled marbles, seconds clear eyes of wondro: med to smile the voices un seless stream depth fn wh ud little by little overcame the soul harassed of grace and 50 far awa their bed of misery and to whom the bout to sit down Take up thy bed and wa ) t from the painful contraction tell of a certain miracle she knew £he was not asleep. Wit G {100 ERIath e & “‘Are you suffering more Wlen every one was silent, though, she profited by the occasion, putting a littie aside the cealed tho horror of her sore hat was related to me Is not about continual jolts! carf which con- is about a woman, C boise, who ran a needle into her hand when her for seven years, no doctor able to draw contracted, could no longer be having been But immediate ne would be glad to sleep a 1 It is put back again i B0 v SHIC J i @ no use, all the are turning in nding the evident fati each time the needle is seen to i 4 for a iong time, wit 55 in her flesh one had pushed it in ord Bercy, and it carried by her in her to courivard any more, only her hand, and the ob, to show what the Holy Vir five yoars she briziera” had c vl convineed her that 7 for her at Lourdes to miracles of the ploted her conversior each sick one lis guardian angel, hovering | g am certainly from heaven. it was, that ncedle Then how pretty and childis: had a pain between my sh Tihen 1 gat I am always in I cough to tear out my annot spit at all, E not stand up; I eat nothi A choking seized her and s T would rather be in my skin and radiant at seeing that nothin, possible to heaven, they would ail become healthy, Was necessary rdently in order that natur would be confounded and the incredible After all, it would be no more than for heaven scemed lieve and pray than in that ¢ T e has what 1 lave, he is further gone than L ore was, in rea'ity, be- ng missionary, Istdore, lying on a mattress, who could not be scen, because he could not even lift his ter of good luck, to_choose those to be e then Marie surprise, but now revived by her fervoi exclaimed: ““Oh, father, how beautiful! Dost REALLY THINK IS PASSING But he was not a consumptive. was dying from Inflammatton of the liver, Very tall, very thin, his face was yellow, dry and dead as a parch- The abscess that had formed on his liver had plerced to the exterlor and suppuration exhausted shivering of fever, vomitings and delirium. His eyes alone tinguishable love, whose brightness lighted up a face like that of Christ dying on the A common peasant's face times was rendered sublime by faith He was a Breton, child of a too numerous family, having left to his elders his And one of his sisters had come Martha, his elder by two years, had gone out at service in Parls, but so de- voted, even in her insignificant situation of mald of all work, that she had left her place to follow him and share his meager econo- “I was outside on the platform when they thrust him into the rallway carriage. 1t took four men." Bup she could coughing shook her and put her back on her was suffocating and her red became blue. Sister Hyacinthe raised her head and wiped her lips with a cloth that was stained with d, At the same time Mme. de Jonquiere was giving her ald to the invelid she had opposite to her and who had just fainted. They called her Mme. Vetu, ‘wite of a small olock maker of the Mouffetard, who had been unable to close his shop to go with her to Lourde: had herself taken by the hospital in order to Fear of death had brought her back to the church, where sl ver put her foot sin thou remember what thou thyself told me about that Joachim Dehaut, who came from Belgium, crossing over the whole of France with her crooked leg, that was covered by an ulcer, the odor of which was so bad that no one could go near her. healed ,they were able to bind up the knee; she felt nothing, only a slight redness was Then came the time for the unbend- In the water she yelled, it seemed as it they were breaking the bones, that her log was being torn off, and at the same time both she and the woman who was bathing her saw the deformed foot sstraighten itself with the regularity of a needle in a compass. The leg stretched itself In the midst of such agony that Joachim ended by fainting away, But when she came to she Sprang up stralght and aglle to carry her crutchos a_continued the last lean little share of M. de Guersaint, also laughlug trom as- tonishment, confirmed by nodding this tale that he had heard from a father of the He could, too, he sald, tell of twenty such cases, each one more touching, more extraordinary than the last, on Plerre to corroborate them, but the latter, who did not belleve, contented himself by shaking his head. At first, not wishing to distress Marle he had forced himself to look out at the flelds, the trees and the houses that wero rushing past, in order to distract They had just passed Angoulem, large meadows stretched before them, which lines of poplar fan, seemed to open and shut as the express Undoubtedly they weré late, for the train pushed at the greatest po apeed, groaned under the weight of spark and fire while tearing over the