CHAPTER XVI.

BY THEIR FRUITS YE SHALL KNOW THEM.

Mr. Yorke went home from that first town-meeting, and opened his Bolingbroke to look for a sedative. He found this: “The incivilities I meet with from opposite parties have been so far from rendering me 163 violent or sour to any, that I think myself obliged to them all. Some have cured me of fears, by showing me how impotent the world is; others have cured me of hope, by showing how precarious popular friendships are. All have cured me of surprise.”

Mr. Yorke readjusted his glasses, and read the passages a second time; but it was not the sedative he wanted. There was something the matter with Bolingbroke; his was a worldly and selfish philosophy; and it was, moreover, a discouraging one; for the reader wished to believe that it was possible to awaken and keep alive in the popular mind an enthusiasm for justice. Mr. Yorke was not aware that in this warfare he had drawn nearer to God, and that what he missed in his old favorite was that final, heavenly motive which, running like a golden chain through the simplest human actions, strings them into jewels, lacking which the noblest human thoughts and deeds crumble like sand on the sea-shore.

Closing his book with a feeling of disappointment, his thought glanced down to later times, and he remembered a noble sentiment uttered by one whom he admired, indeed, but half-unwillingly--one of the purest and most heroic men of our time, a man who lacks nothing but faith.

“With God, one is a majority!” said Wendell Phillips.

The thought came down on Mr. Yorke’s heart like a hammer upon an anvil, and sent sparks up into his eyes and brain.

“I take back all that I have said against that man,” he exclaimed, starting up and walking to and fro. “A man who has a vision of absolute honesty cannot help being impatient of policy. Strong conviction never is, never can be, tolerant.” He ran his fingers through his hair as he paced the room, and combed it up on end. He would have liked to go directly back to the town-hall, and perhaps would have done so but for the probability that it was now dark and empty.

“It is not pleasant to be insulted by such people,” he muttered; “but it would be still less pleasant to think that the rascals could silence me. I will be heard at the next meeting,

‘Though hell itself should gape, And bid me hold my peace.’”

It was some time before Mr. Yorke had the opportunity he desired, though scarcely a day passed in which he did not speak some word for the truth. There was no other town-meeting that summer. The people contented themselves with the weekly scandalous battery of the _Seaton Herald_, and with a small domestic persecution. A few pious church-members were especially active. This was a kind of missionary labor which suited them well, for it gave the pretext of zeal to their bigotry and uncharitableness. If a lady could have persuaded her Irish servant-girl to eat meat on Friday, she would have gloried in the triumph.

“I will not eat of flesh on the day when the flesh of Jesus Christ was hacked and mangled for the sins of the world,” said one faithful girl.

“But nobody knows on what day of the week he died,” the mistress urged. “That is one of the lies of your priests. Now, Bridget”--laying a gold half-eagle on the table--“this money shall be yours if you will eat that piece of meat.”

The servant looked at her mistress with that dignity which a scorn of meanness can give to the lowliest. “Mrs. Blank,” she said, “you remind me of the devil tempting our Saviour when he was fasting.”

The temptation and the occasion were trivial, but they called out the 164 spirit of the martyrs.

Cold weather seemed to cool the zeal of the Know-Nothings; but with another spring it kindled again, making the Catholic school its principal point of attack. Anonymous letters were written to the teacher, threatening her if she did not give it up. The _Herald_ contained, week after week, insulting and scarcely veiled references to her; and the children could not go through the streets unmolested. But no notice was taken of these annoyances, and the school prospered in spite of them. The children came unfailingly, not, perhaps, without fear, but certainly without yielding to fear. They were deeply impressed by the position in which they found themselves. All their childish gayety deserted them. They gathered and talked quietly, instead of playing; they drew shyly away without answering when the Protestant children attacked them. “Keep out of their way, and never answer back,” was the charge constantly repeated in the ears of these little confessors of the faith, and they obeyed it perfectly. Dear children! may they never lose in later years that faith by which they suffered so early in life. Herewith, one who watched and admired their constancy sends them loving greeting.

When the first examination for prizes took place in this school, Mr. Yorke was present, and made an address; and when it was over, he and Father Rasle walked away together.

“I am obliged to go away, to be gone a month,” the priest said. “I must go to-night. But I do not like to leave my flock to the wolves. There is no help for it, though. The bishop wishes to see me at Brayon, and I must visit the Indians on Oldtown Island.”

“I advise you, sir, to go as quietly as you can, and let no one see you go or know that you are going,” Mr. Yorke said.

Father Rasle looked surprised. “Why, you do not imagine that any person would molest me?”

“I do not imagine, but I am sure that the Know-Nothings would do anything,” was the reply. “It is not safe to give them an opportunity for mischief.”

Still the priest looked incredulous.

“I cannot see why they should touch me,” he said. “I have done nothing to provoke them. They insult us, they tell lies, and I do not resent it. Do you know the stories that have been brought to me this week? I find them amusing.” He laughed pleasantly. “See how they represent the church! A Catholic man, they say, wanted to steal a hundred dollars. Now, to take so much at once would be a mortal sin; but to steal ten cents would be only a venial sin. So my brave Catholic steals ten cents, and, after a week, ten cents more, and so on, till he has the hundred dollars. By this means, he secures his money, and is guilty only of a thousand venial sins, which he gets forgiveness for by giving the priest fifty dollars. That is one of Mr. John Conway’s stories. Here is another that was published in the _Herald_, with my name and the others in full. You know that Mrs. Mary O’Conner’s husband lately died in California. Well, the _Herald_ says that the poor widow came to me, weeping and lamenting that she had not even the consolation of seeing her husband’s grave; and I told her that, for thirty dollars, I would have him buried here. She had saved thirty dollars, earned by washing, and she brought it to me. Three days after, I told her that her husband’s body had been miraculously brought, and I pointed out the spot where it was buried, down here 165 behind the church. But I warned her that she must not dig there, as it would be a sacrilege, and that, if she did, the body would disappear. Here’s another: Patrick Mulligan confesses some sin to me, and, for a penance, I tell him to give himself twenty-five blows with the discipline. Patrick goes home, gets ready for his penance, and suddenly remembers that he has no discipline. It is late at night. He puts his head out the window, and sees that Mrs. Mahony, next door, has forgotten to take in her clothes-line, and a fine new clothes-line it is. Pat blesses the saints, creeps down-stairs, steals the clothes-line, and, going back, cuts it up into a beautiful discipline. After he has piously beaten himself, he burns the cord all up, that he may not be known as a thief, goes to bed with a clear conscience, and sleeps the sleep of the just.

“Now, sir,” the priest concluded, “it is not likely that I am to be attacked for such stories as that. Of course, no sensible person believes them; or, if people should doubt, they can easily find out the truth.”

“The truth, my dear sir, is precisely what they do not wish to find out,” Mr. Yorke replied. “They want to be exasperated, and, since you will not afford them a pretext, they will welcome any lie, and no questions asked. Moreover, you are not to think that such slanders originate with the low only, and influence only the low. I came upon a book the other day written by Catherine Beecher. You have heard of the Beechers, of course? The title was _Truth Stranger than Fiction: a Narrative_, she calls it, _of Recent Transactions involving Inquiries in regard to the principles of Honor, Truth, and Justice which obtain in a distinguished American University_. That university is in Connecticut; and the affair was one which created a good deal of stir among the Protestant clergy a few years ago. Miss Beecher seems to prove clearly in her book that certain eminent doctors of divinity, and professors, with ladies of their families, ruined the reputation of a distinguished and innocent woman. But what does Miss Beecher herself do, in the preface to this very book wherein she appears as the champion of ‘honor, truth, and justice,’ spelt with capital letters? She goes out of her way to speak of the Catholic clergy, and asserts that, since their ministrations are efficacious, no matter what their characters may be, ‘there is no special necessity, on this account, to limit admissions to this office to those only who are virtuous and devout.’ Now, the sentence is artfully worded to evade the charge of slander; but almost all non-Catholics interpret it, as the writer wished they should, to mean that, in ordaining a Catholic priest, it is not considered of any consequence whether he is a man of good character or not. It has been so interpreted by every person whom I have asked to read it. I give you another instance: Doctor Martin took upon himself to send Edith some anti-Catholic books, which I returned to him without letting her see them. I glanced into one, and found it divided into paragraphs, each containing a charge against your church, illustrated by an anecdote. I read one paragraph, headed _A Church without a Holy Ghost_. Of course, you were charged with not believing in sanctification; and the anecdote was of a man who became a Protestant after having been a Catholic forty years. When his new teachers told him of the Holy Ghost, he exclaimed, ‘Holy Ghost! What is that? I have been in the Catholic Church forty years, and I never 166 heard of a Holy Ghost.’ Now, sir, this, of course, seems to you idiotic; but a Protestant doctor of divinity keeps such books, and gives them to people to read, and repeats such falsehoods in his sermons. You see what you have to expect.”

“Shall I, then, publish a card denying the truth of these stories?” Father Rasle asked, with an expression of face which showed his distaste for the task.

“No one will read it if you do,” was the reply. “You must leave all to time. At present, for you to be accused is to be condemned. Who was it--Montesquieu?--who says, ‘If you are accused of having stolen the towers of Notre Dame, bolt at once’? That is your case. Whatever they may charge you with, consider yourself convicted.”

They had by this time reached the priest’s house, a little cottage close to the corner of the two streets. Mr. Yorke declining an invitation to enter, they leaned on the gate a few minutes to finish their talk.

“You must not judge our country by what you see here,” Mr. Yorke said. “What you complain of is merely the abuse of a good gift. A priest of your church has expressed himself very well concerning these difficulties. ‘It always pains me, in such periods,’ he says, ‘to hear men express doubt concerning our institutions. As for me, I would rather suffer from the license of freedom than the oppression of authority. War is better than a false peace; riot better than servitude; heresy better than indifference. But none of these things,’ he adds, ‘is to my liking. And may the good God preserve us from them all!’ That was Father John, an American priest.”

“Ah! I know him,” Father Rasle said brightly. “I happened to travel once in his company. We were in a steamboat, and some minister entered into controversy with him. Catholic Christianity degrades the man, the minister said. The Catholic cannot hold any communication with God. If he should be cast away on a desert island, he would be without God. All must come to him through the church. He has in himself no power to reflect the divine motions. ‘You mistake,’ says Father John; ‘and I can show by a familiar figure; Suppose that every man in the world should insist that his timepiece was correct, and should refuse to regulate it by any other. Of course, the chronometers would all wag their several ways, no two alike, and there would be a ceaseless wrangling as to what was the time of day, and every man would think that he carried the sun in his pocket. To the dogs with the meridian and the almanac! my watch is right! That is Protestantism. Now, the Catholic has his spiritual dial also; but since he knows that it is a fallible instrument, he keeps it regulated by the great clock of the church. The consequence is truth and harmony. Every Catholic conscience ticks alike; and, when the meridian-gun of the great regulator is fired, every man says, ‘It’s twelve o’clock. Amen!’”

Mr. Yorke’s warning was well-timed, for the event proved that Father Rasle would scarcely have been allowed to leave the town without molestation had it been known that he was going. No one knew it, however, but the priest’s housekeeper, Mr. Yorke, and the man who drove him over to Brayon that night.

“I do not think that any precaution was needed,” Father Rasle said to his companion, as they drove through the dewy woods by starlight. “But since it was as easy to come away quiet, why, I have. I have no wish 167 or right to throw my life away.”

Mr. Yorke did not know what had happened till Patrick told him the next morning. The crowd had gathered in the streets, it appeared, and taken their usual promenade up Irish Lane, with the usual result. No one came out or answered them, and they could not see a face in the windows, even. But if the patience of the Irish was not worn out, that of their persecutors was. Since they could not provoke an attack, they would make one. From Irish Lane they had marched to the priest’s house, arming themselves with stones and brickbats.

“There isn’t a whole window left in the house, sir,” said Patrick; “and there’s a stone lying on Father Rasle’s bed, where it was thrown through the window, that would have killed him if he had been there, as they thought he was.”

We trust that certain expressions which Mr. Yorke made use of on hearing this story will not be remembered against him on the day of final reckoning. They were not pious expressions, nor mild, nor, indeed, very polished ones; but they were strong. He put on his hat with an emphasis which left a large dent in the crown, refused to take any breakfast, and started for the town.

“What does he mean to do?” cried his wife, wringing her hands. “I must go after him. Oh! if Carl were here. Girls, it is of no use to oppose me. I must know what goes on.”

The breakfast was left untouched, and the whole household gathered about the mother, coaxing and soothing her. Patrick should go down, they said, and keep his master in view.

“What protection would an Irish Catholic be to him?” cried the lady.

Betsey would go, she declared, standing with arms akimbo and her fierce head raised. She would like to see the man that would stand in her way when she was roused!

But, no; Betsey was too pugilistic. If Mr. Yorke were to see her, he would be irritated. Some one more conciliating and politic was wanted.

Clara cut the matter short by appearing in walking dress. She would go down and see what the trouble was, and send a messenger home immediately.

Meantime, Mr. Yorke was in no danger whatever. People were, indeed, more good-natured than usual after the success of the night before. He encountered mocking smiles, but no threats. His first visit was to one of the selectmen. “What are you going to do with the rascals who broke Father Rasle’s windows, last night?” he demanded, without any ceremony of greeting.

The man assumed an air of pompous indifference. “I do not propose to do anything,” he said. “If they were brought before me, as a justice, I should try them. But I am not called on to take any step in the matter.”

“Perhaps you were one of them,” Mr. Yorke said bitterly.

The man’s face reddened. “I shall not take any notice of your insults,” he said. “It is well known that those windows were broken by a few rowdies who cannot be found out. The town is not responsible for them. And even if they were known, the feeling of the community is such that they would not be punished. People are so much excited against the abuses of popery, and the interference of the priest in our public schools, that they are willing to see every Catholic driven 168 out of the town.”

If there was ever a moment in Mr. Yorke’s life when he regretted being a gentleman, it would be safe to say that this was that moment. To talk with such a man was folly. But if some muscular Christian had entered the scene opportunely, and applied to the town-officer’s back a score or so of such logical conclusions as he was fitted to understand, or had enlightened his cranium by propounding to it an argument from an unanswerable fist, Mr. Yorke would, doubtless, have left the office with a smile of serene satisfaction, and a conviction that the dramatic proprieties had been sustained. No such person appearing, he went away with anything but an amiable expression.

His next visit was to the Rev. John Conway. The minister had just finished his breakfast, and came into the room with a comfortable, deliberate air, rather exasperating to a man who was not only indignant, but fasting. His guarded look showed that he expected an attack.

By an effort, Mr. Yorke greeted him courteously, then began: “I come, sir,” he said, “to ask you to raise your voice and use your influence to put a stop to such outrages as were committed last night, and bring the perpetrators of that to punishment.”

Mr. Conway seated himself with dignity, cast down his eyes, puckered his mouth accurately, put the tips of his right-hand fingers to the tips of his left-hand fingers in an argumentative manner, and spoke slowly and solemnly:

“I am sorry that any violence has been done. But when a community becomes incensed by encroachments which threaten their most sacred interests, and when they find that the laws are not stringent enough to afford them security from an insidious foe, we cannot expect that they will act with that calmness and deliberation which is to be desired. I deprecate--”

“You are not in your pulpit preaching to blockheads!” Mr. Yorke burst forth. “I came here to talk common sense.”

A cold glimmer showed under the minister’s lower eyelids, and a flush went over his face; but he had more self-control than his visitor, or he had not that sense of outraged justice and decency which, to that visitor’s mind, made forbearance a vice, consequently he said nothing for a moment. There was, indeed, no more to be said. Mr. Yorke rose and went to the door, but stopped there. Though appeal was vain, warning might not be.

“I warn you, sir,” he said--“I, a Protestant--that your course is not only dishonest, but impolitic. You are working so as to secure the final triumph of those you hate, and to bring about your own ruin. These anti-Catholic mobs are not Protestant, except as they protest against all religious restraint. They hate Catholicism most, simply because it is the strongest religion. You ministers think, perhaps, that you use them; but you mistake. They use you, and they despise you. They speak you fair now, because you stand between them and the law and give them a certain respectability. Indeed, their only power is derived from you. But when they shall have crushed Catholicism, if they ever do, they will have the same weapons you have placed in their hands against you. Do not hope that by the course you are taking you are going to make Baptist, or Congregational, or Methodist church-members; you are going to make infidels.”

A sense of the utter uselessness of his mission had restored Mr. Yorke 169 to calmness. He spoke firmly, but without any excitement, and, having ended, left the house, and walked quietly homeward. Clara, coming down East Street, and looking anxiously right and left, saw him, and dodged out of sight. With her foot propped on a door-step, she made a writing-desk of her knee, hastily pencilling a line to her mother. While she wrote, three several families peeped and wondered at her through their blinds. She looked about for an Irish boy--saw one, and sent him with her message.

“Run like the wind till you come in sight of the house,” she charged him, “but walk slowly up the avenue, or they will think that you bring bad news, and be frightened.”

“All right, mamma!” Clara had written. “Everybody I meet is as quiet and innocent-looking as a cat that has been stealing cream. I saw papa this minute; I am going up to see Hester, and will be back before dinner.”

Mrs. Yorke kissed and feasted the boy who brought the news; Melicent searched for old clothes, and sent him home with garments enough to last him a year, and both nearly cried over him, “Poor little persecuted dear!” Betsey bestowed on him a pie, and the two Pattens, having nothing of their own to give, stole each of them a cucumber, which they slyly slipped into his pocket. People who lived with the Yorkes always thought as the Yorkes did. There was never more than one party in their house. Their domestics were partisans, their dependents adorers.

Edith went out into the garden, and gathered some flowers for the lad, talking with him meanwhile. It was a calm June day--after a rain-storm. The sky had started to clear away--got so far that there was nothing left but a pearly fleck of cloud that just netted the sunshine--then had forgotten all about itself. A lovely, dreamy softness overhung the scene, and the drops of rain that lay on every leaf and flower shone, but did not flash.

The boy gazed at Edith with admiration. Her head was bare, and she wore a blue dress, with loose sleeves, and a little crisp white ruffle close around the throat. She stood on tiptoe, and stretched her arms to reach a branch of red roses. As she caught it, a shower of drops fell over her head and face. “_Asperges me!_” she whispered.

“Oh! she’s real pretty,” the boy said afterward to his mother. “She has dimples in her elbows just like baby.”

When the wreath was made, Edith hung it round the child’s neck, his arms being full, and walked down to the gate with him. “Try to be a little saint, and not be angry, no matter what may be said to you,” she said. “If you are afraid, say the ‘We fly to thy patronage, O holy Mother of God,’ and she will take care of you. Good-by, dear.”

She leaned on the gate, and looked after him. Her cheeks were as red as the roses she had gathered, and her expression was not, as formerly, one of sunny calmness. She was as quiet in manner and speech as ever, but it was the quiet of a strong and vivid nature fully awake, but not fully satisfied, perplexed, yet self-controlled. So much had happened to her in the last year! She had been called away suddenly from childhood, and study, and vague, bright dreams to confront a positive and quite unexpected reality. Unless she should make a vow never to marry, then she was to marry Dick Rowan, that was her conclusion; and having once made up her mind in that respect, she 170 thought as little about it as possible. Perhaps her only definite thought was that Dick might have waited awhile before speaking, and let her study more; for study had now become impossible. She wanted to be in continual motion, to have work and change. A deep and steady excitement burned in her cheeks, her eyes, her lips. Her piety, instead of being tender and tranquil, had grown impassioned. To die for the faith, to suffer torments for it, to be in danger, that seemed to her desirable. She almost regretted that she had home and friends to bind her. If she were still with Mrs. Rowan, in the little house that was under that clay-bank, then she would be free, and perhaps they would kill her. She had scarcely been to Mass that year without thinking how glorious it would be if a mob would break in and kill them all. Her imagination hovered ceaselessly over this subject.

Seeing her uncle coming, she waited for him. “We must make up our minds that we have not seen the worst that they will do, little girl,” he said. “There is no law.”

She smiled involuntarily.

“Why, are you pleased at that?” he exclaimed.

“There might be a worse fate than dying for one’s faith, Uncle Charles,” she said, clasping her hands over his arms.

He laughed, and patted her cheek. “Is that your notion?” he asked. “If it is, remember that I have a word to say about it. I shall fight hard before you are made a martyr of. I see what you have been reading--Crashaw’s _St. Theresa_:

‘Farewell, house, and farewell, home: She’s for the Moors and martyrdom.’

Do I guess and quote rightly, mademoiselle?”

She only smiled in reply. But well she knew that she had been reading from a deeper book than Crashaw.

A few nights after, the Catholic school-house was blown up with gunpowder, and left a perfect wreck. “Of course!” said Mr. Yorke.

“The teacher has taken the children into the galleries of the church,” Patrick said.

“The church will be destroyed, then,” replied his master.

It was not destroyed altogether at once, however, but every window in it was broken. This was done in broad daylight, just after a summer sunset.

Mr. Yorke put himself before the mob, entreating them to forbear, even trying to push back the foremost ones, but without avail. “Don’t listen to him! His niece is a Catholic,” they cried. “To the church!”

Two or three gentlemen drove up in their buggies, and sat at a safe distance while the work of destruction went on, and several women lingered on the outskirts of the crowd. In a neighboring street, out of sight, Edith Yorke stood with Clara, and listened to the sound of breaking glass. For a moment, natural indignation overcame piety in her heart. “Oh! if I were a thousand men on horseback,” she exclaimed. “I’d like to ride them down, and trample them under foot!” Then the next moment, “Oh! how wicked I am!”

“You are not wicked!” Clara said angrily. “I won’t have you talk such nonsense.”

Clara was in that state of mind when she must scold somebody.

Of course the authorities took no notice of this affair. The teacher had the glass reset, and continued her school. Mr. Yorke wrote to Father Rasle, advising him not to return to Seaton for a while, and a lull succeeded.

And now the Yorkes took breath, and felt not quite alone, for Carl was coming home, and Dick Rowan would soon be there, and Captain Cary was coming down.

TO BE CONTINUED.

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THE STIGMATA AND ECSTASIES OF LOUISE LATEAU OF BOIS D’HAINE. 171

Since the days of St. Francis of Assisium, whose life in the thirteenth century was one constant succession of marvels, the occasional appearance upon favored individuals of the stigmata,[45] and the occurrence of ecstatic visions, have excited the deepest interest in devout minds.

To the eye of faith, these departures from the ordinary laws of nature, like the miracles which God has vouchsafed in all ages of the church, have seemed fresh and brilliant illustrations of this divine power. To the purely scientific mind they have presented inexplicable phenomena, which, being irreconcilable with natural laws, have been either openly derided or attributed to pious fraud.

Nor can the physiologist be harshly blamed for scepticism in this direction, for history teems with the records of epidemics of religious enthusiasm, in which fanaticism had led its victims to claim repeated ecstatic visions of God, and to be the recipients of supernatural revelations. The descriptions transmitted to us of the Pietists and Illuminati in Germany, of the French and English Shakers, the Welsh Jumpers, and many others of the sects to which the Reformation gave birth, abound in instances of these ecstatic outbreaks.

The visions of Swedenborg, as related in his _Arcana Cœlestia_, and in the numerous biographies[46] of this extraordinary person, are well known; and among similar claimants to supernatural experience, Arnold’s description of John Engelbrecht[47] is one of the most curious and interesting.

In Hecker’s _Epidemics of the Middle Ages_ is given a full account of the “Convulsionnaires of St. Médard,” so-called from the cemetery of St. Médard in Paris, where a noted Jansenist deacon was buried in 1727. The fanatical excitement of his followers first showed itself in pilgrimages and reported miraculous cures at his grave, to which they gradually flocked in great numbers, many becoming convulsed with terrible contortions, jumping, shouting, rolling on the ground, spinning around with incredible velocity, running their heads against walls, while others preached fanatical harangues or pretended to be gifted with _clairvoyance_. For more than fifty years these scandalous exhibitions continued, Convulsionism growing into a distinct sect in spite of the efforts of the government to suppress it, until swept out of existence by the greater excitement of the French Revolution.

In many of these cases, the supposition of intentional fraud was doubtless well founded; in others, the ecstatics were themselves the unconscious dupes of their own fanaticism. To appreciate the cautious scrutiny with which the church, however, sifts pretensions of this nature in any of her children, the reader need only consult the lives 172 of such saints as have been thus favored.[48]

The psychological condition or state which is somewhat vaguely termed ecstasy has always possessed peculiar interest both for the theologian and the physician; and, although numerous definitions of it have been attempted, it is extremely difficult to convey to the general reader a clear idea of its distinctive nature. The word itself usually signifies a condition in which the mind and soul is transferred, or placed out of its usual state.

St. Augustine called it “a transport, by which the soul is separated and, as it were, removed to a distance from the bodily senses,” and, following this definition, Ambrose Paré, the father of French surgery, terms it “a reverie with rapture of the mind, as if the soul were parted from the body.” St. Bonaventure, the contemporary and biographer of St. Francis of Assisium, says that ecstasy “is an elevation of the soul to that source of divine love which surpasses human understanding, an elevation by which it is separated from the exterior man.” St. Thomas Aquinas, Cardinal Bona, and other theological writers give similar definitions; while among medical authorities, Briquet, J. Franck, Bérard, Thomas King Chambers, Guislain of Brussels, Clymer, Gratiolet, and many others describe its symptoms and discuss its pathological relations.

Well-marked ecstasy and the stigmata have but seldom been united in the same individual, and still more rarely have these extraordinary manifestations been subjected to the searching tests of science.

It will not, then, be amiss to present the readers of this magazine with a brief description of the most notable illustration in recent times of these marvellous phenomena, as the case has acquired a European celebrity, attracting the scrutiny of many savants, and forming the subject of an interesting memoir[49] by a professor in the Belgian University of Louvain. From his description of the facts, which he was officially appointed to investigate in their scientific bearings, we shall condense the following account.

In the rich and industrial province of Hainault, in Belgium, is situated the village of Bois d’Haine, about midway between the towns of Charleroi and Mons. It is mainly composed of cottages occupied by workmen in the neighboring manufactories; and in one of the poorest of these Louise Lateau, the subject of this notice, was born January 30, 1850.

She is the youngest of three children, all daughters; and their parents were poor working people, strong and ordinarily healthy, and never subject to any nervous hæmorrhagic disease. The mother is still living and in good health; the father died during an epidemic of small-pox at the age of twenty-eight. Louise, then two and a half months old, contracted this disease from her father, but made a rapid recovery. The family continued to struggle on in poverty, the children’s food being poor and scant--“plusque frugal,” says Dr. Lefebvre--but they nevertheless grew up robust and healthy. When only eight, Louise was placed in the temporary care of a poor old woman in the neighborhood, while the latter’s son was engaged in outdoor work. A little later she was sent to school for five months, learning her 173 catechism and a little reading and writing. In her twelfth year, having made her first communion, she entered the service of her great-aunt, who lived at Manage, near Bois d’Haine, in a certain degree of comfort. In this position she displayed great activity and devotion to her duties, giving herself up day and night to the service of her relative, who died in a year or two. She then entered the service of a respectable lady in Brussels, where she remained only seven months on account of an illness, the nature of which is not described; after this she obtained another place in Manage, where, as before, she left behind her the reputation of devoted courage, of patient toil, humble and quiet piety, and charity for the poor.

About the beginning of 1867, she became more feeble in health without being exactly ill or obliged to suspend her customary work. She lost appetite and color, suffered from severe neuralgic pains in the head, and her skin assumed the greenish-white hue that always indicates impoverishment of the blood. This had been aggravated by a severe attack of quinsy; and on several occasions, during the early part of April of this year, she spat blood, the source of which (whether from lungs or stomach) could not be decided.

For an entire month she now became constantly weaker, taking almost nothing during this time but water and the medicines prescribed for her. The exhaustion increased to such a degree that her death was thought imminent, and on the 15th of April the last sacraments were administered. She now suddenly improved, and so rapidly that, on the 21st of April, she was able to walk to Mass at the parish church, three-quarters of a mile distant. This apparently remarkable cure was the first incident that attracted public notice to her case; crowds of people coming to see her as an object of curiosity.

This period may be viewed as her turning point from girlhood into a woman; and, at her then age of eighteen, she is described as being slightly below the middle height, with full face, very little color, a fine delicate skin, light hair, clear, soft blue eyes, a small mouth, and very white well-shaped teeth.

Her expression is intelligent and agreeable, and her general health is good, and free from any scrofulous or other constitutional taint. She has always worked hard, and exhibited considerable physical endurance. Mentally she is represented as unemotional, lacking in imagination, by no means bright, but of good, strong common sense, artless, straightforward, and devoid of enthusiasm. Her education is limited, although she has improved the elementary instruction received during her brief school term, speaking French with ease and some degree of purity, reading with difficulty, and writing very little, and incorrectly at that. Her moral character is honest, simple, transparent. Dr. Lefebvre and others, who questioned her about her ecstatic visions, repeatedly tried to test her sincerity, but never succeeded in making her contradict herself or tend in the least degree to exaggeration: nor could she ever be induced by her young friends to discuss her stigmata or visions, upon which she was equally reticent with her friends and her family. Of a naturally gay and happy disposition, she has shown in various circumstances much patience, determination, and courage. Amidst many domestic anxieties and troubles, often losing her rest day and night during the illness of 174 her relatives, and falsely accused by her mother (who seems to have been a person of difficult temper) of being the cause of all the family’s misfortunes, she remained invariably calm and cheerful. Another of her most striking traits was her charity for the poor; “poor herself, she loved to relieve the poor,” and many instances are narrated of her devotion to the sick and helpless during the cholera that raged at Bois d’Haine in 1866. From her infancy almost she was exceptionally devout, and her piety was always practical, and devoid of affectation and display. In her interior and religious life, as in her domestic duties, she was simple, earnest, and discreet.

A recollection of these details of her character and antecedents is necessary for the proper appreciation of the phenomena now to be described. These are of two distinct kinds, having no connection but their accidental association in the same individual; and that they may be more clearly understood, they will be considered separately, first the stigmata, then the ecstatic trances, and, thirdly, the nature of the evidence upon which the extraordinary facts rest.

I.--THE STIGMATA.

The first occurrence of the bleeding was noticed by Louise on Friday, the 24th of April, 1868, when she saw blood issuing from a spot on the left side of the chest. With her habitual reserve, she mentioned it to no one. The next day it recurred at the same spot; and she, then also observed blood on the top of each foot. She now confided it to her director, who, although thinking the circumstance extraordinary, reassured her and bade her keep the facts to herself. During the night preceding the second Friday following, May 8, blood oozed from the left side and from both feet, and toward nine o’clock in the morning it flowed freely from the back and palm of each hand. At this juncture it seemed impossible longer to keep the matter secret, and her confessor directed Louise to consult a physician.

Recognizing the medical character of the case, the periodical bleeding, and the ecstatic trances which subsequently occurred, the religious authorities felt constrained to place its investigation in the hands of a medical expert, and for this purpose called in the aid of Dr. Lefebvre. A more judicious choice could not have been made, as this gentleman had long devoted himself to the study of nervous affections, and had passed fifteen years in medical charge of two hospitals for the insane, and in lecturing upon mental diseases in the University of Louvain.

Of the minuteness of his examination, and of his credibility as a witness, each reader can judge for himself.

If, during the course of the week, from Saturday to Thursday morning, the hands and feet be examined, the following facts are revealed: On the back of each hand there is an oval patch about half an inch (two and a half centimetres) long, of a more rosy hue than the rest of the skin, dry and glistening on the surface. On the palm of each hand a similar oval patch was seen, equally red, and corresponding exactly with the site of that on the back. On the sole and back of each foot are found similar marks, having the form of a parallelogram with rounded angles, nearly three-quarters of an inch (three centimetres) in length.

On examining these spots with a magnifying-glass of twenty diameters, the epidermis (or superficial layer of the skin) is found to be thin 175 but unbroken, and through it the cutis (or true skin) can readily be seen.

The latter looks perfectly natural, except that the papillæ, or little elevations in which terminate the nerves of touch, are slightly atrophied and flattened, this giving rise to the glistening appearance of the surface. When any one of the stigmata has not bled for a week or two, the reddish discoloration disappears, and the papillæ resume their normal appearance. No permanent marks remain upon the forehead; and, except on Friday, the bleeding points cannot there be distinguished. From a natural feeling of delicacy, the chest was only examined during the ecstasy.

The first symptoms announcing the approaching bleeding usually appear about noon on Thursday. Upon each of the rosy spots on the hands and feet, a _bleb_, or little bladder, is seen to rise and slowly develop. This exactly corresponds, when fully formed, with the size of the patch; and is filled with a transparent serous fluid, sometimes of a reddish tint in those on the soles of the feet and the palms of the hands. The bleb consists of the epidermis detached and elevated from the true skin by the accumulating serous fluid. No swelling or redness is seen in the zone of skin immediately surrounding the bleb.

The bleeding nearly always begins between midnight and one A.M. on Friday, and it does not occur in all the stigmata at once, but in each successively and in no regular order. Most commonly the flow begins from the side of the chest, then in succession from the stigmata on the hands, feet, and forehead. A rent occurs in the raised cuticle, which is sometimes longitudinal, sometimes crucial or triangular: the serous fluid then escapes, and is immediately followed by blood, which oozes from the exposed papillæ. Usually the flow of blood detaches and washes away the shreds of epidermis, and the bleeding surface is left uncovered; but sometimes on the palms of the hands and the soles of the feet, where the epidermis is thicker, the blood collects and clots in the bleb.

At each of his Friday visits, Dr. Lefebvre examined the stigma on the chest, which lay in the space between the fifth and sixth ribs, external to and a little below the centre of the left breast.[50]

At the first examination, which was made August 30, 1868, the bleeding point showed no trace of a previous vesicle; the cuticle was not detached, nor was the skin discolored, and the blood was seen to ooze from three little points almost imperceptible to the naked eye, and about one centimetre apart. In three subsequent examinations a vesicle had formed like those on the hands and feet; it had burst, and the blood oozed from a circular spot of the raw skin nearly a quarter of an inch in diameter.

Upon four different occasions, blood was observed to be flowing from the head. It was difficult to ascertain the condition of the skin under the hair; but on the forehead no vesicle appeared, nor was there any apparent change in the color of the skin. The blood was seen to issue from twelve or fifteen minute points arranged in circular form upon the forehead. A bandage, of the breadth of two fingers, passing around the head equidistant from the eyebrows and the roots of the hair, would include the bleeding zone, which is slightly puffy and painful upon pressure. On examining these points with a magnifying 176 lens, most of them looked like minute cuts in the skin, of triangular shape, as if made by the bite of microscopic leeches: others were semilunar in shape, and some quite irregular.

The quantity of blood that flows through the stigmata each Friday is variable. During the first months of the flow and before the commencement of the ecstatic attack, it was abundant, and often lasted twenty-four hours--from midnight to midnight--and it was estimated that as much as one litre, or seven-eighths of a quart, was discharged from the nine wounds. An exact estimate of the amount was difficult, from the fact that most of the blood was absorbed by the cloths about the chest and limbs. But, as the result of his personal observations, Dr. Lefebvre states that at his first visit, August 30, 1868, both the duration and the quantity of the flow had already begun to diminish: beginning at midnight, it stopped about four or five o’clock the next afternoon; yet he counted on that day fourteen large linen cloths (the largest being twenty inches by eight, and the smallest twenty inches by six) completely saturated. Besides this, the left foot was still enveloped during the ecstasy, and there was a pool of blood on the floor as large as two hands. He thinks he rather understates the amount of blood then lost if he estimates it at two hundred and fifty grammes (a half-pint). This, however, he gives as the mean quantity lost, it being sometimes more and sometimes less.

Sometimes the bleeding ceased about midday, and two Fridays passed without any hæmorrhage, the ecstasy occurring as usual. On one of these occasions the stigmata remained unchanged, but on the other the usual vesicle formed, yielding a serous discharge of a delicate rose tint, but no blood. After this the usual bleeding resumed its regular course every Friday, and the bloody chaplet on the forehead, which at first appeared exceptionally, was now displayed each week.

The blood, which was carefully examined, had neither the scarlet tint of arterial nor the dark purple hue of venous blood, but was of a violet red color, like that of the capillaries or minute vessels which unite the veins and arteries. It was of natural consistence, and clotted readily upon the cloths and upon the edges of the wound. With two of his colleagues who were expert in microscopy, Dr. Hairion, professor of hygiene and dermatology (the theory of skin diseases), and Dr. Van Kempen, professor of anatomy, Dr. Lefebvre made several careful microscopic examinations of the blood, which showed a perfectly transparent plasma or blood fluid, with the red and white corpuscles of ordinary blood in proper proportion.

The stigmata are manifestly painful; for, although the girl was extremely reluctant to speak of it, Dr. Lefebvre was satisfied, by careful observation of her attitudes and expression before the ecstasies began, that she suffered acutely.

The bleeding stopped at different hours, as has been stated. On the following day--Saturday--the stigmata were quite dry, with little scales of dried blood here and there on their surface. Not a trace of suppuration ever occurred from the wounds; and the girl, who a few hours ago had much difficulty in using her hands or in standing on her feet, is busily engaged with her morning household duties, or walking a mile and a half to her devotions at the parish church.

II.--THE ECSTATIC TRANCES. 177

The weekly ecstasies of Louise Lateau began on Friday, July 17, 1868, thirteen weeks after the bleeding was first noticed, although the curate of Bois d’Haine, M. Niels, had noticed before this some fugitive attacks of unconsciousness. He discreetly avoided speaking of them, however, and was careful not to discuss them even with Louise herself. No details of these transient attacks, which generally occurred during some of the great religious festivals of the previous year, are given by Dr. Lefebvre, as he had no satisfactory evidence of them, and was unwilling to trust the observations of others. The marked ecstatic trances recurred every Friday after the date mentioned, generally about eight or nine o’clock in the morning, and ended about six in the afternoon, although sometimes lasting an hour longer. Their duration is therefore from ten to eleven hours without interruption; and they generally begin while the subject is occupied with her devotions, although sometimes when she is in the midst of conversation, and occasionally while engaged at her work.

On Friday morning, Louise is accustomed to pass the time in prayer, the tender and bleeding condition of the wounds on her hands rendering work impossible. Her prayers are of the simplest character, consisting generally of the rosary. Seated on her chair, her hands wrapped in the cloths, and her manner calm and serene, suddenly her eyes become fixed, immovable, and the trance has begun. From his notes made on the spot, upon one of these occasions, Dr. Lefebvre transcribes the following description: “It is half-past seven in the morning. I have been talking to Louise upon common topics, about her occupations, her education, her health. She has answered my questions simply, precisely, laconically. Her appearance is quiet and tranquil, her color natural, her skin cool, and the pulse seventy-two in the minute. After a while her conversation flags, and she answers more slowly. I suddenly notice that she has become immovable, her eyes fixed and turned upward, and a little toward the right. The ecstasy has begun.” It is worth observing that the instant the eyes become fixed in contemplation, the ecstatic state has commenced; after this the girl answers no questions, and is quite insensible to external influences.

Dr. Imbert-Goubeyre, professor in the medical school of Clermont-Ferrand, has also witnessed the commencement of the ecstasy under like circumstances. His description is unnecessary.

Lastly, the ecstasy may begin while she is at her daily work. On August 13, 1869, Mgr. d’Herbomez, the venerable Bishop of British Columbia, went to see Louise Lateau, reaching her house about eight o’clock in the morning. She was at work on her sewing-machine, although her hands and feet were bleeding freely, and the blood trickled down from her forehead, cheeks, and neck upon the machine, which she evidently worked with the utmost pain. While the prelate was speaking to her, the noise of the machine suddenly stopped, for she had at once passed into the trance. A number of distinguished ecclesiastics, among them Professor Hallez of the Seminary of Tournay, have witnessed a similar onset of the attacks.