kilometres, And Pierre, in spite of himself, help hearing scrap: tales, that were Interrupted by the joltin the wheels, as thoukh the locomotjve, perate and unrostrained, were hurry all to the heavenly lands of d. they weat, and finally he coased Assumption. ay no more, cheek bones lke the sticks of a She was the rushed onward, recelve some care, oonsumed by 4 cancer in the the haggard B ek [TR'R 1Y Y soot. o tar 4|v|,r.Ig{ the Journey she had not sald a word, her Tips were sealed and she suffored horri§R @ Then she had vomited and she had lost"dhsclousness. The moment aho opened her mdith there exhaled a fright ful smell, o gstilence (o turn one's stomach. “This 15 no lofker possible,” murmured Mme. do Jonquiof, who felt hersolf giving way, “‘we must hie a Iittle air.” Siater Hyacinth@ had succeeded In lay- ing La Grivotte d®yn on her pillows, “'Certainly, lot us open the windows for a few minutes. But not on this side. I should be afrald of another spell of cough- ing. Open on your side ho heat incroased momentarily. It was stifling in the midst of the heavy nause- ating air, and the little air that did come in was the greatest comfort. For a moment there wore other dutios—a thorough clean- ing. The sister shook up the pots and the basins, the contents of which she threw out of the window, while the hospital nurse wiped up with a sponge the floor, upon which much had been spilled. verything had to be arranged, and it was therefore a now care when the fourth invalld, the one who had not yet moved, whose face was entirely c 1 up in ck gearf, said she wa hungry. In the meantime Mme. de Jonquiere w lielping, in her quiet selt-devotion Do not trouble yourself, sister. 1 will cut her bread into small piecos.” Marie, in her need for distraction, had In- terested herself in this motionless figur hidden under the biack vell. She sus- pected some sort of sore on the face. She liad been told simply that it wos a mald ervant That unfortunate, a Picardinn, named Blise ito had been of leave her situation 1 lived in is with a elete I ated hor, for, not being otherwise 1), no hospital would re celve her. — Of grent plety, she had ly longed for monihs past to to Lourde So Marle waited, with a secret horror, see the searf taken off. Are these emall enough?” ask Do Jonquiere in a motherly way You manage to put them {n your mouth From under the black scarf a loarse voice growled some confused words madam.” Finally the scarf foil and Mari a thrill of horror 1t was a lupus that had covered the nose and mouth, little by little growir re, an unceasing v spreading under the crust of the skin athag the mucous mbrane. The I pointed like the rauzzie of a dog, with coarse hair anl , round cyes, had come loous, Already the c of the n carly caten a mouth had retr by the oblique " bloody sweat, mised ran from tho huge, livid sore Oh! look, Plerre,” murmured Ma tremblin The priest also shuddered he at Dise Rouquet slippir great e thoe littde pleces broad the biceding hole that gerved for her All the ocen P4 tia i Fatiwa g Redrrl had tur puie at the shocking apparitio s bt rose from all th ouls, swelilng with hope, “Ah, Holy Vi Virgin all powerful, what a mivacle it n il might be cured s nob think of ourselves, my chil- to keep well,”" repeat who had maintalned he ¢ the second flagellation of owned wit thorns, Jesus cross, desus dying on the lowed the hyn “1 place my c . I thy help.” ussed through Blois and already traveled for thres iong hour. rie, who had turned away °T cyes fron se Rouquet, noyw fastened them on a m cupied a ¢ tr of the other compart- pere Brother Isidore was At intervals ghe had noticed him very ly dre sed in an oid black frock coat mon beard that was nd he scemed to sted, livid, ted face cbhvered with L N ng, he regained motionless in hi peakng to'no one, looking fixedly with great open eyes. And donly cho remarkdd dhat the eyelida fell and the man fainted. Then she drew the atte tion of Sister Hyacinthe. “‘Sister, look there; one would fay that gentioman felt iil “Whereabouts, my dear chila?" “Over there; the one with the head tum- bled down.” This caused a commotion, all the well pil- grims standing up to see. And Mme. de Jonquicre thought to call Martha, the sister of Brother Isidore, to slap the palms of the man’s hand: “Find out; ask him where he suffers. Martha approached, shook him, asked him questions. But the man d'1 not answer, but with a rattle in his throat kept his cyes al- ways closed. A frightened volce was heard saying, “I really think he is pas:ing away.” inereased, words waxed plenty and advice was given from one end of the railway carriage to the other. Nobody knaw the man. He certainly was not a free pa- tient, for did he not bear on his neck a white card, the color of the train. Somebody told that they bad scen him arrive only threa minutes before the train left, dragging him- self along, and that he had thrown himself in the corner where he was now dying with tho air of intense fatigue. Since then he had not even whispered. Presently they found his ticket, stuck in the band of his high old hat that was hooked up near to him. Sister Hyacinthe made an exelamation. Ob, now he breathes! Ask him his ame.” Bul when guestioncd freshly by Martha, the man merely murmured a_com- plaint, that ery ely lisped, “Oh, T suf- fer.” " And from that on he made but that reply to ev thing they wished to know— who he was, from whence he came, what was his malady, what assistance might be glven; he gave no answer, but that continu- ous groan “Oli, I suffer. T suffer.” Sister Hyacinthe was wild with impatience. 1t only ould be in the same compa ment.” And she resolved to change her place at the very next station where they should stop. Only there would be no such stop for a long time. It was gotting awful, all the more as the man's head feil forward once again. “He is going, he is dying,” repeated the voice. Oh, God, what was to be done. The sister knew that a Father of the Assump- tion, Father Massias, was on the train, with the holy oils, all ready to administer to the dylng; for some one died cach year on their journey. But she did not dare to pull the signal of alarm. There was also the canteen van, in charge of Sister St. Francis, and where there was a doctor, with a small phar- macy. If the invalid could get as far as Poitlers, where they stopped for half an hour, every possible attention would be given to him. The horror was that he might die suddenly. They finally became some- what calmer. The fan, still unconsclous, breathed somewhat, more regularly, and scemed to be asleep, ''To die before getting there!” murmured Marie, shuddering. “To die in view of the promised lan: Then as her fath{t yeassured her, “I suffer. I suffer greatly. I also—" “Trust on," said Pierre, “the Holy Virgin watches over you." She could no longer sft up, they were obliged to lay her down agafn in her narrow coffin. Her father and the priest were forced to take infinite precautidns, for the least touch wrung from her a groan. And she remained without a sigh, almost like a corpse, with her face of suffering:surrounded by her glori- ous, royally golden hair. For nearly four hours they had bedi traveling—always tray- eling. If the railway tarrlage was shaken at this moment by a miotion of zigzag it was because they were at the end of the line—the couplings creaked, the wheels rumbled furi- ously. Through thée'Wihdows that they were torced to leave open’came tho dust, acrid and burning, and above all the heat was get- ting terrible, an overpowering beat of a storm, with & tawny sky, that was slowly overcast by large motionless clouds. The overheated compartments were turned to furnaces—these rolling boxes where one drank, one ate, where the invalids satisfied all their needs, In the middle of the vitiated air, amid the bewilderments of complaints, of prayers and of hymns, And Marle was not the only one who: condition had told upon her. The 'other: too, were suffering from thelr journey. On the knees of hor despondent mother little Rose no longer stirred. She was so very pale that twice Mme. Maze leaned forward to hands, fearing to find them cold. Every fow instants Mmo, Sabathier had to change the position of her husband's leg for their weight was such, he sald, that b hips were torn away, Brother Isidore ha just been crying out in his customary tor- por, and his aister had only been able te pacity him by raising him and holding him In her arms. La Grivott seemed to be asleop, but a continuous hiccough shook her, and A thin stream of blood ran from her mouth. Mme. Potu had again thrown up a | black and pestilential flood. Elise Rouquet | o longer remembered to hide the awful op soro on her face, and the man yonder kept up the death rattle with such dificult breath ing that It seemed at every second he must expire. In vain Mme. de Jonquiere and Sis- ter Hyacinthe lavished their attentions. They only succeeded in leviating so many {lls, timos it was like a bad dream, this ve- misery and pain that was being th groat speed, In the midst of the continuous rolling that' swung the lug the old clothes hung up, the worn out ba Kets mended with twine, while in the last compartment the pilgrims, old and young, all of a pitlable ugliness, sang without ceas- ing In a sharp, lamentable and false tone. Then Pierre thought of the other car rlages on the train—this white train that transported ~ particularly the test in- valids. ~ All were rolling In the same suf- foring— with their 300 invalids and their 6500 pilgrims, Then he thought of the other trains that left Paris that day—of the gray train, of the blue train that had preceded the white train, of the green train, of the yellow train, of the pink train, of the orange train that would follow. From one end of the line to the other at every hour a train was dispatched And he thought, too, of all the other trains that were leaving that same day from Orleans from Maus, from Poitiers 1 Bordeaux from Margehles, from Cacassonno—the land of I'rance at the same hour was furrowed In every direction by similar trains, all go ing thither toward the Holy Grotto, hearing 30,000 sick ones and pilgrims to the feet of the