When once established, the course of the attack is thus described. During most of the trance, the girl sits on the edge of her chair, as motionless as a statue, with the body bent slightly forward; the 178 bleeding hands enveloped in cloths and resting upon her knees, the eyes wide open and rigidly fixed as described. The expression of the face is that of rapt attention, and she seems lost in the contemplation of some distant object. Her expression and attitude frequently change, the features sometimes relaxing, the eyes becoming moist, and a smile of happiness lighting up the mouth. Sometimes the lids droop and nearly veil the eyes, the brow contracts, and tears roll slowly down the cheeks: at times again she grows pale, her face wears an expression of the greatest terror, while she starts up with a suppressed cry. The body sometimes slowly rotates, and the eyes move, as if following some invisible procession. At other times she rises and moves forward, standing on tiptoe with her hands stretched out, and either clasped or hanging open like the figures of the _Orantes_ of the catacombs; while her lips move, her breathing is rapid and panting, her features light up, and her face, which before the ecstasy is quite plain, is transfigured with an ideal beauty. If to this be added the sight of her stigmata: her head encircled with its bloody chaplet, whence the red current drops along her temples and cheeks, her small white hands stamped with a mysterious wound from which bloody lines emerge like rays--and this strange spectacle surrounded by people of all conditions, who are absorbed in respectful attention and interest--some idea may be gained of what Dr. Lefebvre often witnessed at Bois d’Haine.

About half-past one o’clock, she usually falls on her knees, with her hands joined and her body bent forward, while her face wears an expression of the profoundest contemplation. She remains in this attitude about half an hour, then rises and resumes her seat. About two o’clock the scene changes. She first leans a little forward, then rises--slowly at first, then more quickly--and, as if by some sudden movement of projection, falls with her face to the ground. In this position she lies upon her chest, the head resting upon the left arm, her eyes closed, her mouth half-open, her lower limbs stretched out and covered to the heels by her dress. At three o’clock she makes a sudden movement: her arms are extended at right angles with the body in cross-like fashion, while the feet are crossed, the right instep resting on the sole of the left. She maintains this position until about five o’clock, when she suddenly starts up on her knees in the attitude of prayer. After a few minutes of profound absorption, she resumes her chair.

The ecstasy lasts until about six or seven o’clock, the attitude and expression of face varying according to the mental impressions, when it terminates in an appalling scene: The arms fall helpless alongside of the body, the head drops forward on the chest, the eyes close, the nose becomes pinched, while the face assumes the pallor of death: at the same time the hands become icy cold, the pulse is quite imperceptible, a cold sweat covers the body, and the death-rattle seems to be heard in the throat. This condition lasts about fifteen minutes, when she revives. The bodily heat rises, the pulse returns, the cheeks regain their color, but for some minutes more there hangs an indefinable expression of ecstasy about the face. Suddenly the eyelids open, the features relax, the eyes look familiarly at surrounding objects, and the ecstasy is over.

If the different phases of the paroxysm be carefully watched, it is evident that the intellect, far from being dormant, is very active; 179 although the girl is quite unconscious of what is passing around her, she remembers perfectly all her subjective sensations. Although extremely reluctant to discuss the subject, she was ordered by her spiritual directors to answer Dr. Lefebvre’s questions, which she did--briefly, but distinctly--to the following effect:

When her ecstasy begins, she says she finds herself suddenly plunged into a vast flood of light; figures more or less distinct soon appear, and several scenes of the Passion then pass successively before her. These she minutely but briefly describes--with the appearance of the Saviour, his garments, wounds, crown of thorns, and cross. He never addresses her a word or even looks at her. She describes with the same clearness and precision the characters that surround him--the apostles, the holy women, and the Jews.

Dr. Lefebvre has given a lucid exposition of the state of the different organs during the several stages of the ecstasy, as well as of the chief points of interest of the paroxysm. During the first period--from eight o’clock in the morning until two in the afternoon--Louise remains sitting in her chair, and her organic and functional condition changes but little. The skin is cool; the face retains its usual color; respiration is regular, and so calm that close attention is needed to note the chest movement; the pulse is soft and regular, beating about seventy-five in the minute. Occasionally the heart-beats are more rapid or slower than usual, and the face flushes or becomes suddenly pale: these functional modifications accord with the play of the features, and are evidently the result of the varying impressions of the mind.

From midday on Thursday, when she dines more sparingly than usual, until eight o’clock on the Saturday morning, she tastes absolutely no food or drink of any kind. She feels no need of either, and her stomach would not retain it if taken; for, several times, when ordered by her physician to take certain nourishment on Fridays, it has been swallowed without resistance, but at once rejected. In spite of this complete abstinence from drink, the tongue was always moist: the great excretions of the body were suspended. Careful attention was directed to the condition of the nervous system, and especially to sensation and motion. To the touch, no tension or spasmodic contraction is perceptible in any of the muscles, and the girl executes no movements but those required for the action of the scenes at which she assists. Thus, at times, she sits up straight, her hands either clasped or hanging loosely, her lips relaxing into a smile, or her face drawn into a frown. If her limbs be moved by a bystander, the result varies; sometimes they preserve the position given, as, when her arms are lifted up, they may retain the new position for nine or ten minutes, and then slowly relapse to their former place. But, if she is lifted to a standing position, great muscular relaxation is evident, and as soon as the support is withdrawn she falls back into her chair. One peculiarity should here be noted: if any effort be made to change her position during prosternation, when the arms are extended and the feet crossed upon each other, a decided resistance is perceptible, and the extremities immediately resume their position.

The exercise of the special senses is completely suspended, as was tested by experiment. The eyes are widely open, the pupils dilated, the lids quite immovable, except when the conjunctiva[51] is touched, 180 which produces a slight winking or contraction of the lids. A bright light or other object may be suddenly passed without effect before the eyes, which gaze vacantly into space.

The sense of hearing is equally blunted, and insensible to ordinary sounds. On several occasions, a person standing behind her has shouted loudly into her ears without exciting the least evidence of being heard. Except upon the conjunctiva, as mentioned, general sensibility seems to be completely in abeyance. Numerous experiments were made to test this fact.

For instance, the mucous membranes of the nose and ears were repeatedly tickled with a feather without exciting any reflex contraction; a strong solution of ammonia held under the nose produced no effect. The skin, being less sensitive than the mucous membranes, was pricked with a needle, and a pin thrust through a fold of skin on the hands and forearm; the point of a penknife was also driven into the skin until it bled freely, without producing the faintest muscular contraction or indication of sensibility.

A still more decisive test was made with an electro-magnetic battery,[52] the electrodes of which were placed on the front of the forearm where the skin is very thin and sensitive, and the strongest possible current passed through the muscles for more than a minute by the watch without eliciting the least evidence of pain, and the electric brush was equally powerless. The poles were likewise applied to different parts of the face, and violent and prolonged contractions of the facial muscles induced, but without the slightest winking or other sign of sensibility or suffering.

Such is the condition of the organic functions during the first part of the ecstasy, but some modifications are observed during the second. Thus, while lying prostrate on the floor, the pulse becomes almost imperceptible, and an ordinary observer would fail to detect it at all, although Dr. Lefebvre was sure it never ceased to beat fully. Its frequency was at the same time greatly increased; so that, when it could be counted, it often rose to 120 or 130 in the minute. The movements of respiration now become more and more feeble, and the closest attention is needed to make sure that they exist, the rhythmical motion of the little shawl that covers her shoulders being often the only appreciable evidence that they are not totally suspended.

Another remarkable fact, which is contrary to the general physical rule, is that the rate of the pulse and that of respiration are directly in an inverse proportion; both Dr. Lefebvre and Dr. Imbert-Goubeyre having proved that, while the pulse rose from 90 to 130 per minute, the respirations (normally averaging 20 to 25) sink to 18 or even 10 in the same period. In proportion as the pulse and breathing become feeble, the skin loses its natural temperature, and is bathed in a cold sweat. As was stated, reaction occurs in ten or fifteen minutes; the pulse regains its force and normal frequency, respiration increases, and the natural standard of bodily heat is restored. The ecstatic thus passes at once from her trance into her ordinary life without any intermediate stage of transition. No headache, stiffness of the joints, or other discomfort is complained of; the intellect is perfectly clear, the expression serene, the face 181 calm, and the body active. At this moment the pulse has been found regular, soft, and from 72 to 75 per minute; respiration of natural strength, and 22 per minute, and the skin perfectly natural.

III.--THE QUESTION OF CREDIBILITY.

The suspicion of fraud seems never to have been entertained by the people who surrounded Louise Lateau. Her straightforward character, her simple and unostentatious piety, and her heroic acts of charity to the poor seemed to them the antithesis of hypocrisy. Of the likelihood of intentional deception each reader will judge for himself from the sketch we have given of her history. Dr. Lefebvre, however, acknowledges without hesitation that when he first visited her he was sure a pious fraud was being attempted which the eye of science would at once detect. Considering that he knew nothing of her and her antecedents, this suspicion, he says, “was natural, legitimate, necessary even; but it soon disappeared in presence of the facts.”

If only the stigmatization be considered, the supposition is untenable, when it is remembered that she was constantly watched by her friends, neighbors, and visitors. How, under such circumstances, could she possibly buy and use the blisters, caustics, or other means of producing the bleeding wounds? But, granting she had all these at her command, how could the ignorant peasant girl--even though aided by two or three accomplices--produce a result which the physician with all the resources of science cannot effect? For it involved the necessity of causing a bloody discharge from nine or ten points of the body, and of sustaining this for a half-day or even longer under the very eyes of witnesses who prevented any repeated irritation of the bleeding surfaces. But when the ecstatic trance is borne in mind, the impossibility of imposture is still more evident. How can we conceive that a young girl, brought up in the hardships of manual work, deprived of all instruction, who has read nothing, and seen nothing, could each week, during an entire day, play the part of a consummate actress; that she could simulate not only the abolition of sight and hearing, but complete insensibility to the most exquisitely painful tests; that she could control functions which are essentially beyond the power of the will, as circulation, bodily temperature, respiration; or that she could suspend those excretions which are at once the most humiliating and the most irresistible evidence of human weakness!

If, then, the problem at Bois d’Haine presented only one difficulty--the stigmatization or the ecstasy--it would be next to impossible to explain it on the supposition of fraud. But this difficulty is incomparably greater when we consider these two extraordinary facts in association. To suppose that both the ecstasy and stigmatization were fraudulent would involve the manifest contradiction of admitting that the hæmorrhage, which required a frequent movement to sustain it for ten, fifteen, or twenty hours, could be maintained during the prolonged immobility of the trance. No one, however dextrous, could play this double _rôle_ for eighteen months[53] without detection, although constantly examined by all kinds of people--many of them filled with scientific distrust, and among them more than one hundred physicians. As an example of the 182 uncertainty of her privacy, Dr. Lefebvre states (in a note) that, on the 11th February, 1870, he was unexpectedly passing through the neighborhood, and, as it chanced to be on Friday, he thought he would stop and see Louise. He knocked at the door--was at once admitted, and went straight to her little room without stopping to speak to the family. It was a quarter to four in the afternoon, and she was completely alone, lying prostrate on the floor, with her arms extended as described, and insensible to all that was passing around her. The bleeding limbs were wrapped in the usual cloths, of which he counted nine. The blood which trickled from her forehead was dried; and, lifting up her little white cap, he noticed the circle of bleeding points on her forehead, which presented the usual appearance. The feet had not been bleeding; on the right hand the flow was just stopping, while on the left the blood was still distinctly flowing from both stigmata. Having ascertained these points, he quietly left the cottage without her having been aware of his visit.

As a general answer to the objection of insincerity, Dr. Lefebvre appeals to both moral and physical proofs. As the most convincing of the former class, he cites the general good repute of Louise, which was never doubted, even by those who most resolutely questioned the nature of the phenomena she presented: her brave and humble life, her contempt for presents or money, her simplicity and avoidance of all parade; her extreme anxiety to conceal the first evidence of the stigmata even from her own family. If, as occasionally happened, money or presents of any kind were offered to her mother or sisters, their wounded pride was unmistakable; and when the Archbishop of Malines, after a long examination of Louise, once asked the family if they had no request to make of him, they only entreated that they might be relieved of visitors and left undisturbed.

To meet the physical objections raised to the theory of the stigmata, he tried the effects produced by cupping, caustics, and various blistering agents. The first of these has little or no force; for, besides the difficulty of exhausting the air under a cup upon the hard and uneven surface of the back of the hand, it is necessary to cut the skin to make the blood flow, and, when the amount drawn to the surface flows out, the bleeding ceases at once.

Caustics produce a destruction of the skin at the point to which they are applied, and after five or six days an eschar is detached, leaving a sore but not a bleeding surface; or, if bleeding exceptionally occurs, it ceases very soon, and the healing process is slow and always followed by an indelible scar. This in no respect accorded with the facts observed.

The blistering hypothesis seems less improbable, as this class of irritants produce a special form of inflammation of the skin, during which the epidermis is raised from the derm by an exudation of serous fluid. As this process much more resembled the vesicles that preceded the stigmatic bleedings, it was examined with greater care. The characteristic odor of cantharides or ammonia was never perceived, nor could the peculiar spangles of the Spanish-fly ever be detected with a magnifying lens. Litmus paper, moistened and applied to the wounds, gave no evidence of the application of acids. In addition to this, there was no inflamed areola around the stigmata, as is common around the edge of blistered surfaces, and their development was not simultaneous, but successive; and more than once, in Dr. Lefebvre’s 183 presence, the ampulla or vesicle ruptured spontaneously, and the flow of blood instantly began in its usual quantity.

When, however, the vesicle produced by a blister is ruptured, the raw skin is exposed, but never under any circumstances emits a flow of blood. To prove this in the most conclusive manner, the following experiments were instituted:

On Friday, Nov. 27, 1868, Dr. Lefebvre, who usually adopted the wise precaution of taking with him two or three of his colleagues or other respectable physicians on his visits to Bois d’Haine, in the presence of Drs. Lecrinier and Séverin, applied strong aqua ammonia to a spot about half an inch in diameter upon the back of the left hand, alongside of the stigma, which was then bleeding freely. A narrow strip of sound skin was purposely left between the two. In about twelve minutes a well-developed circular vesicle was obtained, filled with transparent serum. On the hypothesis of fraud, this should have burst spontaneously; but, as it did not do so, it was ruptured and the cuticle torn off, thus exposing two raw surfaces side by side, upon the same hand, and involving the same tissues. The two spots were carefully watched; the stigma continued to bleed freely for two hours and a half longer, while the blistered surface during this period did not yield a single drop of blood. For a half hour it exuded a little colorless serum, after which its surface dried up; on rubbing it with a coarse towel, a little rose-colored serum escaped and soaked into the cloth, but ceased the instant the friction was stopped.

The second experiment, which was still more decisive, was by means of what he calls “the glove test” (_l’épreuve des gants_).

On Wednesday, February 3, 1869, Dr. Lecrinier, M. Niels, the curate of Bois d’Haine, and M. Bussin visited the cottage, and took with them a pair of thick, strong, well-stitched leather gauntlets. After carefully examining her hands, and satisfying themselves that no vesicle or abnormal redness existed, they asked Louise to put on the gloves, which fitted her exactly. A strong wristband being then wrapped five times around the wrist, so as not to leave the smallest interspace between the glove and the skin, it was tied in a double knot, the ends cut short, covered with melted sealing-wax, and impressed on each side with a special seal. To prevent the wax from scaling off from friction or any chance blow, the seals were enclosed in little bags (_bourses en toile_). The gloves were the same for both hands, except that on the right glove the thumb and forefinger were cut short to allow the girl to continue her usual sewing. On the next Friday morning, before seven o’clock, Dr. Lefebvre met by appointment at the cottage Mgr. Pouceur, vicar-general of the diocese of Tournay, and two well-known Belgian physicians, Drs. Moulaert, of Bruges, and Mussely, of Deguze. After each one had satisfied himself of the integrity of the seals, and that it was impossible to slip an instrument of any kind between the glove and the skin, the strings were cut and the gloves removed.

They were full of blood, which also covered the hands. When this was washed off, the stigmata were found just the same as on other Fridays; on the palm and back of each hand the epidermis had been detached; it was torn, and the surface of the skin left raw, and each of the stigmatic spots continued to bleed as usual. Of the feet, which had not been subjected to any test, the right was bleeding freely, while 184 the left was dry.

Lest some subtle doubter might object to this experiment that, by some indiscretion on the part of the examiners, the girl might perhaps have discovered their intention, and applied her secret irritant to the hands before their arrival, Dr. Lefebvre resolved to repeat the test with still more conclusive precautions.

The gloves were therefore again applied on a Tuesday with the same care as before, and the next day were removed for a few moments, and the hands found in a perfectly healthy and natural state; they were then re-applied as before. On Friday morning, they were taken off before a new set of witnesses, when the stigmata of both hands were found bleeding freely as usual.

In his appendix, Dr. Lefebvre states that this glove test was suggested by Mgr. Pouceur, who superintended the theological part of the inquiry at the request of the Bishop of Tournay, and to whose tact and intelligent liberality he pays the highest compliment.

These experiments, and the inferences that they logically involve, convinced Dr. Lefebvre that the hypothesis of fraud in the production of the stigmata was untenable.

It would be easy to show by similar proofs that the ecstatic trances could not have been feigned. But for our purpose it will suffice to recall the reader’s attention to the numerous trials that were made to test the subject’s sensibility to external impressions. Those made with the electric current alone are decisive upon this point, for it may fairly be said that the strongest and most resolute man could not possibly resist some exhibition of feeling while a powerful magnetic battery was contorting his muscles.

In a subsequent part of his volume, Dr. Lefebvre enters into an exhaustive medical study of the facts observed, the discussion of which would be out of place in this magazine. He shows conclusively that, although they have some points in common, the ecstatic trances essentially differ from hysteria, catalepsy, and other allied disorders of the nervous system; while animal magnetism in its various subdivisions of “Braidism,” hypnotism, and electro-biology is equally powerless with somnambulism or the theory of spiritualism to unravel the phenomena presented by this simple peasant girl of Bois d’Haine.

The reader who desires to pursue this inquiry is referred to Dr. Lefebvre’s work (pp. 162 _et seq._) and to Fournier’s article entitled “Cas rares” in the fourth volume of the _Dictionnaire des Sciences Médicales_, which is replete with curious information upon the subject of the stigmata.

So convincing are the statements of Dr. Lefebvre, who never descends into the advocate or mistakes his own theories for facts, that the case he narrates has been accepted in good faith, and republished within the present year by two of the leading journals[54] of this country and England.

In one of these, Dr. Day, of London, discusses the probable cause of the phenomena with considerable liberality, while the learned Clymer contents himself with reporting the extraordinary facts.

[45] It is scarcely necessary to explain to Catholic readers that this expression is applied to the marks of the five wounds upon our Lord’s body, as described in the Gospel, and illustrated in all representations of the crucifixion.

[46] Among others, White’s _Life and Writings of Emmanuel Swedenborg_. 1867.

[47] _Observations, etc., upon Insanity._ London. 1806. Cited by Clymer.

[48] See among others, Salvatori’s _Life of Veronico Giuliani_, pp. 100-108, and the exhaustive _Christliche Mystik_ of Görres, in which is given a full account of Maria Mörl, the “Ecstatic of the Tyrol.”

[49] _Louise Lateau de Bois d’Haine: sa Vie; ses Extases; ses Stigmates. Etude Médicale._ Par le Dr. F. Lefebvre, Professeur de Pathologie Générale et de Thérapeutique. Louvain. 1870. 12mo, pp. 360.

[50] For the unprofessional reader, it may be proper to state that this point is just external to the usual position of the apex of the heart.

[51] The thin, transparent membrane that covers the eyeball, and is reflected upon the inner surface of the lids. It is one of the most delicate and sensitive portions of the body.

[52] This test is often applied for the detection of feigned convulsions, etc., by criminals and other malingerers; its efficacy will be appreciated by any one who has tried to hold the poles of a powerful battery.

[53] That is, from July, 1868, to April, 1870, when Dr. Lefebvre’s book was published. In a subsequent letter dated January 13, 1871, to Dr. Day, of London, he states that her condition is in all respects unchanged.

[54] _The Journal of Psychological Medicine_, New York, Oct., 1870. _Macmillan’s Magazine_, London, April, 1871.

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THE LEGENDS OF OISIN, BARD OF ERIN. 185

BY AUBREY DE VERE.

INTRODUCTORY.

Among the mountains and on the wild shores of Western Ireland are still recited, in the Gaelic, to eager listeners legends relating to Fionn Mac Cumbal and his son Oisin, known to the English reader chiefly under the names of Fingal and Ossian. Some of these “rhapsodies” have been recently published, with an English version, by the Irish “Ossianic Society,” and others by Mr. Hawkins Simpson, in a valuable volume called _Oisin, the Bard of Ireland_. Many poems on the same subject are included also in _The Dean of Lismore’s Book_, a work consisting of ancient Gaelic poetry, selected from a MS. collection made about A.D. 1514, by Sir James MacGregor, Dean of Lismore, an island in Argyllshire. The early Irish settlements in Western Scotland are largely referred to by the chroniclers and archæologists of Scotland. W. F. Skene, Esq., in his learned Introduction to the Dean’s book, informs us (though for Scotland, also, he claims Ossianic poetry) that, during the four centuries in which the great Celtic house of the “Lord of the Isles” held sway, there existed “not only a close political connection between the Western Highlands and Islands and Ireland, but the literary influence was equally close and strong; the Irish sennachies and bards were heads of a school which included the Western Highlands, and the Highland sennachies were either of Irish descent, or, if of native origin, resorted to bardic schools in Ireland for instruction in the language and accomplishments of their art.” ... “The oldest of the Gaelic MSS. preserved in the library of the Faculty of Advocates belongs to this period. They are all written in the Irish character; the language is the written language of Ireland; and they contain numerous specimens of the poetry of these Irish masters.”

Among the Ossianic poems still chanted in Ireland, not a few consist of dialogues between Oisin and Saint Patrick. They descend from a very remote antiquity, though they have been much modified in the course of ages. The bard, last of his race and clan, is represented as the guest of Saint Patrick in one of his convents. He accepts the Christian faith, though with misgivings, for he fears that he is thus false to the friends of his youth, and now and then his wrath blazes out against the monks, who have no faith in the chiefs of Inisfail. The saint beguiles his outbreaks by praying him to sing the old glories of the land.

Fionn, the father of Oisin, was the great commander of the Irish Feine, a standing army elected from all parts of the country, and invested with privileges which made it almost a kingdom within a kingdom. Individually, he belonged to the Feine of Leinster, the celebrated “Baoigne Clan.” Alarmed by the regal attributes assumed by Fionn, all the provincial kings of Ireland banded themselves together against him, and the battle of Gahbra, near Tara, in Meath, was fought, A.D. 286. In that battle almost all the chiefs of both sides perished, including Oscar, Oisin’s son, who commanded the Feine. Oscar is always represented as the gentlest, not less than the bravest of the Feine--the Hector of the Irish Troy.

Fionn and Oisin flourished, despite these poetic disputations, nearly two centuries before the time of Saint Patrick! Some have supposed, accordingly, that the Patrick of the Ossianic poems was some precursor of the Irish apostle. But the chronological discrepancy would probably have proved no counterweight to the strength of that instinct which made the national imagination insist on connecting the heroic with the saintly period of Ireland. A theme full of pathos and interest was presented by the blind old warrior bard, divided between his devotion to his father and his son on the one hand, and his reverence, on the other, for the teachers of the better faith--between old affections and new convictions--patriotic recollections and religious hopes.

I.

THE CONTENTION OF OISIN WITH PATRICK.[55]

[FROM ANCIENT IRISH SOURCES.]

When Patrick the faith to Oisin had preached, He believed, and in just ways trod; Yet oft for old days he grieved, and thus Stormed oft at the saint of God.

“Woe, woe, for the priestly tribe this hour 186 On the Feine Hill have sway! Glad am I that scarce their shapes I see; Half-blind am I this day.

“Woe, woe, thou Palace of Cruachan! Thy sceptre is down and thy sword, The chase goes over thy grassy roof, And the monk in thy courts is lord!

“Thou man with the mitre and vestments broad, And the bearing of grave command, Rejoice that Diarmid this day is dust! Right heavy was his clinched hand!

“Thou man with the bell! I rede thee well, Were Diorraing living this day, Thy book he would take, and thy bell would break On the base of yon pillar gray!

“Thou man with miraculous crosier-staff, Though puissant thou art, and tall, Were Goll but here, he would dash thy gear In twain on thy convent wall!

“Were Conan living, the bald-head shrill, With the flail of his scoff and gibe, He would break thy neck, and thy convent wreck, And lash from the land thy tribe!

“But one of our chiefs thy head had spared-- My Oscar--my son--my child: He was storm in the foray, and fire in the fight, But in peace he was maiden-mild.”

Then Patrick answered: “Old man, old man, That pagan realm lies low. This day Christ ruleth. Forget thy chiefs, And thy deeds gone by forego!

“High feast thou hast on the festal days, And cakes on the days of fast--” “Thou liest, thou priest, for in wrath and scorn Thy cakes to the dogs I cast!”

“Old man, thou hearest our Christian hymns: 187 Such strains thou hadst never heard--” “Thou liest, thou priest! for in Letter Lee wood I have listened its famed blackbird!

“I have heard the music of meeting swords, And the grating of barks on the strand, And the shout from the breasts of the men of help That leaped from the decks to land.

“Twelve hounds had my sire, with throats like bells, Loud echoed on lake and bay: By this hand, they lacked but the baptism rite To chant with thy monks this day!”

Oisin’s white head on his breast dropt down, Till his hair and his beard, made one, Shone out like the spine of a frosty hill Far seen in the wintry sun.

“One question, O Patrick! I ask of thee, Thou king of the saved and the shriven: My sire, and his chiefs, have they their place In thy city, star-built, of heaven?”

“Oisin, old chief of the shining sword, That questionest of the soul, That city they tread not who lived for war: Their realm is a realm of dole.”

“By this head, thou liest, thou son of Calphurn! In heaven I would scorn to bide, If my father and Oscar were exiled men, And no friend at my side.”

“That city, old man, is the city of peace: Loud anthems, not widows’ wail--” “It is not in bellowings chiefs take joy, But in songs of the wars of Fail!

“Are the men in the streets like Baoigne’s chiefs? Great-hearted like us are they? Do they stretch to the poor the ungrudging hand, Or turn they their heads away?

“Thou man with the chant, and thou man with the creed, 188 This thing I demand of thee: My dog, may he pass through the gates of heaven? May my wolf-hound enter free?”

“Old man, not the buzzing gnat may pass, Nor sunbeam look in unbidden: The King there sceptred knows all, sees all: From him there is nothing hidden.”

“It never was thus with Fionn, our king! In largess our Fionn delighted: The hosts of the earth came in, and went forth Unquestioned, and uninvited!”

“Thy words are the words of madness, old man, Thy chieftains had might one day; Yet a moment of heaven is three times worth The warriors of Eire for aye!”

Then Oisin uplifted his old white head: Like lightning from the hoary skies A flash went forth ‘neath the shaggy roofs Low-bent o’er his sightless eyes:

“Though my life sinks down, and I sit in the dust, Blind warrior and gray-haired man, Mine were they of old, thou priest overbold, Those chiefs of Baoigne’s clan!”

And he cried, while a spasm his huge frame shook, “Dim shadows like men before me, My father was Fionn, and Oscar my son, Though to-day ye stand vaunting it o’er me!”

Thus raged Oisin--’mid the fold of Christ, Still roaming old deserts wide In the storm of thought, like a lion old, Though lamblike at last he died.

[55] The substance of this poem will be found among the translations of the Irish Ossianic Society.

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LUCAS GARCIA. 189

FROM THE SPANISH OF FERNAN CABALLERO.

III.

Lucas, who could neither do nor remedy anything, suffered fearfully from the presence of his sister so near him. Happily, in two days the general left for Sevilla.

But from the hour when she met her brother and he refused to recognize her, Lucia’s existence was changed. To her, in the flowery butterfly life into which, at seventeen, she had been almost forced by circumstances, the encounter with Lucas had been like the striking of a bark indolently voyaging, without patron and without compass, to the breath of light and laughing breezes, against the first rock of firm land: the shock had been terrible. In perplexity she asked herself, “Where am I? Whither am I going? Who is this that flatters and shelters me? Who he that rejects me?” In terror she gazed around her: all seemed new and strange, all odious and reprehensible. In her memory--oh! that she had consulted it before!--she found the words her brother had said to her at parting: “Never turn from the right path, though it be steep and sown with thorns. Always look straight before you, for he that does not do this never knows where he will stop.” Lucia’s wretchedness was augmented by the seeming impossibility of escape from the position in which she found herself. Could she turn back without either encouragement and support, while, by continuing in sin, she would have both? Her natural want of energy made it the more difficult for her to return to the right path, with no help but his who never fails those who seek him with faith and without fear or faltering. The tears she shed tarnished her beauty, and the sorrow that preyed on her heart robbed her manners--hitherto so gay and caressing--of their charm. All this at first annoyed Gallardo, then offended, and finished by exasperating him. Violent scenes took place between the lovers; these introduced discord; and discord, when once it has burst its primitive embankments, filters through whatever others may be raised to contain it.

When the general was recalled to Madrid, expecting to be employed, and thinking that his stay would not be long, he resolved to leave Lucia in Sevilla. She allowed him to go without opposition, for so weary was she of the life she led that any change seemed preferable. She was, besides, very far from possessing the brazen and insolent courage that women of her condition are wont to acquire, and that causes so many of them, when they have ceased to be objects of passion, to be dreaded by the men around whom they have coiled themselves like horrible snakes; making miserable Laocoons of the victims, who often marry them through fear, where before they would not do it for love, and thus render the latter part of their career as ridiculous as the beginning was scandalous.

A worthy manner, truly, in which to fill up a man’s existence!

The stay at court, however, of the _young_ general, as the papers styled Gallardo, was prolonged. He alternated in various combinations 190 of second-class political intrigues, and allowed himself to be made the conceited tool of one of them, under the full persuasion that he had become the imposing leader of a party.

The general now began to think, with excellent reason, very sound judgment, and profound calculation, that it was time for him to be more considerate. The reader will pardon us the expression, which, in his case, meant to enter upon a life of usefulness and devotion to the interests of the country--without sacrificing his own, it will be understood. Influenced by these grave considerations, our young leader subscribed to newspapers, bought books and read some of them, though he soon forgot precisely which he had read and which not; wrote a memorial on river navigation, and another upon the _Renta del Excusado_;[56] made short speeches as a preparation for longer ones, which succeeded very well and met with the entire approbation of his hearers; and, in the time it takes to say a devout _amen_, exchanged the rakish air of the young blood for the pompous tone of the prominent and influential citizen.

Our friend, as may be seen, had reached his apogee: in confirmation of which--among other sacrifices made to seriousness--he had procured a good cook, and loosened the lacings of his stays.

Nevertheless--since there is a difference between a serious man and a moral one--our hero maintained a sort of toned-down dissoluteness behind the scenes, where he and his intimates entertained themselves in conversations tissued with a variety of subjects, such as the discourse _A_ and the scandal _B_; the concordat and the theatre royal; the ministry and the _danseuse_; the bishop and the prima donna; the crown and cards; erected a throne to Tauromaquia; proposed an apotheosis of industry; and passed a vote of censure upon the luxury of novenas.

“Look here, _little one_!” said to him just such another “_little one_” at a breakfast party--where champagne was made to represent the tone of good society that the greater part of the guests lacked--“what has become of _La Lucia_?”

“She was not very well, and I left her in Sevilla,” responded the hero.

“Doesn’t it strike you that she is losing her varnish?”

“At twenty-one, man?”

“It is not singular,” remarked the elegant son of a capitalist (the youth had been educated in France). “At that age, one who lives fast is _sur le retour_.”[57]

“The existence of _camellias_ is like that of roses,” quickly added another, whose Christian name of Bonifacio they were in the habit of contracting into _Boni_.

Having constituted himself an inseparable copy of the engrafted Parisian, and not wishing to fall behind his model in anything, _Boni_ never allowed the capitalist to express an idea without instantly reproducing it in different words, always endeavoring to surpass the original in elegant Gallicisms; in scepticism of the most material, and cynicism of the most approved kind, and in extreme affectation of the fashionable foreign mannerism.

“You ought to place this Lucia _dis_-lucent among the number of the thousand-and-one Didos,” said the would-be Gaul.

“Lay her aside with last year’s _modes fanées_,”[58] the copy hastened to add.

“I cannot do that,” said the general. 191

“Stale Spanish morality!’” exclaimed the capitalist, bursting into a laugh. “Does the fair creature expect to find an Amadeus of Gaul in a general of the age of enlightenment?”

“Or a Pastor Fido in one who aspires to become a father to his country?” put in _Boni_.

“The fact is,” replied our friend, “that in my connection with Lucia there have been exceptional circumstances.”

“Tell them to us, little one,” said his intimate. “The romantic tale will flavor the coffee.”

The general related all the preliminaries and particulars of his relations with Lucia.

“Don’t you see, general,” said the imitator of the tone Parisian, “that it was all a farce, very well got up, by those _fourbes rustics_ to set you on; alarm you; interest you in the girl, and oblige you to take her?”

“That it was all an intrigue of _las étage_?” added the copy of the copy.

“_Apropos_ of impositions,” said the capitalist, “I must tell you what happened to me yesterday. A fellow came into my office--”

“Don’t omit,” said _Boni_, “that you were counting an immense sum of money at the time, for that is what heightens the joke.”

“He asked me,” continued Creseus, “if I would lend him two doubloons. I told him that it cost me the greatest pain to be obliged to refuse, but that I had not sixpence by me.”

“If I had not wished to give, I would have sought another reply,” said an old general--uncle to ours--who had lost a leg in the battle of Bailen.

“General,” replied the narrator, “among us, _I have not_ is synonymous with _I will not_; even sucking-babes understand it.”

“A synonym which Huertas has omitted, but which is known in these days, even in the Batuecas,” chimed the repeater.

“It could not have existed when he composed his work,” said the general.

“The fellow,” proceeded the narrator, “begged and implored, lowering his demand to the most insignificant sum. I was as inexorable as destiny.” And the millionaire cast around him a look worthy of Cato.

“He was, then, in real need, and not an impostor?” questioned the old general.

“O sir!--general rule--every one that asks is an impostor.”

“Unless he is an intimate friend,” said _Boni_, speaking this time with unaccustomed personality.

“_Ma foi_,”[59] answered the Gaul_ish_ Spaniard, “I except no one. Seeing that he was not going to desist, and always with the amiability and delicacy that must be used in such cases--”

“_Sans doute_, the same as in affairs of honor,” said the bad copy of a worse original.

“I told him that, since his necessity was so extreme, I would venture to lend him--not money, for I had none--but something that would be of more use to him in his circumstances. The imbecile thought, perhaps, that it was going to be my signature.”

“Your signature! What one might call the only and unique _sanctum sanctorum_ of the disciples of Mercury. A thing so sacred!”

“My dear _Boni_,” said his friend, “_veuillez ne pas m’interrompre_?[60] The fellow’s countenance lighted up. I believe, upon my word, that he had not eaten in three days. Laughing within myself, although my face 192 denoted the gravest sympathy for his situation, I led him to a closet, took out a case of pistols, which I opened, and, handing him a weapon, said, as I bowed his dismissal, ‘Here is a remedy for all your troubles.’ My mendicant turned upon his heel and left; and you may be sure that I have rid myself of him, _une bonne fois pour toutes_.”[61]

Boni’s mirth was overpowering.

Gallardo and the rest of the Spaniards were silent.

“You must positively put this joke into some paper,” said the capitalist’s admirer, between his paroxysms of laughter.

“_Mon cher, à quoi bon?_”[62] responded the hero of the anecdote, with an air of modesty.

“To show people how to get rid of impostors,” answered Boni; “to furnish a specimen of your humor--to let it be seen that you are as richly endowed by nature as by fortune--to give circulation to an entertaining item--and to--”

“And could a paper be found that would print such an iniquity as an entertaining item!” shouted the old general, no longer able to contain his wrath. “Is it the mission of the press to propagate such ideas and sentiments? God help us, sirs, if there is no one left in Spain capable of a blush! Can the press parade infamy shamelessly, and no one be found to repudiate the impudence that relates such a scandal in terms of laudation; or appeal from it to the noble and generous instincts, and sense of public decorum, of good and true Spaniards? Have we become as positive as the written law? In former times, gentlemen, not all gave, but the few that denied did not boast of their refusal. Charity made men sorry to say no, even to impostors, and, having said it, they would have been silent about it for shame. Avarice was looked upon as one of the disgraceful vices which respect for public opinion required to be kept out of sight.”

“Uncle, for God’s sake!” entreated Gallardo.

“For God’s sake what, nephew?”

“Speak with more moderation.”

“When I do, look towards Antequera for sunrise.”

“Don’t feel apprehensive, general,” said the capitalist, “_Je sais vivre_.[63] I respect your family, and know how to make allowance for gray hairs and the ill-humor of advanced age.”

“Yes,” instantly added the speaking shadow, “_carte blanche_ belongs to ladies, children, and--”

He was going to add _old men_, but a look from the general silenced him.

“No, nephew, don’t be apprehensive,” said the latter. “The weapons of a gentleman are for nobler uses than the punishment of insults.”

“Come, let us talk of something else,” said Gallardo’s intimate, anxious to change the subject, but glad in his heart, as were all the other guests, of the lesson the braggart had received from so worthy and authorized an antagonist.

“It is not possible, Gallardo, that you will allow Lucia to be an irredeemable lien upon you. Let me tell you, my boy, that it would be a pretty piece of folly on your part to create an obstacle to your future establishment.”

“I don’t see that--in order to be a deputy, senator, or--”

“Oh! you’re on the wrong tack. Your political ideas absorb all your thoughts; but I have been told--by one of her friends--that the daughter of Don Juan de Moneda,[64] the banker, is quite smitten with 193 your person.”

Gallardo straightened himself, and caressed his curled locks.

“Her mother is completely taken with the title of Marquis de Monte Gallardo, which they say you are about to receive, and her father with your capacity.”

“We are even there,” said the general, “for I am as much impressed with his. To buy--”

“But,” proceeded the friend, “he is equally so with your sash and rent-roll. Here, boy, is an opportunity to settle in life.”

“Really, I hardly know the kind and amiable young lady who has been so condescending as to think of me!” drawled the extremely flattered Gallardo, privately resolving to tighten his stays again.

“She is very beautiful,” affirmed his friend, “and you must know that she rides like a Cossack.”

“Oh! Athenaïs la Moneda has the most elegant figure and complexion--so pale!--and the fiercest glances” (he meant haughtiest) “of all the belles of Madrid. She is delicious!” exclaimed the Parisian.

“She has the neck of a swan, with such _serpentine undulating_,” said Bonifacio, quite at a loss for another comparison.

“The most desirable _parte, ma foi_! Her father is worth forty millions, and she is the only daughter,” continued the capitalist, who did not allow his appreciation of beauty to interfere with his devotion to dollars.

“You ought to improve your opportunity, and marry at once,” advised the friend. “These girls with forty millions are more capricious than the wind. They change oftener than weather-cocks, and do just as they please; for millionaire fathers who know only the Castilian have the highest consideration for daughters who have learned French from Sue’s novels, and Italian at the opera.”

“An heiress’s whim is like a flash of lightning. In losing time, you expose yourself to a--”

“To a deception,” said the capitalist, concluding the sentence.

“To a _disabusement_,” said the copy, thinking, with profound satisfaction, that he had, for once, surpassed the original.