Virgin. And he thought that this pres ent torreat and crowd rushed al othor year; that not a passed without seeing a pilgrimage to Lourdes; that it was not only France that th pressed onward, but that all Burope, the whole world; that certain years of great religious revival had seen 300,000, and even 500,000 pilgrims and invalids. Pierre imeagined he could hear them— these shaking trains—these trains from everywhere, all converging toward the same hollow in the rock, where blazed the can- dles. All groaned amid the cries of pain the lifting up of hymns. They were & hospital of hopeless invalids, the by- paths for suffering humanity, leading to the hope of recovery; a furious nced for conzolation, in the midst of an extended | crisis, under tic menace of a speedy death, | hideous in the hustling of the rabble. On they rolled, on they rolled; they rolled with- out’ end, carting the misery of this world to the way to the divine vision, the health of the infirm, the consolation of the afflicted. And an overwhelming pity seized the heart of Plerre, the human religion for so many ills, 0 many tears that consume weak and naked man. e was sorrowful unto death, and a living cherity burned within him, like the unextinguishable fire of his brotherhood for all things and for all human beings. At half past 10, as they were leaving the sta- tion at St. Plerre-des-Corps Sister Hya- cinthe gave the sign, and the third rosary was said—the five glorious mysteries—the resurrection of Our Lord, the ascension of our savior, the mission of the Holy Spirit, the assumption of the Blessed Virgin, the coronation of the Blessed Virgin. Then was sung the canticle of Bernadette, the unending compline of sixty verses, where the angelic salutation comes over and over in a refrain, a prolonged greeting, slow be- sotting, that ends by overcoming the whole being and lulls it o an_ ecstatic slumber dur- ing the delicious expectation of the miracle. CHAPTER IL Now, the great plains of Poitou passed by, and the abbe Pierre Froment, looking out, saw the trees fly past, and littie by little he ceased even to distinguish them. A church tower appeared, disappeared; all the pilgrims crossed themselyes. They were not due at Poitiers before 12:35. The train kept on its rolling in the growing fatigue of a dull, stormy day, and the young priest, fallen in a deep revery, no longer heard the hymn, save as a slow, lulling sound, like the surg- ing swell of the sea. It was the oblivion of the present, an awakening of the past that filled his whole being. He went back in his memories ns far as he possibly could remember. Again te saw at Neuilly the house where he was born, where he still lived, that home of peace and ‘of work, with its garden where grew several beautiful trees, that a green hedge strongthened by a wooden fence separated only from the neighboring house, exactly like his own. He was-about 3, or perhaps, 4 years old, and on a summer day he saw ance more, seated round a table at breakfast, under the shade of an Immense horse chest- nut tree, his father, his mother and his eldest brother. The face of his father, Michael Froment, was not distinct; he saw it vague and obliterated, with the renown of an fllustrious chemist, and his title of Mem- ber of the Institute, burying himself in his laboratory, in the depth of this quiet nelgh- borhood. But he saw, clearly, his brother William, then 14 years of age, who had come that morning from the Lycee for a shor| holiday; and above all his mother, so gentle, 80 calm, with her eyes filled with active benevolence. Later, he witnessed the agony of this religious soul, of this believer who had through esteem and gratitude resigned horself to marry an infidel, 16 years older than herself, from whom her family had re- celved great favors. Himself, the last child of this unfon, brought into the world when his infidel father was nearly G0, he had only known his mother as the respectful and sub- missive wife of her husband, whom she tried to love ardently, tormented though she might be to feel he was in a state of perdition. And, suddenly, another memory selzed him, the terrible remembrance of the day his fathor died, killed by an accident in his laboratory, the explosion of a retort, He was then 5 years old; he remembered the smallest detalls, the cry of his mother when she found the shattered body In the midst of tho debris, then her fainting turn, her sobs, her prayers, with the idea that God had ruck down the implous man, damned f ever. Not darlg to burn his papers and his books, she contented herself by closing the room, and no one entered again. Then from that moment, haunted by & vis- fon of hell, she had but one ldga—to take her younger son, still so young, bring blm up in strictest religion, and make of him the ON THE TRAIN. ransom, the pardon of his father. Already the eldest, William, had ceased to belong to ler. Brought up at colloge he had imbibe the advanced ideas of the age, whereas this | the little one, should not leave th houso, should have a priest for a preceptor, and her secret dream, her