“What is your opinion of all this?” asked Gallardo of his uncle, with a laugh, intended to appear jesting, but which betrayed his interior satisfaction.

“Yes, give us the benefit of your wisdom,” said the capitalist, covering his ill-humor with a tone of light irony. “In matrimonial as well as martial councils, the Nestors should be heard.

‘_La face des vieillards est pleine de majesti: Leur voix sur l’existence a des secrets intimes._’”[65]

“_Une vieux de la vieille_,”[66] confirmed _Boni_, “is a California of experience; a barometrical and chronometrical counsellor; a universal grammar bound in gold; a--”

“Hush, _Boni_!” whispered the capitalist in the ear of his friend, who, less accustomed to champagne than the others, began to feel its emancipating influence.

Meantime, the old officer stroked his gray moustache in silence.

“Well, what do you think, general!” questioned Gallardo.

“I think that you ought to marry.”

“_C’est clair_,” said the Parisian.

“It is clear,” repeated _Boni_--“as clear as detestable water; and they think of bringing it into Madrid! Will spend millions to do it!”

“_Taisez vous, mon cher_,” entreated the model, in a low tone. 194

“I am not in the humor,” replied the copy, in excellent Spanish.

“Of course he ought to marry,” said all the rest.

“Let us understand each other, gentlemen,” said the old general. “I think, Gallardo, that you ought to marry, not the mushroom of the millions, but Lucia.”

These words were received with clamorous disapprobation.

“You take advantage of your _rôle_ of Nestor, general,” exclaimed the capitalist.

“The hero of former times dotes--I would say _radote_. I propose a vote of censure!” hiccoughed the copy.

“S-s-s, Boni. _Le vous en prie!_[67] Do you want to get another broadside from the disabled old pontoon? Don’t provoke him, for the next time neither prudence nor contempt will enable me to keep my temper,” murmured his patron.

“The general is jesting. A gentleman of his fine delicacy cannot mean to counsel one, in Gallardo’s position, to marry a woman of light reputation,” said Gallardo’s friend.

“I do it because I have delicacy--a plant that strikes so deep when once it has taken root, that neither the silver plough nor the golden spade which cultivates the field of ideas of the present day can turn it out. I counsel a man who has done a wrong to repair it. I advise one who has been the ruin of an honest girl to become her defender. And the more public he has made her position, the more he is bound to set her right in the eyes of others. If the future looks smiling, I counsel it all the more earnestly, that the past may not reproach him. In my days, gentlemen, marriages were not discussed in semi-public meetings. The only counsellors were, according to the circumstances, the heart, the honor, and the conscience. But,” added the old man, rising, “my sentiments are as much out of harmony with yours, as my person is out of place in a reunion of gay young men. Gentlemen, I salute you. Nephew, good-by. Do not ask me to your brilliant wedding if you marry with the million-heiress of the caprices. If with Lucia, I will be your groomsman.”

With these words the noble veteran took his leave.

“Style of an epic poem,” said the pseudo-Parisian.

“Tone of an _elegiac lyric_,” stammered the copy. “One would think the governor had been drinking some kind of palate-skinning Catalan wine, instead of the excellent, exquisite, delectable, delicious--”

“Enough, _Boni_,” interrupted his friend, indicating to him with his foot the urgent necessity of more discretion.

“The general has, so to speak, one foot in the grave, and, naturally, all looks to him _de profundis_ color,” observed Gallardo’s intimate. “But we live in a positive age, and must conform to the step of its march; to do otherwise would be to make ourselves antiquated and ridiculous.”

Days followed days, each one bringing to our hero its business, novelty, interest, and forgetfulness of those that had preceded it. Lucia, in the meantime, saw her means of subsistence failing without informing him; for, with the reawakened sentiments of duty and shame, came the comprehension of her guilty dependence, and sense of the double humiliation of soliciting and receiving. She had lived for some time by the sale of her valuables, but this resource was almost exhausted.

“What is to become of me?” she questioned, with more of weakness than 195 inquietude, more inertia than anguish, as she sat one day alone, her head drooping upon her breast. “In forgetting how to work, I have been like the sailor that forgets in a calm how to handle the ropes. What shall I do when all is gone? What can he who has brought me to this be thinking of?”

Her questionings were interrupted by the entrance of the woman of the house with a letter.

“It is from Madrid,” she said, with a fawning smile. “I’ll bet that the general tells when he is coming, and confirms the report of his appointment as captain-general of this province.”

Lucia opened and read the following epistle:

“DEAR LUCIA: Nothing can last for ever. Mature age brings serious ideas; the life of a man, obligations, circumstances, compromises, and position, duties, which force us to make, in favor of reason and morality, sacrifices that are not the less painful because they are necessary.

“My family has undertaken to negotiate a marriage for me, which will assure me a certain and brilliant future; and matters have proceeded so far that I cannot oppose myself to the arrangement without offending a powerful and respectable family, compromising my own, and causing grave inconveniences, inconveniences which you would be the first to deplore.

“I believe that you will understand the necessity of my establishing myself in life, and will feel neither surprised nor pained. I am equally persuaded, having noticed for a long time how unhappy you seemed at my side, and how little pleasure my presence gave you, that you will not miss me. It may be that another already occupies in your heart the place that once was mine. If you will be happier with him than you have been with me, I trust that I have enough philanthropy to rejoice in your good fortune.

“Adieu. It is likely that we may not meet again; but, believe me, I shall never forget you; and, if I can serve you in any way, command me.”

“Well,” asked the woman, eagerly, “does he say anything about coming?”

“No,” answered Lucia, with the tears raining down her cheeks, “he says that he is not coming.”

Lucia did not feel for Gallardo that which can properly be called love; but, during four years, her naturally affectionate heart had attached itself to him, and could not but be wounded by the cold insensibility with which he had abandoned her.

The harpy’s face, manner, and tone changed at once; for this grief confirmed her suspicions. Lucia’s lover had cast her off.

“Madam,” she said, “certain exigencies, in which I unfortunately find myself, have obliged me to introduce a rule into my house, requiring my boarders to pay in advance. All the rest have agreed to it, and I trust that you will do the same.”

“No, madam,” replied Lucia, “for I am going away to-morrow, and so shall have to give you only what is already due.”

The poor forsaken girl went out that night and sold her wardrobe to a pawnbroker. After satisfying her creditor, she had enough left to pay some wine-carriers for a ride upon one of their mules as far as Jerez, and from there she meant to go to Arcos on foot. At dawn, on the following morning, she passed through the Carmona gate, casting a long, sad look upon the sleeping city--the city that the Bitis serves as a page; La Giralda for insignia, and the verdure of its orange 196 groves for adornment; the city that is at once gay as a village maiden and imposing as a queen; beautiful as a young girl, and full of wisdom and memories as a matron; graceful as the Andalusian of to-day, and chaste and noble as the Castilian dame of olden time.

Lucia found herself in Jerez alone and without resource, but, by favor of her good angel, met Uncle Bartolo at the inn where she alighted. The visible presence of the former would not have rejoiced her more than did the sight of this old friend of her family, to whom she told the whole of her sad story, adding that now she knew not what to do, since she dared not seek even a servant’s place.

“My daughter,” said the old guerilla, “you grew vain in the fiend’s own house of _Leona_, and forgot that wings were given to the ant for its destruction. If you had shown that wretch a repulsive face, he would not have ventured to do what he did. What motive, will you tell me, could a _You Sir_ have for playing clucking fox to a little country girl, but to make of her a mark for shame?

“However,” he continued, seeing that Lucia’s tears began to flow, “far be it from me to hack at the fallen tree, or double the burden of the ass that is down. The baptism of repentance opens the fold, and your repentance is sincere, because you return to poverty, when, if you had chosen otherwise, profligates would not have been wanting, in the great city, to complete your ruin. Come with me, and I will talk to Lucas. It is his duty to take care of you.”

“He will never forgive me, Uncle Bartolo!” exclaimed Lucia sadly. “He has said that he had no sister, and no one can make him say the contrary.”

“True,” replied the guerilla, “the Garcia heads are harder than anvils. I learned that by experience when your father--Heaven rest him!--married _La Leona_. But this is another thing, for, notwithstanding that your father did so badly, Lucas has turned out well. And it is a great deal easier to yoke two that are united by blood than to unyoke two that the devil has united. We will see, God helping us, and, in the meantime, you shall come to my house; there is no great abundance, but good-will is not wanting.”

The next day saw Uncle Bartolo and Lucia travelling along the road which we described at the commencement of our story; Lucia mounted upon a little ass, and the agile good old man following on foot. At nightfall they reached Arcos.

Alas! for the one who, returning to his native place, instead of experiencing pure happiness, feels his heart torn by grief and shame; finds his parents dead, the house where he was born the property of strangers, and sees, in the looks of neighbors, cold disdain instead of the joyful smile of recognition and welcome!

Uncle Bartolo took Lucia to his own house, and, while they were preparing supper, went himself to that of Lucas, who, on receiving his discharge, had returned to Arcos and to his post among the day-laborers, and had, by his aptness and diligence, won so much credit that several profitable jobs and positions had already been offered him. As will be supposed, he had found his father’s house sold. But as his kinswoman still lived in it, he hired his former habitation, and she assisted him.

Uncle Bartolo entered, just as Lucas had finished his supper.

“Sit by, Uncle Bartolo,” said the young man.

“No, thank you. May what you have taken profit you! Will you have a 197 cigar?”

“It wouldn’t come amiss.”

Uncle Bartolo handed Lucas a paper cigar, lighted his own, and, with characteristic bluntness, plunged into his subject.

“Lucas, man, will you tell me why you never speak of your sister? Does it appear to you that a sister is a patch sewed on to be ripped at pleasure?”

Lucas, disagreeably surprised, contracted his brows as he answered:

“I have no sister, Uncle Bartolo.”

“What! what do you say?”

“I have already said it. ‘In my manse they bestow but one loaf.’”

“Go a-walking with your grand talk! I’d like to know what right you have to deny your sister, even though her life has not been what it ought to be?”

Lucas had turned pale, and his beard trembled with repressed indignation.

“Uncle Bartolo,” he replied, affecting an air of indifference, “the saying is, ‘He that goes away is not counted.’ Let us drop this conversation.”

“I don’t feel disposed to; you may as well understand that. And now, let me tell you that this face of a judge, though it may be the correct one to show to a sinner, is not by any means the one to show to a penitent. Do you comprehend? Your poor little sister is penitent; and you know that

‘He who sins and mends, Himself to God commends.’”

“I have said that I had no sister.”

“Don’t be stubborn, for God’s sake! Look here now, soul of an ape! How can you say you have no sister, if he has given you one? Lucas, I have come, and I shall not go away until you forgive Lucia.”

“Uncle Bartolo, don’t pledge yourself to what you cannot accomplish.”

“You are your father’s own son--the one and the other harder-headed than oxen. Juan Garcia and Lucas Garcia: there’s a pair fit for a cart!”

“Why fall upon me, sir, in such a shower of sarcasms? Is it necessary to give so many punches to say that the bull is coming?”

“Because he comes with a purpose, and, ‘when things come with a purpose, more than the ass may fall to the ground.’ I tell you only the pure truth, and you, with your devil’s motto of ‘few words and bad ones,’ what you say has neither form nor sense! But to come back to the subject, for I don’t let go the handle this way when I am defending the right. As I was going to say, your stubbornness is worse than your father’s; because it is not so bad to be determined upon marrying one’s girl as to be determined not to forgive one’s sister. It’s better to do more than your duty than to do less. If your father lacked puncto, you have half a share too much. Your mother committed your sister to you; and you are disobeying the last will of her that bore you!”

“She committed my sister to me, but not the kept miss of a villain.”

“You are soaring as the eagle, which is a royal bird; you pronounce your sentences like a judge of the Audiencia, and make yourself believe that you are wiser than the Regency. But you are greatly out of the way, my son. It ill becomes you to go before God in casting out your sister; your own mother’s daughter, when her misfortune was partly your fault.”

“Mine, sir?”

“Yes, yours; for you threw off the burden like an untamed colt; cast behind you the trust you received from your mother, and, without 198 commending yourself either to God or the devil, shouldered your gun and made off; knowing that for six years, walled up in a uniform, you must lose sight of your charge; knowing, besides, that you were leaving her in a house where wickedness was well established. And so what happened, happened. The past is past, and can’t be mended now; but after this, do you think it is right, Christian, that your sister should have no one to turn to when she leaves her sinful life?”

“She ought to have remembered in time that every uphill has its down.”

“But, my son, is not this to

‘See the ulcer, see the woe: Shut the purse, and naught bestow’?

This is to have bowels of a pagan toward a poor creature that they pushed and pushed--a child that did not know what they were doing.”

“Uncle Bartolo, ignorance does not take away sin.”

“Do you think, if you had had your evil hour--suppose it for instance, only--and had robbed or done something that had dishonored you, and had gone to your sister, that she would refuse to own you? I’ll be bound she wouldn’t!”

“Well, I should have acted badly. But the case is impossible, for it would have been my care not to put myself in her way. ‘He that touches his own with his leprosy, gives it to them, and does not cure himself.’”

“Lucas, my son, the sentence says, ‘Act with good intention, and not with passion!’”

“And the proverb says that ‘blood boils without fire,’ Uncle Bartolo.”

“Lucas, for the love of the Blessed Virgin! How can he who shows no mercy hope for the mercy of God? Do a good deed, and, when you lie down, though it be upon a mattress of rushes, you will sleep without bad dreams, and as sweetly as if it were a bed of feathers!”

“You are wasting words, Uncle Bartolo. Even if I am condemned for it, I will not hear that vile thing spoken of, and so--stop!”

“Go to, then, _Cain_!” exclaimed the good old man as he rose to leave, “and God set a mark on you as he did on the cruel brother that he cursed! I’d rather have her, with her sin and her repentance, than you, with your virtue and your pride.”

To paint the grief of the wretched Lucia when Uncle Bartolo informed her of the no-result of his mission, would be impossible.

“Holy God!” she exclaimed between her sobs, “only with thee shall I find mercy! Ah! how I loved this brother in the days of my happy childhood, when I was innocent, and he was all my consolation! Then he could not do enough to please me, and used to swear never to abandon me!”

“Come, come, dry your tears, my daughter,” said Uncle Bartolo. “‘The frightened partridge is the first to get skewered.’ What do you want of an unnatural, without bowels of compassion? You have me, and the roof of my house is not so small that it cannot shelter you. What I have you shall share, and you can help my poor Josefa. She has become a potsherd, and don’t get much rest, for ‘woman’s work is done and to be done again.’”

When the other inmates of the house slept, Lucia kept lonely vigil, and wept the things that had formerly made her happiness--her poverty, her innocence, and her brother’s affection. Wandering in the vast field of her recollections, she found both affliction and consolation in recalling all the particulars of her simple life; every proof of 199 tenderness that she had received from her brother; every hope, withered or dead. With the deepening silence and shadows of the night, her anguish increased. “What shall I do? What shall I do?” she cried, wringing her hands. “I cannot be a burden to this good old man! I cannot stay in this neighborhood, for my own brother’s rejection of me will encourage others to outrage me! What shall I do? I must beg if I cannot find work! Where shall I go? Wherever God may lead me!”

Without waiting for daylight, and silently, in order that her departure might not be perceived by her protector, Lucia opened the door, and stepped into the street.

But she could not leave, for ever, a place so dear to her, without lingering for a moment before the adjacent house. It was the one in which her mother died; its roof had sheltered her tranquil infancy: in it she was leaving the brother that she still loved, in spite of her guilt and his inhumanity.

Lucas was not asleep. Exasperation, a disquieted conscience, and heavy heart had driven repose from him.

All at once, he was startled by the tones of a sweet and tremulous voice near to the street door, singing the romance that he had taught his sister when she was a child. He sprang from the bed, moved by an irresistible impulse, but instantly covered his ears with his hands as if to shut out the sound.

The voice sang:

“Praying in God’s name, sister, And for his sweet mother’s sake, Give my little children bread, And his word in payment take.”

Struggling with mingled emotions of rage and grief, Lucas seated himself upon his couch, and beat upon the ground with his feet.

The voice, becoming all the while more low and quivering, proceeded:

“He takes a loaf, and breaks it, But throws it down again, For blood run out of the bread.”

The brother’s heart was choking him, yet, still resisting, he covered his now tear-stained face with both hands. But when the voice, broken by sobs, continued,

“And she that, without pity, To a sister refuses bread, To God’s Mother doth refuse it”--

he rushed to the door, and, dashing it open, ran out; and Lucia, with a cry of joy, threw herself into his extended arms.

The next day, Uncle Bartolo remarked to his wife:

“When the devil enters into one, he locks all the doors behind him. But until the last hour, his divine Majesty keeps a postern open in the sinner’s heart.”

[56] Name given to the subsidy formerly levied by the King of Spain for carrying on wars against the infidels.

[57] On the wane.

[58] Faded fashions.

[59] In faith.

[60] “Will you please not interrupt me?”

[61] Once for all.

[62] What for, my dear?

[63] I know how to behave.

[64] Don John made of Money.

[65] “The aspect of the old is full of majesty: Their words are laden with the secrets of existence.”

[66] An old soldier of the olden time.

[67] “Hush, I beg of you.”

----------

THE LIQUEFACTION OF THE BLOOD OF ST. JANUARIUS. 200

NO. III.

But this is far from being the general rule. In 1543, the diary mentions the presence of Muleasses, Bey of Tunis, a Mohammedan, and records his expression of astonishment at what he beheld. On several other occasions, Mohammedans were witnesses of it; some became Christians. Protestant travellers from England, Denmark, Sweden, and Germany have written accounts of what they themselves saw. On four of the six occasions when the writer of these lines was present, he can bear personal testimony to the presence of Protestants.

It is narrated that the liquid blood has been known to solidify instantly, whenever the reliquary passed into the hands of a particular canon, in his turn of office, to be presented by him to the people, or when certain persons approached to venerate and kiss it, and would as quickly liquefy again when they withdrew. A notorious case is mentioned by the Bollandists, and by other authorities, of a prince, whose name, for family reasons, was not given--for the matter was published in his lifetime. At his approach the liquid blood used to become solid. His personal character left no doubt on the minds of the Neapolitans why this happened.

We have already spoken of the notable differences of color, on various days, or parts of the same day. The diary registers them as _bright_, _beautiful_, _vermilion_, _rubicund_, or as _dense_ or _dark_, or _blackish_, or _ash-colored_, or, again, _pale_ or _yellowish_. Sometimes the whole mass was of one uniform tint. Sometimes there were several tints in different parts, as in 1748, when, as we saw, one portion was blackish and the other ash-colored, the vial being then full, and the blood liquid, as afterwards appeared.

Again, the liquid blood is sometimes quite quiescent, yielding, indeed, to every movement of the ampulla, as water would, but when the ampulla is at rest on its stand, remaining in it as tranquil as water, with a level and smooth surface, and without the least indication of internal movement. Yet often it gives forth a froth or foam, which covers a part or all of the surface, which stains the glass dark or vermilion, and the remains or traces of which may be noticed on the mass when indurated afterwards; that is, if this foaming has continued until a solidification on the altar, or until the reliquary is locked up in the evening. Very often this foaming will cease after lasting half-an-hour or an hour. Its ending and disappearance is as fitful as its beginning.

Sometimes the motion is greater, and of a different character--an ebullition or boiling, as the Italians call it. Portions of the liquid blood are thrown up a quarter of an inch, or more. Sometimes this bubbling has been very violent, some of the liquid being thrown up into the neck of the ampulla to the very top.

On December 16, 1717, it is recorded that, before the liquefaction took place, and while the blood was still hard and solid, “an exhalation was seen to rise from the hard mass, like to a little cloud, 201 and to ascend to the top of the neck.” On 24th September, 1725, “the blood was taken out hard, and immediately liquefied; and three or four times, of itself, it moved round in a circle within the ampulla, although the ampulla was then in its place on the altar, and motionless.”

It is needless to cite any more of the thousand-and-one items of such character scattered through the diary. They all show the sincerity and good faith of the writers, and the care with which the minutest facts were observed, and accurately recorded on the day of their occurrence.

Next to the occurrence of the liquefaction, the most important fact, in our judgment, is the frequent change of volume which the mass undergoes while liquid. We say while liquid, for we do not discover, either in the diary or in our researches elsewhere, any indication of such a change taking place while the blood is in its solid condition. But, while liquid, such changes are so frequent and so great that the diary, as we saw, noticed their absence or _quasi_-absence, during one octave, as something remarkable. The blood is said to be at its ordinary or normal level when it fills about four-fifths of the space in the ampulla, or vial. It has been known to sink below this, but very rarely. Ordinarily it is oscillating in volume, sometimes reaching the neck, or entering it so high as to leave only a thread of light, or even filling the neck up to where it enters the mass of soldering. The extreme distance between the two levels is about an inch and a half, and the volume must increase over twenty per cent. in order to rise from the ordinary level so as to fill completely the ampulla. The days are comparatively rare when some change of volume is not seen, either by increase or by decrease. The change is generally gradual, yet such as may be watched and followed. Sometimes, however, it is quite rapid in the ascent or the descent, or in its alternations of rising and falling; sometimes almost instantaneous--_in un colpo, in un tratto_.

These ordinary oscillations or changes of volume, which occur at any time, may be looked on as the usual and minor form of one general and striking trait or mode of action. When the increase is carried to its utmost extent, the vial is seen to be completely filled; and this fulness, in turn, presents many variations to be studied. We may divide them into two classes. The first embraces all those cases in which the fulness terminates, and the blood commences to diminish in volume, at any time before the close of the octave; we may call these completed periods. The second embraces all those in which the fulness continues to the end, so that, on the last day of the octave, the blood is replaced in its closet still completely filling the ampulla; these we call incomplete periods.

To the prior class belong, first, all those many instances in which the blood swelled up and filled the ampulla and commenced to sink again in volume on the same day, whether after a few moments or after several hours of fulness. Again, the diary records _three_ cases in which it so rose one day and sank the next; _four_ cases in which it rose one day and sank the second day after, keeping the ampulla completely full for the entire intermediate day; _six_ cases in which there were two such intermediate days; _two_ with three, and _four_ with four such intermediate days of complete fulness. We have thus nineteen cases recorded in the diary, to which we should add, 202 perhaps, an equal number for the first category. A complete period, so to call it, of the fulness may vary, therefore, from a few moments to five consecutive days.

The second class comprises ninety-four instances of fulness opened and not completed during the octave. The varieties in these are even greater than in the former class. In _nineteen_ cases the fulness, or, at least, its last phase, commenced on the closing day; in _five_ cases, on the day before; in _nine_, on the third last day; in _eleven_, on the fourth; and in _twenty-two_ on the fifth day, counting from the closing of the octave; in _twenty-six_ cases, the fulness began on the sixth day; and in _two_ cases, as far back as the seventh day, counting from the close of the octave. We have here twenty-eight of these incomplete periods, longer than the longest of the closed or complete periods, just mentioned, still further complicating any question as to the lengths of these periods of fulness.

Whenever, during an octave, the ampulla is locked up at night _full_, it will be found _full_ the next morning. When it is locked up at the close of an octave in that state, it will be found in the same at the first opening of the next celebration, months afterwards. We said that the mass changed its volume only when in a fluid condition. We may now venture to add that such changes take place only in public, and never while the blood is closed up in the closet, or _armoire_. In examining the diary very carefully, we find that, in the vast majority of cases, the level of the mass as stated when taken out--whether it be at the ordinary level, or somewhat elevated, or very high, or full--perfectly agrees with the level at which it was stated to stand when last put up, whether the day before or at the close of the preceding octave. In a number of cases, indeed, the diary is silent or obscure on the point; but its language often seems to imply this fact, or to take it for granted. Nowhere does it state the reverse in general terms; and we cannot find a single instance recorded which establishes the contrary. The blood is always found at the level at which it stood when last put up.

These ninety-four unclosed periods were, therefore, prolonged to the next festival, when the ampulla was taken out still _full_. Some of these periods had just commenced on the last day; others had lasted six full days after the day of their commencement. Is there any marked difference in their closing? Not in the day; for they all, with three exceptions, closed on the first day of the incoming octave, if they had run over to May or September, or on December 16, if that was the next exposition. In regard to time, there is no rule. The most numerous class, containing twenty-six instances, varied from _immediately_ to _nine hours and a half_; nine times the liquefaction occurred in less than one hour, and nine times it delayed more than three hours--the other eight times it lay between the two. The twenty-two cases of the next highest class present the same diversities of time, from _immediately_ to _nine hours and a half_. Nine instances were under an hour, eight were over three hours, the remaining five lay between the two divisions.

The more those periods of fulness are examined, the more clearly does it appear that they follow no system, and can be classified or accounted for by no law. We see the mass swelling and increasing its volume and filling the ampulla, and continuing to fill it for some 203 moments, or hours, or days. We can note the facts; but why this increase? why does it rise so high? why to-day, and not yesterday, or to-morrow? why so long, or not longer? Physical science is as utterly unable to answer these questions as it is to assign a cause for the liquefaction itself, or for the various and varying phases of the blood of St. Januarius.

As was stated in our preceding article, the Neapolitans hold that the proximity of the relics of the head and the reliquary with the vials of the blood to each other, is ordinarily the sufficient and determining cause of the liquefaction. Their whole ritual of the expositions is based upon this principle. The separation of the relics, or their _quasi_-separation, by a veil thrown over the reliquary of the blood, is ordinarily sufficient to terminate the liquefaction and to indurate the blood anew. But, on the other hand, the diary records a number of instances in which the blood, having been found hard, liquefied at once, even before the reliquary was placed near the bust. Several times, too, it has liquefied in the streets, while carried aloft in the afternoon procession of the vigil in May towards Santa Chiara or a _seggia_, although the bust had already been carried thither in the forenoon. So, too, a liquefaction, partially commenced in the _Tesoro_ chapel or in the cathedral, has often continued or been completed during the outdoor procession through the streets, on the festival of the patronage, in December.

Another cause or condition, perhaps as important as the proximity of the relics, is, in our judgment, the strong faith and the earnest devotion of the attendants--a faith and devotion in which the Neapolitans, clergy and people, are not surpassed. It was, perhaps, for this reason, that in the extraordinary expositions of which we have spoken, the liquefaction so often occurred quickly, and, as the Neapolitans would say, _Il miracolo era bellissimo_. The devout strangers to whom the favor was granted brought to it faith and piety. On the few occasions when it was tardy--on none did it entirely fail--there may have been too strong an ingredient of mere profane curiosity. Kings, and princes, and nobles of high worldly standing have often visited Naples, and sometimes sought and obtained this favor of an extraordinary exposition of the relics in their presences, that, apart and with less danger of any intrusion on their personal dignity or comfort, and in the company of their chosen attendants only, they might have an opportunity of witnessing the miracle at their ease. This was the length of their privilege. As for the liquefaction itself, they had to wait as others waited, and, perhaps, because they did not pray as others prayed, they were sometimes disappointed.

In 1702, Philip V., King of Spain, to whom Naples was then subject, visited the city, reaching it on the afternoon of Easter Sunday. On Easter Tuesday, April 18, he was present at a Pontifical High Mass celebrated in the cathedral. After that long ceremony, his majesty passed into the _Tesoro_ chapel, where there was to be a special exposition of the relics, that he might venerate them and might witness the liquefaction. “The blood was brought out hard; four Masses were celebrated in succession (about two hours); but the saint was not pleased to work it. The king departed, and the Masses continued. At the sixth Mass, and as the king had entered his carriage at the cathedral door, the blood liquefied. The king returned at 22 o’clock, and kissed the relics in the hands of his eminence in the _Tesoro_.” 204

However, the diary mentions that he did witness the liquefaction itself at the next regular day in May, with all the people.

Other instances are given in which viceroys and nobles and princes waited until they were tired out. Soon after their departure, when the faithful and fervent people might freely crowd the chapel and pray, the liquefaction would occur.

It is impossible to exaggerate the firmness of their faith or the depth and tenacity of the affection of the Neapolitans for this _their_ miracle. Whatever else happens to their fair city, nothing must interfere with their devotion to St. Januarius and the proper celebration of these festivals--neither wars nor pestilence, nor eruptions nor earthquakes, nor change of rulers. Once a battle raging in the streets prevented an outdoor procession. But, within the cathedral, there was a procession through the aisles and nave, and all things else went on as usual.

Oddly enough, the greatest disturber, to judge by the simple-minded writers of the diary, has been--rain. Not that the weather has any direct influence on the liquefaction or its circumstances. Quite the contrary. The blood liquefies all the same, and with as many attendant variations, whether the day be fair or rainy, whether the season be so dry that the farmers are complaining of drought, and prayers have been ordered for rain, or whether it has been raining incessantly for weeks and months, to the injury of the crops, and in the churches they are praying for fair weather; in summer, when the sun is pouring down his almost tropical beams; and in winter, when the procession is confined to the cathedral because it is too cold to go out into the streets, or because the ground is covered with snow. These meteorological changes have no apparent influence on the liquefaction or its characteristic circumstances.

But at Naples they sometimes have terrible deluges of rain--steady downpourings such as one may witness only within or close to the tropics. Sometimes these have come on just at the hour to interfere with the grand afternoon procession of the vigil in May, forbidding it, or ludicrously disarranging it, and forcing monks, friars, priests, seminarians, canons, and people alike to break the ranks and seek immediate shelter in the neighboring shops and houses. However, come what might, at the worst, his eminence, or the highest ecclesiastical dignitary present, with a few attendants of waterproof hearts, would carry the relic, in a sedan chair or a carriage, it might be, to the appointed place. Is it not all punctually set down in the diary; at what corner, or in what street, the procession was broken up, and who then carried the relic on, and whether still on foot or in a carriage, and how many courageously accompanied him? We may be sure that on arriving at their destination they never failed to find the church, despite the rain, and despite the absence of fashionable ones, filled by devout souls, who loved their saint more than they feared even such weather.

Passages in the extracts we have made from the diary, and many other passages we might quote, indicate the feelings of alarm which fill the hearts of the Neapolitans when the liquefaction fails to occur, or is attended by circumstances which they traditionally dread. St. Januarius is their patron saint. This ever-recurring liquefaction is, in their eyes, a perpetual and miraculous sign or evidence of his care 205 and protection. When it occurs regularly, when the liquefaction is complete and the color of the liquid blood a bright vermilion, and when there are no sudden disturbances and only slight variations of level, the Neapolitans are happy. “It is a blessed octave.” They think they have evidence that all will go well with them. If, on the contrary, the hard mass does not liquefy at all, or if the liquid blood appear turbid, dark or ash-colored, or if it rises and falls rapidly, or if it presents other unusual and sinister appearances, their hearts sink, and they are filled with alarm and anxiety. They fear that this is an indication of the displeasure of heaven, and that the chastisements they deserve for their sins may soon come on them. We once heard a learned Neapolitan enlarge on this theme, and cite various instances in the history of his city in which he showed a remarkable coincidence, at least, between such facts of the liquefactions and the occurrence of wars, pestilence, famine, and disastrous earthquakes, or of other signal chastisements from heaven. We were not sufficiently conversant with the history of Naples either to controvert his statements or to allege other facts to the contrary. It is a subject on which one might go astray, almost as easily as if he undertook to interpret the Apocalypse. But our friend professed to have the history at his finger-ends, and certainly was himself thoroughly convinced of the truth of his opinion.

Travellers are accustomed to tell amusing stories of the impatience and irreverence of the Neapolitans during the exposition, whenever there is an unusual delay in the liquefaction. They charge them with addressing the saint alternately in expressions of religious homage and of bitter reproach, praying and beseeching him one moment and apostrophizing him the next in slang terms of vituperation. Such travellers, we may be sure, are either drawing on their own imagination or on the store of anecdotes they have heard from others. They usually know little of Italian, and are utterly ignorant of the peculiar dialect of the Neapolitan people--almost a language in itself. The only possible excuse for making such a charge would be a stranger’s misconception or misinterpretation of the demonstrative gestures they indulge in when deeply moved, and his utter ignorance of the words they are uttering. We opine, however, that the motive, generally, is a wish to parade droll and amusing statements, even if they be neither witty nor true.

We have been assured by many respectable clergymen of Naples, who, of course, know their own people, and often have to chide them, that there is not a word of truth in this charge.

The clergy and the laity of Naples, of all classes, learned and unlearned alike, believe most steadfastly and earnestly in the miraculous character of the liquefaction of the blood of St. Januarius. Many strangers who have seen it and have examined it critically have come to the same conclusion. Although the church has not spoken authoritatively on the matter, still the consensus of so many learned, intelligent, and pious persons who have so accepted it--the fact that during so many centuries it has stood the test of time, and that science has not been able to explain it away or to reproduce it artificially--and the very character of the liquefaction itself, with its attendant circumstances, so clear, so plain, and so decisive--all leave no room for reasonable doubt.

To complete our statement, we must, perhaps, go still further back, 206 and inquire how it has come about that a portion of the blood of a Christian bishop, beheaded in the year 305, under Diocletian, and in virtue of edicts by that emperor for the suppression of Christianity, should, after the lapse of so many centuries, be now found in a glass ampulla, or vial, at Naples. To some, this primary fact may, at first sight, appear as strange and as extraordinary, if not as unaccountable, as the subsequent liquefaction itself.

To an Italian Catholic, indeed, a doubt on this head would scarcely present itself. The usages and the thoughts of his ancestors in the faith have come down to him so naturally that they form, as it were, part of his being. He thinks, and feels, and knows as his fathers did before him. In such cradle-lands of Christianity, and among a people that has never swerved from the faith since the early ages of the church, there is what we might term an inherited Catholic instinct, a readiness and a correctness of Catholic thought in religious matters, which those of other lands that received the light of Christianity only at a later period, and consequently have not such a bond of ancestral connection with the Christians of the days of persecution, can only reach by study and cultivated piety. However, even a moderate acquaintance with the usages and customs of those early ages will show in many instances that what some have considered peculiar national traits of perhaps later growth are in reality deeply rooted in the customs of those ancient times; and that many a point, often set down as a fond fancy or a singular product of superstition, is firmly established as a truth, by historical research into their records.

This is the case with the question before us.

As we study the daily life of those early Christians, passed under circumstances so very different from those of our modern life, and strive to realize to ourselves their thoughts and aspirations, their motives and modes of action, nothing stands out in bolder relief than their exalted conception of the honor and glory of martyrdom. In the exquisite pages of _Fabiola_ and of _Callista_, the learned Cardinal Wiseman and Dr. Newman have made these early Christians live again before us; and we catch some insight into their enthusiasm on this subject. To them, a martyr, dying for the faith of Christ, was--and truthfully--a hero of the highest grade. _Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends._ John xv. 13.

They could never sufficiently honor him. For, honor him as they might, all they could do would fall infinitely short of the honor which God had already bestowed on his soul in heaven, and that which he would bestow on his body in the resurrection. A martyr’s blood, in their view, stood next in rank to the blood of the Saviour.

Their daily life made martyrdom the prominent subject of their thoughts. Day after day, they saw their brethren seized, imprisoned, tortured, and put to death for the faith. Each day, any one of themselves might be seized and led to martyrdom. The greatest of all triumphs, and the surest passport to everlasting bliss, was to persevere unto the end in that conflict; the greatest of all misfortunes was to fail and renounce or deny the faith for fear of death. Each one strove to hold himself ever ready for the trial. Their pastoral injunctions; their mutual exhortations; their most precious 207 literature--the _Acta Martyrum_; the ornamentation of their chapels and crypts, still visible in the frescoes of the catacombs; the site of their chosen sanctuaries, amid the tombs of their martyred brethren; the very altars at which they worshipped; the tombs of their more glorious martyrs--everything co-operated to keep alive this high esteem of martyrdom, and to stir up their hearts to courage, and even to a yearning for so glorious a crown, and so happy an ending of this life of trials and sorrow.

While a confessor of Christ, as they called him, lay still in chains, they used every means to enter the prison and to visit him--sometimes availing themselves of legal rights, sometimes under various pretexts, sometimes by bribery; when these would all fail, then by stealth and at every risk. For he was to be strengthened by the sacraments and encouraged by their words, or they were to be strengthened by his example; and especially they would not lose the opportunity of commending themselves to his prayers, and of seeking the blessing of a chosen friend of God.

When he was led forth to trial, or to torture, or to death, they would glide in among the crowd pressing around him, that he might be cheered and sustained by the sight of Christian faces or by their outspoken exhortations, and that they might catch and embalm in their hearts every courageous word of faith he spoke to his judges, to the executioners, and to themselves or to the crowd, and afterward be able to bear testimony and to record the heroic triumph of another martyr.

After his death, they spared no effort to obtain possession of his mortal remains, as of a most precious treasure. Their very earnestness on this point was not unfrequently made an occasion of aggravating the sentence. After execution, so the judge would order, the body must not be delivered to his friends, according to ordinary usage. These obstinate and fanatical Christians must be thwarted in their dearest wish, or, rather, in their criminal purpose, of honoring one whom the laws had sentenced to an ignominious death. Let the body be burned, and the ashes be cast to the winds or to the running streams; or let the vultures and ravenous dogs consume it; or let it be sunk by weights in deep waters; let it be done away with in some manner, so that the hated Christians be balked of their purpose.

At times this was successfully done. Often, however--even despite these orders--entreaties and bribes to the soldiers and executioners would prevail to obtain the body, or at least the fragments of it. If they failed, stratagems would be used, and persevering search made, even at great personal risk, to recover it. Very often, as the martyrologies and _Acta Martyrum_ tell us, it was in such attempts that the Christians were discovered, apprehended, and themselves condemned as fresh victims.

When the execution was by beheading or dismemberment, or such other mode as caused the effusion of blood, the Christians were careful to gather this up in any way they could. Not unfrequently it was all they could recover. Cloths and sponges sucked it up from the hard pavement of wood or stones. The earth saturated with it was carefully gathered up and borne away, that at home and at leisure they might carefully separate the blood from the earthy matter, and place it reverently in some vase, ordinarily of glass, sometimes of earthen ware, and in a few instances of bronze. Sometimes a portion of sponge or of cloth 208 so saturated would be kept as a precious jewel in a locket of silver or gold, and be preserved in the oratory or chapel of a Christian household, or even be reverently borne on the person. Ordinarily, however, the vials or vases into which the martyrs’ blood had been gathered, or the open vases containing the saturated sponge or the bundle of blood-stained cloths, would be placed with the body in the tomb; or the vials might be built into the masonry of the tomb, near the head, in such a way as to be partially visible from without.

The _Acta Martyrum_--the official records of the sufferings, death, and deposition or burial of the martyrs, written out at the time by appointed officers of the church--bear frequent testimony to the widespread existence of this custom. Other Christian writings, in prose and in poetry, refer to it frequently. We find it prevailing at Rome and in all Italy, in Carthage, in Sebaste, in Nicomedia, in Gaul, and throughout the church. It was the universal custom.

About the time when the body of St. Januarius was transported from the original tomb where it had been laid during the persecution, to the church of St. Januarius, _extra muros_, at Naples, similar translations of the bodies of martyrs took place elsewhere. St. Ambrose, the great Bishop of Milan, gives an account of such a ceremony for the martyrs St. Gervase and St. Protasius, and again for the martyrs St. Vitalis and St. Agricola. He mentions finding in the tombs, in both cases, the blood of the martyrs which had been gathered and placed there. St. Gaudentius, Bishop of Brixia, about the same time, mentions a similar fact. Some centuries later, the northern barbarians were making raids into Italy, and had repeatedly broken into and desecrated the sepulchres in the catacombs, either in mere wantonness or in search for the treasures which they thought might be hidden there. In order to save the venerated relics of the martyrs from such outrages, the popes opened the tombs of the martyrs in the portions of the catacombs then accessible--a great portion being already closed up, either by the falling in of the roof or by the act of the Christians centuries before--and transferred the remains to the churches within the city for greater safety. In opening the tombs, these vases were often found, and hundreds of them are now in the churches or in the sacred museums of Rome. Three centuries ago, Bosio, and after him Aringhi, Boldetti, Mamachi, and others, penetrated into the catacombs, searched them anew, and came upon some of those portions which had not been disturbed at the time of the general removal. In such portions not a few unopened and undisturbed tombs of martyrs were found. Within lay the remains of the body--bones and dust--with sometimes the rusted fragments of the instrument of death, and frequently the vial, or ampulla, of the martyr’s blood. During the last forty years, the work of investigating the catacombs, which had been intermitted, has been taken up afresh and prosecuted with earnestness and skill by F. Marchi, Cav. de Rossi, and other eminent archæologists. They still come occasionally across the tombs of martyrs, evidently untouched since the day of deposition, and within them, or in the mortar by the head, the vases of blood are still found. Where these vials are so placed in the mortar as to be visible and accessible from without, the thin glass has generally been broken. But the bottom still remains firmly set in the mortar, and contains 209 or is covered to some extent by a thin, dry, reddish crust adhering to it. This crust or film is all that is left of the blood the vase originally contained. Vials, or ampullæ, in the interior of the tombs are of course perfectly preserved. It is indeed interesting to look on one of them, and to mark exactly the line to which the liquid blood once reached, and the purple hue of the sediment or crust now left, with its brighter or darker shades of color, perhaps from the character of the blood, more probably from the thickness or thinness of the crust itself. Under all the accumulated evidence, one scarcely needs to read the rude inscription found and still legible, although only scratched in the mortar when it was soft: SANGUIS, or SANG: SATURNINI, _The blood of Saturninus_. We know that this is blood which once flowed from a martyr’s veins, in testimony of his faith in Christ our Lord.

In the 17th century, when Bosio, Boldetti, and others brought out such vases from the catacombs, and special attention was directed to them, the nature of this dry reddish crust adhering to the interior was examined chemically. There was no discordance in the results obtained.

Among those who made such an examination was the celebrated Leibnitz, a Protestant, among the ablest and most learned men of that age. He gives an account of his process, and the decision at which he arrived: _This coloring matter on the glass is sanguineous_. Some years ago, the present Pontiff, Pius IX., had a new analysis made according to the fullest and most accurate tests of modern chemistry. The answer was still the same: This substance is, so far as chemistry can decide, precisely what ought to remain as the residuum of human blood.

It is clear that, both as to the custom of the early Christians of carefully gathering up the blood of their martyrs, of placing it in ampullæ, or vases, and religiously preserving it, and likewise as to the identification of the ampullæ themselves, the testimony is all that can be desired. Bosio, Aringhi, Boldetti, Mamachi, Gaume, Marchi, Raoul-Rochette, De Rossi, Perret--all who have studied the question, are unanimous in recognizing these numerous old Roman vials, or ampullæ, still found in the catacombs and tombs or preserved in the churches, as the identical vials, or ampullæ, so used by the ancient Christians. On this point, there remains not the slightest room for doubt.

It is therefore but reasonable that there should exist in Naples a vial, or ampulla, of the blood of St. Januarius. He was in his day a distinguished bishop of the church. His martyrdom was public, and attracted the attention of the Christians. It was by beheading. There was no conceivable reason why the Christians should omit in that instance what they were universally so careful to do in such cases. On the contrary, to judge from the ancient accounts we have of the martyrdom of St. Januarius and his six companions, the Christians found no extraordinary difficulty in obtaining the bodies, and entombing them in their usual mode. When, eighty or ninety years later, the church had been firmly established in peace, the body of St. Januarius was taken from the original tomb and brought to Naples, as the bodies of the others were taken to the various churches which claimed them.

The very presence, therefore, of an ampulla in the custody of the church of Naples, together with the other relics of St. Januarius, is 210 under the circumstances _prima facie_ evidence of its own authenticity--evidence which cannot be impugned, except by attempting to overturn a well-known and universally admitted usage of the early Christian church, or else by a supposition, equally gratuitous and absurd, that the ampulla which originally was in existence, and was prized beyond measure and carefully preserved, was somehow lost, and another fraudulently substituted in its stead. We need not recur to the olden traditions of the church of Naples or its legends concerning this relic--traditions and legends found, too, we believe, among the Greeks, whose intercourse with Magna Grecia, as Southern Italy was called, was more intimate and continued longer than with any other portion of Italy. We scarcely need the testimony of _Fabius Jordanus_, quoted by Caraccioli, going to show that, so far back as A.D. 685, it was the custom of the clergy of Naples to bear the relics of the head.

The historical evidence in favor of the genuineness of the relic is ample and satisfactory. There would not be a moment’s hesitation on the point but for the very vain hope which some minds may entertain that, by declining to admit the genuineness of the blood, they will somehow escape the difficulties of the liquefaction. As if the liquefaction of any other substance, with all the circumstances which characterize the liquefaction at Naples, as we have set them forth in our previous articles, would not be for them as hard if not a harder nut to crack than the liquefaction of the blood of St. Januarius!

Having, therefore, established the genuineness of the relic, the next question which presents itself is this: Are we to attribute the amount of the blood still to be seen within the ampulla when at its ordinary level, and its condition when hard, to the continuous action of natural causes; or are we to recognize in those points the effects of that supernatural force to which the liquefaction itself is to be attributed? Would or would not the agency of natural causes have resulted in a greater reduction of the original volume of the blood, and in a far different condition of the residuum, at the present time?

We know pretty accurately the composition of human blood. The proportions of the several ingredients going to constitute it may vary somewhat according to the health and the food of individuals. Without entering into the refined, and as yet not fully accepted results of the latest qualitative analysis, it will be sufficient to give the following table of the constituents of the healthy blood of man:

Water, 790·37 } Albumen, 67·80 } Oxygen, } } Nitrogen, } } serum, Carbonic acid, } } 869·15 Extractive matters, } 10·98 } Salts, } } Coloring matter, } } Fibrine, 2·95 } Hæmatine, 2·27 } } Globuline, 125·63 } } clot, ------ } 130·85 Blood globules, 127·90 } -------- -------- 1,000·00 1,000·00

Water constitutes nearly four-fifths of the entire quantity. If it be driven off by evaporation, only a dry mass would remain behind.

When blood issues from the veins, it first passes through the process of coagulation, the successive steps of which have been carefully examined. Perfectly liquid as it comes out, the blood soon thickens, through the action of the fibrine it contains, into a firm, elastic, uniform, jelly-like mass. Soon drops of clear, amber-colored fluid begin to exude from the mass of jelly, and accumulate until the whole 211 mass is divided into two parts--the serum, a transparent, nearly colorless fluid, in which there floats the clot, or crassamentum, a firm, red and opaque mass. In time, the clot is further divided. The fibrine is seen at top, forming a layer of considerable consistence, soft, elastic, tenacious, and of a yellowish white color; the under portion, consisting of the heavier parts of the clot which have gradually settled down to that position, is a red mass, made up chiefly of the blood globules.

Further exposure would by degrees eliminate the aqueous portion by evaporation, and the progress of decomposition would tend to free the gases in the other constituents, and thus still further to diminish the mass. But no experiments, instituted by physicists, can compare, in time at least, with the instances presented to us in the vases of the catacombs. There, traces on the glass still show clearly to what level the blood, or at least the clot, originally reached; and we see what has remained after a lapse of sixteen hundred years--a crust of dry reddish powder adhering to and coating the sides and bottom of the vessel.

Boldetti, however, mentions three instances in which such ampullæ were found in the catacombs containing a residuum of the blood still thick and slightly liquid. And, if we are not mistaken, something similar may be seen in some other vials preserved here and there, and held to contain a portion of the blood of certain martyrs.

The early Christians of Italy gave up the old Roman custom of incremation, or burning the bodies of the dead, and adopted instead the Eastern rite of sepulture. In some instances, at least, they seem to have used spices and ointments, as the Jews and Eastern nations generally did; and some of them might even have had a knowledge of the antiseptic preparations used by the Egyptians. They never prepared the dead as mummies, but they may at times have put some antiseptic ingredient into the blood, tending by its chemical action somehow to retard the escape of the water and the decomposition of the mass. If this were really done or not, we believe modern science cannot decide; and the historical evidence is not clear.

Something may be due, also, to the mode in which they would sometimes close a narrow-necked vessel of glass. When it had received its contents, the glass of the neck would be heated, probably by the flame of a blowpipe, until it became soft and pliable. The sides would then be pressed together until they coalesced and became united, thus obliterating the orifice; or else molten glass would be carefully dropped on the lips of the mouth, until the whole was entirely coated over and perfectly closed. When either was followed and the work was done perfectly, the ampulla would be, in fact, hermetically sealed. The air would thus be excluded, and evaporation nearly arrested. Placed in a _loculus_ or grave in the dry earth of the catacombs, twenty-five or thirty-five feet beneath the surface of the earth, the ampulla would also be subjected to an ever-equable temperature of about 58° Fahr. Under such circumstances, especially if we admit the presence of some antiseptic ingredient, it may be possible that decomposition would be very slow. But, after all, the glass sides of these ampullæ are thin, and glass is porous, and sixteen centuries is a very long time. Even were the sides far thicker than they are, evaporation would have slowly taken place, the gaseous products of decomposition would have gradually passed through into the outer 212 atmosphere, and only the dry solid residuum would be left, as we ordinarily find it in the ampullæ from the catacombs. The case of the ampulla containing the blood of St. Januarius is not open to these doubts. We are not able to say, indeed, whether it was actually closed in either of the modes we have indicated. As it stands in the present reliquary, of which we have given an account, the mouth enters so deeply into the upper mass of soldering within the case that the eye cannot discover the manner of closure. Before it was placed in this reliquary, five hundred and seventy or seven hundred and thirty years ago, this could probably have been seen; but we have found no record throwing light on the subject. We presume it was done in one or the other of the modes we have described. It is certainly so tightly closed that not a drop of the liquid blood within has ever been known to ooze out.

But this ampulla has not been lying in the low and equable temperature of an underground vault of the catacombs. It has been preserved in the upper and variable atmosphere of a city, subject for many centuries to the excessive heats of almost tropical summers, and to the cold winds that blow down at times from mountains covered with snow. By no law of physics could a mass of blood so situated escape the natural consequence--a vast diminution of bulk by the loss of water and the escape of gases. The film that coats the interior of the smaller ampulla seen in the same case or reliquary, so like the film seen in the whole and in the broken ampullæ of the catacombs and churches generally, shows, we think, what would have been the natural course.

That the larger ampulla should, on the contrary, have lost nothing in the volume of its contents--that it should still be four-fifths filled, although for centuries exposed, as we have said, to heat and cold--that this general permanence of bulk and of character should be maintained, although eighteen or twenty times a year the mass alternates from a solid to a fluid condition, and passes through many subordinate changes of color and volume--these facts seem to us not only utterly inexplicable, but directly contrary to all we know of physical laws. We place them along side the grand fact of the liquefaction itself, as being in some measure its characteristic concomitants. Still, should any one deem these questions too obscure to be peremptorily decided, we shall not now discuss them. We are quite willing to let them stand or fall with the more prominent and important and more tangible question of the liquefaction itself. Of that we shall now proceed to treat.

TO BE CONTINUED.

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THE WAYSIDE SPRING. 213

FROM THE FRENCH OF ALPHONSE DE LAMARTINE.

As here is quaffed a sweet forgetfulness Of the long journey yet to go, So unto all who through life’s pathways press, Lord, from thy rock let waters flow! Let thy sweet grace refreshment be! On earth we wander wearily, And in a thirst that will not cease. Oh! let each dry and dusty lip From thy deep hidden fountain sip Sweet draughts of love and peace.

Ah! every soul drinks its own cup of bliss. Some the delights of glory bless; One finds it in a little daughter’s kiss, Another in a wife’s caress. The secret friendships of the heart, The rapture of creative art, Each hive its own sweet honey stores; To every lip let torrents burst From life’s great fount; but I--_I_ thirst For the eternal shores.

Earth’s dreams are but a bitterness to those Whose yearnings are for love divine. No rivulet sparkles here, no runlet flows, To satisfy this thirst of mine. What shall assuage it? The desire That heavenward ever doth aspire, And sigheth ceaselessly; The sweetness that in suffering lies, And tear-drops showering from my eyes, Are hope’s one draught for me.

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VALENTINE. 214

FROM THE REVUE DU MONDE CATHOLIQUE.

I.

“Frankly, my dear friend, tell me, is she not charming? Does she not lend a certain grace to her white dress, and a brilliancy to her blue ribbons? Is she not the prettiest flower in my garden?”

“And my Alfred, dear Madame de Guers, does he not look well by her side? Are there many young men in our village who appear to such advantage near this fair and graceful darling, now in the flower of her youth?”

“What you say is true, my friend. We have both of us, thank God, fine children--noble, virtuous, and good; and I hope they will be happy.”

“They will make a very handsome couple, at all events,” concluded M. Maubars, rubbing his hands and smiling contentedly.

Thus spoke two old friends, as they sat quietly, one summer evening, in the shadow of the hop-vines of a pretty green arbor, and talked away in this simple, lively, and joyous manner, while they observed their children as they appeared here and there in the garden-walks.

When people have passed fifty, and known each other since they went to the same school in childhood, and during the long succeeding years have resided pretty much in the same place, they are very apt, when talking together, to speak openly from their hearts, especially if those hearts are filled to the brim and running over with justifiable paternal pride and motherly tenderness. And it was true that the dear Alfred, the only and cherished son of M. Maubars, was handsome, honest, active, and gifted, and, thanks to the fortune which he would inherit, would one day take his place among the most respectable citizens of the province. As to Madame de Guers, this fair and worthy old lady, with white hair, in whom all the select souls of the little town saluted and recognized a sister, all the poor a benefactress, and all the afflicted a friend, she had never been a mother. She had married late, less from inclination than duty, to obey a vow of her parents and fulfil a family project; she had cared for, with an admirable devotion, and supported with a no less admirable equality of temper, the precocious infirmities and frequent brusqueries of M. de Guers, who, as former captain of a vessel, had lived a silent, sombre, deserted life in an old cold-looking little house on the coast. But one happy day the sun seemed to shine brighter for her, and the radiant sentiment of an unknown happiness mingled with her tears and her regrets, as one of the friends of her childhood, a poor widow, in dying, confided to her the education and guardianship of her deserted infant. What a complete happiness, what a recompense for all the sunless days, the gloomy and heavy hours, so faithfully supported! M. de Guers, though very ill at the time, consented to receive the child, on condition, as he added peremptorily, “that she should be kept very neat and make no noise”--this his precise and solemn declaration. The 215 little Valentine seemed to understand what was expected of her, and, though stirring, vigorous, and lively, rarely a rent was seen in her little Indian silk, never a spot on her red lips nor her cherubic forehead. When she happened to fall, she smothered her sobs and cries; when she remembered the past, she wept low for her mother--and all this not to displease the old gentleman, shut up in his close parlor, where he contemplated with astonishment mingled with pity and respect his two unfortunate legs--done up in flannel. Time, childhood, and natural gaiety combining, the little girl began even to find herself perfectly happy in this old house, where she was cherished, and nothing left undone for her needs, her games, or her repose.

Need we say that her adopted mother was happy? At the end of the long nights of want of sleep and suffering that she passed with the ill and impatient old man, she ran for a moment to the little chamber above, and watched the sweet pet, with brown eyes and rosy cheeks, as she woke to her morning’s happiness; she felt the dear little round arms press her neck, the sweet tender lips imprinted on her own, and she thanked God for this blessing. The little toilet made, and the breakfast over, she carried down-stairs happiness enough for half-a-day. Later, when her voice trembled at the end of some long lecture, or her arms were wearied at some endless rubbing, she looked out the window, saw the little one disporting in the sun, playing hide-and-seek among the lilacs, or smiling to her from amidst the roses, and, at this sight, it seemed her cup of joy was full, that the spring light played even in the sick man’s chamber, and for the time she forgot whether she was guardian or victim. Thus she lived on, consoled and strengthened by the child, consoling and strengthening her husband, until the day when M. de Guers died, and both wept his loss--Valentine with time having learned to love him; and he himself, won by the grace and beauty of the child, had often so far unbended as to keep time for her with his crutch while she danced all alone before his window in the garden.

From this moment, Madame de Guers gave Valentine all her time, her heart, her cares, her tenderness. I leave you to imagine how such precious gifts, with the aid of years, added to everything lovely and noble in the child. Of all the young girls of C----, Valentine at eighteen was not only one of the most beautiful, but, better still, the best, the simplest, the most tender, the humblest, the most joyous, and the best loved: the most ill-natured of the citizens could not refuse her their homage, and her adopted mother loved her to excess and with pride and delight; M. Maubars, too, the oldest friend of the house, and his son, the elegant Alfred, saw in her perfection a treasure, and their united wonder. Then at eighteen the future is so beautiful, the horizon so pure, dreams so sweet, and friends so tender! How happy, then, was our Valentine at this moment, when, joyous under the eyes of her mother, gay and confiding in the presence of her future husband, and gracious and pretty as she always was in her simple and quiet toilet, she wandered hither and thither in the garden, breathing the air, gathering the flowers, and breaking from the trees the large snow-balls that shed their petals on her lustrous brown hair.

We do not know exactly what Alfred and Valentine were talking about in 216 the garden-walk, as running from side to side to form their bouquet they chanced so often to meet. But, under the arbor, they were more grave, calmer, and certainly more mature, and they spoke of business.

“If you will permit it, my dear friend, I should like the young couple to live in my house,” said M. Maubars. “It is, I may say, without vanity, one of the most comfortable and best furnished in the town. As to me, you know, I am becoming a monk, or a bear, or a house-rat. The rolling of the half-dozen coaches and the three or four cabs our town possesses is sufficient to trouble my digestion, and almost deafens me; so I think, in order to plant my cabbages in peace, I had better lodge in the pavilion of my large garden at Vaux, which is not more than a league from the town. My good old Baptistine will accompany me, and keep the pot boiling. Every evening the children can come and see me, that is, every fine evening; and you can have them right by you--nothing to do but cross the street, and walk a few steps on the quay, ring the little bell, the latch will fly up, and there will be Valentine in a clean dress and red ribbon coming to meet you, for her delicate hearing would distinguish your step among a thousand others on the same pavement.”

“Poor dear child! I don’t want to be selfish, and yet it is hard to part with her,” murmured Madame de Guers, while stifling a sigh.

“Do you call that parting with her, when I tell you she will be right under your eye? And then, my dear friend, I must tell you you have become very worldly of late. You are obliged to accompany Valentine to this and that soirée, and it fatigues you, absorbs and puts you out altogether. When it comes my Alfred’s turn to do all this for her, you will see how you will improve, and old ladies always recover so naturally. Confess it, my dear Madame de Guers, have you not for some time been very negligent of yourself and your old people?”

“Alas, yes! poor good old people!” replied the respectable lady, with a sweet smile. “Yet every morning, after Mass, I stop to see them. True, my child monopolizes much of the time I should give to them, but she loves them too: she has so excellent a heart! How often I have seen her, when quite a child, take from her weekly allowance to buy jujube for old Manou, who has catarrh so badly, and tobacco for Périne, whose happiness is in smoking! And how she takes care of them when necessary, my friend! How merry she makes them, and consoles them, and reads them good books, and the Scripture she explains so prettily! In truth, this humble work will not perish with me: I have some one to whom I can confide it.”

This demands an explanation. Madame de Guers was not only an excellent, tender, and devoted mother, a constant and generous friend, but she was, at the same time, profoundly pious and sincerely charitable. The death of M. de Guers had left in her soul a bitter and secret sorrow, which she had never been able to console. The former lieutenant of the service, in spite of the solicitations and tears of his Christian and devoted wife, had bid farewell to this world in a manner far from exemplary, dying, without doubt, peaceably and bravely enough, but without repentance, without hope, without penitence, neither fixing his eyes on the cross nor listening to the absolution of the curé. So, for the poor, tender soul of the wife there remained a gnawing regret, a continual terror, and at the price of any 217 austerities, of any sacrifices, she wished to secure the eternal salvation of this obstinate husband. God only knows what mortifications she practised in secret, to gain a little every day towards the tender and sublime end she proposed; and, above all, she openly redoubled her works of fervor and charity. A part of the money left her by her husband had been employed by her in a house of refuge, where ten or twelve old, infirm women, the very poorest of the department, could live comfortably and in peace until the end of their days, and at the low price of reciting every day from their bench in the chapel a prayer for the repose and salvation of the soul of Jean Louis de Guers, former officer of the king’s fleet. We said before that Madame de Guers had given Valentine all her heart, her time, and her life: we should, nevertheless, have remarked that she reserved a portion for the poor old recluses of her little hospital, not finding it a difficult matter to reconcile, in her humble and peaceable existence, happiness and duty, charity and love.

“My dear old pensioners,” she said again, while regarding from a distance her charming adopted daughter, who smiled on her from amidst the shady trees, “they will be truly happy to find after me this dear child, who will, I am sure, possess the courage and strength to replace me. Good little Valentine! she has already given them, in my name, a portion of her heart, and to do so she needs to be as generous as in truth she is, for I could have given a much more brilliant heritage to this dear child had I not already adopted my old people. Her mother, alas! died without fortune, and for me, I have still remaining forty thousand francs, invested in rentes in the state, and my little property here. This is all, my good Maubars, I have to give her.”

“Well, well, my dear friend, don’t trouble yourself. The whole will amount to sixty thousand francs, at the lowest figure. Valentine is treasure enough in herself, and don’t need any more.”

“A treasure! Yes, indeed, you have spoken the truth!” replied the noble woman, fixing on her interlocutor a look radiant with joy, happiness, and confidence; “and as you make me so happy, my brave Maubars, in speaking as you do, I am not ashamed to confess I have often thought--have often feared--well, don’t blame me; nothing, you know, is so restless and timid as a mother--I have feared that a dowry so small could not respond to the legitimate views of a young man like Alfred, who can aspire to the best match in the country. I dare not tell you how this secret doubt has tortured my heart. It would have been so painful, so frightful to think that my want of foresight might have prepared so bitter a disappointment for my dearly loved Valentine.”

“And who speaks of disappointment, cowardly mamma that you are?” replied M. Maubars, with the good hearty laugh of the retired successful merchant. “Of course I do not mean that any dowry is to be despised, and, I will add, if this were larger, it were so much the better. But the moment that the question is between it and you and Valentine, Alfred and I will accept what you have in all confidence. Let there be no more mention of these things between us any more than there is just now in the conversation of that happy couple smiling and babbling among the roses.”

“How good you are, Maubars,” replied the adopted mother with a sigh 218 of relief. “Assuredly,” she continued with a sweet and mischievous smile, “I am very sure that it is not with dowry or business that they are entertaining themselves just now.”

This you may be assured of, my readers, for, just then, Valentine, spreading into a sweet smile her fine and delicate lips, while her brilliant eyes sparkled above the cheeks as rounded and satiny as the petals of her roses, said to her partner, who was coming toward her:

“You had better believe me, Mr. Alfred. We will not go to Paris. Paris is very far off, and it costs a great deal to go there. But we will go every evening and see dear papa in his little pavilion at Vaux. Won’t it be charming to do just as we did when we were little, ten years ago, just us two alone, you and I, running through the ruts and the fields, gathering the new hay and the herbs covered with dew?”

And the simple child, clapping her white hands, gently smiled still more joyously at the innocent, truant projects with which she proposed to inaugurate their future housekeeping. Then, Alfred having offered his arm, she accepted it a moment in order to adjust with her young intended some other detail of great importance, which she must tell her mamma immediately--mamma holding her breath meanwhile, hearing vaguely the murmur of the wind in the arbor and smiling with tenderness as her child approached.

“Mamma,” cried Valentine, throwing her arms around her mother’s neck, and with a caressing and infantine movement mingling the waves of her lustrous hair with the fine, heavy gray curls, “did you not say that the anniversary of your birth would come in two weeks, the second of next month, and that you would love to see Alfred and me choose that day to celebrate our betrothal?”

“Yes, my darling,” replied Madame de Guers gently.

“Very well, dear mamma, it is all arranged; we will exchange our rings on the same day that gave me so dear a mamma. But have you decided anything about the invitations?”

“I have at least thought of them, my child. We will have, I think, the greater part of those of our own society, and especially, you understand, all your young friends.”

“Yes, just as you wish. But is it to be only for the evening, dear mamma?”

“Ah! my little ambitious one wishes to give a whole day to her _fête_.”

“Indeed I do, mamma; I have dreamed of it even, so I may as well confess. I want particularly in the morning to have those I invite al to myself; I will receive them, lodge them, and serve them with my own hands. O mamma! it will be so nice, in the shady part of the garden, among the flowers, to set the long tables, and have an excellent breakfast, good wine, cakes, a roast, and Pierrot the violinist with his violin, and the baskets all filled with flowers! And my guests will be so surprised, and so pleased, my dear good mamma!”

“But who are they, then?”

“Your old women, dear mamma.”

Madame de Guers’s response was to take the pretty brown head of the charming child in her trembling hands, and to press it tenderly and long upon her lips, while a gentle shivering of admiration and love made her heart beat.

“It is said,” she replied at last; “the table shall be set for fifteen, and there shall be cakes and violins, and wine and flowers. 219 You shall serve them, my child, and my old people will believe they are at the wedding.”

Then, as the first stars began to dot the pure sky, and the happy and united group rose to leave the perfumed shelter of the garden, Madame de Guers, more joyous and prouder than ever, held back on purpose to let the young people pass before her, while she whispered in the ear of her old friend, who was philosophically taking in the whole scene:

“My good Maubars, did you not say, just now, my Valentine is a treasure?”

II.

Two weeks afterward, the air being of the softest, and the sky most radiant, Valentine received with great joy and pomp her morning guests on this the day of her betrothal. Everything passed conformably to the announced programme: the large table was ornamented and covered with a long white cloth; the light wine of the country filled the glasses; the cakes appeared large and gilded; and the roast was cooked to perfection. At this succulent and cordial banquet the twelve old women arranged themselves in order, and Valentine waited on them, cutting up the mutton in rosy slices, distributing the pieces of cake with her pretty little white hand, upon which shone the golden ring, with its blue stone, that Alfred had sent her that morning to wear until she took the other that would enchain her for life. The poor old gossips feasted with a good heart, and laughed as they tippled, their glasses tumbling against each other; while the sparrows, somewhat ousted, piped in the branches, astonished at so much noise, then dropped gently to the earth to peck at the crumbs of cake that fell in the grass; and, to crown all, the violin of Pierrot, seated at his post under the arbor, played for the delighted old women all the minuets, gavottes, and hops of the good old time.

You can judge of the gratitude and general joy.

“God will take you to his holy paradise, good and beautiful young lady!” said mother Périne, as she received from the hands of the pretty child her third slice of mutton.

“What are you saying there, mother Périne?” cried Babet, her usual antagonist. “What kind of wish is that you are making? Better hope for Miss Valentine, as for many others, that paradise will come as late as possible, and that here the dear good young lady will become a great and good matron, and enjoy herself as much as she can in this world.”

“True enough,” said Manou, “for there is the scraping of the violin; and just listen to that pretty gavotte! Oh! in those days when I was but twenty, how I hopped about like a young goat at the first note of the music. Dear me! Miss Valentine, how this good wine makes you young again, and puts the gaiety into you! I do believe, if Pierrot begins that flourish once more, I shall jump up and dance a minuet in your honor.”

So Valentine laughed, and the other old women applauded, and Manou fluttered about in true dancing style. Madame de Guers herself, who was rarely gay, wiped away a joyous tear from her eyes, while a tender and proud smile spread over her countenance. There was only the very, very old Genevieve, who could not laugh, because she had lost her five sons and grown blind in weeping for them. But, with her old wrinkled hand, she had groped for the pretty little one of her young friend and 220 protectress, pressed it between her own, and repeated in mourning accents:

“Miss Valentine, you deserve to be truly happy; you know how to give blessings like the good God, whose care and pleasure it is to think of the poor.”

Thanks to the pleasure of such a repast and so much time so happily spent, the old guests lingered around the table in the garden, and exceeded the limits of the morning hours. When at last they wended their way homeward, accompanied by the good sister who took care of them, they met on the road several of those invited for the afternoon, friends of Valentine mostly, accompanied by their mothers, in elegant toilets, and coming in great pomp to offer their compliments.

“Why, how is this, my dear? Have the old pensioners of Madame de Guers come to congratulate you?” asked Rosine Martin, one of the young ladies, as she entered and embraced her friend.

“Yes, Rosette, on this occasion I gave them a little _fête_. They breakfasted here and drank my health; and, do you know, Pierrot played the violin, and old Manou was so excited she actually danced a minuet.”

“Do you hear what Valentine is saying?” whispered Madame Martin to her friend and confidante, Madame Fremieux. “I always thought Madame de Guers put on the airs of a great lady, and, of course, will leave the same to Valentine, as foundress of charitable institutions. Insupportable, is it not? And charity costs something too. It is well to make a parade of it, whether one has it or not; and the question is, whether it is prudent to put such ideas into the child’s head, when she will give her at the very most two poor thousand francs?”

“Provided that charity is a luxury like any other, and often more imprudent than any other,” added, sententiously, Madame Fremieux, while she pulled out with her right finger the crushed ruche of her green satin dress.

“What an odd fancy you have for these old gossips, Valentine!” said Adeline de Malers, another good friend, a pretty young woman with two handsome children, whom she led gaily into the garden. “There they go, charmed with your reception, and repeating your name to all the echoes of the town. Well, it is a good idea while you are waiting and have so little to do, and nothing much to love. See what will become of them when you will be mamma in your turn, my dear!”

“Do you think so, Adeline? I cannot agree with you,” replied Valentine, blushing a little. “My dear good mamma Marie always found time to give me all her care, her love, and her watchfulness, and yet I am sure she never neglected these poor old friends. It seems to me that when one becomes a mother, one desires to heap up a treasure of good actions, and multiply one’s merits and virtues, in order that God may requite the little good one does in graces and benedictions on these dear little heads.”

“You always have a sentimental way of seeing things,” replied Adeline, stooping and arranging with her rosy fingers the white plume that graced the hat of baby; “but I doubt if Mr. Alfred Maubars will give the same light to the chapter; for, my little one, husbands are not nonentities in the future organization of a household; their decrees are inevitable, and must be listened to.”

“O Adeline! do you really think that Alfred would wish to prevent my doing a little good in assisting the unfortunate?” said Valentine, 221 deeply moved and almost indignant. “He who gave up his project of going to Paris, which we were to do immediately after our marriage? He who promised to give me one-half of what it would cost to make this trip to make a present to dear mamma, and furnish woollen stockings and aprons for the poor little parish children in the winter?”

“O my good Valentine! where you are just now, all this may be. But later, it will not, my dear. Do you see? The most part of the good husbands I know--and there are none too many of them--think charity begins at home. The wife, if she pleases, may give away the old boots and slippers, but woe to her if, in a fit of generous imprudence, she parts with the half of the chicken or the little glass of port that belongs to my lord.”

The joyous Adeline laughed with all her heart as she finished these words, and for a moment Valentine smiled at the lively raillery of her friend. But, M. Maubars and Alfred appearing at the same time at the end of the walk, she fixed on her intended a disturbed, timid, and sad look, asking herself if it could be true, if it could ever be possible, that he who should be her natural confidant in all the sweet and tender inspirations of her heart, in all the Christian aspirations of her innocent and pious soul, should consider it a crime in her to continue to obey the great and holy law of Christ that she had seen practised, every day from her infancy, in her own humble home.

However, this passing distrust of the sweet and charming betrothed was soon dispelled. Alfred approached and presented her a rich and graceful bouquet, and his words as he handed it were so respectful and tender, and his look so subdued and sincere! Then all the young people invited had arrived; they were just finishing the joyous feast taken together on the grass, and already they were preparing for the dance. And now the scraping of Pierrot made way for an harmonious orchestra that resounded sweetly, echoing through the shady bowers. On the branches of the large lindens were suspended light and capricious-looking garlands, in which little red, blue, white, gilded, and green lamps were hung. They looked like stars that had come from heaven to see the _fête_ and smile at the other living stars, the young girls their sisters. M. Maubars had charged himself with this part of the entertainment--an offering not of charity, but one made to youth and pleasure. So, everything passed off as brilliantly as could be wished on such a day; and quadrille after quadrille succeeded each other on the same spot where, a few hours earlier, Manou, recalling her twenty years, had so valiantly executed the rhythmical and bounding steps of the ancient minuet of Auvergne.

And while the young people danced, the older ones talked in the parlor, or complacently looked on while their children enjoyed themselves from the little fringed pavilion with velvet benches that had been prepared for them in front of the greensward. Madame Martin, while admiring from afar her brown and pretty Rosette, had insensibly approached the father of Alfred--and of all the ladies in the town, she had the least sympathy for Valentine, having for a long time nourished very sweet maternal hopes on the possibility of a marriage between Rosette and the young Maubars.

“In truth, dear neighbor,” said she, accosting with an amiable smile the honorable retired merchant, “one must confess you do things 222 royally. It certainly cannot be these ladies, with their small, very small fortune, who have by themselves given us such a _fête_ as this. And then, it is not according to their tastes. If by accident they should have a little too much money, they would have less pleasure in offering a ball to their friends than a breakfast to their old poor.”

“My dear Madame Martin, when one does as one can, one does as one should,” replied, with a deep bow, M. Maubars, responding to her compliment to himself. “As to these ideas of our excellent friend Madame de Guers, you see, we must not be surprised at them. She has always lived a little above our so-called middle society; she is a woman--how shall I say it?--well, of the old _régime_. In her devotions, in good works, and perseverance, she has grand ideas; the commandments of Christ, the love of her neighbor, the good of the poor. It is all beautiful, Madame Martin, and sits superbly on a woman like her, grave and dignified, with such handsome white hair.”

“But for the little one--for Valentine--do you think, M. Maubars, that it will suit her as well?” replied, quickly, the lady, with a mocking smile.

“Oh! why not? Everything becomes a child. All these fine devotions are an occupation for the widow and an amusement for the little one. It is much better to direct her by caring for the poor than by ruining the reputations of others and seeking false excitements. Wait till Valentine becomes the wife of Alfred; that will change everything, you know, neighbor. The dear child will only have one end, one duty, one love--her husband.”

“Do you really think so, neighbor?” interrupted Madame Martin, in a jeering tone.

“It is, at least, what all women promise at the altar, madame. And Valentine will do as she promises, I am certain. A child so docile, a nature so pliable, and a heart of gold. Yes, madame; I do not doubt, if my Alfred wishes it, she will prefer the road to the market or the grocery in preference to that of the church. And as to the refuge of which you speak, Madame de Guers will take care of that, as it will be her only occupation. My daughter-in-law will visit it occasionally in her leisure moments.”

“It will become her well to adapt her household to his wishes; for every one knows, neighbor, your son brings her a fortune far superior to her own.”

“Alas! yes, you say truly; her dowry is the only weak point.”

“The little one will have scarcely anything, will she, M. Maubars?” asked the lady precipitately, in her ardent, almost joyous curiosity.

“Oh! a modest cipher, but enough. There is nothing to complain of. If it had been less, I confess I do not know what Alfred would have done. The needs of luxury are so numerous nowadays, and it costs so much to live, my dear lady!”

“Yes, we all know that,” replied the prudent mother. “This is the reason I calculate, and economize, and stint myself every day for the love I bear Rosette. According to my ideas, it is a culpable charity that does not consider one’s own first.”

At the enunciation of this wise maxim, M. Maubars sighed profoundly. At the bottom of his heart he could not help wishing, in the interest of Valentine and Alfred also, that Madame de Guers, his dear old friend, had less tenderness and greatness of soul, less generous devotion, and a little more worldly prudence and solicitude for the 223 material side of life. Nevertheless, he was careful not to express aloud the secret preoccupations which now and then disquieted him a little; and just then Valentine, leaving the joyous group of dancers, approached him, sweet and charming in her innocent joy and unaffected simplicity. Her steps, delicate and modest, slid silently over the grass, and the golden reflection of the long garlands of light made her muslin dress appear whiter and more transparent, while her brown hair, simply raised and half-crowned with a bouquet of small roses, glittered browner and more lustrous as the tiny lamps threw their rays upon it as she passed. The smile alone of such a charming daughter-in-law could dispel a host of deceptions and fears. In Valentine’s eyes beamed so much candor, love, sweetness, and virtue that in admiring her one forgot the more or less respectable cipher of the promised dowry.

But Valentine did not remain long with the group of talkers seated in the shade; she was looking for Madame de Guers, and ran away promptly when she heard the good old lady had gone into the house.

“Dear mamma, are you ill?” said she, quite distressed when she saw her dear protectress in the little reception-room, carefully wrapped up in a large shawl, pale, trembling slightly, and appearing to suffer.

“Oh! my child, it is nothing; a slight chill--a trifling ailment only. We have had a great deal to do today, and I am tired. Perhaps I took cold sitting so long in the shade of the lindens. Go and dance, my love, for you must replace me and finish the ball. Make my excuses to our guests.”

Valentine obeyed, but she left her mother sadly, with a secret convulsion of the heart, that dimmed her bright eyes and her radiant smile. Two hours after, when, at last, alone on the step of the dear old house, she had said adieu to her guests and was at liberty to run to the room where Madame de Guers already reposed, she saw clearly that this instinctive fear was a realized fact. The sleep of her adopted mother was agitated and painful, her forehead was burning, her eyes half-open, her breathing difficult and accelerated. For the first time in these fifteen years of peace and happiness passed under the friendly roof of the old house, the heart of the young girl sank for a moment under the weight of an unknown grief--of a mortal anguish. Without thinking of her ball-dress, she knelt down at the foot of the bed, weeping in terror, praying to God, and gently kissing, from time to time, the hand of the sick woman, who, in her feverish sleep, muttered words without meaning. And thus she awaited the day--the new day that was to arise for her, and menace her with danger, grief, terror, and anguish.

III.

It had been decided, on the day of the modest betrothal, that the marriage of Alfred and Valentine should be celebrated a week after the Nativity of Our Lady, in September, before the first fogs of autumn had tarnished the verdant woods, and before the vintagers had robbed the robust vines of their golden grapes on the slopes descending to the valley below. But autumn passed; the woods grew yellow and the leaves fell; the joyous shouts of the vintagers ceased to rejoice the hills, and the icy winds of winter blew over the blackened slopes, without Valentine having sought her white marriage robes. Alas! it 224 was a robe of mourning that covered her now, poor little one! She had again become an orphan; her sweet and careless happiness of the young daughter, the cherished child so tenderly protected, was all gone, destroyed for ever, for ever lost with the last swallows that fled from the woods with the first falling leaves. The most devoted care, the greatest affection and constancy, could not preserve to her this nervous and tender mother, whose life here below was sad enough, and whose death would have been sweet, had she not so felt for and trembled for her child. Her illness, however, had been long and courageously combated, and for some time there was hope of triumph over the disease, until one day, when Valentine was absent on a pilgrimage to a neighboring chapel, a sudden hæmorrhage set in, and Madame de Guers, feeling it necessary to use what strength she had left, sent for several papers, and with pain wrote for her adopted daughter directions which were not to be opened until a month after her death, when the first transports of grief were over.