burning wish was to one day seo him a priest saying his first mass and administoring to the souls in thelr eternal sufferings Another vivid pieture formed Itselt be tween the green branches riddled by the sun. Plerre suddenly saw Marle de Guer saint just as he had seen her one morning through a hole in the hedge that separated the two neighboring properties. M. de Guersaint, of the smaller nobility of Nor mandy, was an architect for inventors who were then occupled in the building of towns for working people, with church and school; a great undertaking, badly worked out, in | which he had risked his fortune of 300,000 francs with his habitual impetuosity and th lack of foresight common to a would be tist It was a similar religious faith that had brought together Mme. de Guersaint and Mme, Froment, but in the latter, dis tinct and rigid, there existed the superior woman, with an iron hand that alone pre vented the household from slipping into many eatastrophes; and brought up her daughters, Blanche and Marie, in a_narrow devotion, especially the elder, who was already solemn like herself; the younger, very plous, however, loving all playthings with an intense enloyme ¢ of life that brought her its melodious laughter From thefr earliest age Plerre and Marie played together; the hedge w being climbed; the two familics mixed togeth And on that morning of bright sunshine when he again ) her thus s was 10 years old He, who was 16, expected to enter the seminary following Tuesday. Never had sho ned so lovely. Her golden her was long that when unbraided she was completely clothed by it. Once again he saw her face ith an_extraordinary precision; her round cheeks, her blue eyes, her red mouth, about all the radiance of her snow white skin. She was gay and brilliant as the sun; ing, and yet she had tears on the edge of her eye- 1 lids,” because she knew of his departure. | They were both seated in the shadow of the hedge at the end of the garden. Their fin- gers were entwined, their hearts were leavy. | Nevertheless, in their games they had never exchanged any promises, so great was their | absolute innocence. But on the eve of separation their tenderness came to their lips, and they talked without knowing it swearing to think constantly of one another, to meet again one day, as one meets in heaven, to be quite happy. Then, without being able to explain why, they had hugged one another almost to suffocation; they had kissed each other's faces, weeping hot tears. There was still a delicious memory of it that Pierre had kept everywhere; that he still felt alive in him now, after so many years and so many sorrowful renunciations. A very violent jolt roused him from his reverie. He looked about the railway car- riage, catehing vague glimpses of those st fering creatures: Mme. Maz motionless, overcome by sorrow; little Rose uttering her faint moan on her mother's knees; La Gravotte choking with a hoarse cough. For a second the bright figure of Sister Hyacinthe prevailed in the whiteness of her shirt and her cap. It was the tiresome journey that kept up, with its ray of hope beyond. Then, little by little, all became submerged in a fresh wave of thought, coming from the past; there only remained the soothing bymn, the indistinet voices of memory that came from an invisible world. Henceforth Pierre was at the seminary. Clearly he called back the classes, the yard with its trees. But all at once he only saw, as in a looking glass, the figure of a young man, such as he was then; and he looked it over, he picked it in picces, as though it were the figure of a stranger. Tall and thin, he had a long face, with a prominent head, high and straight as a tower, w the jawbone tapercd down to a very small chin; He appeared all brain; only the mouth, somewhat large, was tender. When the usually serious face unbent the mouth and eyes showed an infinite tenderness, an unsatisfled longing to love, to give and to live. At once, elsewhere, intellectual pission returned, this intellectuality that had al- ways consumed him with the desire to com- prehend and to know. And those years at the seminary, he recalled them only with surprise. How could he have submitted for s0 long, that harsh discipline of a blind faith, that necessity to believe all without injury? They had demanded a total abne tion of reason and he had forced himself to it, he had stiffied fn himself the torturing ned for truth. Of course, he had been greatly softened by the tears of his mother; he only wished to glve her much dreamed of happiness. In this present hour, however, ho remem- bered certain feelings of revolt, he found deep In his memory the recollections of nights passed in tears, without his knowing the cause; nights peopled by Indistinct pictures, where a sense of frecdom and manly enjoyments ran riot, where the form of Marie constantly appeared as he had scen her one morning, dazzling and bathed in tears, kissing him with all her soul. And that alone remained now; the years of re- ligious study, with their monotonous lessons, their exercises and their fellow