The fatal moment then came, and by one of the last auroras of September, soft, fresh, and almost veiled, Valentine found herself on her knees by the bedside of the dying, exchanging the last adieux with her tender benefactress, the devoted mother who, from her infancy, had so unceasingly studied her happiness. The poor child remembered no more: grief had completely prostrated her, and she forgot her own existence until one evening, returning to consciousness, she found herself clothed in deep black, and alone with Marianne, the old and faithful servant, who wept low by her side and tried to console her. Then, M. Maubars and Alfred had come, and Valentine felt a secret consolation in the midst of her sadness. It was so sweet, so toning and strengthening, to know one’s self still loved while circumstances had separated her from him upon whom she had lavished such a wealth of affection. It is true the consolations offered by the future father-in-law and betrothed were not of the highest order of morality, and not very profound, perhaps, but they were truly affectionate and sincere--at least, Valentine thought so--so they had power to alleviate her grief and restore her heart’s serenity.

“What would you, my child? We are all mortal,” said the future papa. “But we can still console ourselves, and live almost happy in the love of the friends that remain to us.”

Alfred did not even say as much. But he looked at her tenderly, with a gentle expression of interest and pity; he quietly took the little white and thin hand that lay languidly on her black drapery, and pressed it between his own, while he murmured:

“Poor dear Valentine! Poor friend, so dearly loved.” And these simple words, this look, this affectionate gesture from the friend of her childhood, seemed to open to the heart-broken young girl a new treasure of hope and consolation.

The days, however, rolled on: grief was not less profound, less constant, or less bitter, but it became necessarily more contained, more resigned, was borne more valiantly in secret, giving place to austere duties, they serious preoccupations of life. The time came, naturally, when business had to be spoken of to Valentine. Until then, with respect for her grief and her weakness, they had spared her every proposition, every discussion on the subject.

“I will do all that is necessary,” murmured the poor child. So they told her she must assist at the opening of the will, which would take 225 place by the notary, in presence of authorized witnesses.

The solemn assembly, therefore, convened on a cold morning of November in the large parlor of the house. A biting and mournful wind shook the windows, and threw against them in disorder the last leaves of the lindens that on the day of the betrothal had balanced so joyously their green perfumed crowns above the gladdened heads of Valentine, her companions, and her betrothed. The last wishes of Madame de Guers were expressed in a manner at once neat and concise. Her little capital of 40,000 francs, placed in rentes on the state, and her house, with all its dependencies, were willed by her to her dear pupil, Valentine Vaudrey, in default of direct inheritors from her own family or from that of her husband. The assistants knew in advance the tenor of the will; nevertheless, after its reading they hastened to congratulate the poor heiress, now overwhelmed in tears.

“Dear good madame knew you well, and she was not wrong,” said the old and honest Marianne, with a convinced air.

“My dear child, hereafter you are quite at home,” added M. Maubars, as he pressed with lively affection the little white hand, quite dampened with tears.

The notary, however, made a gesture with his hand to reclaim still some moments of silence. “The reading of the papers establishing the last wishes of the defunct is not yet completed, gentlemen,” added he, in a grave and measured voice. “I have in my hand a letter written by my respectable client fifteen days before her death, and addressed to her pupil, Mlle. Valentine Vaudrey. Mlle. Valentine will be kind enough to take notice, conjointly with myself and M. the President of the Tribunal or M. the Justice of the Peace, if these last recommendations are not to be considered as bearing upon her affairs.”

Valentine, drying her eyes, raised her pale, noble forehead, and tried to collect her voice, that trembled greatly.

“My good Monsieur Morin, read the letter,” said she, “I pray you. My dear and best friend had no secrets to confide to me, I am sure, and her last wishes should be respected and known by all.”

The notary bowed and broke the seal. With one look he glanced through the writing, and a shade of surprise and anxiety was depicted on his face. Valentine, disquieted in turn, advanced gently, and extended her hand toward the paper.

“Of what is this the subject, sir?” she asked timidly.

“Business; only business, my dear young lady,” stammered the good M. Morin in an embarrassed tone.

“Then read it aloud, I pray you, sir,” said the young girl, tranquil, resolved, and suddenly reassured.

The notary then slowly unfolded the paper, put on his spectacles, and began his reading in the midst of a profound silence, and perhaps anxiety, that reigned just then among the little assembly.

“My dearly loved Valentine,” said the noble woman dead, “forgive me if I open my heart to you, and if, in giving up what has been, after you, the joy and consolation of my existence, I leave you perhaps serious duties, real and profound anxiety. My will, as you no doubt have learned, makes you the one and only heiress to the modest sum I feel so happy to be able to leave you. But you know, my poor dear child, I have besides undertaken, and you know with what end, a work of mercy 226 that I wished to succeed and prosper a long time, even when my presence and aid would have, by the will of God, been withdrawn from my poor old _protégées_. This charitable foundation has been for me the object of grave and disquieting cares, that till now I have never found necessary to confide to you. I have just learned that the proprietor of the building that shelters my poor old pensioners, having some speculation in view, has decided to take possession of it and its dependencies himself, or will only permit me to retain it under conditions too exacting to be in harmony with my slender resources. Many people of judgment whom I have consulted have all counselled me to choose another abode and there install my pensioners. If I had found myself, as formerly, alone in the world, I should not have hesitated to do so; but to find a suitable house and pay several debts of my poor little hospital--for times have not been good for a few years past--I should have had to have laid out at least twenty thousand francs, almost the half of my present fortune; and could I deprive you of so important a sum--you, my best loved and only heiress, who cannot have the same reasons for being interested in the existence of the work, and therefore its continuation?

“This idea has not seemed possible to me, my dear child; therefore I have made no reserves, no stipulations in the interests of my poor old dependants, leaving it to your reason, not less than to your generous heart, to decide what you find best to do. Perhaps the advice, the support of the new family into which you are going to enter, of my good friend M. Maubars, whom I have always known so loyal and just, will be at your service, and, without impoverishing yourself, you can aid those whom I have always wished so much to see prosper. Take advice, then, of these friends, my daughter, consult your own faculties, your strength, and, above all, do not precipitate anything. It would have been too painful for me to have died in the thought of relinquishing this work which has been so dear and consoling, therefore I speak to you of it to-day, confident you will understand me in this as in everything else. But, in any event, I hope that Providence will continue to watch over this modest foundation for his glory, and whatever you decide to do, my good and tender child, be assured you will have my approval and my blessing.

“Farewell, joy and consolation of my old years, sweetness of my life, my dear daughter. I will not forget you in the presence of my God, if he will deign to hear my prayers.”

Thus the letter finished, and the sad and continued voice of M. Morin, which seemed to die out in murmurs, was only replied to by the long and bitter sobs of Valentine.

At the end, the young girl, trembling and half-tranquillized, approached the notary, turned toward him her mild countenance, where a timid smile of gratitude and tenderness already commenced to shine as a fugitive and light ray in the midst of her tears.

“Monsieur Morin, in four months I will be twenty-one,” said she. “Perhaps the proprietor of the asylum will wait till then. I shall be free then, will I not, to give the twenty thousand francs necessary for the purchase of the house?”

A profound silence, soon interrupted by a feeble murmur, greeted at first these words of the orphan. M. Maubars rose from his chair, shrugged his shoulders slightly, approached her, and took her hand 227 with a benevolent and paternal smile.

“Permit me, my dear child,” said he. “You are not--my worthy and respectable friend knew it well--quite competent to decide in matters of business, and you had better, I think--”

“You think perhaps I would do better to install the poor women in this dear old house,” interrupted the generous girl, with her sad and sweet smile. “Monsieur Maubars, I love it too much, this humble abode, too much in truth, I have in it so many sweet recollections, and have passed here so many happy days of infancy. But my poor dear mamma would perhaps be happier to know her old friends lodged and sheltered here, in her own house. So I am quite ready to give it up to them, if you think it right, quite suitable.”

“But no, no, dear good Valentine,” replied the prudent papa, with a very embarrassed air. “My child, you well understand, questions of sentiment should never interfere with those of business. Think, by abandoning this little property, or its equivalent sum, you give up in reality one-third of your dowry--a dowry, permit me to say too, without any grudge, that is already not the most considerable. Think that all prudent people would endeavor to dissuade you from taking this part; that you are not in reality free to accomplish a sacrifice so important and to the detriment of your future family.”

Ah! poor Valentine! had she ever expected such a declaration? At first she listened calmly, then smiled; then as she comprehended these words, that came like a thunderbolt upon her in all their cruelty, her paleness disappeared and gave place to a quick and glowing redness; then this in turn vanished, and she remained cold and white as a marble statue. Then a ray of indignation and grief glanced from her pure eyes, but compressing, however, the sudden beating of her heart, palpitating and growing colder every instant, she replied, still in an uncertain and timid voice, with a firm and serious accent, but caressing and affectionate:

“Free, did you say, my good Monsieur Maubars? Do you not mistake me? Should I not be always free to accomplish my duty, the last wishes of my mother?”

“But allow me ... distinguish,” repeated the future father-in-law, alarmed but yet not discouraged. “There is an imprudent and rash liberty, my dear young lady, and one that is provident and wise. You see yourself that your tender and generous protectress orders nothing, and asks nothing of you. She simply engages you to seek for the best advice of those who are interested in your happiness, in your future destiny, mine amongst others, my dear child. And you know well I am disposed to act toward you as an old friend, as your father. I have a great influence in benevolent societies, am a member of several; nothing easier for me to tranquillize you on the subject of your old women than to make out a little account of the actual state of things, with a few words of my own observation, and have them received without any delay or trouble into the hospital for incurables in this department. In this way, my dear Valentine, you see all can be arranged for the best. You will be relieved from all inquietude as to the fate of the _protégées_ of the excellent Madame de Guers; your little fortune will not be compromised; exempted from every care, free from obligations, you can consecrate your entire time to your duties, to the affections that await you in your new family.”

Valentine listened to every word, her eyes fixed, her lips immovable. But from time to time a deeper and more sombre shade spread over her 228 eyes, an expression more desolate fixed itself on her lips. When the caressing and persuasive voice of her future father-in-law ceased to be heard, she sadly bent her head, and replied:

“Alas! Monsieur Maubars, I see we can never again understand each other. I am not free, as you appear to think. What my dear and worthy protectress would have done, I must do for her.”

“But, my child, reflect: you cannot sacrifice your little fortune.”

“And this fortune, to whom do I owe it, then--I, a poor, abandoned orphan, who, without the generous protection of this inestimable friend, would have been sent in years gone by where you would place these poor infirm people--in a hospital. Oh! my good Monsieur Maubars, if my benefactress had in dying left some debt of honor that I should pay, would you advise me to cancel the obligation--you who are so just and honorable?”

“But, dear young lady, the case is different; your excessive delicacy leads you astray.”

“It is only different in one respect: it is more grave and solemn. This is a sacred debt that Madame de Guers has contracted toward God and toward the poor, to satisfy the yearning of her soul. To-day this debt is transmitted to me. I recognize it; I receive it with the rest of her heritage; I promise to use, if necessary, all my resources, all my time, all my strength to pay it as I should.”

The young girl, pale though resolute, rose in pronouncing these words, and extended her little hand, that had ceased to tremble, as if she called upon all the strangers assembled to witness her irrevocable decision, her generous determination. The old frequenters of the mansion could scarcely recognize her: she seemed to have grown taller, ripened in a moment, and was transfigured. Her former sweetness, so timid and charming, did not abandon her, but there mingled in it an expression of invincible courage and inflexible integrity; the weak and feeble child had disappeared, and in her place appeared a woman--loyal, intrepid, resigned, ready for every devotion, for every sacrifice, even of the oldest and most cherished affections of her heart.

M. Maubars was undeceived; it was with an expression evidently of extreme surprise and marked discontent that he fell back a few steps and bent his whitened head: “I persist in hoping, mademoiselle, that you will still reflect,” said he, in a tone impressed with remarkable coldness. “Otherwise, you understand, without doubt, our projects must undergo same modification. Consider that such obstinacy on your part is a most unhappy precedent for the well-being and peace of your future household.”

At this brutal menace, at this the saddest moment, perhaps, of her life, Valentine became still paler and her look more sombre, but she neither trembled nor flinched, accepting without a murmur and in silence all the bitterness of the duty she had just embraced. Only, by an old and tender habit of childhood, with the remains of a hope perhaps, her gaze, more eloquent and earnest than ever, was fixed upon Alfred--the friend, the betrothed, whom, for so long a time, she had been accustomed to consult in any sadness or disquietude. But Alfred, before the mute anguish of this regard, was not moved. He bore with his father an air of gravity and dissatisfaction.

“I am sure you will reflect upon this, Valentine,” he simply said. 229 “You see my father counsels you as a true friend, having only in view your happiness and the preservation of your fortune.”

Then Valentine turned slowly and sadly, without allowing a single tear to escape her, or a single sob that was then swelling in her breast.

“My good Monsieur Morin, my resolution is taken,” said she, her voice at first trembling, but becoming steadier as she spoke. “All the reflections that I could make would only serve to show me my duty, more distinct, more exact, more sacred. In two months, if you wish, we will hear what property had better be sold, and choose a suitable abode for our asylum.... Now, gentlemen, our council is ended, I believe.... I thank you one and all for having accorded me your advice and the support of your presence.”

All the assistants understood that the courageous young girl must be left alone to suffer, alone to weep. They rose simultaneously, bowed to her profoundly with admiration and respect, and went out. Alfred wore already a resigned look of sadness, and M. Maubars betrayed his irritation in his brusque movements and unsteady walk. The echoes of their steps died in the distance, and around the orphan in her mourning reigned only solitude and silence.

“It is all over; they have said it,” she murmured then, and let fall the pent-up tears. “But no! it was to be.... I wished it also. It was my duty--why could he not so understand it? Oh! Adeline told me the truth. God is good to have enlightened me while I am still single and free. Poor mamma, you could not have imagined this. So much the better, for you would have wept so bitterly.”

Speaking thus, she wept and wept, hiding her face in her hands, and sobbing as if her heart would break. The hours flew by, night came, and the November rain fell on the windows, the November wind shook the shutters in the little parlor, formerly so tightly closed, so bright, and peopled with good friends, but now so solemn and deserted, and where the orphan alone must suffer and weep.

IV.

Valentine held firm to her resolution; her soul, so loyal and pure, was of those where the courage of devotion, and the love of duty accomplished, united to double the price of the humble virtues, submission, gentleness, and tenderness. To a very polite and respectful letter from Alfred, in which the young man begged her to let him know if she still persisted in her intentions, she replied in simple terms, releasing him from his engagement, and telling him that henceforward she should devote herself to the austere and honorable task bequeathed her by her adopted mother. Notwithstanding her orders to the contrary, one of her best friends forced her way into the house, no doubt with good intentions. It was the lively and joyous Adeline de Malers, in whom, in spite of much prudence and worldly experience, tenderness and benevolence were not wanting, and who would sincerely have desired to conquer what she considered the obstinacy and blindness of her poor dear friend. Adeline took care to bring precious arguments with her to plead the important marriage cause: she led her two dear little children by the hand, with their innocent babbling and sweet smiles, the source of so much delight and maternal felicity. However, Valentine did not yield; her soul was steeped and her resolution strengthened by the secret prayers and solitude of her 230 affliction.

“My dear,” said Adeline to her at the end of her arguments, “if you grow poor by this foolish liberality, and if, half-ruined, you are obliged to give up M. Alfred Maubars, you will be an old maid, I warn you.”

“I have always been a happy young girl, I can be a tranquil and contented old maid. Happiness has no age,” replied Valentine, with her calm and tender smile.

“My dear, the obliged are generally ungrateful; gratitude from the poor is a rare and uncertain commodity.”

“I know it; but the satisfaction of an accomplished duty is immense, and the grace of God infinite. Besides, I shall be so happy to realize the intentions and to continue the work of my mother, who is in heaven.”

Adeline shrugged her shoulders with a gesture of impatience. “But your poor old folks won’t live for ever, and when the last one has disappeared, your work will be finished, and you will be alone. Besides, in devoting yourself in the flower of your years to their catarrhs and their rheumatisms, do you know, my poor child, what you renounce and what you lose? Come here, Bertha, my treasure, kiss me, Max, you dear little angel.... Look at them now, you wicked little obstinate one, and tell me, as you examine them well, if all the happiness, all the glory of a woman, does not consist in raising, caring for, and cherishing such charming little loves.”

At these words, Valentine drew the little ones to her; kissed each of their pretty white foreheads, and laid her hand gently on their blonde heads; for she had at heart that tender and deep love of children that God has given innocent young girls, in order that one day their most holy duty may become their truest and sweetest happiness. And for an instant perhaps the caressing look that she fixed upon them became more tender, deeper, and more tearful; she stooped then a moment toward the earth; then resumed her serenity, and replied peaceably and with resignation:

“God has given me my children--children, Adeline, who have great need of me, for they are suffering, poor, and feeble. Besides, my good friend, when the last of these poor old people shall have gone, there will remain to me the foundation, the hospital. I will open it then to real children, to young and poor orphans. In this way, I too will have my family--my family blessed by God.”

“It is fanaticism, truly, and I begin to despair of your future, my dear friend,” cried Adeline, surprised and discontented to find her overtures so energetically repulsed. “But, then, why do you persist in remaining in the world, that will only have, believe me, disdain for your heroism, coldness and raillery for your generous devotion? Why do you not at once adopt the cornette and serge of the Sister of Charity?”

“Because, thus far, God has not so commanded me,” replied the courageous child, modest and resigned. “My duty lies near these old women; here my place is marked out; I have nothing else to do but understand, adore, and obey. And since I have friends among my people, I esteem and love them also. Why should these friends abandon me because a sacred duty claims a portion of my time and my strength, and I must consecrate myself to it? My destiny is no doubt changed, but my heart will never change, and from those I should have loved my memory will never be detached; no rival affection will banish their remembrance, 231 and for them, always, I shall be Valentine.”

Adeline took leave soon after, half-angry, half-impressed, declaring she could understand nothing of the character of such an obstinate girl, who could hide such real perversity, such inexplicable tenacity, under a manner so timid and so gentle. After her departure, the pupil of Madame de Guers read for the last time the solemn message to Alfred, and finished the reply she had already commenced. Not a tear sullied the page whereon slowly and courageously she traced her farewell. Not a start of tenderness or grief agitated the poor little white hand, that so heroically sealed the decree of separation, renunciation, and forgetfulness. Only when she had finished, when there was nothing more to propose or hope for, when the old Marianne, carrying the letter, had disappeared in the fog, near the neighboring quay, she gently approached, with her eyes full of tears, the chimney where the noble and tender face of her second mother, the friend of her youthful years, smiled on her as if to encourage her from under her light glass covering. Before she pressed her trembling lips on the little portrait, she smiled sweetly through her tears.

“It is all finished, mamma,” murmured she. “I will do as you would--hereafter live only for God, and for his poor. You have told me more than once that such is the lot of the elect. I believe you, dear mamma; I love you and I bless you.”

And as the choice of the young girl was made, she lived, as she had said, devoted and valiant, active and resigned. The notary soon came to the conclusion, and made it known to her, that all her resources would be needed for the support of her old people. But what would she have done all alone in the dear old house, much too large for her by herself, and so full of remembrances, rendered so bitter in silence and solitude? Valentine understood what she had to do, and easily resigned herself. The old and peaceable abode, a little enlarged, received on one story the old pensioners of the little hospital, while the young protectress reserved on another her bedroom, her little parlor, and her library: a modest apartment filled with pious relics and sweet and humble souvenirs. And from this moment her life was entirely consecrated to her retreat, to God and the poor; from this moment, too, she openly relinquished all hope of any new situation, any other destiny; and the circle of friends and acquaintances of the little town of C---- ceased to include her among the marriageable.

In obscure cares, in constant labor, in hidden devotions, passed the days, sped the years, and robbed her of her youth. But peace remained, because she was content to establish her abode in the shadow of a Christian roof, and in the love of grateful hearts. It is true--though some of our readers may be permitted to doubt it--that a peace the sweetest, the most delightful, the most constant, and the most sure does not depend on what excites and passes so quickly from earth, but on the true, salutary, and Christian manner in which the soul, wise and resigned, puts itself in harmony with the exigencies of its destiny and the will of its God. Valentine felt this early, and from that time experienced it always. The serene tranquillity of her heart, humble in its desires and contented in its destiny, was never overshadowed by a cloud; it stood proof against any shock, even on the day when, having finished the reading of the Scriptures to the old 232 Genevieve, she heard in the street, quite close to her, a great noise of carriages, rolling joyously towards the church, from which resounded the sounds of a _fête_, and, looking out the window to explain the cause of the tumult, she saw in the first of the carriages, ornamented with wedding favors, bouquets, and ribbons, two friends of her childhood: the betrothed of that day, Alfred Maubars and Rosine Martin. There passed over her face a calm smile, vague and almost dreaming; then a fixed and disturbed look, for at the bottom of the page, as she read, were these words: “_It is not good for man to be alone._”

But almost immediately resounded in her ears the caressing and infantine voices of childhood, those of two little orphans, her cherished dependants, who had taken the places of Babet and Manou, dead full of years, and now quietly reposing in their graves. At the joyous call Valentine was once more herself, and, with a calm smile, bending her head as if she recognized her error, she said:

“Yes, indeed, it would be sad to be alone, but those are never so who know how to love. Dear mamma told me so, and well she knew what she said. Come, Marie, come Louisette, let me say the _Angelus_ with you.” The little ones approached, knelt down, and she laid her hands on their heads, and kissed their browned foreheads. And before she made the sign of the cross she regarded them earnestly, and with a joyful, softened, peaceable, and triumphant gaze, even an expression of indifference and forgetfulness to the carriage that was rolling towards the church, and she rose at last full of gratitude and love of benediction and prayer, and lifted her eyes to the clear and blue heaven that caressed her with its gold-lit rays.

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TRUE FAITH.

Faith is no weakly flower, By sudden blight, or heat, or stormy shower To perish in an hour.

But rich in hidden worth, A plant of grace, though striking root in earth, It boasts a hardy birth.

Still from its native skies Draws energy which common shocks defies, And lives where nature dies! E. CASWALL.

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THE PLACE VENDOME AND LA ROQUETTE. 233

THE BEGINNING AND THE END OF THE COMMUNE.

FROM LE CORRESPONDANT.

II.

I shall not pass abruptly from my first account, drawn up at the end of March, respecting the tragedy of the Place Vendôme, to that written at the end of May, concerning the invasion of the Madeleine, my detention at the Préfecture de Police and at Mazas, and the transcendent crimes of the Commune which I witnessed at La Roquette.

What was the opinion of the few politicians left in Paris respecting the strange events they witnessed, the accomplices and auxiliaries of the Commune, and the degree of responsibility the national and international element would incur in its follies and crimes?

We must render this justice to the victorious insurgents of the eighteenth of March--that the power of dissimulation was the weakest of their traits and the least of their cares. If they aimed at imitating Carnot, Danton, and Robespierre, they made no pretensions of rivalling Richelieu, Mazarin, and Talleyrand. With a moderate degree of coolness, curiosity, and discernment, it was easy to gain access to their larder, and ascertain the ingredients of the viands to be served up to us each day. They had too slight a dash of moral sense to be preoccupied with questions of honor and propriety. The absoluteness of their aims made them completely insensible to delicacy of means and diffidence as to appearances. Therefore, the politicians who had not fled before the heroes of the Internationale did not waste their time. If they were nearly deprived of action, they could, at least, be observant, communicate the result of their impressions, and acquire a reasonable conviction respecting the operation of the revolutionary engine, with its numerous springs and mysterious propelling forces, not revealed by the press of the Commune, and therefore escaping the attention of the vulgar.

I have already protested against the weakness, blindness, or connivance of the republican mayors and deputies of Paris, who, immediately after the massacres of the Place Vendôme, became reconciled to the agents of the central committee, disbanded and dispersed the battalions of the national guard still faithful to the cause of order, and gave Paris up to an association of adventurers and outlaws, some of unknown origin, others notorious for their conflicts with the laws of their own countries, and all for their savage hatred of every social institution.

Instead of subsequently acknowledging their weakness or error, the majority of the radical republicans continued their campaign against the national assembly with a persistence and hypocrisy that cannot be sufficiently stigmatized. To preserve the republic, they emboldened and strengthened the Commune, thus sacrificing to their political idol the peace, prosperity, honor, and existence of their country. The 234 Commune did not conceal its affection for such auxiliaries, but its caresses were to some of a more serious and compromising nature.

Formerly, the most ultra never dreamed of giving up their patriotism. It was reserved for the members of the Commune to divest themselves of this old prejudice of all nations. They vehemently demanded, during the siege of Paris by the Prussians, the most extreme measures--a general sortie, “_des battailles torrentielles_,” and fighting to the last. When conspiracy made them masters of Paris, their violence and ferocity against the Prussians changed to obsequious devotedness and civilities of the most amicable nature. Their dishonest protestations were displayed in the columns of the official journal of the Commune with a coolness that makes one blush. The delegate of foreign affairs treated the Prussians, who had just lacerated and humiliated France, and bombarded its capital, as if they were our most faithful allies, and were sacrificing themselves heroically for our safety.

The generals of the Commune, who had been imprisoned some weeks before by the government of the national assembly as Prussian spies and agents, made no change in their patriotic course. The delegate of war, General Trochu, recalled at the tribune, “is making a series of rigorous arrests, the object of which is to assure to the enemy the freedom the pending negotiations confer on them.”

The politicians and chemists of the Commune proved they had been in a good school by borrowing two ideas of M. de Bismarck and M. de Moltke, the very names of which now inspire horror--the system of hostages and the use of petroleum. To ensure the entire payment of the exorbitant requisitions on the invaded provinces, and somewhat avenge the limited enthusiasm manifested by the humiliated and suffering inhabitants, the Prussians retained the most notable individuals as hostages, and sent them to the prisons of Germany. Citizens Ferré and Raoul Rigault found this system too ingenious and convenient not to be adopted. They took as hostages, and imprisoned them at Mazas and La Roquette, the priests and laymen who, according to the opinion of these servile imitators, had been more devoted to social and national interests than to those of anarchy and demagogism.

Fourteen months ago, a peculiar dictionary was discovered in the headquarters of the Internationale, in which was a list of such words as nitro-glycerine and picrate of potassium, and a recipe for sulphurate of carbon, and the chlorate and prussiate of potassium. At the end of the recipes were these words, significant of the uses to which they were to be applied: “To throw from the windows: to be thrown into the gutters.” If the most formidable of recipes is not to be found there, it is because the citizens of the Commune had not yet learned in the school of Prussian engineers the art of destroying houses and monuments by means of petroleum.

In continuing the account of the horrible deeds of the Commune, I find consolation as a Frenchman in the thought that the murderers and incendiaries of Paris denied not only their God, but their country, and that they were members not only of a criminal, but a foreign league.

I.

THE CLOSING OF THE MADELEINE.

In following with serious attention the various evolutions of the Commune, we are struck by the contrast between its beginning and its 235 end. Its first essays were rather grotesque than frightful. The statesmen most preoccupied about the quicksands on which it threatened to cast society and the nation did not at first foresee the crimes that are without a name, which made its end one of the most sinister pages in human history. The reason is easily understood. Once masters of Paris, the charlatans and rogues that composed the Commune hoped to become the rulers of France. They saw themselves already at the head of a social revolution, and, encouraged by their unexpected success in the seductive cause of pretended renovation, they set to work in earnest. Hence the deluge of strange and incoherent decrees that became a dead letter, and only served to amuse the careless and frivolous Parisian.

But when the generals of the Commune made an audacious effort to seize Versailles and open communication with their numerous agents in the populous centres of the provinces, they were overwhelmed by the army they thought disorganized or won over to their cause, and all their plans were overthrown. The attempts to excite an insurrection in the large cities failed. The Commune could expect nothing more from the intervention of the departments: its rule was restricted to Paris, and the days of its power were numbered. Then projects of hatred and vengeance succeeded those of social renovation. The monkeys of the Hôtel de Ville gave place to tigers. The prophets and apostles of the Commune lost their _sang-froid_. The foul Felix Pyat exhausted himself in atrocious invectives, and the fiendish Delescluze evidently preferred to blow up Paris rather than give it up to France.

While the emissaries of the radical republicans knowingly deceived France and all Europe respecting the condition of Paris, and were circulating their deceitful and imprudent sophisms, dictated by their admiration for the Commune and their hatred of the national assembly, what was the language of foreign journals that cared for nothing about these internal struggles but exactness and impartiality? The correspondent of the _Times_ was not satisfied with comparing Paris to an infernal caldron, in which seethed all human passions, but thus depicted the armed forces of the Commune: “Besides the old and the young, excited by the phraseology of the first revolution, still novel to them, all the villains in Paris are under arms. I have never seen, even in London, so sinister a collection of faces. These men always seem more or less intoxicated. They have not, perhaps, ceased to be so since the eighteenth of March.” Such is the spectacle in the streets and public places: that of the forts and ramparts is of a still more expressive character: “Man is there only a ferocious animal, everywhere scenting blood. We hardly recognize him, and no longer comprehend him.”

The parish service I directed at the Madeleine after the arrest of M. Deguerry encountered but few difficulties. The Commune only made some insignificant requisitions in a civil manner. The qualification of “citizen director of the church of the Madeleine,” given me in the most solemn manner, enlivened me for an instant in the midst of my cares and griefs.

The success of the Versailles army, in giving joy to the respectable people still remaining at Paris, was a source of danger to them. The Commune concentrated, or rather gave up, its civil and military power into the hands of the committee of public safety and the central 236 committee. On Wednesday, the seventeenth of May, in going to administer the last sacraments to the daughter of a concierge in the Rue de la Victoire, I found the ninth arrondissement hemmed in by the insurgents, who were making frequent arrests. Thanks to one of the most ultra journals of the Commune that I pretended to be reading very attentively, I passed through their inquisitorial ranks unimpeded.

On the eighteenth, which was Ascension day, the church of St. Augustine was closed, and one of the vicars and the organist were imprisoned. All the offices of the day were celebrated at the Madeleine, attended by a numerous and very devout congregation; but, so far from yielding to any illusion about the fate that awaited me, I begged Dr. B. de L----, a parishioner of the Madeleine, to enable me after vespers to see M. Jacquemin, one of the physicians of the prison of Mazas. There was every reason to believe I should soon require his kind services. I was already acquainted with M. de Beauvais, the second physician at Mazas, whose courageous devotedness I was subsequently to experience, and who had already been so thoughtful as to give me news of the curé of the Madeleine and of the Archbishop of Paris. After my interview with Dr. Jacquemin, I felt some embarrassment about returning to my residence. The Rue de la Ville-l’Evêque was filled with an armed band of the national guards. The house of the Sisters of Charity, opposite the Presbytère, was guarded by two sentinels. The sisters had been expelled, and the girls’ school confided to some _citoyennes_, who, according to the unruly tongues of the quarter, had been replaced at the prison of St. Lazare by the Sisters of Picpus, who were accused of a series of crimes, each one more extraordinary than the rest. I bought, as on the previous day, one of the ultra journals of the Commune, and, armed with this new kind of a safe-conduct, I took a roundabout way to the Rue la Ville-l’Evêque, in order to avoid the national guards as much as possible. Once their protection would have been eagerly sought against a robber or assassin, but since the reign of the Commune respectable people feared and fled from them as the worst of evil-doers. And the new military organization will doubtless have to undergo a radical transformation, for it will be difficult for it to rise above the moral discredit into which it has fallen.

Some moments after, a Polish priest, who had given himself up with indefatigable zeal to the service of the ambulances, notified me that an order had been signed to close the churches and arrest the priests still in Paris. I went to see one of my devoted _confrères_, M. de Bretagne, and consult with him about the means of preserving the holy eucharist from profanation. The insurgents had already thrown away or carried off in their cartridge-boxes the sacred elements in some of the churches. At this very time the church of St. Philippe-du-Roule was entered by the insurgents, and for want of priests they arrested two employees who were guarding the church. The Madeleine of the eighth arrondissement was the only church that was still open.

Although, after the arrest of M. Deguerry, a part of the valuables of the church had been carried to a safe place, I employed the first moments of Friday, the nineteenth, in confiding the remainder to some women of the working-classes. I only left in the church a few valuable 237 objects and several hundred francs. The agents of the Commune had a singular longing for money, and when they could not obtain some bank-bills or gold in their expeditions, the places invaded or the persons arrested had to suffer for such a financial disappointment.

At half-past three, the sacristy door burst open. A tall young man, clad _à la_ Robespierre, with a broad red mantle that half-covered him, advanced at the head of a knot of confederates armed with revolvers, and exclaimed in a loud tone: “The church of the Madeleine is closed by order of the committee of public safety.” I was at that moment supplying the unfortunate people whom the _régime_ of the Commune had deprived of work and bread. I had on my choir robes in addition to my ordinary ecclesiastical costume. The inmates of the sacristy were greatly excited. Some who were waiting to go to confession fled. Only one, the wife of an old prefect of the empire, bravely remained to witness this singular spectacle. I approached the judicial agent, and asked to examine the official decree and see if it was authentic. While I was reading it, I saw in his hands two other decrees of the committee of public safety, one prescribing my arrest and the other the suppression of some newspapers that had not conformed to the opinions of the Commune. I thought the signature was that of Ranvier, the mayor of Belleville, one of the most influential members of the Commune and of the committee of public safety. He was an old bankrupt wine-dealer, who had several times been amenable to the laws, and, like all social outlaws, swore an implacable hatred to society. He acquired great popularity in the clubs, after the fourth of September, by advocating social war, as in the last months of the empire he had advocated the claims of absolute liberty! It was by virtue of this absolute liberty that he had just signed the three decrees, that aimed so many brutal blows at religious, civil, and political liberty.

“Are you the citizen director of the church of the Madeleine?” added the delegate, somewhat irritated at the inspection of the warrant, which seemed to him rather impertinent.

I would willingly have replied like Sganarelle, “Yes and no, according to your wish,” but unfortunately, instead of living any longer in the Paris of Molière, we lived in a city of folly and crime.

“You know perfectly well that the curé of the Madeleine was arrested six weeks ago. It is I who am for the present in his place.” I had not finished these words before he took the second warrant, and exclaimed in thundering tones: “By virtue of a decree of the committee of public safety, the citizen director of the church of the Madeleine is arrested.” The murderers who escorted him, and who belonged to the battalion of the _Vengeurs de Flourens_, rushed upon me, holding their revolvers against my throat and chest, and bestowing on me a series of names, the most decent of which were “_bandit_, _canaille_, _crapule_, _assassin_!” One of them, whose stupid ferocity can only be attributed to drunkenness, cried, while endeavoring to adjust his arms: “It is you, vile rabble, who cause the patriots of Paris to be assassinated by the wretches at Versailles: the priests are the murderers of the people: they should all be shot.” I had received these miserable men with politeness and a sentiment of resignation. Their low insults made me flush with indignation and decide to confront them.

“I am not accustomed to hear such language,” said I to their leader. “If you continue to treat me in this way, I shall seat myself without 238 another word, and force alone shall tear me from this sanctuary.”

He made a sign to his followers to moderate their civic indignation, but without being heeded. I now sought to lead them into a discussion, hoping to appease them and preserve the church from devastation by making them incapable of justifying their acts and outrages. For two hours--hours that seemed ages--I was obliged, under the greatest peril, to defend myself as a man and a priest against these emissaries, who were as ridiculous as they were odious. I will relate the principal points in this interchange of observations.

I first asked why I was arrested. At this question the delegate of the committee of public safety replied by a torrent of accusations and maledictions against the “miserable quarter of the Madeleine, the most hostile in Paris to the _régime_ of the Commune.” He was not wholly wrong in this, for at the last elections the parish of the Madeleine, which comprises about forty thousand inhabitants, did not give more than a hundred votes to the candidates of the Commune. In the eighth arrondissement, where the church is, of about nineteen thousand votes, only five hundred voted for the Communist members. He added: “You must therefore expiate your conspirations in favor of the Versailles assassins.” Here the delegate was no longer right. But it was evident that I was arrested because I was the “citizen director of the Madeleine,” and they would make me expiate the sympathy and concurrence that the parishioners of the Madeleine had the unpardonable offence to refuse the Commune. To gain more time and thus calm their fury, I spoke of political affairs. My observations visibly disconcerted my interlocutors. The epithets, _canaille_, _crapule_, and assassin, became more and more rare, and their revolvers, at first so actively and impertinently exercised, were returned by degrees to their cases.

Another incident that might have been fatal to me served still more to disconcert them. During the last half of the reign of the Commune, the affair of the bodies found at St. Laurent, Notre Dame des Victoires, and Notre Dame de Lorette had an unfortunate effect. Disregarding the reports of the physicians and what was clearly evident, the revolutionist papers, the _Journal Officiel_, and the clubs exclaimed at the scandal. The most abominable crimes were imputed to the clergy, against whom a diabolical persecution was excited by extravagant accounts and vile pictures. In vain were these extravagances met by decisive reasons: the reasons themselves became new subjects of crimination and invectives which gave me great concern.

The vaults of the Madeleine were at this epoch filled with bodies. During the siege of Paris by the Prussians, the bodies of several generals and foreigners of distinction had been deposited there till they could be carried to their distant family tombs. I had for several days dwelt on the explanation I could give respecting these bodies so as to silence these furious madmen, but had found none. The time had come when I needed it.

“It is in this miserable parish of the Madeleine,” exclaimed the delegate of the Commune with a smile of contempt and hatred, “that we shall discover the infamy of the priests. I will bet,” continued he, turning toward his agent, “that we shall find here more horrible things than at St. Laurent and Notre Dame des Victoires. Citizens, 239 let us go down into the vaults!”

The ray of light that I had sought for in vain the three previous weeks all at once beamed into my mind, I found the reason I needed. Though in the power of the dangerous agents of the committee of public safety, I blessed God for his protection.

“I have two observations to make to you,” I replied. “The first is that you will find in the vaults of the Madeleine many more corpses than in the other churches....”

I can still see the delegate laughing with fiendish satisfaction at these words till he nearly fell backwards. “I told you, citizens, that there was more infamy in this church than anywhere else!”

“The second observation, sir, concerns you personally, and from a motive of charity I think it a duty to draw your attention to it. I warn you that several of these bodies belong to illustrious families in Spain, Italy, England, and America, and, if you are rash enough to disturb them, it is with these foreign powers, and not with me, you will have to deal.”

In his place I should have endeavored to dissimulate my embarrassment by doubting this assertion, and requesting to be assured of the fact. But he was not constrained in the least. He waved his hand with a triumphant air, and, as if it were I who proposed to violate the tombs, he exclaimed in the most sonorous manner: “Yes, yes, the Commune will protect these bodies; they shall be protected!”

After this incredible instance of foolishness and incoherency, we may stop. I will only beg pardon for mentioning one of the moral reflections made by one of the emissaries of the Commune at the commencement of this scene. I had occasion to pronounce the name of God. “Stop,” said he to me, flourishing his revolver, “if God existed and should descend here, it is he I would shoot first!”

It was half-past five. My situation became less critical. These men, at first so ferocious, now treated me with politeness. The most brutal seemed almost ashamed of having insulted me. I was able to request the national guards appointed to watch over the Madeleine not to allow anything to be removed or desecrated. I also begged that the faithful employees of the church might have the liberty of returning home. The delegate charged to arrest me could no longer deceive himself. He became almost affable. I will not mention his name. He sufficiently dishonored the family from which he sprang by his deeds. A week after, by a coincidence worthy of note, he directed from the Madeleine the fight on the Boulevard Malesherbes. More strongly resisted than he had expected, he found himself with two of his agents hedged in by the Versailles troops, and sought shelter in the cellar of the church. An officer of the line shot him with a revolver, fracturing his skull. This prodigal child had become hardened in sin: unworthy of pardon and mercy, he had become incapable of repentance.

I arrived at the préfecture de police at a quarter past six, accompanied by a staff-officer of the Commune. I was as yet but little preoccupied about my situation, but when told that I was to appear at once before citizen Ferré, the _préfet de police_, who was regarded by men of penetration as another Robespierre, I felt that my case was extremely grave, and that, having but little to hope from man, I should confide myself to the protection of God.

II. 240

THE PREFECTURE DE POLICE AND MAZAS.

It is no easy matter to describe the singular scene at the préfecture de police, usually so quiet, so disciplined and solemn. This establishment had become noisier and more picturesque than a fair-ground. By way of contrast with the usual proceedings, robbers and other criminals now issued decrees of arrest and imprisonment, and they who were arrested and imprisoned were lovers of order and their duty.

The entrance was guarded by a crowd of national guardsmen, who had stopped drinking and smoking to laugh at the unfortunate victims of the hatred of the committee of public safety, who were arriving in large numbers. I had seen at the Madeleine the delegate who ordered my arrest give the staff-officer appointed to conduct me a five-franc piece to pay for the carriage. This honest man found it more suitable to leave this expense to his prisoner, and keep the five francs himself. It was a little contribution to the expenses of the war that I cheerfully paid. Like the misanthrope of Molière, I was almost glad to see the masters of Paris throw off the mask and add niggardliness to all kinds of violence. It was pleasant to be able to testify that a staff-officer of the Commune, the friend of Ferré and Raoul Rigault, the confidential agent of the committee of public safety, and one of the great dignitaries of the prefecture de police, committed a theft at my expense, and with an unceremoniousness that could not be found among the robbers and pickpockets of the worst quarters of the barriers.

After waiting three hours, I was summoned before citizen Ferré, the member of the Commune delegated to the ex-préfecture de police, which signifies in common language the _préfet de police_. He appeared to be from twenty-six to thirty years of age. He was no longer the ten-years student and the burlesque writer for the small journals of the Latin quarter, who gave himself up to pleasure on those rare festivals when the proceeds of his pen allowed him to revel at the public balls at the crossway of the Observatory. He had exchanged his worn clothes for a more elegant suit, his old pointed hat for a cap with gold spangles. Carelessly seated in a superb arm-chair in the luxurious office where Delessert, Maupas, and Pietri had labored, he gave orders to his subordinates with the solemnity and self-sufficiency of a pasha. I am mistaken; the great pashas I saw while travelling in the East were only inferior rulers beside him; he realized with admirable precision the fantastic idea I had formed of a Chinese mandarin of the first class.

After making a salutation which he doubtless did not find proportionate to his dignity, I requested permission in respectful and sufficiently humble tones to appear as promptly as possible before the _juge d’instruction_. He interrupted me in a dry and haughty tone: “Be silent, citizen. You are here to listen to me, and not to talk!”

I had never met with so humiliating a reception. It is true I had never been in the presence of insolence personified. I immediately drew from my pocket a number of the _Journal Officiel de la Commune_ which I had been carefully keeping for three days, and which contained a recent decree by virtue of which all individuals arrested should appear before the _juge d’instruction_ within twenty-four hours or be 241 restored to liberty.

“I wished at first, sir,” I firmly replied, “to solicit a favor, now I claim a right. By virtue of the decree of the Commune which I am going to read to you, I demand the right to appear within twenty-four hours before a _juge d’instruction_.”

Our arrogant mandarin shrugged his shoulders, and smiled, as if to say, “Here is a simpleton who still believes in the decrees of the Commune!”

“Captain, conduct this citizen to prison,” was his only reply. On Wednesday, the twenty-fourth of May, at half-past seven in the evening, I noticed through the bars of my cell my mandarin transformed into a bloodthirsty tiger, crossing the court of La Roquette and giving orders for the immediate execution of the Archbishop of Paris, M. Bonjean, M. Deguerry, and their three companions.

My situation assumed a more gloomy aspect than I had anticipated. I had been arrested as one of the last hostages, and was at the mercy of a band of ruffians who were exasperated to madness by the approach of the Versailles army. I did not lose courage in my misfortunes. Convinced by the example of the staff-officer who had robbed me of five francs that I still had one means of alleviating my lot, I henceforth placed all my confidence in the infinite mercy of God, without forgetting a generous distribution of pieces of a hundred sous. I immediately slipped two into the hands of my jailer, who was profuse in his bows, and gave me an exceptional testimony of his gratitude, in his way, by shutting me up in the cell that had been occupied by M. Deguerry. I told him that, lacking everything, I must absolutely write my friends that evening, and begged him not to send my letter through the office. As he objected, I told him I needed money, and, if I were not at once supplied, I should not be able to acknowledge, as was my practice, the kind services of the good officials with whom I had to deal. At this, what had been impossible was instantly effected.

I wrote to the Presbytère of the Madeleine for money and other effects; then I added what I considered very important, and wished not to be seen at the office, that they must not speak to any one of my arrest, or write me a single line, or, especially, take any steps for my release. To pass unperceived and confounded in the crowd of prisoners was my only chance of safety. I remained faithful to this principle to the end.

Having had no food since ten o’clock in the morning, I asked for something to eat. They told me it was too late, that the dinner was at five o’clock, and the regulations allowed nothing afterwards. The same accident occurred several times, and owing to other obstacles I was no more fortunate about sleeping. I will say, for the edification of those who wish to get an idea of the _régime_ of the Commune, that at the end of ten days’ imprisonment I returned home, after having dined twice and slept two hours and a half. My friends declared that I looked ten years older; but, knowing the truly French elasticity of my temperament, I consoled them with the assurance that ten days of freedom would make me ten years younger, which has proved true.

During the night, prisoners were continually being brought in. Among them were some members of the national guards of the Commune, who, through insubordination and drunkenness, became my companions in captivity. They kept up a terrific noise. Some cried as loud as they 242 could bawl: “Vive la République! Vive la Commune!” Others thought they were at a club, and, all speaking at once, advocated in discordant tones the abolition of capital, the death of the priests, the freedom of woman, and other benefits of social revolution.

Just after midnight, a confederate officer was brought into one of the neighboring cells who was indebted to too copious libations for the eloquence of a Demosthenes and the strength of a Hercules. This patriot thought himself confronting the Prussians, among whom he made frightful carnage. “Now it is your turn, you bully of a Bismarck! Now you, William, you rascal! You shall see what a patriot and a republican can do!” Then he would throw himself on to the door of his cell, and pound and kick it. This continued till daybreak. The heroic avenger of the national honor made me forget for a time the singular insolence of Ferré, and more than once I laughed at his manly eloquence and glorious feats in battle. I took pleasure in retaining, in the midst of the extravagances and crimes of the Commune, a bitter remembrance of the crushing and humiliating proceedings of Prussia.

On Saturday morning I wrote to M. Moiré, the _juge d’instruction_, asking to be heard in the course of the day. At half-past three I received a reply. It was an order to Mazas. No illusion was longer possible. The advocates of legal forms must expect to be shot without form--a respect for which would doubtless have been a poor consolation in falling under the bullets of assassins, but it is well to observe that such judicial modes are unknown among the cannibals themselves. Among the prisoners who accompanied me were, with other ecclesiastics, the Abbé Laurent Amodru, the vicar of Notre Dame des Victoires, and the Abbé de Marsy, the vicar of St. Vincent de Paul. Both came to me and manifested a sympathy that began to cheer the gloomy perspective of Mazas. M. de Marsy was full of animation, and his cordial devotedness was of more benefit to us in a moral than a material sense. And I became inseparably attached to M. l’Abbé Amodru. He was my neighbor again at La Roquette, and his encouraging example, even more than his precious religious ministrations, aided me in enduring the greatest trials in that fearful abode. I wish to give him a public testimony of my profound gratitude. We were transported in one of those cellular vehicles, the very sight of which inspires horror and disgust, and arrived at Mazas at half-past five. They kept us shut up nearly two hours in a kind of grated cage, which made me wish for one of those which contain the wild beasts in the Jardin des Plantes.

Though separated from one another, we were able nevertheless to exchange some words. “It is an indignity,” exclaimed a young national guardsman, who had refused to serve the Commune, “to shut us up in this way as if we were robbers!”

“Cheer up,” replied an old man with a cultivated and sympathetic voice. “In these days, honest men are placed here, and robbers are left without.”

Exhausted with fatigue, I could neither sit down, lie down, eat, nor read. I can understand these rigorous precautions for the disciples of Cartouche, Troppman, and Dumolard. Would there have been any great social danger in shutting us up in an apartment where there was a bench? I learned afterward that the Archbishop of Paris had the same preliminary ceremony to undergo, which almost reduced him to agony. 243 When my turn came to go to the register’s office, I was very much exasperated, and not at all disposed to conceal my dissatisfaction; and I had begun to observe that mildness and patience only served to aggravate our troubles with the emissaries of the Commune, while a timely and vigorous protestation obtained some alleviation. The registrar, in taking a long and minute description, demanded my name--“The Abbé Lamazou, Vicar of the Madeleine.” I never failed to articulate this title distinctly. It edified some, irritated others, and proved to all that by my profession I did not necessarily belong to the family of those accused of robbery, brigandage, or assassination, for whom the prison of Mazas was intended.

Having entered the establishment, they pointed toward a door. I supposed it was my cell. By no means: it was a bath-room. As vagabonds and criminals are not always models of neatness and health, I understood the necessity of making them take a bath at their entrance into prison. I also comprehend that recourse may be had to this easy means of ascertaining if a dangerous criminal has not concealed in his clothes some weapon or some document that may compromise him. When the warden ordered me to undress in order to take a bath, I was for a moment confounded. The sight of a dirty bath-room and a smoking rag, that perhaps had just wiped the body of some foul vagrant of the barriers, quite restored my energy.

“I will not take a bath.”

“The regulations require it: you must submit to them.”

“I tell you once for all, that I will not take a bath, if you shoot me.”

“Well, in your place I would act the same,” replied the warden in a most friendly tone. “I am distressed at all that has been going on here for some time. Only, as the director of the prison is a furious partisan of the Commune, if he were aware of your resistance, he might subject you to rigorous treatment. I will close the door for a few minutes, and you will be reported as having taken your bath.”

I thanked him warmly. Some wardens of the former administration still remained at Mazas and La Roquette. They not only manifested a cordial respect for us, but rendered us the most valuable assistance. Of all the marks of sympathy that I received after my deliverance, none affected me more than the letters and calls of my old wardens of Mazas and La Roquette. Among those who came to see me was the warden of the bath-rooms at Mazas. There were then, among the hordes of the Commune, who were a disgrace to the human race, some men who honored it by their conscientiousness, their courage, and their moral dignity.

Although the day was nearly at an end, I was not at the end of my tribulations. The cell in which I was shut up seemed most objectionable. It was exceedingly cold, and, as I had been laid up with an attack of bronchitis, it might bring on inflammation of the lungs. It was on the ground, and immediately facing the interior entrance to the main part of the prison. I knew the populace might take Mazas by force and give a second edition of the days in September. I should then be one of the first at hand. Finally, and this was decisive, I had fallen into the hands of a Communist warden, who, seeing me exhausted, having had no nourishment since morning, gave no other proof of his solicitude than examining my pockets, my 244 books, and even my portemonnaie.

The next morning I asked to see one of the physicians of the prison. It was Dr. de Beauvais’s day, whom I had already seen at the Madeleine. As he was under the surveillance of the agents of the Commune, I made no sign of recognition. I made known to him the intolerable treatment I had received, the bad state of my health, and the physical impossibility of remaining in my cell. I added that I simply wished to inform him of my situation, but by no means to claim a favor.

He replied that, in consequence of my state of health, I had a right to change my cell. He ordered one to be given me in the first story.

The energy of my language had such an effect on the infirmarian and pharmaceutist of the prison that they hastened to manifest their sympathy. My new warden was perfect. In spite of the severity of the discipline, I could, thanks to them, obtain news of M. Deguerry, Mgr. Darboy, Mgr. Surat, and of M. Bayle, the vicar-general of Paris, who was in my neighborhood. Hitherto I could only give an idea of their trials and those of the other hostages of the Commune by relating my own, only most of them had been incarcerated seven weeks, and I only four days.

Sunday was, relatively speaking, a comfortable day. I guessed, on Monday morning, from the general sound of the tocsin, that the Versailles troops must have entered Paris. The pharmacist and wardens confirmed the supposition. “Courage,” they said to me, “perhaps in a few hours, or to-morrow at the latest, you will be free.”

I offered up my thanksgivings to God, and hailed the first dawn of light on Tuesday as the happy day of my deliverance, and the deliverance of all my companions in captivity.

III.

LA ROQUETTE--MASSACRE OF THE HOSTAGES--FOUR DAYS OF AGONY.

A brilliant sun lighted the prison of Mazas. We were, then, about to return to Paris, from which we seemed a thousand leagues distant, though within its limits; we were to behold once more those who were dear to us, and endeavor, according to the measure of our strength, to heal the moral and material wounds made by the most shameful and odious of _régimes_ that ever burdened a civilized people. I forgot all my fatigues, all my sadness, all my anguish, in the reawakening of hope and life. I prayed with the enthusiasm of an exile who had despaired of ever seeing his country again, and to which he was, by an unexpected event, about to be restored.

At a quarter before ten, the door of my cell was opened. A warden I did not know ordered me to collect my effects and go down. My deliverance, then, was nearer at hand than I had hoped. All my things were packed in a few minutes. I took all the money out of my purse except enough to pay for a carriage and give the driver a generous _pourboire_. I was too happy not to wish to make those around me happy. In descending I distributed all the money I possessed. They shut me up in one of the compartments of the prison parlor. After some minutes, they took me to the director, who asked me if I had any observations to make. “None,” said I, “unless that I am ignorant why I am brought here.”

His face, and the faces of the agents who surrounded him, seemed very 245 ferocious, but I knew they had been indebted to the insurrection for their places at Mazas, and must therefore be dissatisfied to see Paris restored to France and to itself. In my heart I pardoned all the ill that had been done me. Nevertheless, one thing astonished me, that I did not see Mgr. Darboy, M. Deguerry, or Père Olivaint, or any of the priests who had been transported with me from the préfecture de police to Mazas. I spied a warden I knew. I asked him where I might expect to find the curé of the Madeleine. He replied with tears in his eyes: “He left last evening with the archbishop and several other gentlemen! May God watch over you!”

I could not describe the impression made on the happiest of men by this mysterious reply and the frightened appearance of the warden. I questioned him, but he disappeared in a passage. What had happened to my companions? What was going to happen to me?... I sought an explanation to this mystery--but it was beyond my comprehension. Suddenly a word, a single word, pronounced, I know not by whom, I know not where, resounded in my ear like a thunderbolt: “La Roquette!”... To this voice from without, an interior voice instantly replied: “La Roquette, the prison of those condemned to death!”...

This frightful thunderbolt, which precipitated me into an abyss a thousand times more fearful than that from which I thought I had issued, was enough to dismay a nature more strongly tempered than mine. I was dismayed and broken down, and yet, after the poignant griefs and enervating perplexities that had overwhelmed me for two months, I had at least the advantage of knowing my certain fate. My conscience gave me the consoling testimony that I was a victim of my fidelity to duty; my courage revived at the thought of the numerous and illustrious captives who had suffered more than I, and whose examples I only had to follow to die as a priest and a Frenchman. I cried with the royal Psalmist: “But I have put my trust in thee, O Lord: I said: Thou art my God, my lot is in thy hands.” This lifting of my heart to God sufficed to give me firmness and the serenity of Christian resignation.

When they shut me up in one of the grated cages in the vestibule of Mazas, the warden charged with this painful task secretly pressed my hand, and informed me that the Archbishop of Paris, the curé of the Madeleine, and most of the other hostages had gone to La Roquette, where we were now to be taken. His pressure of my hand and the consternation of his face were more eloquent than all he could say. It was a comfort truly providential to find the Abbé Amodru again in the cage next mine. Our impressions were the same. Thanks to the signs we agreed upon when we left the préfecture de police, we could give each other absolution. We must find ourselves in the presence of death to comprehend the nothingness of all human things; there is then no longer any difficulty in praying, in repenting, in pardoning our fellow-men, and in trusting wholly in the mercy of God.

One by one the cages opened and shut with a lugubrious noise, and I was surrounded with hostages destined for La Roquette. I was surprised to find several under complete illusion respecting our situation. Some thought we were about to be restored to liberty, and others did not seem to comprehend the significance of our being sent to La Roquette. 246 It was not best to enlighten them yet, but I resolved to do so at a later moment. With almost certain death staring us in the face, I thought it proper, and especially more Christian, to modify my attitude. Until now I had taken an energetic stand against the agents of the Commune, and sometimes expressed my indignation. I now resolved to speak but little, to pray a great deal, to encourage those of my companions who should need it, and to arm myself with patience and meekness toward our persecutors.

The charitable young pharmacist of the prison, who, the night before, so gladly announced our approaching liberation, was stationed in a corner of the vestibule to give us a last proof of his sorrowful sympathy. This was not only a kind but a courageous act at a moment when a single smile of compassion might be regarded as treason. A week after, a young man, kneeling by the body of M. Deguerry in the lower chapel of the Madeleine, stopped me to express his joy and his grief. It was the pharmacist of Mazas.

An enormous cart, surrounded by armed national guards, awaited us in the first court. I at once bethought myself of the carts that during the Reign of Terror conveyed the victims of the committee of public safety to execution. And we too were to go in the same direction, toward the Barrière du Trône. Such coincidences could not fail to strike any one familiar with our revolutionary history. Fifteen prisoners mounted the cart, among whom I noticed M. Chevriaux, the principal of the Lycée at Vanves, who bravely wore his ribbon of the Legion of Honor; Père Bazin; M. Bacues, the director of St. Sulpice; an honest workman, and some members of the national guards, guilty of not having sacrificed to the idol of the day. They were mostly ecclesiastics.

We were told that the reason we had not been sent to La Roquette the night before with the first hostages dispatched was that a third vehicle could not be procured. Mgr. Darboy, Mgr. Deguerry, Mgr. Surat, and M. Bonjean had suffered very much at Mazas: the prolonged severity of the prison discipline had, in particular, shaken the archbishop’s health. They had been obliged, only a few hours before his departure for La Roquette, to apply blisters to him. But they all showed themselves, by their firmness and patience, superior to their sad condition.

At the sight of M. Perny and M. Houillon, apostolic missionaries in China, whom the Commune had stupidly arrested on their way through Paris, M. Deguerry said to Mgr. Darboy: “Only think of those two Orientals coming to seek martyrdom in Paris! Is it not curious?” On the way, they had to encounter the threats and outrages of a rabid mob. Men _en blouse_, ragged children, and women, or rather furies, wished to stop and enter the vehicles: “_A bas les chouans et les calotins!_”--“Stop, we wish to cut them in pieces!”

It was revolting, monstrous, and yet something still more hideous was reserved for us. We were insulted in our turn, not by the multitude, but by the national guards who had charge of us. I could understand the threatening attitude of an over-excited mob, led away by its bad instincts and the speeches of demagogues, but I had never seen, or thought it possible, that an armed force could basely insult and threaten those whom they were officially deputed to escort to a place of punishment. I had not suspected such a degree of vileness in human nature, and felt rather humiliated than indignant. “Ah! citizen,” 247 said one of these tigers armed with a _képi_ and a chassepot, “you reckon on the arrival of the Versailles assassins! Well, this morning we cut them off at the Porte d’Auteuil with our mitrailleuses: twenty thousand prisoners are in our hands. The _chouans_ and their accomplices will have the fate they merit.” An ecclesiastic of the Faubourg St. Antoine, who had been embittered by his trials, wished to take up for the Versailles army. I tried to make him comprehend that reserve and silence were the safest and most suitable course for us.

I asked the national guardsman at my right the quarter he was from. He replied that he belonged to the battalion of Charonne. It was more and more manifest that the old suburbs of Paris ruled and kept Paris in terror. The quarters St. Martin, St. Antoine, and St. Marceau were no longer rulers of this great city, but the citoyens of Belleville, Montmartre, La Villette, Ménilmontant, Charonne, and Montrouge, that is to say, the districts that a few years ago were not a part of Paris, that had municipalities and material interests distinct from Paris, and had made a most vigorous resistance to their annexation to the city. But the head of the second empire conceived a pride in reigning over a capital containing two millions of inhabitants, and the thickly settled suburbs were violently annexed to Paris. He wished to eclipse Babylon and ancient Rome. To make his way through his capital, innumerable boulevards must be opened, bordered by sumptuous edifices. To seek the fresh air of the Bois de Boulogne, he must traverse immense avenues peopled with all the wealthy idlers in the world, and consequently new legions of workmen were summoned from every point of the compass, who concentrated themselves like an army ranged in battle in the annexed zone.

A humble journalist, I had pointed out, as a great social danger, the tendency of the empire to separate Paris into two parts, one peopled by the aristocracy and bourgeoisie, and the other by workmen, outcasts, and the dissatisfied from the entire world. My criticisms and sad forebodings were recompensed by officious remonstrances, domiciliary visits, and the seizure of my papers. The course of the empire had, then, been fatal to France in a political point of view, since compression had only served to debase its inhabitants and organize all kinds of social conspirations; fatal in a religious point of view, for the affairs of Rome alarmed the consciences of Catholics, and the clergy, so respected in 1848, became the objects of prejudice and hatred, the bitter fruits of which we were reaping; and fatal in a military sense, for France was humbled and crushed by a foreign power.

I will declare, for the political honor of the eminent men whose opposition to the empire I shared, that at the time I thought I was about to be put to death in prison and render the Supreme Judge a strict account of my actions, far from regretting a stand that some of my friends and ecclesiastical superiors had blamed and treated as “_passion politique_,” everything at Mazas and La Roquette, everything in Paris and the whole of France, assured me I had not taken a wrong course; that, on the contrary, I had served the cause of religion and of my country.

TO BE CONTINUED.

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THE DÖLLINGER SCANDAL. 248

FROM THE HISTORISCH-POLITISCHE BLAETTER.

During the course of the year 1857 we published in these pages an exhaustive article on the philosophy of Baader. Before the article was sent to press, the editor of Baader’s complete works gave to the public the author’s correspondence in another volume, the appearance of which occasioned the most painful surprise among the admirers of the great thinker. The book showed that, in his later years, Baader’s mind was out of harmony with the church; and that his tone towards it had grown to be one of bitterness even. As was wont to be the case in those happier days, the editors of these pages turned to Dr. Döllinger for an explanation of the glaring contradictions between the earlier and later views of Dr. Baader. The result was a postscript to the article above referred to, written by Dr. Döllinger, and which may be seen in the fortieth volume of the _Historisch-Politische Blätter_, p. 178.

In this postscript, Dr. Döllinger pointed out from the correspondence itself what were the reasons of the change, and showed that Baader’s animosity against the church rested only on extraneous and accidental causes, and had nothing to do with his philosophy. “No further key”--these are Döllinger’s concluding words--“will be needed to understand how the broad chasm that separates the calm convictions of the ripe man in his prime from the passionate, almost childlike, outbursts of mental impotence of the old man in his decline, was overleaped.”

These lines were written by Dr. Döllinger thirteen years ago, and we have often read them since. Step by step, he has himself proceeded in a course towards the church which he so severely censured in the philosopher of Munich.

The fall of the two men is to a certain extent the same. The gray-haired church historian, too, is separated by a great chasm from what he was in his prime--at a great distance from the convictions that guided him when he was in the zenith of his intellectual power.

His deportment and language betray signs of ungovernable passion, incompatible with the self-possession of a man who understands his own mind.

We have a right to seek in his case, also, for a psychological solution of the change that has left him the very reverse of what he was. In his case, as in that of Baader, it will be seen that the reasons have nothing to do with his erudition as a church historian; that they are of a purely “extraneous and accidental character.” But, indeed--and this is the great difference between the two--in Baader’s case, the motives were of a private, domestic nature; in the case of Döllinger, they are of a public and political nature. To express it in a word, it is the spirit of the times and of the world that has carried Döllinger into the fatal gulf. Döllinger’s fall, his breaking off from all he was in the past, is only a piece of the political history of Bavaria during the last twenty years. The Council and the definition of the 18th of July have only hastened the matter; they have merely given the disease, in its crisis, an acute form; but, 249 without them, the break would still have taken place; for a current of thought had set in in Döllinger’s mind which would have necessitated it. When, therefore, we are asked how it happens that a highly learned and highly respected man, like Döllinger, in the enjoyment of a completely independent position, could cast himself into a current running counter to his whole previous life, our answer is very simple; for, from the very beginning of a certain period in the history of Bavaria, every true Catholic was called upon to bear his cross with the church; and it is not given to every one to choose being put in the background when he needs only to yield in order to reap his share of the honors of this world.

It was beyond a doubt impossible for Döllinger to add anything to his reputation for learning. Was he not the head and ornament of the Catholic school of Munich? And, by the way, it is beyond a doubt that that school had taught as a body, concerning the _ex cathedrâ_ decisions of the Holy See, neither more nor less than is now required by the decrees of the Council of the Vatican. Witnesses can be found for every day and year, from among the students of the Munich theological faculty, from the Bishop of Mainz down to the humblest parish priest, to show from their notes and memoranda that Döllinger himself taught exactly what the Archbishop of Munich requires him now to subscribe to. Whoever questions the infallibility of the Papal decisions contradicts the present and past testimony of the church, and must deny the infallibility of the church itself--such was the view of the whole Munich school; such was Döllinger’s own view.

If Döllinger’s present views were correct, the immunity of the church from error could not for a moment be maintained, no matter where it might be claimed its infallibility resided. Döllinger subordinates the church to science and the decisions of the church to the final judgment of the learned, more especially to the final judgment of historians. Such is his theory, and such, practically, his answer to his ecclesiastical superiors.

Not without reason, therefore, does the Archbishop of Munich in his pastoral, dated Palm Sunday, say: “In this manner the church’s divine commission and all Catholic truth is called in question.” It cannot for a moment be doubted that a man who speaks as does Döllinger in his declaration of the 28th of March last, has lost completely the Catholic idea of the church. The only difference between him and the Protestants is that, in addition to the Bible, he admits, tradition, “the unanimous consent of the fathers,” to be a source of religious truth; and this a Protestant may also do, provided no external authority be constituted the court of final appeal; and Döllinger in fact claims that there is no such court, since he subordinates both Pope and Council alike to what he calls “science.”

In point of fact, however, even if not expressed in precisely those words, these were Döllinger’s views years ago. We long since foresaw what was coming, and just as it has come. It was then a matter of no little surprise to us that his course caused no uneasiness even in ecclesiastical circles; and that no importance was attached to the remarkable revelations to which we now call attention, although the circumstances attending and the persons concerned in them were calculated to invest them with a character of the highest importance. 250 We have already referred to the revelations in question as throwing light on the internal history of Bavaria, and on Döllinger’s dangerous complication with certain tendencies of the late government; but we must return to the subject, and treat it more particularly. We refer especially to the academical oration held by Dr. Döllinger on the 13th of March, 1864, on King Maximilian II.

In his oration, he happens to speak of the remarkable interest felt by the deceased monarch in historical research, and reveals to the world a very strange, “a more secret” motive for the royal interest. The reader, to understand the full bearing of the history which we give below entire on Döllinger himself, must bear in mind the peculiar characteristics of a man who has lived more among his books than among men. It would be hard for any one to be more subject to external influences than Döllinger is, and, at the same time, to be less conscious of their presence or effect. He unconsciously puts forth to-day, as the result of his own experience, what he happened to hear expressed yesterday by another. Döllinger is always the product of his surroundings, and hence his change, as he lost his old friends, one after another, by death or by alienation, and fell in almost exclusively with the society of the so-called “Bernfenen.” This explains also how it came to pass that many younger men, and the members of the scientific guild--for example, his little Mephistopheles, Huber--exercised so unwarranted and increasing an influence over him. Bearing all this in mind, it is impossible to overestimate the effects and influence of the overtures which King Maximilian made to Dr. Döllinger. He was completely intoxicated by them, and his new friends found means to prevent his return to his sober senses. The impression made on Döllinger in the conference in question must have been the more lasting, as Döllinger, the acknowledged head of the Ultramontane party, could not have hoped to stand any higher in his majesty’s favor than any other of that abused class. To express the whole matter in a few words, we are convinced that the careful observer will discover the later as opposed to the earlier Döllinger in the following account, or in his cradle.

The following extract is from the oration above referred to:

“As I have permitted myself to refer to the deeper thoughts which guided the king in his government, and especially in his attitude towards science, I may also recall certain other communications which I received from his own mouth. An upright, faithful Christian, he believed in the lasting future of Christianity, and, therefore, could not conceive that its divisions and the struggle of the different confessions should continue for ever; that Christians should waste their powers in mutual injury. The division, he was of opinion, had had its time, and God had permitted it for some high purpose; and that time, even where not entirely past, was near its end; and he believed firmly that in spite of all polemical bitterness, in spite of the sordid spirit of self which had intruded itself into the controversy, the day of union for Christian nations would come, and the promise of one fold and one shepherd be fulfilled. And the great ecclesiastical bodies of the West being once reconciled and working with more than redoubled intellectual vigor upon the Græco-Russian church, the latter would not long resist the powerful magnetic influence of unity. Or, on the other hand, when once the union of the Catholic and Anatolian 251 churches was effected, the various Protestant sects would be gradually drawn into the current and meet their brethren.

“Naturally, however, the attention of the king was claimed in the first instance by whatever could be looked upon as tending in a proximate or remote degree to the reconciliation of the East, and particularly of Germany. He saw that the future union could not be a simple, unaccommodating mechanical coming together of the separated confessions. Neither did he think for a moment of the absorption of one church into another. It was necessary, he thought, that both bodies should first undergo a purgative process, and that each should acknowledge that it might receive, though, perhaps, in an unequal degree, some good from the other; that each might help to free the other from its peculiar defects and one-sidednesses, and supply what was wanting in each other’s ecclesiastical and religious being; that each might heal the other’s wounds; and that neither should be required to surrender anything which its life and history had proved to be a positive good. Under these conditions, sooner or later, the process of reconciliation and of union would take place in the heart of Europe, in Germany.

“Such nearly were the thoughts which the king developed to me in a long conversation which I had with him, and which I never can forget. I do not know how far Schelling’s ideas of an all-embracing church of the future gave form and shape to the royal views. It is a matter of fact, however, that that thinker had exerted a great influence on the mind of the king long before his accession to the throne. At the same time, the king saw that this idea of a future church entertained by Leibnitz and by Germany’s greatest men was recognized as a necessity, and confidently hoped for also by his eminent and enlightened kinsman, King Frederick William the Fourth of Prussia. A German patriot, he saw in this reunion the salvation of Germany; a Christian, he saw in it a bulwark for the defence of the Christian faith, now so fiercely menaced.

“And here he believed his own Bavaria was called to take an active and initiatory part, and the Bavarian king not only to point out the way the country was to go, but to guide it in that way. It was not a matter of mere chance the Frankish race, the numerically predominant race in Bavaria, was about equally divided between the two confessions, and that in no country, not even in Prussia, were the local mixture and inter-relations of Protestants and Catholics so intimate and extensive as in Bavaria.

“In the second place, as far as the king himself was concerned, he could and it was his duty to do something to bring Germany a little nearer to the desired goal. He had been obliged to establish a perfect equality of rights and of political standing for the professors of both confessions, to the end that no portion of the people might feel oppressed, or grow embittered, or think themselves kept in the background, for with such feelings on the part of any portion of the nation, all coming together, all understanding, was impossible.

“And here he was of opinion science, and particularly historical science, was called upon to accomplish much; for religion itself was history, and only as a historical fact, and in accordance with the rules of historical criticism, could religion be understood or appreciated. In his own view, historical science was the kingdom in which, in the words of the sacred writings, peace and justice would 252 kiss; for only through history, as established by the most thorough research, could men know their own past and others’ past, their own and others’ failings; through it only was there any hope of begetting a conciliatory and pacificatory frame of mind.

“Thus the field of historical science seemed to the king like the Truce of God in the middle ages, or like a sacred city in which those elsewhere at variance found themselves at peace together; and, urged on by the same desires, endeavored to slake their thirst at the same fountain of truth, and grew into one communion.

“Out of the scientific fraternity of historians would one day proceed, so he hoped, after the trammels of confessions had been done away with, a higher union, embracing all historical, all religious truth, a brotherly reconciliation, such as patriots and Christians alike hoped and prayed for.”

All this Dr. Döllinger spoke with all the warmth of personal conviction. Although the whole is evidently a thrust at the idea of a confession and against the church as an organization, Döllinger does not append one word of correction in the name of the church. We cannot, however, help wondering that a critic so acute, a thinker so profound, as Döllinger should have surrendered himself to such a politico-religious system. It is easily seen that there are three separate, and in part contradictory, ideas in the royal programme, and all three have this in common, that they are totally irreconcilable with the idea of a divinely instituted and saving church.

In the first place, there is mentioned St. John’s church of love, Schelling’s church of the future, on which subject Döllinger was otherwise perfectly innocent. An ideal which contemplative enthusiastic characters like King William the Fourth might cherish, and which might also claim a place in the thoughts of the Bavarian king, could scarcely have much attraction for Döllinger. But it was otherwise with the second idea which King Maximilian had elaborated, that is, with the idea of a German national church; and, finally, with the third idea, that of the absorption of all the confessions into a universal republic of _savants_, and the church into a world-academy of science. Here the thread of the supernatural is completely lost, though, perchance, the king himself was not aware of it; for, is this not the most utter rationalism?

If, now, we look at Döllinger’s declaration of the 28th of March, we will find these two ideas standing out in bold relief. The odious antithesis of Germanism and Romanism may indeed be in harmony with the reigning political spirit; it certainly is incompatible with the idea of the Catholic Church. Whoever presumes in the name of nationality to speak of any member of the church as of the “Roman party,” either knows not what he is doing or must wish the “German national church” in schism. From this there is but one step, and that not a hard one for the pride of intellect or the haughtiness of science, to the position occupied by Döllinger in his declaration to the archbishop, in which he places the scientific fraternity of historians as the highest authority over the church, and makes it the court of final appeal in matters of faith. And yet the learned gentleman, although he signs himself only “a Christian,” will have us consider him a Catholic.

It is impossible to look into the abyss into which this once clear thinker has fallen without a feeling of terror. Is it not sufficient to open the eyes of every one that the apostles of German Catholicism 253 and free religion, like a Heribert Rau and an Oswald, have again called the attention of the public to their already published works as an “interesting commentary on Dr. Döllinger’s protest”?

It is true that Döllinger has nothing in common with those men in his views of his relations to God; but then we must remember these gentlemen are only drawing their own consequences, and Döllinger has lost all right to find fault with the consequences they draw.

The unwarranted introduction of nationalism into the idea of the church was doubtless Döllinger’s first step downhill. This gained, the disturbers of the peace of the church soon possessed themselves of the whole man. There can be nothing more hostile to the real spirit of Catholicism than this false principle of nationality; for the end of the church, in a spiritual point of view, is to smooth away all national differences, and bring the different nations into one fold.

To wish, at a time like the present, when the fanaticism of nationality, if we may be allowed the expression, is tending to alienate still more the peoples of different nations--to wish, we say, at such a time to destroy the only tie that holds them together, is to betray the wildest party fanaticism imaginable.

We can understand what the cry for a German national church means in the mouths of those modern Neros, the liberalists--in the mouth of any one else, we cannot understand it.

We know very well that Döllinger was very far from desiring a schism when he spoke at the Linzer Catholic meeting in 1850, upon the subject of the place of German nationalism in the church. It was somewhat otherwise in his declarations in the Munich Conference in 1863. There a turning-point was discoverable.

A short time previously, the at first purely scientific difference with the “Roman party,” or neo-scholastics, had arisen. Döllinger had roused the suspicions of these latter; but we feel certain that at that time there were no grounds for their suspicions. He was, it was plain, only a little too susceptible to the influences of a certain kind of liberalism, and extraordinarily anxious to do away with any suspicion of adhering to the Ultramontane party.

The danger practically and in point of fact began when he became entangled in Bavarian politics, especially in what concerns the question of the relations of science to ecclesiastical authority. “German science” now became the focus in which the more or less conscious tendencies of Döllinger were concentrated. It is in 1865 that we must place the real turning-point in Döllinger’s career.

About the end of the year 1861, the writer of these lines went to Frankfort-on-the-Main. He visited Böhmer, and will never forget a scene he witnessed on the occasion of that visit. The great historian was sick at the time, fresh in mind, it is true, but in a repining condition, and almost bitter. Our conversation turned on the condition of the University of Munich under the _régime_ of the so-called “Bernjungen.” Böhmer expressed great regret at what was going on in Munich, but reserved the vials of his wrath for the celebrities of the month of March previous. Especially, he made Döllinger responsible for it that so favorable a time had not been used for the founding of a historical school in the interests of the church. It was well known that Dr. Döllinger had had many scholars during his long career as a professor; but he had founded no school. It might be said, even, that he did not leave a disciple after him. Whilst he expatiated in the 254 endless world of book in a manner hitherto unparalleled, perhaps it became impossible for him to prepare the living materials which young men needed, and lost the gift of sociability.

Böhmer became more and more aggravated as he proceeded, till, finally, his anger culminated in the following anecdote: He said that, when Döllinger visited Frankfort last, he had had a walk with him through the city, and Döllinger had spoken to him about his literary plans. He, Böhmer, remonstrated with him, and inquired why he did not fulfil his older promises; why he did not continue his unfinished church history. Whereupon Döllinger, stopping and swinging his cane, said with a smile: “You see, I can’t do that; for now my researches have brought me to such a pass that I cannot make the end of my history tally with the beginning; the continuation of my church history would be entirely Protestant.” I see Böhmer this moment before me with the same grim visage which he wore as he closed this story with the words: “_He--he_ said that!”

Still, in 1860, Döllinger’s great work, _Christianity and the Church in the time of their Foundation_, appeared. Embracing the results of the latest research, and written in the most charming manner, this book touched and strengthened many a Catholic heart, as it did my own. But Döllinger has made that same beautiful book a sad memorial of his fall. He had written the book when he was sixty years of age, but when, in 1868, the second edition of it appeared, it was discovered that he had omitted some of the principal passages of the first edition, bearing upon the promises to and the establishment of the primacy; and what he had not omitted, he had changed in the interests of liberalism, and all without giving any ground for the alterations, without a single note even.

Döllinger has a wonderful memory for everything in the world of print, but very little for what concerns his own person or his own acts. When he wrote his declaration to the Archbishop of Munich, he seems to have quite forgotten the intentional “corrections” of his celebrated work. Otherwise, he would not have referred to the approval which it met with from the whole of Catholic Germany, and raised the question, Which text he meant--the true one of 1860, or the altered, not to say the falsified, one of 1868? Moreover, he, as the inspirer of _Janus_, recalled, in that last-named book, the little he had left in the edition of 1868 favorable to the primacy, for the reason that it “contradicted all opinions of the fathers, and the principles of exegetical theology.” In other words, _Janus_ has completely and flatly denied the primacy.

It is hard to calculate what a blessing Döllinger might have been the means of to his contemporaries and to posterity, had he continued to make the rich treasures of his knowledge accessible to Christendom as he had done in his work of 1860. The Almighty, who had preserved him upright during the wars and passions of these later years, would have decreed him doubtless a rare old age had he remained true to his resolution not to divide his powers, to live an unprejudiced votary of science. It was to be otherwise. That book was the last fruit of the professional activity of the historian. The historian was now to become the bitter party-man, not to say the future Bavarian senator, and, as a writer, a mere political pamphleteer. Here his career as a 255 man of science closes.

Late in the fall of 1861 appeared his work, _The Church and the Churches, etc._ It was a kind of colossal apology for the two well-known Odeon Lectures of the fifth and ninth of April of the same year, on the temporal power of the popes. In these lectures Döllinger has come forward in the _rôle_ of the politician--a _rôle_ which he was never intended to play on account of his too great credulity. Expressions had crept into these lectures so little savoring of piety, so painful to Catholic hearts, that the worst was feared for Döllinger in ecclesiastical circles. We also feared the consequences. Döllinger himself was evidently staggered at the unexpected impression of his, to say the least, unexplained appearance in such a character. The book which followed, in other respects a wonder of historical information, was nothing but a powerful effort to shield himself from the consequences of this step.