ceremonles had vanished in the same mist, a dim twi- light filled with mortal silenc Then as the train rushed at full speed through a station in the uproar of th Journey there came to him a long succes- sion of confused thoughts. He recalled a large deserted close, where he saw himself when 20 years old. = His reverles wandered A rather long iliness, that kept him back in his studles, finally ended in causing him t0 g0 to the country. He had remained some time without seeing Marie; trus, during va- cations passed at Neullly he was unable to meot bLer, for she was nearly always tray- eling. He knew sho was & great sufferer, in consequence of a fall from her horse whon 13 years of age and just as she was entering womanhood, and her brother, in despalr, a victim of contradictory advices given by doctors, took her each year to some different baths. Then he had heard, like & clap of thunder, of the sudden death of thls mother, 80 strict, yet 80 necessary to her family, and under ‘such tragic cir oumstances~—an inflammation of the lungs carried her off in five days. 8ho had caught it one evening at Bourboule, where they had taken Marie for treatment, by taking off her cloak while walklng and putting it on | | | sofa, and there was only Blanche to | the house, already occupied by her jast In_ all haste, bringing back his daughter half crazed and his wite a corpse. The Worst wis that since the death of the mother the family affairs were In jeopardy, Ehn-vum\lu more and moro embarrassed in the h of the architect, who had thrown his fortune without thinking in the gulf of his enterprises. Marfe no longer left aminations for the diplomas she obstinat detormined to win, with the foresight gaining the bread she plainly saw must | come from her earnings some day Suddenly Plerre had the sonsation of bright vision that separated Itself from the mass of theso troubled events so nearly fors n. It was during a holiday he had 1 forced to take on account of poor health. He was Just 24; he was very back- ward, only having received up to that time | the four ‘minor orders, but when he res | turned he was to be admitted to the sube deaconate, which would, by Its Ine violable vow, hold him~ forever, And more the seone was sot, pros as of old, in the little gars cullly, tho de Guorsaints' garden, formerly he had often played. ¥ had rolled Marle’s bath chalr under big trees at the fort, near the middle and they were alone in the peaceful sadness of an afternoon {n autumn, and he saw Marie in deep mourning for her mother, half reclining, her limbs inert, whilst he, also clothed in black, already in a soutan was sitting 1 ! W an iron e For ars she bean a sufferer. Sho 18, pale and thin, but still aderablo or royal golden hair that 1 Hline At any rate, ho thought her confirmed Invalid, condemned never to 1 woman, deprived cven of h R THe doctors did not agree, had given hor up. loubt, on this mournful after noon, when the yellow leaves were raining down upon them, she told him these things But he could. not remember ier words, ho aw her pallid smile, her youthful faco still _so charming, but Nopeless already in its regrets for 1if Then he understood that she was calling back the distant day of their separation, in’ this very place, behind hedge riddied with sunbeams, and it all like death, their tears, their em- s, their promise to meet again some in a nty of happiness. They met, but with what good result? So she was as one already dead, and he soon to die to the lfe of this world. From the moment the doctors gave her up, since she ver be a woman, nor a wife, nor or, he might as well re- nounce hiz own manhood and annihi himself with God, whom his mother given him. And he still felt the bitter sweetness of that last interview, smil- ing sadly over their old child ing to him of the certain happiness he would il in the service of God, so overcome by the thought that she had made him promise to take her to hear him say his first m At the station at Saint il a commotion that brought back Plerre's at- tention to the cceupants of the railway car He fancied it was some or fresh fainting. But the sad faces ho were just the same—Kkept the same con- racted expressions, the anxious waiting for divine help, so slow in coming. In vain Aid M. Sabathier try to ease his logs, and Brother Isido fing a faint cry like that of a dy ol while Mme. Vetu, v tim of a terrible paroxysm, her stom gnawing, did not even breathe, biting Lips, face discomposed, dark and fierce. It was Mme. de Jonquiere who, in cleaning & vessel. had left a zine jug fall, and not- withstanding their torments, it had made the {1 ones laugh, those simple souls whom suffering had made almose puerile. At once Sister Hyacinthe, who was right to call them her children, children that she led by a word, made them say their beads i they reaced the Chatelle according to the given program, Then followed Asis, it was only a murmur of grumbling, lost in the noise of the iron bolts and rumbling cf the wheels. Pierre was 26 and he w priest. Sov- days before his ordination he felt somo tardy scruples, the