The ideas expressed in the royal conversation above referred to are here recognizable, more particularly in the introduction, as well as the endeavor to harmonize them with the principles of the church. It would not be very difficult to allay the doubts which Döllinger has endeavored to awaken concerning the mediæval church and the Papacy in his (or his amanuensis’s) letters on the council in the _Allgemeine Zeitung_, and now in his “declaration,” from his own work of 1861. The Encyclical, and particularly the doctrine of the Syllabus on the relations of church and state, may be both explained and defended by the assistance of the same book. Döllinger then knew very well how to vindicate the true sense of certain decrees and bulls of the popes issued while the mediæval relations of the church to the state were yet in force; he well knew then how to separate what is transient from that which is eternally true. If, at that time, any one had come to him to tell him that Napoleon III. intended to take advantage of the Bull “Cum ex apostolatus officio” against the Protestant princes of Germany and Prussia, with what shouts of laughter would he not have received him! Now he himself is guilty of just such an absurdity--and how grave he is withal!

The question of the relations of science to church authority became now in Bavaria a practical question, and Döllinger was called upon to prove the strength of his principles by overt acts. One difference followed another in that country, and Döllinger was as interested in them as he could be in matters entirely personal to himself. Like a general, he felt himself responsible for the result of all those contests, and never thought of examining closely the claims of those who crowded around him and offered him their services. In this way it was that he became the protector of one so unworthy as Pichler against the archiepiscopal ordinary. At this time, even, he had his passionate turns, which gave rise to serious misgivings, but which he was sure to regret himself before any length of time had expired.

At this period the episcopal conference at Fulda resolved to take steps to revive action in the matter of the establishment of a “free Catholic university.” Döllinger could see in this nothing but the proof of a dark conspiracy against German science.

He was unable to see that the anti-ecclesiastical, not to say the antichrist, spirit which had crept into the universities, was more than even he would be willing to be accountable for were he the chief 256 pastor of a diocese.

The opinion expressed in an appeal to the Catholic ladies of Germany on the subject of the higher schools, made him lose his patience altogether. The outbreak of the Seminary question in Spiers was in his view another attempt of those infected with the “Roman” spirit against free German science, and it found him, even if not publicly, on the side of the decided opponents of the bishop’s rightful claim in the matter.

Very nearly at the same time, the then Bavarian minister of worship made a report to the king on the occasion of a vacancy in the theological faculty of Würzburg, in which he painted the clergy educated in the German College at Rome in no flattering terms. An accidental circumstance threw suspicion on Döllinger as the instigator of it. The pamphlet “for the information of kings,” which appeared in the beginning of 1866, represented Döllinger, although only under the general name “of the Munich school,” as the real actor in the minister of worship’s puppet-play. There was a report that in the Spiers matter, speaking of the attitude of the bishops, he had said: “They are attempting to misuse the king’s youth!” How much of this had its foundation in truth, to what extent the statements of the pamphlet were based on a change or mistake between the ministry and cabinet, must remain undecided.

The pamphlet referred to created no small excitement, however; and, precisely two years before the appearance of the notorious articles on the Council, was exhaustively replied to in the _Allgemeine Zeitung_. The style and other accidents would lead to suppose that the “amanuensis,” since known more of, had here made his _début_. The reply was not a refutation. It was made up of a series of counter-complaints, and, with the exception of the attacks on the Jesuits, the Roman party, and the boys’ seminaries, these articles contain the kernel of the articles against the Council published two years later. In spite of all this, however, Döllinger is represented in these articles as of the same unaltered mind with other members of the faculty, Haneberg and Reithmayer.

“If there was no ground of suspicion during all these long years, no reason to believe that these men were hankering after dangerous novelties, how comes it recently that such suspicions are aroused, seeing that they have always been of the same mind?” It is now certain that this unanimity has since ceased; and it is clear that Döllinger’s monstrous accusation--“not a soul believes it”--must have been unjustly brought by him against his colleagues. The articles also quote the words of the Tübingen theologian: “The suspicion has spread further--Döllinger and Michelis are no longer innocent.” What says the Tübinger of the drifting of these two men to-day?

On the first of January, 1867, the Hohenlohe ministry took charge of the ship of state.

It will not be claimed that Döllinger’s influence increased with the accession of his old friend Prince Hohenlohe to the ministry; it seemed more probable that the prince would have found the learned professor a powerful obstacle in his way. The prince had formerly been considered unexceptionable in his religious views and relations; but in order to dissipate the bad odor in which he was in the highest circles, suspected as he was of favoring Prussia, he knew no better method than to encourage the superstitious fear of the Ultramontanes and of the Jesuits which for twenty years had reigned within the walls 257 of the royal palace at Munich. This it was which had made Dr. Döllinger so interesting a subject since he was regenerated from the infection of Ultramontanism.

Countenanced by such a man, it was thought the discomfiting of the “clerical party” would be a less dangerous operation than effecting it by an unasked-for alliance with the party of progress.

This explains how Prince Hohenlohe, at the head of the foreign department, was determined to serve Döllinger in every way possible against the “Curia” and all matters related to it.

The infamous articles on the Council appeared in the _Allgemeine Zeitung_ from the 10th to the 15th March, 1869, under an anonymous name. Every effort was made to conceal the author, and even to mislead the public as to who he was. The real author could not conceal himself as far as we were concerned; but it required a long time to convince the many, and great was the surprise of all unprejudiced minds at the discovery.

In the meantime, the preparation of the anonymous _Janus_ was undertaken, and the circulatory dispatches of Prince Hohenlohe made their appearance on the 9th of April, 1869, which, of course, Döllinger could not well subscribe as their author. The council of ministers, of course, was not consulted in the matter; and the well-known five questions put by Prince Hohenlohe to the theological faculties of Munich and Würzburg, concerning the future council, were not whispered to the minister of foreign affairs by some secret agent.

In the name of the majority of the faculty of Munich, Döllinger was called upon to answer his own questions. In contradistinction to the clear and frank separate vote of Professors Schmid and Thalhofer, and to the incisive opinion of the Würzburger faculty, that exposition was but the unworthy production of a time-server. It was impossible for any one to discover the real meaning of the opinion. The only thing plainly discoverable was the ambiguity by which the author sought to shield himself from trouble.

The absence of conviction in the whole affair is so evident that we may well yet remain in doubt concerning the position of Döllinger’s colleagues; and that in spite of the fact that the libellous articles of the _Allgemeine Zeitung_ are to be found in the widespread pages of _Janus_. We have already looked into this department of the literature of our day; we have done so already. Not only was infallibility condemned in it; but the primacy, at least since 845, is there made to appear as an infinite series of deception and forgeries, or, as _Janus_ expresses it, as a sickly, uncouth, consumptive-engendering excrescence on the organism of the church. Not only was the future council condemned before it was held, but the Council of Trent was turned into “a should-be œcumenical council,” which was arbitrarily governed by legates, in which the Roman party alone had sway, and which, in a word, was nothing but an assemblage of fools and pickpockets. This view of the Council of Trent Döllinger seems to have forgotten, when he wrote his declaration of the 28th of March of the present year, in which he refers to the Tridentine article of faith which he had twice sworn to, and in which he leaves out the essential part of the oath, namely, the promise to interpret the Holy Scripture only “in the sense approved by Holy Mother Church.” 258

The foreign office and its zealous co-operator, the learned professor, now began their campaign against the Council. The reporter of the Leipzig _Grenzboten_ of the 24th of June, 1870, thus expresses himself on the subject: “The alarming circulatory dispatches of Prince Hohenlohe have turned to political account the results obtained by _Janus_, and introduced them into governmental and diplomatic circles.” The Bavarian ambassador, a man of no distinction and one who favored the “Curia,” was recalled and replaced by Count Tauffkirchen, the most talented diplomatist at that time at the disposal of the government.

His operations in Rome were very influential; and if the matter furnished by the events in the Council became immediately the subject of discussion in the press and in the literature of the day, the Bavarian Embassy is not entitled in the least to the merit of it. The rest was accomplished by Döllinger, as is now well known, and by his intimate young friend Lord Acton.

About the end of the year appeared the pamphlet, _Considerations for the Bishops of the Council on the Question of Papal Infallibility_. This time he appeared again anonymously, but without making any extra effort to conceal himself as the author. A little later, he appeared under his own name in the official organ of the new Catholic theology, the _Allgemeine Zeitung_, in the “Declaration in the matter of the address touching Papal Infallibility,” on the 19th January, 1870. From this declaration, says the Lepzig correspondent more than once referred to above, proceeded his agreement with the views of _Janus_.

The publication of his name was no sooner made than the party of progress took it as a signal to make him their own entirely.

This had already been done in the press; now it was accomplished in the House.

On the 7th of February, Dr. Völk, a deputy, seized the opportunity presented by the debates on the “address” to drag Döllinger into the field against the “patriotic” majority. He read the most objectionable and most venomous parts of the “Considerations” and “Declaration,” and imputed these views to the majority of the House as their own opinions, endeavoring to drive them to declare themselves for Döllinger and against the Pope and the Council. The “patriotic” majority had taken care not to embitter the debates by introducing questions ecclesiastical into them; but now a defence was called for. The stenographic report describes the scenes, which were closed with the following words from Deputy Törg:

“I have been on the most intimate terms with the gentleman whom Deputy Völk so formally parades before the House, for years. I became acquainted with him shortly after the time of the ‘genuflexion question’ in Bavaria; and, surely, no one then imagined that a time would come when Dr. Döllinger would be thus quoted before the whole House by Dr. Völk. I consider it a terrible misfortune, and accept it as such; yes, gentlemen, as a personal misfortune. Dr. Döllinger was an authority for me; he is such no longer; for he has fallen the victim of blind passion and lost the calmness necessary to the forming of an opinion; and he is no longer in a condition to formulate a dogmatic question as a theologian ought to be able to formulate one.”

But that is not what Döllinger wants. He now stands in dread of all 259 conscientious critics, his own fame for critical acumen being entirely gone.

He makes the definition of Papal infallibility a monstrous bugbear, and no remonstrance prevails to prevent his making the bugbear more terrible to himself and others. The worst feature in the whole is his passion against the temporal power. He sees nothing in his opponents that is not criminal. They use the infallible Pope to depose the monarchs who do not suit them, to absolve subjects from their oath of fealty, to overthrow constitutions, to annihilate every right. Dr. Döllinger endeavors by the most unqualified denunciation to tell the new German Empire--elsewhere he always says that the doctrine was never known in Germany: “I cannot dissemble that this doctrine, in consequence of which the former German empire perished, in case it should obtain sway among the Catholic portion of the German nations, would sow the seeds of an incurable disease in the newly founded German empire.”

But what now? As we have already pointed out, the matter did not turn out as those interested wished it would.

It was expected that Döllinger’s influence would have carried the greater part of the clergy and intimidated the bishops; thus it was hoped without much danger would be obtained the object which, although yet not clearly defined in every particular, embraced, at all events, the annihilation of Ultramontanism, of the “clerical party,” and of the Jesuits in Germany. It was hoped to accomplish all this without the always, as was acknowledged, dangerous assistance of the party of progress, through the mere weight of Döllinger’s name and influence. But his name has not accomplished what was hoped it would. The auxiliaries wished for did not come; the others who were not expected came in crowds. Scarcely had the national liberals rested from other arduous tasks than they enlisted under Döllinger’s standard for the accomplishment of their next and greatest task, the destruction of the Catholic Church in Germany. We are far from denying that at first, under the pressure of slanders and denunciations, some well-intentioned men were carried away. We have hopes for their return, and do not wish to wound the feelings of any one. But when Dr. Döllinger surveys the chaos of the “address,” and considers how it would fare with him could he hear the confessions of all these “Catholics,” I do believe he would blush at such adherents, for I do not believe he has quite lost the power of distinguishing moral turpidity from virtue.

He need not know the state of the consciences of his Munich colleagues who signed the address, in which they hesitate not to give the lie to the whole Catholic episcopate; he knows better than anybody how many of them have a moral right to speak in the name of “Catholic Christendom.”

Viewing the matter in this light, we have in one way wondered at the signing of many, in another way we have wondered at the signing of only a few. And in the face of such phenomena, Dr. Döllinger desires a church the duty of whose bishops it shall be simply to declare that which all believers, represented by scientists, will have thought or believed upon a question of the faith.

It is easy to say what the next thing sought by those who follow behind Döllinger’s banner is. The police regulations required by the government against the decrees of the Council are a matter of secondary importance. And the great storm of an ovation given to Döllinger is 260 meant not so much for Döllinger himself as for its influence on the king and his government.

The king must a second time be made to serve the cause of German liberalism. We said it in the beginning: as soon as the little German Empire is established, the party will want a “German National Church” for their little empire. We did not think, indeed, that any attempt at this would be made so soon; for, a year ago, men who knew what they were talking about assured us that so long as the old king lived he would not permit the peace of religion to be disturbed; but that it would be otherwise with those who came after him. But now that the king has become German Emperor, unanimous reports of the contrary come to us. “The idea of the establishment of a German National Church is taking deeper root, to all appearances, in the government circles.” So a relatively unprejudiced Berlin correspondent lately reported. The rest of the tale is told by the debates in the chamber of deputies.

The party are anxious to strike the iron while it is hot; not without reason was the party battle-cry spoken during the war--all our noble blood were shed in vain did not the stroke which freed us from France sever the Catholics of Germany from Rome--“War against France and against--Rome!” Even Dr. Michelis joined in the cry.

If it was very desirable that the Bavarian king should take the initiative in the matter of the imperial title, it was also very desirable that the first step for the establishment of the “German National Church” should proceed from the palace at Munich.

The King of Bavaria was to be to the “new Luther” what Prince Frederick of Saxony had been to Luther of old; and on that account, he is promised the surname of the Wise. This is the meaning of the infamous telegram of the tenth of March from Dresden--“him, the enlightened thinker who publicly proclaims his dissatisfaction with the dogma of Papal infallibility!” When the representatives of high offices in Munich dare to set themselves up publicly as commanders in the military ecclesiastical society, one need not be surprised at the progressionist intrusive attempts, rashly sporting with the monarchical principle itself. Thus only can we understand how any one could be so bold as to encourage the clergy to fall by insinuating a provision that no one might fear a material loss. Could the necessary number of state-church servants have been found, the programme was that the King of Bavaria should give the “German National Church” its first ground in the Munich places of worship. We wish to be excused from describing further the plan which finally would make true the saying: “They wish to misuse the king’s youth.”

We are not deceived. Should this plan fail, another will be sought to accomplish what is intended. Döllinger has been in relation with Prussian diplomats since 1866. However, neither he nor the new German Empire has the divine promise which the church has; and where the Pope and the bishops are, there is the church.

Let all Catholics gather more closely yet about the centre of unity. We can do no better service to the world. God will take care of the rest.

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A GHOST STORY OF THE REVOLUTION. 261

We have not many haunted spots now in our Empire State, or even in America, and very few genuine goblin stories, such as once upon a time, told by the fireside, made one afraid to look behind him; delightful old tales, implicitly believed in by narrator and listeners, and casting over all a shadow of utter and indefinable terror! Not that ghosts have ceased to come, but they are things of course now, and their position with regard to mortals in the flesh is entirely changed; the territory of spirit-land (at least a part of it) has been annexed, we may say, to our free and independent thirty-seven states; a regular intercourse has been opened; and, as the intangible parties in the compact have frequent and passing invitations to make earthly visits at certain specified periods, it is no more than civil in them to wait until they are expected.

Now, in years gone by it was quite otherwise; so far from being invited, they were universally shunned; man, woman, and child fled at the slightest indication of their presence; and as for speech, it was next to impossible for them to put in a single word before the terror-stricken mortal had speeded away, far beyond all hearing. Not much seemed the gain to either side by those interviews; occasionally some rogue was known to disgorge his ill-gotten pelf in consequence of the midnight apparitions of some phantom things, a warning to him to mend his ways; or some timid heart perhaps grew faint, and before long time ceased to beat, under the idea that it had received a supernatural summons to the unseen world; but generally speaking, the shock of an intense and overpowering affright was about all that accrued to the sight-seer from the meeting--a terror so genuine that he was able to impart it to many a circle of eager listeners for an incredibly long period after the adventure.

But what attraction has modern America for sprites, spooks, brownies, fairies, and all that dainty ethereal tribe that may be met in the Old World? Or what, for the more solemn shadows that haunt dilapidated galleries, in the tumble-down ruins of ancient transatlantic castles? What homes have we for “elves and little people,” that dance for years, yes for centuries, on the same greensward in the Highlands of Scotland? Alas! in an incredibly short period grass here gives place to wheatfields, and fairy rings would be disrespectfully ploughed up and planted. Let any sociable _brownie_ plan a visit to old friends, she would probably find the whole family, bag and baggage, moved off to the far West, and only strangers round the hearthstone. They love things old, and here all is new and cheerful under the tireless march of improvement. We have no black forest, no

“Castled crag of Drachenfels,”

but the primitive woodland yet clothes the mountain that “frowns o’er the wide and winding” river.

The nearest approach to a haunted castle is to be seen sometimes in travelling over the Western States. There, in some lonely inconvenient spot which no prudent man would have chosen for a homestead, an unfinished, overgrown, weakly-looking wooden house tells its story, 262 not of greatness gone by, but of greatness planned and never accomplished--a pitiful comment on the uncertainty of human affairs! It happens thus: Some settler, sadly miscalculating his resources, projects a palace in the wilderness on a scale of city splendor; that is, with parlor, dining-room, kitchen, bedrooms, and the little elegances of pantries and closets. The sides are enclosed, the roof is on, and the revenues he counted on as certain are not forthcoming. Then do papered walls and panelled doors with brass knobs, and visions of portico and piazza, all float away to the blue clouds; the hapless dreamer fits up one corner room for the reception of his whole household until he can find another _location_, and take a new start in the search after fortune, and so abandons his rickety palace to the lord of the soil. As the boards blacken in wind and storm, and one end blows down perhaps in some rough northwester, it gains the name of being haunted; and to ride past such a skeleton thing by moonlight or in the dim twilight, with the utter desolation of all around, and the yawning blackness of cavities which should have been doors and windows, it requires no great stretch of imagination to picture an unearthly head peeping out here and there. Very bold yeomen are known to always whip their horses to a full gallop as they approach and pass the fearful spot; and as for women and children, under that strange fascination by which the supernatural repels and yet attracts, they always gaze intently, and as surely “see something”!

Although goblin visits in our land are just now rather on the decline (except in a regular business way), there was a time when strange sights were seen and strange things happened; and, although it may seem almost incredible, it is a fact well established in history that it was generally to the Dutch settled here, to that clearheaded, reasoning nation, so little likely to be deceived on any subject, that most of these revelations were made.

This certainly ensures for the tales the firm belief of all mankind. When an imaginative Hibernian or a lively, light-hearted Gaul announces a vision, it must be taken with some little allowance for flights of fancy, etc., etc.; but when a phlegmatic, cool-headed Hollander declares he has seen a _spook_, you may believe as if it was your own eyes.

For the precise period most prolific in signs, sights, and dreams, we must go back to the early days of our state, yet not to the _first_ settlers. _Their_ troubles, so numerous that it is scarcely possible to number them, had their origin in things tangible; and so closely did these troubles press daily on all sides, that the thoughts of the first colonists were entirely engrossed by the things of earth. To such a point did this downward tendency reach, that they seemed at times in danger of relapsing into heathendom, as may be seen from the reports sent back to Amsterdam, and yet extant among colonial papers, that they possessed neither school-houses nor churches. They did possess, however, three unfailing sources of annoyances and danger--an Indian warfare, neighbors on their eastern boundary of unparalleled audacity, and domestic bickerings in the perpetual strife kept up between Manhattan and Rensselaerwyck.

What might have happened if the Indians had been treated with common justice and honesty can be now only conjecture; but their wrongs began at the beginning. It is a dark spot on the glories of the adventurous 263 little yacht _Half-Moon_ that her very first track through the waters of the magnificent Cahohatéa (now the Hudson) was marked with their blood, causelessly and wantonly shed.

Hendrik Hudson and his crew landed, we are told, on the western bank of the great bay, which was lined with “men, women, and children, by whom they were kindly received, and presented with tobacco and dried currants.”[68] A little further on were “very loving people and very old men, by whom the Europeans were well used.” They brought in their canoes to the voyagers all sorts of fruit and game, and on one occasion of a visit made by white men to the shore they broke their arrows and threw them in the fire to express their pacific intentions. Yet despite all this, when the vessel had advanced only a few miles, one of her crew fired and killed an Indian, without the least warning, for attempting to steal a pillow and some old garments.[69] No satisfaction was offered to the terrified savages, and they pushed off for the shore in their canoes, but they vowed a vengeance, and they kept the vow; so that, when some few years later one ship after another brought the enterprising individuals who first unpacked their household utensils and farm tools in the New World, they entered upon a stormy existence already prepared for them. It was not a glimpse of wraith or goblin that people feared to encounter in the lonely by-path, but the stealthy tread and dark visage of some lurking savage, ever watchful and merciless, ever close at hand when least expected. How often in the silent night, in how many little hamlets, in how many solitary huts, women and children listened in speechless terror to the war-whoop, that fearful yell, and were made to feel Indian retaliation for the evil doings of fathers and husbands! Small time had they for ghostly fears. When the savages fled before European firearms, it was only to return. More than two thousand of them appeared in their canoes at one time before the little block-house at Manhattan, because Hendrik von Dyke, with an imprudence and wickedness perfectly disgraceful in a mynheer, had killed a squaw for stealing apples in his orchard. His orchard was on the present site of Rector Street.

But, though the Dutch colonists were generally at fault in provoking contention, they were also valiant, after some preparation, to meet it. When Claes Smit was ruthlessly murdered by the natives, some time about 1642, and they refused either to give up or punish his murderer because he had fled and could not be found, the colonists consented to march to battle,

“provided the director himself (Von Kieft) accompanied them to prevent disorder, also that he furnish, in addition to powder and ball, provision necessary for the expedition, such as _bread and butter_, and appoint a steward to take charge of the same, so that all waste be prevented.

“If any person require anything more than this _bread and butter_, he to provide himself therewith.”[70]

Finally, however, gunpowder prevailed; and the aborigines retreated to forests beyond the reach of the _pale-faces_; schoolmasters and ministers had been sent over from Holland, and the inhabitants of Manhattan Island, as well as the other little settlements up the river, began to live a more spiritual life, and to gather around them 264 by degrees all that troop of unearthly beings well-known in the mother country. Little children were encouraged to be good and expect Santa Klaus, and bad ones were no longer frightened into propriety with the threat of being devoured by some hideous Waranancongyn with tomahawk and scalping-knife.

One of the spots first renowned for ghostly adventures was a pleasant little valleylike place, on the northern limits of the town, called Medge Padje (now Maiden Lane), where a clear stream ran between grassy banks, so gentle and noiseless that it carried the gazer’s heart back--far back over the ocean to the canals of Faderlandt, and was a perfect relief from the lashing waves of the great North River. Hither, on pleasant summer afternoons, many a gude vrow would turn her steps with her troop of sturdy urchins, and, work in hand, knitting, knitting, all the way. But they were always careful to return before dark; for such fearful tales had been told, principally of a tall woman in white who always vanished in the direction of Golden Hill (now John Street), that no one cared to make her acquaintance.

Long years after this, when the palisades marking the extent of the city had been removed as far north as what is now Warren Street, and a field of barley flourished on the Heerewegh (now Broadway), somewhat about the present City Hall, we again hear of the same apparition. The Rev. John Kimball, passing along the little stream rather late at night, heard steps, and, looking behind him, saw the spectre; of course he fled. Doubtless she was the bearer of some important message from the spirit-land which she was anxious to communicate, but, as no one ever stopped to listen, what it was can now never be known.

Mr. Watson, in his _Annals of New York_, relates a story given by a military gentleman of his own encounter with an apparition in that same place. The captain declares, and doubtless believed, that he bravely attacked it, and discovered only a mischievous mortal in disguise; but it is hardly probable that any mortal in his senses would be personating a ghost at midnight on haunted ground, so that the tale, being rather one-sided evidence, is doubtful.

Another solitary place was Windmill Lane,[71] which led from Broadway between Cortlandt and Liberty Streets down quite a steep hill, in a northwest direction, to the river edge, where stood a windmill. There was a time when this lane was the most northern street in the settlement; then house after house began to be built around the old mill, and the city crept up gradually in that direction. Among those who made their homes there was a French lady, Madame Blonspeaux, who had crossed the ocean to teach the rising generation all she knew--French and embroidery. Two paths led to her establishment, one through the Lane, the other through a wheatfield, where now is St. Paul’s church, and both were beset with spectres. Alas for the scholar kept in after the others were dismissed! Lightly did the offended majesty of madame weigh in the balance compared to what might possibly beleague the path homeward. There was a legend of a tall Indian who was always digging about for his bow and arrows, and a little short Dutchman about a foot high in breeches and cocked hat, who, the moment he found them, sprang into sight from somewhere and kicked the dirt 265 over them, and the Indian began his search again![72]

But the section of country most famous for spectral manifestations was the region about the Kaatskill Mountains. Darkly wooded glens, and lonely streams, and deep ravines offered the most ample facilities for all kinds of signs and wonders. Indeed, the Dutch settlers that dwelt in that by-place of existence, on the little cleared spots that here and there dotted the landscape, were so quiet and orderly, so far removed from the commotions that agitated the river colonies, no wonder ethereal beings found their companionship most congenial. These settlers had removed thither originally from the neighborhood of Fort Orange, and principally, nay, I may say solely, in disgust at the general uproar and discomfort which invested everything in proximity to that fort, under the joint dominion of the Patroon of Rensselaerwyck (or his agent), who resided there, and Director-General Petrus Stuyvesant, who fulminated his bulls from the south end of the Hudson; the contemporary edicts of the rival parties being always diametrically opposed to each other.

The truth is that, from the moment Director Stuyvesant landed at Manhattan, appointed there by the States-General of the United Netherlands, he had carried matters with such a high hand that everything succumbed before him. The boldest spirits bent to his rule, and (to continue the metaphor) he walked over them. His word was law without reason or explanation. He had even been known to shorten a troublesome state audience by tearing up the documents and dismissing the deputation.

Thus ruled the governor at Manhattan; but when Brant Arent Van Slechtenhorst was sent over from Holland as agent for the heir of the last patroon--Johannes Van Rensselaer, a minor--Petrus Stuyvesant met his match. Commander Slechtenhorst was in popular estimation “a person of stubborn and headstrong temper.”[73]

When Stuyvesant directed Carl von Brugge to quarry stone and cut wood for repairs on Fort Orange, nearly destroyed by a freshet, Brant dared the deputy to touch stone or stick at his peril, either for fortification or firewood; for the trees, root and branch, all belonged to his employer the patroon! He further forbade any of the inhabitants to aid them with horses, etc., while at the same time he was building a house himself not a pistol-shot from the fort. The news being carried to Manhattan, the director sent some soldiers to demolish the offending house now being built, and arrest the offender. This was more easily ordered than accomplished, so the soldiers held a parley with him, and were cautioned, among other bits of good advice, to take warning by one Jacob Jansen, who had not long before cut two fir-trees--eight days after he was seized with his plunder on the river by the patroon’s officer, and duly punished! with the stunning point to the climax: “Can’t he do so now?” All this being duly reported to the great director at Manhattan, it was deemed best to seek supplies beyond the domain of Rensselaerwyck, “stones from the mountains, rocks, and plains--timber from anywhere within the limits of New Netherlands--to have a wagon made, and take the horses of Jonas Bronck, who was in debt to the company,” and whose opinions on the 266 subject were of course of no consequence. As for pulling down the house recently erected, Herr Van Slechtenhorst pointed to the fact that Fort Orange stood on the very soil of his employer, and that it was his intention at some leisure day to annihilate it. So went matters, until at last, when Stuyvesant ordered a solemn fast, and Van Slechtenhorst absolved all in his latitude from obedience, human patience could stand it no longer, and the insulted autocrat rushed to Albany in the swiftest sailing sloop that could be found; there, as has been said, to meet his match.

But our business is not with these belligerents, but with those peacefully disposed burghers, who had grown tired more and more, year after year, with this turmoil, which seemed now to have reached its height. Armed soldiers were in their midst (for seven had been sent up from Manhattan), and when the talk was of razing houses, why, even the neighboring Indians came crowding in to ask what the _Swannekins_ were about.

Happily another home opened to them, and very many packed up all their worldly goods and migrated. This home was the region about the Kaatskill. One part of the mission of Herr Van Slechtenhorst when sent over the ocean was “to acquire by purchase the lands around Kaatskill for the greater security of the colonie, as they were forming companies to remove thither.”[74]

On the land thus obtained, they had nothing to fear from Indian opposition, and the kind of domestic life they coveted is pictured in a lease yet extant in the Van Rensselaer family, dated 1651, wherein the tenant binds himself to “read a sermon or portion of Scripture every Sunday and festival to the neighboring Christians, and to sing hymns before and after prayer, after the custom of the Church of Holland.” Years in that little nook of creation brought few great changes; their habitations had come to be grouped together somewhat town fashion, and were dignified by a name much too long, and unpronounceable except by a Dutch tongue, but well loved because traceable to Holland; and there life after life passed away like great waves in a stream--one disappears and another takes its place.

Such were the mortal inhabitants of the place; but the invisible portion of the community--their name was Legion! It seemed the very place of refuge for all sorts of bodiless personages who had been insulted and expelled from other places; indeed, if a census had been taken, according to the old wives’ stories, their aggregate numbers would have made up near half the population of the village.

In one portion of the spot which might truly have been called the supernatural reservation was a deep ravine, which bore traces of having once been the bed of a mountain stream. At this period (some time before the old French war), its sole inhabitants were a morose, ill-looking woodman and his aged mother, and their dwelling-place was a miserable hut perched on rocks, and so hidden by gnarled and twisted trees and a dense undergrowth of shrubs as to be almost invisible to any but its occupants. Why they established themselves in that uninviting place, or what were the events of their lives previous to their appearance there, their unintelligible English failed to communicate, nor was there aught in the sullen taciturnity of both of them in the presence of a stranger, or in the loud and fearful 267 bickerings heard ofttimes in their hovel by the passer-by, that created a desire to fathom the mystery. When the news arrived that French and English had met, the outcasts in the glen, strange to say were the only ones in the settlement whose fortunes seemed in any way to be affected by it. Their disputes were heard louder and more frequent than ever before, to end, alas! in a tragedy. The man, tired perhaps of his monotonous existence, and hoping also to better his fortunes, was desirous of joining the ranks of war, yet, feeling at the same time the necessity of his support to his old mother, he strove to wring from her a consent to his departure. It was sought in vain. The aged woman, to her consciousness of utter helplessness, added doubtless a natural desire for his safety, and consent was withheld. Opposition goaded him, and in a moment of passion he struck her lifeless to the ground.

The miserable parricide fled, and the hut fell in ruins. Time passed on, the war was ended, and peace restored.

And now, when the tragedy of the glen had grown to be an old story, only told by a winter evening’s fire, it began to be whispered--and it fairly petrified the senses of every hearer--that Dark Rob, as he was called, or his spectre, had returned to his old abode!

No one cared to investigate the matter very closely. A light was certainly seen flickering in the ruined hovel, and a phantom-like thing in human shape glided about the spot. No mortal would choose to remain there alone, so it must be the shade of Dark Rob, on the theatre of his unnatural crime!

Many an evil deed was related of him in this, his second sojourn in the hut; but one of the most evil, because passing all comprehension, was the strange influence he contrived to acquire by ways unknown over a sturdy farmer named Jansen Van Dorp. How they first met was perfectly inexplicable; for goblin Rob had never been visible in any of the ordinary paths of the settlement, and, although Jans was one of the very few who laughed to scorn the idea of a ghost, he would scarcely venture in his sober senses to penetrate the dark shadows of the haunted hovel uninvited. In whatever way it happened, events proved their close intimacy; his steps were watched, and traced night after night to the hut, where they held their unholy orgies.

As a matter of course, the worldly affairs of Jans Van Dorp became disjointed things. His vrow had always borne a close resemblance to the helpmate of Socrates, and it is not to be supposed that such doings on the part of her truant spouse added to her sweetness of temper.

The most irritating part was the sudden taciturn spirit which seemed to possess the mynheer. Taunts, sneers, questions, reproaches, all were in vain! This was both new and alarming, because on no previous occasion had he ever been backward in contributing his share to the Babel din of their wordy skirmishes. It confirmed, alas! her worst suspicions, namely, that he was in toils and snares beyond all mortal power of extrication.

Great light was thrown on the affair by a shrewd neighbor, Effie Demson, who, having migrated to America from the Highlands of Scotland (and by some odd chance wandered down to the Kaatskill), was allowed to be especially versed in hobgoblin ethics. She affirmed that she had often heard from reliable authority that, whenever a mortal is admitted 268 to the society of spirits, an oath of secrecy is imposed under a penalty few would care to brave. She cited the cases of several imprudent individuals who, having violated this compact, suffered fearful consequences. One was Alice Pearson, of Byrehill, somewhere about 1588. Having been introduced to the invisible world by a friend, and joined them in “piping, mirth, and good cheer” (to use her own words), she was warned that, if she ever related what she had seen, “she should be martyred.” One day, when she began to speak of these things, an unseen blow took away her breath and left an ugly mark on her side; heedless of the warning, Alice continued her revelations until she was burned as a witch, thus fulfilling her doom.[75] Every one in the Highlands knew, too, the terrible visitation that had lighted on one kirk for having pried into secrets merely to publish them. Every one knew that he was a mere wandering gypsy in the universe, and would be to the end of time.

Effie generally concluded her oracles with the remnant of an old song, written about fairies particularly, but equally applicable to any unearthlies. It was called

“_God a Mercy Will_.

“To be sung or whistled to the tune of _Meadow Brow_ by the learned; by the unlearned, to the tune of _Fortune_.

“A tell-tale in their companie They never could endure, But whoso kept not secrecy Their deed was punished sure. It was a just and Christian deed To pinch such black and blue.” Etc., etc., etc. _Poetica Stromata._

As this bore the antique date of 1648, and was written by Corbet, Bishop of Norwich, it was considered good authority for anything.

This, then, explained the unusual silence of Jans Van Dorp, and it also half-reconciled his gude vrow to endure her unsatisfied curiosity. To wonder and to be afflicted night after night by his truant absence was bad enough, but to have seen him vanish in blue smoke would have been worse.

Things were passing thus in that sequestered little spot, while the great world without was agitated with mightier events--the opening scenes of the Revolutionary war. It is doubtful whether the faint rumors of it which penetrated the seclusion there would have excited the least attention, except for the fact that it was the only earthly topic on which Jans Van Dorp nowadays manifested the least interest. Every Dutch villager, whose business led him to the great cities, was questioned and cross-questioned on his return as to the precise state of things, with a minuteness which would have done honor to that renowned lawyer Heer Adrian Van der Donck, the first who landed in the New Netherlands. The one little gray newspaper that arrived weekly, and had hitherto circulated among his neighbors until it was quite illegible, was now packed immediately in his great-coat pocket and taken to his ghostly partner. All this was a perfect labyrinth of mystery, and furnished texts for many a sage conjecture and dubious shake of the head. Some hinted that Jans Van Dorp might mean to put in execution the threat he had been so often heard to hurl at his irritating helpmate when her vexatious volubility exceeded all bounds of endurance--that he’d be off to some war. But time puts an end to all things, although it does not always explain things to universal satisfaction. What Jans or the goblin thought or meant can never be 269 fathomed, but some things are matters of history; and it is a testified fact that the very moment this little dingy newspaper brought tidings that the first cannons of battle had boomed, Jansen Van Dorp started as if his doom was somehow connected with it. It was a night, dark and stormy, but he seized his hat, and rushed from the cheerful glow of his own home to the pitchy darkness without, and they whispered he was bound to the haunted hovel! Too probable, for from that hour neither Jans nor spectre was ever seen there more.

It should rather be said, never seen as mortal _could_ be seen, for by many he was still considered an inhabitant of the settlement, although lost for ever to his hapless vrow. He had visited her in dreams, and warned her of something she could not exactly remember, but very terrible, and given on these occasions such diverse accounts of himself, it was hard to tell what to believe. To Effie he had frequently presented himself. She had seen him in the coffee dregs, in leaves at the bottom of her tea-cup, in a mirror which she had cut triangular for that express purpose, and, finally, in a tremendous thunder-storm, standing close beside her.

As he gave no sign on these occasions, her charitable conclusion was that he had nothing very good to relate of himself.

Many months after this, one of the most intelligent mynheers of the settlement, having been called by business to a far eastern city, declared on his return that, among a troop of soldiers marching to the frontiers, he had recognized Jans Van Dorp and Dark Rob; but, as he failed in speaking to them, his assertion passed for nothing, and his story was dismissed as mere moonshine, too absurd to be believed.

[68] O’Callaghan. _Hist. New Neths._, vol. i. p. 37.

[69] _Ibid._ vol. i. ch. 2.

[70] O’Callaghan, _Hist._ vol. i. bk. iii. ch. 2.

[71] Watson’s _Annals of New York_.

[72] The writer of this possesses two pieces of embroidery done by one of madame’s pupils.

[73] O’Callaghan, _Hist._, vol. ii. p. 72.

[74] O’Callaghan, _Hist._, vol. ii. ch. iv.

[75] _Trials from the Criminal Records of Scotland._ By R. Pitcairn, Esq.

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THE RELIGIOUS MOVEMENT IN GERMANY, AND THE _FRACTION DU CENTRE_ IN THE GERMAN PARLIAMENT.

TRANSLATED FROM THE REVUE GENERALE.

An apathetic calm generally succeeds to political agitation at the close of legislative sessions. An exception to this rule prevails in the German Empire, inasmuch as the attacks against the _Fraction du Centre_, which began during the session, increased to an actual storm at the close of the diet. Most of the foreign journals have spoken of this phenomenon, but in so unsatisfactory a manner that perhaps a more minute account of the movement will not be displeasing to the readers of the _Revue Générale_.

I have already indicated in a general way, in an account of the parties in the German Parliament, the attitude and tendency of the Catholic party, or the so-called _Fraction du Centre_.

The bases upon which it is founded are as follows:

“_Justitia fundamentum regnorum._ The _Fraction au Centre_ in the 270 German Parliament limits its activity by the following principles:

“I. The fundamental characteristics of the empire as a confederation (_Bundesstaat_) shall be maintained. Conformably to this principle, all efforts shall be opposed that tend to modify the federal character of the constitution of the empire, and the spontaneity and independence of the several states in their interior affairs shall only be sacrificed when the general interests evidently require it.

“II. The material and moral welfare of the popular classes shall be urgently insisted upon. The civil and religious liberty of all the subjects of the empire shall be secured by means of constitutional guarantees, and religious associations, in particular, shall be protected against legislative encroachments.

“III. The _Fraction_ weighs and forms resolutions in accordance with these principles, upon all questions submitted to the deliberation of the parliament, but without forbidding isolated members to vote in the assembly contrary to the decisions of the _Fraction_.”