hollow voice of a cone science that talked boing clearly questioned. But he dreaded to do so, live ing in the bewilderment of his decision, thinking that by his voluntary knife thrust to have cut ofi all human longings. His passion had died with the innocent romance of his childhood, the falr girl with golden locks whom he saw only lylng on her bed of pain, her passions likewise dead. And ho afterwards made the sacrifice of his reason, which he fancied he could do so much more easily, hoping that it was suf- ficient to will in order to think no more. _ Besides, it was too late. He could not draw back at the last moment, and If at the time of pronouncing the last solemn vow Lie felt agitated by a t terror, by an un- defined yet immense regret, he forgot it all, rewarded from above for his effort on the day when he had given to his mother that great bliss, so long awaited, of hearing him say his first mass. He could still seo her, his poor mother, in the litds church at Neuilly that she had herself sclected, tho church in which the obsequies of his father had taken place; he stdl saw her on that cold November morning, olmost alone in the dark little chapel, kneeling with her faco hidden in her hands, weeping quietly whilo he clevated the host. She had tasted of her last pleasure, for sho lived alone and melancholy, not .once seeing her eldest son, who, filled” with the ideas of others, had gone away, broken all conncctions with his family since his brother was destined to tho priesthood. They said that Willlam, a chem- ist of great ability, like his father, but “de- classe,” plunged into revolutionary projects, lived in a little house outside the city limits, where he gave himself up to dangerous cx- periments with explosives, and, it was added, that what had completed the break with his mother, who was €0 pious, so upright, was the fact that he lived with a woman as his wife who camo from no one know where. Pierre, who adored Willlam in his childhood like a great paternal brother, good and gracious, had not seen him for three yoars, Then he felt a great oppr m. He saw his mother dead. Again it was like a clap of thunder. An illness of scarcely three days— a sudden disappearance, like that of Mma, de Guersaint, He found her one evening, after a vain search for a doctor, dead in his bsence—motionless and white—and his lips ad retained forever the frozen taste of her last kiss. He remembered nothing further— nothing of the vigil, nor of the preparation?, nor about the funeral. All was lost in the depths of his stupefaction; such a fearful sorrow that it nearly killed him, shaking by a chill on returning from the cémotery, fol- lowed by a fever that for three weeks held him delirious between life and death, His brother had come, liad nursed him, had looked after matters of interest, dividing the small fortune, leaving him the houso, with a modest income, and himself ing his share of the money. Then, when he had seen that all danger was over, ho had g away again, returning no one knew whither. But what a long convale nee, burfed in the rted house! Pierre had done noth- ing to keep William, for he understood what an abyss cxisted between them. At first he suffered from loneliness, Then his sclitude became very precious to him, in t in- tense silence of the rooms, where tho distant nolses from the str s not come, under the comforting hadows of the narrow garden, whera ho could pass entire days without seeing a soul. Above all, his place of refuge was tho old laboratory-—the room of his father, which for twenty years his mother had carefully Kept closed, as if to wall in tho past of un belief and damnation. Perhaps, in spite of her mildness, her respectful ubmisslon of former years, she might have ended by de stroying the papers and books if death had not come to surprise her. And Plerre had opened the windows once more, dusted desk and the hookease, had established him self (n the great leather armehalr and passe there some deliclous hours, almost rogen erated by his fliness, rencwing his youth and 1iking to read the hooks that came undel his hand, an extraordinary intellectual feast, During those two months of slow recovery he only remembered having recelved Dr, Chassaigne, This was an old friend of his father, a physician of real morit, who mod estly kept to his role of practitioner, having the sole ambition to cure. He had failed with Mme. Froment, but he boasted that he had pulled the young priest through a bad attack, and he came occaslonally to see hi chatting, diverting him, telling him about his father, thoe great chemist, about whom he told inexhaustible charming anccdotes with all the burning dotails drawn from an ardent friendship. Little by little, In the Janguid weaknoss of convalescence, the son thus formed an idea of a person of adorable simplicity, tenderness and joviality. It was his father as ho really was, and not the man of severe sclence that he had formerly | Marle's shoulders. The father jolued them | sgined 1 by llstening to his mother, Te while’ waiting for the Angelus that was note_