The _Fraction_ remained faithful to these principles during the session of the parliament that has just closed. It avoided all extreme views, and manifested no systematic hostility to the government. Nevertheless, the very fact that it is composed of Catholics firmly resolved to defend the rights and liberties of the church against all attacks, and that these Catholics were elected from the most prosperous and intelligent sections of Germany, where pseudo-liberalism thought its rule immovably established, sufficed to excite against the _Fraction_ a coalition of all who were opposed to the church. Their invectives began with the debates on the address. The form of address proposed by the national liberal party contained, besides some expressions in praise of the historic views of the adversaries of the Papacy, the following sentence: “The days of interference with the national affairs of other kingdoms will, we trust, never return under any pretext or under any form.” This sentence, destructive of all national rights, was evidently aimed against Rome, as was partly acknowledged: the Italian revolution was not to be checked by diplomatic representations in the accomplishment of its designs against the visible head of the church. Naturally, it would not have occurred to any one to impose absolute passiveness on the powerful German Empire in its relations with neighboring states. The party of the _Centre_ drew up a counter-schedule, which did not contain the proposition of absolute non-intervention we have just referred to, but which was nevertheless in conformity with the address of the liberals. This counter-schedule did not demand, either directly or indirectly, any intervention in favor of the Pope: it contained nothing that clashed either with the government or the other parties, and consequently was not the object of criticism in any quarter. So true is this, that the _Allgemeine Zeitung_ of Augsburg, the chief organ of anti-religious liberalism, could not disguise its preference for the schedule of the _Centre_ as to its substance as well as form. Nevertheless, though the _Centre_ remained wholly on the defensive, and its orators exhibited the greatest moderation, a real storm of invectives was raised against them and the church by the journalists of all the other parties and by the parliament. Even the so-called conservatives took sides against the _Centre_, whose motion, thanks to these outcries, only obtained sixty votes. A proposition made shortly 271 after by the _Centre_ in the interests of civil liberty met the same fate. This proposition had for its object the admission of several principles into the constitution of the German Empire which had been sanctioned by the Prussian constitution. As these principles guaranteed the independence of the church--the Evangelical as well as the Catholic (Art. 15, Pruss. const.)--the proposition was opposed with extreme bitterness, even by a large majority of the Catholic deputies who did not belong to the _Fraction du Centre_. Among these was Count de Frankenberg, of Silesia. This noble member had given his electors a written promise to vote in accordance with the proposition of the _Fraction du Centre_. But in the speech he made against it, he declared that he did not consider the time chosen by the _Fraction_ as opportune. In his ignorance of judicial things, he probably is not familiar with the adage: _Quod sine die debetur, statim debetur_.

The _Fraction du Centre_ made no other independent motions during the session that could incur any attacks. But the “clerical party” was attacked the more vehemently at the elections, so the _Centre_ found itself still exposed to a cross fire. The whole affair has been related in the journals. We will confine ourselves to an incident that gives a tolerably correct idea of the majority.

Before the election of Dr. Schüttinger, nominated from the district of Bamberg, and belonging to the _Fraction du Centre_, the curate of a small town within that district announced from the pulpit, after divine service, that those of his parishioners who had confidence in him could assemble at his house after church to learn which candidate was preferable, according to his opinion. This invitation appeared to the majority an intolerable infringement on electoral liberty as well as an abuse of the pulpit, and the election of Dr. Schüttinger was annulled. A new ballot gave the same candidate a thousand more votes than at first. At the next session, the validity of this re-election will be submitted to the decision of the parliament, and the question arises if the majority will be fully satisfied respecting the electoral liberty of the district of Bamberg. But the Belgian Catholics know by long experience what their adversaries mean by electoral manœuvres.

In all the occurrences we have referred to, the government showed itself entirely passive, so there was no real conflict between it and the party of the _Centre_. When the debate took place respecting Alsace-Lorraine, our party proposed to ensure to those provinces the most independent existence possible, and a separate constitution. Prince Bismarck did not exactly agree with this, but his opinions coincided far oftener with those of the deputies Windthorst and Reichensperger than with those of the leaders of the other parties. On the whole, no instance can be mentioned in which the _Fraction du Centre_ is in flagrant hostility to that powerful statesman. It even openly opposed an interpellation respecting the Roman question, in order not to excite any irritating debates and appear suspicious of the good intentions of the emperor and chancellor. In spite of this, it was reported during the session that the _Fraction du Centre_ had incurred the disapprobation of the chancellor of the empire. The _Deutsche Reichscorrespondenz_, the organ of the so-called liberal conservatives, gave some foundation to this report by pretending that the Count de Tauffkirchen had, according to the instructions of Prince Bismarck, accused the _Fraction du Centre_ to Cardinal Antonelli of 272 having assumed an attitude hostile to the government of the empire, and that the cardinal had expressed his disapproval of this attitude not only before the Count de Tauffkirchen, but in a letter addressed to the leaders of the _Fraction_. This assertion being repeated in several quarters, the said leaders denied it in the journals. Driven to the wall, the _Deutsche Reichscorrespondenz_ then brought up the case of the Count de Frankenberg already mentioned, and at last Prince Bismarck himself declared the blame really proceeded from Cardinal Antonelli. This induced the Bishop of Mayence to ascertain the correct account of the matter from the cardinal. His eminence replied that it had been incorrectly reported to him that the _Fraction du Centre_ had insisted upon the Emperor of Germany’s intervention in favor of the Pope, and that, under the existing circumstances, he had declared such a step inopportune. At the same time, the cardinal assured the Bishop of Mayence and his friends that he had a particular esteem for the members of the _Fraction du Centre_ and its proclivities. Thus failed the effort made at the court of Rome to bring discredit on the _Fraction_ among Catholics, for at once a great number of Catholics gave in their full adhesion to the _Fraction_, and besought it to persevere courageously. This effort had, moreover, a comic side, for until now the _Fraction_ had been represented as the servile tool of the Roman curia, whence it received its orders on all important questions.

No general interest would be felt in all these facts, if they were not the clear prelude of an act the consequences of which cannot be foreseen. It is not the acts of the _Fraction du Centre_ that provoke the violent attacks against it: it is its very existence that is considered a crime. Those hostile to the church had calculated, without distinction of party, that the very first diet of the German Empire would aim a blow at “Romanism” in Germany, on the ruins of which would afterwards rise a national German church, that might finally end in a cosmopolitan “Humanitarianism,” without dogmas, without sacraments, and without altars--the very _beau idéal_ of freemasonry. Everything, in fact, seemed propitious for the realization of this hope. The two principal Catholic nations successively conquered, the Roman race suffering from incessant convulsions, the head of the Catholic Church a prisoner at the Vatican, and, finally, a schism that seemed likely to arise on account of the dogma of infallibility--all seemed to form a breach by which it was hoped their opponents would be overcome. Only, as an ancient adage says: “Man proposes, but God disposes!”

The election of the Prussian deputies and the members of the German Parliament has already paralyzed the action of these regenerators of humanity, by rousing the Catholics to an energy not easily to be surmounted. The complete union of the representatives elected, and their bold stand, showed it would be quite useless for the legislative assemblies at Berlin to make any serious charge against Catholicism. On the contrary, it was hoped at Berlin that the initiative would be taken by Munich, where “the Luther of the nineteenth century” had raised a standard of revolt against the Roman Pontificate. But Munich was likewise under the influence of illusions. It was supposed that Mgr. Hefele, the Bishop of Rothenberg, would add the sanction of 273 episcopal authority to the influence of the learned Professor Döllinger, and thus sustain his course. It was still more certain that a great number of the pupils of the theological seminaries would respond to the appeal of Döllinger and his able adherents. Döllinger, it may be remembered, had publicly declared that thousands of priests thought exactly as he did.

But Bishop Hefele remained faithful to the Pope, and the German clergy unanimously declared that Döllinger’s assertion was a calumny. The King of Bavaria himself, who had given Döllinger so many proofs of his esteem, hesitated a long time about giving him his support, because he could not help seeing that the anti-ecclesiastical movement was chiefly led by a political party whose efforts openly tended to mediatize the reigning houses of the second and third ranks in order to form a united and centralized Germany, in imitation of the empire of Napoleon III. These efforts naturally met with the most favorable concurrence on the part of the democrats; for an empire of this kind, established on a broad and “liberal” basis, would lead, by a sort of fatality, to a republic, especially if they first succeeded in doing away with the religious and historic traditions.

Immediately after the close of the parliament, a fire was opened at Berlin upon the “clericals,” and especially upon the _Fraction du Centre_. The official journals did their best to open the way to “modern progress” by removing all the obstacles that might impede it, and to increase the diplomatic pressure that had so long been exerting its influence on the Bavarian cabinet. The whole German press, with the exception of a dozen journals, naturally joined in the chorus, and then began an attack on the Catholics, the like of which had not been witnessed since the Archbishop of Cologne was sent under guard to the fortress of Minden, under the pretext that he had conspired with the two revolutionary parties against the Prussian government.

The German Catholics are accustomed to these kinds of accusations, which have passed through all possible variations. Thus, the Catholics of the Rhenish provinces have been successively accused, according to the circumstances of the moment, of plotting with France, Belgium, Bavaria, and Austria, against Prussia, and of considering the Pope as their legitimate sovereign. Foreigners can hardly credit what I am obliged to relate here, and, if they should, it would excite their risibility. Unfortunately, these absurdities have a serious side for the Prussian Catholics. Independently of the circumstance that these perfidious calumnies, systematically repeated, might pervert public opinion in those sections of Germany where Protestantism prevails, they serve as a pretext for practically refusing Catholics the open equality which they should share with the adherents of other religions. For example, all the higher offices of influence are, with very rare exceptions, filled by Protestants, who, as a matter of course, specially favor the interests of their co-religionists in every way, and, so to speak, are obliged to do so, because genuine Catholics are officially designated as unpatriotic. An exact list of the functionaries of the German communes and government, drawn up with reference to the religion of each one, would be a valuable statistic, because it would incontestably establish how far the principle of _suum cuique_, which constitutionally recognizes the equality of Christian sects, is really applied. It is evident that such a report 274 will never be published or drawn up by the authorities, consequently the formation of a private agency to effect such an object is an urgent necessity. Perhaps this report might at last put an end to the constantly repeated accusations of the base ingratitude of Catholics against the Prussian government. The clear judgment of Frederick William IV., and the constitutions that sprang from the events of 1848, guaranteed a liberty of action to the Catholic Church and its organs which had not existed in any German state since the peace of Westphalia. The Prussian Catholics displayed a lively gratitude for this, and flattered themselves with the hope that several crying injustices which weighed on them would be removed, especially in the conferring of public offices and the nomination of professors at the universities. This hope was then the more reasonable, because, in the war against France, Catholics, as well as Protestants, shed their blood on the battle-fields, and submitted to the heaviest requisitions. The religious orders particularly signalized themselves by their services, as the recently published report of the Knights of Malta (Catholics) prove. Unfortunately, this hope has already given place to serious preoccupation.

Prince Bismarck appears no longer able to endure repose. Having vanquished our foreign enemies, he seems to aim, unless all appearances deceive us, at making adversaries of the Catholics of Germany and causing them to feel the weight of his hand. Perhaps he is influenced by the consideration that military unity, to be on a solid basis, should be founded on, or crowned by, political and religious unity. At all events, this is the opinion of the liberal party, whose course involuntarily recalls the expression of Tacitus, “_Ruere in servitium_;” whereas, while M. de Bismarck was rising to power, they abused him beyond all bounds. These worshippers of success have for allies the Catholics who are not willing to submit to the decrees of the Council of the Vatican. In the jargon of the liberals, these Neo-Protestants are designated as old Catholics, while the immense majority of Catholics who now, as formerly, consider the authority of the Pope and bishops in religious things as higher than that of certain professors, are styled Neo-Catholics, absolutely as if they had abandoned the faith of the church. A foreigner would find it difficult to understand how it is possible to give a completely opposite meaning to the real signification of a word, and this in a country like Germany, which prides itself on its intelligence.

But it is not the anti-religious journals alone that take this liberty. M. de Mühler himself, the Prussian minister of the public worship, treats the Catholics, who remain faithful to the decrees of the Pope and bishops as rebels to the government. Immediately after the suspension of the council, he took under his protection the professors, even those who were priests, who refused to submit to the decisions of the council and the bishops, and encouraged them in their revolt against ecclesiastical authority. Recently, _à propos_ of the affair of the Bishop of Ermland, he went so far as to submit to the ministry of Prussia, composed exclusively of Protestants, a resolution to ascertain what Catholics should be considered as orthodox, and he ordered a priest named Wollmann, who had been excluded from the fold of the church by major excommunication, to retain his professorship as religious instructor in the Catholic college of Braunsberg. The students, unwilling to receive religious instruction from a fallen priest, left the college. They were thus obliged to give up most of 275 their studies, as there is no other establishment of the kind at Braunsberg. It should also be remarked that the College of Braunsberg was founded by a bishop and sustained by Catholic foundations. In Silesia, another priest named Kaminski, likewise excommunicated, was appointed to a church that he might celebrate the divine service for those who protested against the Council of the Vatican. In a word, every where there is any reason, or even a pretext, the episcopal authority is sacrificed to those who refuse them the obedience solemnly sworn to them, or become unfaithful to the church by calling the episcopal crosier the _bâton_ of a police officer. On all sides were declarations, more and more threatening, that an end must be made of “Romanism,” that German science should take the place of idolatrous papistry, and the echo of this cry is to be found in the papers that seek their inspiration from the ministerial bureaux.

But in spite of the great power of the Prussian government, the centralists, to their severe mortification, were doubtful about succeeding in fully organizing a persecution against the Catholics unless the other German governments, or at least the most important of them, declare war against the church. The Würtemberg government was so wise as to declare from the first that it would ignore the decisions of the Council of the Vatican as long as no one was influenced by it against the laws and constitution of the kingdom. As this evidently would never be the case, the Würtemberg ministry, if the national liberals who have just begun an outcry in the assembly of representations at Stuttgart do not impose a different policy on them, will consequently remain strictly passive with respect to the church, as is the case in Belgium, Holland, England, the United States, and every country where genuine liberty prevails. The statesmen who govern those countries do not allow their slumbers to be disturbed by the decrees of the Council of the Vatican, and deem it beneath their dignity to regard them as a pretext to form a kind of Cæsaro-papism.

As we have remarked, the course of the Bavarian government in the ulterior development of this agitation, will be of great importance. The pressure brought to bear on that government by Prussia and all the parties inimical to the church has led to the retirement of Count Bray, whose devotedness to the church is well-known. Nevertheless, the king has not fully decided to create, by an open rupture with the religious authorities, unforeseen complications in his kingdom, already so shaken, and to recompense by moral violence the fidelity of those of his subjects who have shown themselves the most devoted partisans of the dynasty of Wittelsbach. This question, so painful for the majority of Bavarians, will be doubtless decided before this article is published.

Having given a general outline of the present state of affairs, I am led to ask myself what, before the end of the year, will be the stand of the Catholic representatives who are still faithful to the church in the legislative assemblies of Prussia and the German empire. The reports of those deputies to their electors appear to me adapted to strengthen them in their resolution to continue to struggle courageously against the supremacy of the state as well as against revolutionary absolution, and to remain defenders of the church and of all constitutional rights against the false apostles of liberty and an arbitrary ministry. At all events, I imagine these deputies will smile 276 with pity when they hear themselves styled unpatriotic by some parties in imitation of a part of the journals hostile to the church, or even accused of conspiring with foreigners or the _Internationale_. Some papers, in fact, have not shrunk from the ridicule attached to such foolish accusations. Does not this having to resort to such imputations prove the want of any serious charge against the members of the _Centre_? They are evidently not credited by those who make use of them, nor is any attempt made to convince others of their truth.

The members of the _Fraction du Centre_ figure, for the most part, among the notabilities of their districts. Many of them have occupied or occupy some public office with honor: and several have, for many years, showed their constant zeal in the old Prussian house of legislation, where they had a seat, and gave their devoted support to the government in the crisis of the year 1848 and the following year, often at the expense of their popularity. They were often known to defend the authorities against the attacks of those who are now endeavoring to excite the government against them.

In support of what I have just stated, it is sufficient to recall the names of those whom the confidence of their colleagues chose as a committee of the _Fraction du Centre_ in the German parliament and the Prussian house of representatives. I will mention M. de Savigny, the son of the illustrious jurisconsult so well-known throughout the whole world, who was formerly Prussian minister at Brussels, and latterly the representative of the King of Prussia at the Diet of Frankfort; M. Windthorst, who was president of the house of representatives in Hanover, and twice minister of justice in that kingdom; the Baron d’Arétin, the vice-president of the upper house in the kingdom of Bavaria; M. de Mallinkrodt, the counsellor of the Prussian regency; the Prince de Loewenstein; the Count de Landsberg-Velen, a hereditary member of the Prussian house of lords, etc. Perhaps I may be permitted to mention also my brother, a counsellor of the Prussian Court of Cassation, who was one of the most active leaders of the conservative party when the government was the object of the most violent attacks.[76]

He who consecrates his time and strength to the cause of justice and religious liberty, or uses them in the arena of political combat, should not expect to reap any gratitude, but the leaders of the _Centre_ and their friends could not foresee that they would be exposed to the calumnies I have alluded to. The only appreciable grievance uttered against the Hanoverian and Bavarian members of their _Fraction_ is, that the former disapproved of the annexation of their country to Prussia, and the latter used its influence to prevent Bavaria from joining the new German Empire. But these deputies have stated publicly that, these measures having been decided by vote, they were ready not only to fall in with the new order of things, but to endeavor to strengthen it, which cannot be the case if the national liberal party is not opposed, the evident tendency of which is not of a nature to fortify the constitution of the empire, being directed 277 against the federative principle, which is the fundamental characteristic of this constitution. No one has a right to suspect the statements and character of these men who merit the esteem of all honorable people for having defended in a purely conservative sense, and by all legal means, the traditions of their ancestors, to which they remain faithful, and which they wish to maintain as long as their duty evidently requires it.

To the _Fraction du Centre_ in the German Parliament belongs also M. Kraetzig, the leader of the Catholic department of the ministry of public worship, which has just been dissolved. This division, composed of three counsellors belonging to the Catholic faith, was organized by Frederick William IV. with the benevolent intention of giving the Catholics of Prussia a sort of guarantee for the suitable administration of the funds for public worship: it was not wished that such matters should be decided by a Protestant government without at least listening to the advice of the Catholic functionaries. (The leader of the Catholic department of public worship had only a consultative voice.) The existence of this division was a pledge to the Catholics, being an assurance that their religious interests would never fall into hostile or indifferent hands. If we except the Prince de Hohenzollern, no Catholic ever had a seat in the ministerial council, and especially no Catholic was ever appointed minister of public instruction. The suppression of this division, decreed on the eighth of last July, is the more serious a symptom that it has been applauded by the journals opposed to the church, and with a joy equal to that manifested at the measures taken in Alsace against the brothers devoted to instruction and against the Catholic press. The party of the _Centre_ will naturally oppose with all its might the current of opinion which these acts prove to exist in the region of power. Its voice, it is true, will be stifled by the majority, but it will not be raised the less energetically for liberty and justice, with the hope of seeing a better day dawn, and, whatever the event, with the conviction of having fulfilled an obligation of conscience not only toward the church, but to the state.

The hope of soon seeing the clouds disperse that have been accumulating of late around Germany in so unexpected a manner is founded on the political prudence, the experience, and the opinions of the Emperor William. It is not possible for this monarch crowned with laurels, after having established peace with foreign powers through the bravery and fidelity of the _whole_ German nation, to authorize the persecution of millions of Germans on account of their faith, and consent to sacrifice the national peace--the peace which is especially due to his royal brother, whose memory is still blessed by Catholics. There is no doubt but the appeals of the Catholic population will be heard and listened to, as soon as they reach the foot of the throne. The statesman who, in such an unparalleled manner, has been so highly exalted to the very steps of that throne, and whose celebrated name is displayed, without his consent I am persuaded, on the standard of the enemies of the church, cannot be ignorant that, when these troubles shall have assumed more formidable proportions, it will be more difficult to overcome moral resistance than to triumph over physical obstacles, and that measures of policy will be powerless against the former. He will hardly consider it chivalric; with all the enormous 278 material resources of the state at his disposal, to enter into a combat against people who can and will only oppose him passively, as is suitable in the defence of a cause which represents the most powerful interests of humanity.

But perhaps all these hopes are illusory; perhaps we are about to see in our Fatherland the beginning of a sad and fruitless struggle, such as has so exhausted the strength of other countries by giving a free course to the most dangerous passions. In this case the Catholics of Germany should prepare themselves to endure a long succession of contradictions, for their moral courage will be severely tried. They will have to make sacrifices of all kinds for their faith, recalling the precept of the Gospel that commands us not only to render to Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s, but also to God the things that are God’s, whatever may happen, whatever may be the consequence of such a struggle, the church of God, which has always been victorious through patience, will never yield either under assaults of unbelief or the attacks of a false science, that in its pride seems to declare anew: _Eritis sicut Deus_. Truth is great, and it will prevail: _Magna est veritas et prævalebit_.

A. REICHENSPERGER. COLOGNE, Aug., 1871.

[76] The modesty of the eminent author of this article did not permit him to mention his own name among the most illustrious members of the _Fraction du Centre_. It would be ungrateful not to supply this omission by adding to the valiant champions enumerated above the man whose multiplied labors, marked by his superior intelligence and ardor of feeling, are at once an honor to Germany and the church.--(_Note of the Editor._)

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THE MOUNTAIN.

The mountain’s sides are green anear, In clouds is lost its snow; And he who climbs that Alpine height Shall earth and heaven know. Lo! like a temple to the skies, For toil, for prayer, for sacrifice, Its green and snowy heights arise.

A thousand pilgrims wander up To yonder blue abode, And some are lost, and some are slain, Or robbed upon the road. Far up the holy hermits dwell, And sounds the monastery bell The safe and ancient way to tell.

And they who mount that highest steep Are tired and sad and poor, But lo! a starry house is there, And angels at the door. Rich joy for poverty and pain They give, that summit to attain: All earth they leave all heaven to gain.

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COLOR--ITS POETRY AND PROSE. 279

The three primary colors, according to the latest conclusions of science, are _red_, _green_, and _blue_.

Oersted, in one of the chapters of his _Soul in Nature_, gives us a little diagram to show how the _complementary_ and _characteristic_ combinations of colors are produced.

The colors opposite in the figure complete each other in white, hence are called complementary colors--red and green, orange and blue, yellow and violet. These are the harmonious colors.

Two colors, between which there is only one intermediate color, constitute characteristic combinations of color, as Goethe calls them--for instance, red and yellow, yellow and blue, blue and red--and are the combinations most common in uniforms.

In regard to the symbolism of colors, Oersted gives the following enumeration:

White fitly typifies _innocence_; the purity of snow and summer clouds, and all the analogies of nature, suggesting and completing its significance. Black, which, as the withdrawal of light, denotes loss of life-giving power, as in night, and to which is added in the storm-cloud unwonted gloom and desolation, stands appropriately for the color of mourning. Red is the color of love, from the hue of the blood, to which is united the idea of the heart, heat, and intensity of life. Yellow denotes falsehood, as indicating the deceitfulness of that which shines, also as the color which, when it departs from purity, soonest becomes disagreeable. Green symbolizes hope, the green of spring in nature giving token of the fruition of summer. “If we consider also,” says Oersted, “the satisfaction with which the eye can rest on it, we should call it the color of trust. Blue,” he adds, “is called the color of fidelity, but since faith, hope, and love are so frequently named together, and the two last each has its symbolical color, we might assume that one of the colors belonged to this noble quality. It is evident that blue, since it indicates distance, vacuity from matter, therefore the immaterial is suitable as a symbol of faith. It is the color of the sky also, and this leads us away from the earthly. Then the repose in blue, and the feeling that of all colors it is the least splendid, with the exception of violet, which, when unmingled with red, really the violet of light, is so feeble, and has in it so little power, that it is not much considered. Goethe says that blue is a ‘_stimulating negation_.’ We learn from natural science that blue united with violet is reflected back every time that light passes through a less occupied space, namely, a vacuum, hence Goethe’s expression. Violet and blue also indicate darkness, since they are the colors which have the least light in them, and the pigments which they represent are easiest converted into black.

Faith, which looks up out of the blackness and shadow of death into 280 the full-orbed splendor of the sun of righteousness, may not inappropriately take for its symbol the “stimulating negation” of the poet.

Thus do the three primary colors, blue, green, and red, represent the triad of Christian graces, the primary virtues of the Christian life--faith, hope, and charity, or love.

But leaving the poetry of color, we come to the subject of its place and function as it imprints itself on the myriad forms of the organic world. The question has been asked, Are all these tints of nature in the flower and shrub, the gorgeous plumage of the bird, only meant to please the eye of man and to gratify the artistic sense? Is there a deeper, subtler purpose running through all this apparently wanton pageantry, aside from the delight which it affords the mind of man, and looking only to the perfecting and preservation of the organism itself?

A utilitarian age has answered in the affirmative, and the researches of Darwin, Wallace, and others are daily opening new vistas into this interesting field of inquiry.

Darwin was the first to establish the fact that the bright coloring of flowers is for the purpose of attracting insects in order to accomplish their fertilization, and deduces the general rule that all flowers fertilized by the wind are of dull and inconspicuous colors. In the animal kingdom the principle of assimilation guides and modifies coloring in conformity with surrounding nature, and it is, therefore, to a great extent, protective.

The lion inhabiting the desert is of the color of the sands, so as hardly to be distinguished at a short distance. The leopard lives in jungles, and the vertical stripes on its body harmonize admirably with the vertical reeds of its tangled lair, and completely conceal it from view.

In arctic regions, white is the prevailing color, as here reign perpetual snows; therefore, it is that the bear is only found _white_ in this part of the globe.

The curious fact that among birds the female is usually of a dull neutral tint, while the male monopolizes the bright colors, is accounted for on the principle of protective coloring, the female needing the obscurity afforded her by her sober plumage. When there is an exception to this rule, the protection is afforded in some other way. And this leads us to the subject of _birds’ nests_.

Wallace, in a chapter on the theory of birds’ nests, divides them into two classes, those in which the eggs are protected by the shape or position of the nest, and those in which they are left exposed to view. He then gives the following law: “That, when both sexes are of strikingly gay and conspicuous colors, the nest is of the first class, or so as to conceal the sitting bird; while, whenever there is a striking contrast of colors, the male being gay and conspicuous, the female dull and obscure, the nest is open and the sitting bird exposed to view.”

In connection with the subject of protective coloring, the phenomenon of _mimicry_ is not the least curious. Wallace gives several instances of butterflies, moths, snakes, etc., where the coloring of protected families is imitated by weak and unprotected ones not in any way allied to them. A large and bright-colored butterfly, the heliconidæ of South America, which is protected by a disagreeable quality affecting its taste, thus rendering it secure from insect-eating birds, is imitated by a smaller and eatable family, resembling it so completely as to be quite indistinguishable by its enemies from the 281 former. Thus it is protected and enabled to perpetuate itself by borrowing the colors of its secure and powerful neighbor.

The elaps among venomous snakes is another instance where protection is afforded through mimicry to a harmless snake that would otherwise be defenceless. The elaps and the species that copy its coloring are found only in tropical America, and are peculiar as being the only snakes marked in the same manner by red, black, and yellow rings.

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NEW PUBLICATIONS.

THE WORKS OF AURELIUS AUGUSTINE, BISHOP OF HIPPO. A New Translation. Edited by the Rev. Marcus Dods, M.A. Vols. I. and II. The City of God. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. For sale by the Catholic Publication Society, New York. 1871.

The Messrs. Clark, of Edinburgh, are well known and honorably distinguished among publishers for the works of a high class of scientific and literary worth in sacred literature which they are regularly bringing out in the best style of the typographic art. Besides their series of works by the most eminent German Protestant theologians of the orthodox school, some of which are really valuable to the Catholic student, they are issuing a set of translations of the Ante-Nicene Fathers, and have now commenced a series of translations from St. Augustine which they design to extend to sixteen or eighteen volumes. We cannot sufficiently rejoice in the publication of these patristic works. Nothing can produce an equally powerful impression in favor of the Catholic Church on serious and educated minds with the perusal of numerous and extensive works translated from the early Christian writers. The two volumes before us are, in every sense of the word, superb. The editor has prefaced them by an introduction, whose style reminds us of Macaulay--while its matter is excellent, interesting, and in all respects unexceptionable--in which he gives an account of the nature and the circumstances of the great work of St. Augustine, and of the various judgments of eminent scholars upon it. So far as a merely cursory glance can warrant us in judging of the merit of the translation, it appears to us that the extremely difficult task of rendering the Latin accurately into good English has been successfully accomplished. The work itself has been considered by some eminent scholars as one of the great masterpieces of human genius. It is the first great work on the philosophy of history which was ever written. It was the fruit of the latest and most mature period of the great doctor’s life. Its plan embraces a comprehensive defence of Christianity against the objections of the Roman statesmen and philosophers of the fifth century. A vast number of interesting topics are treated in it, so that, apart from the philosophical value which it possesses, it is most interesting and curious as a museum of antiquities from the epoch when paganism was passing away to give place to Christianity. It is to be hoped that Catholics as well as Protestants will patronize the truly noble and useful undertaking of the Messrs. Clark and their literary _collaborateurs_, to enrich our 282 English libraries with these splendid patristic translations.

A Life of St. Augustine is also promised to accompany the selections from his writings. From this we can scarcely expect as much satisfaction as from the other parts of the undertaking. The theology and opinions of the writer must unavoidably prevent him from understanding and correctly representing a Catholic bishop and doctor, and giving a perfectly complete and correct account of the state of the church during the period in which he lived. No one but a Catholic can achieve this task with success, although a Protestant who is sufficiently learned, accurate, and skilled in the art of composition, may make a perfectly satisfactory translation of Catholic works. It were much to be desired that some competent Catholic scholar would give us a biography of St. Augustine so complete and perfect that it would supplant all others, and take rank as the standard history of his life and times.

LIGHT IN DARKNESS. A Treatise on the Obscure Night of the Soul. By the Rev. A. F. Hewit, of the Congregation of St. Paul. New York: Catholic Publication Society. 1871. Pp. 160.

This is a very small volume in bulk, and of very modest pretensions, but of great merit, and treats with much truth and justice a very important subject. It belongs to what is called _Mystic Theology_, and gives us in a small compass the simpler elements of the science of the saints, and cannot fail to interest all those who are entering upon a life of Christian perfection, whether in religion or in the world. The “obscure night of the soul,” as St. John of the Cross calls it, is experienced in some degree by all whom the Holy Spirit is conducting through purification, not to be effected without pain and sorrow, to the highest and closest union with God possible while we are still in the flesh. It is a deprivation of all sensible sweetness in devotion, a desolation, a deadness of all but the very highest faculties of the soul, in which all is dry and hard, and the soul discerns not a ray of light to relieve the darkness that seems to pervade and envelop her every act, and everything seems listless, prayer demands an effort, and brings no consolation, and meditation is painful and fruitless. This obscure night of the soul, sometimes called passive purgation, is supernatural, the gift of the Holy Ghost, and is intended to try the soul, to test its faith and confidence, to purify it, and enhance its merit by bringing it in the end into joyful union with God.

If carefully distinguished from sadness and melancholy, which may spring from the physical constitution and a variety of natural causes, this inward desolation, in which the soul longs for light, for spiritual life, and to behold the countenance of the Lord, is a great good, and a proof that the Holy Spirit has not left us, but is present within, and is preparing us for the joyful day that will dawn in the soul, and permit us to ascend to the Mount of Vision with the saints. Sensible sweetness, even visions, which are not seldom experienced by one just entering a religious life, are baits to lure us on, or to save us from discouragement, but they cannot create in us a robust and solid piety. Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son that he receiveth. Far more profitable to the soul is this obscure night in which the Lord hides his face from us, and leaves us desolate, and yet does not leave us, nor cease to love and care for us.

Father Hewit explains the sources and solidity, the certainty, the infallibility, of the science of the saints; shows the principles on which it rests; describes the desolation of the soul due to the discipline to which the Holy Spirit subjects the aspirant to Christian perfection; gives plain and simple directions to distinguish it from natural sadness or melancholy, and for the behavior of the soul while 283 suffering, and for deriving the greatest possible spiritual benefit from it. He also gives us a criterion by which the operations of the Holy Ghost may be distinguished from visionary illusions sent by Satan to deceive and ruin the soul, which the spiritists make so much of. His remarks on spiritism are just and opportune, are exceedingly valuable, and should be pondered by every Catholic. The ravages of spiritism are fearful.

The work is addressed solely to Catholics, and we think young and inexperienced confessors and directors will find much in it to aid them in their noble but arduous duties of directing souls in the way of perfection. To the class of Christians for whom it is specially intended, it will serve as a valuable and trustworthy guide, and will assist them to profit by the many larger and fuller treatises on the spiritual life whose excellence is unquestionable, and without superseding them. We thank the author for the rich present he has made us.

THE MONKS OF THE WEST, FROM ST. BENEDICT TO ST. BERNARD. By the Count de Montalembert. Boston: Patrick Donahoe. 1872. 2 vols.

This is an American reprint of the English translation of Count Montalembert’s great work. The English edition is not only very splendid, but very costly. Mr. Donahoe’s edition is compressed into two volumes, at the reduced price of eight dollars, and is nevertheless very handsomely printed, with type sufficiently large and clear, and in all other respects well brought out. We welcome its appearance as a most fortunate event, and recommend the work most heartily as one which every intelligent Catholic ought to read as a glorious monument of his religion, and every literary man as one of the finest historical and literary productions of the age.

It is without a question that the Count de Montalembert was one of the greatest and noblest men of this century, whether in or out of the Catholic Church. The present work is the most complete and splendid monument of his genius and piety which he has left to perpetuate his fame. It is no mere compilation of biographies of the common sort, but a history of the great monastic institution in the West, of its stupendous works, and of the civilization of which it was one of the chief organizing powers. It includes some most important and little known chapters in the history of the chief nations of Christendom. Its copious and exact erudition is only equalled by the majestic eloquence of the style in which it is written, and which the translator has well rendered into English. There are a few passages in the introduction in which the author has allowed a certain bitterness of feeling to disturb the ordinarily pure current of his sentiments, and has betrayed some signs of his sympathy with the errors of the party of so-called Liberal Catholics. We do not consider this blemish, however, sufficient to detract seriously from the value and merit of this great work, or to make its perusal in any way dangerous. It is a work thoroughly Catholic, and pervaded with the same spirit of loyalty to the Holy See which the illustrious author has expressed in his dedication of the work to Pius IX. Whatever he said or did in a contrary spirit was a lamentable inconsistency, which we trust God has pardoned, as the Holy Father has done in so tender and magnanimous a manner.

PETERS’S CATHOLIC CHOIR. A Monthly Magazine devoted to Catholic Church Music. New York: J. L. Peters.

The purpose of this publication is to offer in a cheap form selected musical Masses, hymns, and motets for the use of our church choirs. 284 The selections, from a purely musical point of view, are as good as publications of this nature generally contain.

THE PICTORIAL BIBLE AND CHURCH HISTORY STORIES. Abridged. A Compendious Narrative of Sacred History, brought down to the present Time of the Church, and complete in one Volume. By the Rev. Henry Formby. New York: The Catholic Publication Society, 9 Warren St. 1871.

This is a book which deserves to find a place as a text-book in all Catholic schools, and to be put by all Catholic parents into the hands of their children. Even the very little ones will be found capable of comprehending the easy and familiar English of the narrative; nor can too much stress be laid on the importance of thus familiarizing them from the start with the history of God’s dealings with men. For this purpose, the plan of acquainting them with the Bible history simply is far from sufficient. It leaves too great a gap between the past and the present--as if sacred history had virtually come to an end eighteen centuries ago, and since then everything had been merely secular and profane. A well-instructed child needs to have the whole of sacred history, from the creation of the world to the usurpation of Rome by Victor Emanuel, laid before his eyes in a series the connections of which are plain and unbroken. Such a simple historical knowledge will be apt to prove the best safeguard of his faith in a time when there is no longer any great temptation for him to abandon it in favor of misbelief, but when open unbelief in the providence of God is fast becoming his only real enemy. The task which Father Formby has undertaken, of presenting this history in an easy and compendious form, is one which he has very satisfactorily accomplished, and for which there seemed to be a crying need.

We can only hope that American Catholics will make haste to avail themselves of the results of his labors. The book is an attractive one, very fully illustrated by pictures which, if they are not to be called artistic, have at all events the merit of being often suggestive, and the letterpress will be found good reading by older readers as well as by the young ones.

THE ILLUSTRATED CATHOLIC FAMILY ALMANAC FOR THE UNITED STATES FOR THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1872. Calculated for different Parallels of Latitude, and adapted for use throughout the Country. Illuminated cover, 12mo, pp. 144. New York: The Catholic Publication Society. 1872.

There are many good works to be done for our Catholic community, and here is one of them. A little annual at a trifling price, yet, in paper, typographical execution, and illustrations, wonderfully attractive, now finds its way to over seventy thousand Catholic homes, and gives to perhaps a quarter of a million of Catholic readers information, instruction, and entertainment.

The material is new and healthy. It is a commentary on the communion of saints. Catholics are not of one state or country, of one age or century. We are a brotherhood embracing all. The young growing up wish to know of the past glories of the church as the old love to speak of them; and all desire information of the actual life of the church.

God’s hand is not shortened in the nineteenth century. He overlooks the great and wise, and reveals himself to little ones, now as of old. Bernadette Soubirous, whose likeness is given, kneels there, and all cluster round her to hear the wonderful history of Lourdes. The lately martyred Archbishop of Paris will be viewed with interest, and the sketch of him will be imprinted on all minds. The beautiful portraits of Adelaide Procter and Eugénie de Guérin bring to mind the representative women of the church in our day, whom to know is to 285 love; and many thousands will here begin to appreciate those two beautiful souls. In the history of the church in America, all will feel that Catholicity is no stranger in the land when we see before us the remains of a cathedral in Greenland, built in the twelfth century; a bishop in Florida in the sixteenth, predecessor of the illustrious Carroll in the last, and the saintly Flaget in our own.

Ireland, the fatherland of so many sons of our Holy Mother, is not forgotten. The ruins of religious houses, caused by hate, and the excellent portrait of the Liberator, O’Connell, show the close union between Catholics of all lands and times.

This little attractive bouquet of Catholic flowers, rich with the aroma of faith, will, by its suggestions, its information, and its creditable appearance alone, keep alive and stimulate the true Catholic feeling; and there can be no better work than to disseminate it widely and more widely in every parish, until it finds its way to every Catholic family in the land.

LIFE OF THE REVEREND MOTHER JULIA, Foundress and First Superior of the Sisters of Notre Dame, of Namur. Translated from the French. With the History of the Order in the United States. New York: The Catholic Publication Society, 9 Warren Street. 1871.

Marie Rose Julia Billiart, the foundress of the Sisters of Notre Dame, was born at Cuvilly, in Picardy, in 1751, and died in 1816. The life from which this is translated was first published in 1862, for the use of the Sisters, but will be found also of great interest to the general reader. It is certainly so, or at least should be, in this country, where they are so widely diffused, are doing so much for the cause of Catholic education, and are so well known. Mother Julia was also a saint, and the lives of the servants of God are always interesting, especially when told in a natural and unaffected way. Her whole life was an extraordinary one, though her congregation was not established till 1803, when she had reached the age of fifty-two; its foundation being, as it were, necessarily delayed by the disturbances in France during the Revolution; but of course the greater part of this memoir is occupied with her last years, which were more abundant than those that preceded in visible service to others, though not perhaps in merit to herself. At her death, the order was firmly established, though not without passing through many trials and difficulties, and had a number of houses in France and Belgium. It was brought to this country in 1840, and to England three years later; it now has seventeen houses there, and twenty in the United States, having the care, in these two countries alone, of more than thirty thousand children. The latter part of the book, as stated in the title, is occupied with its foundation and establishment here; also an interesting account is given of its introduction into England and Guatemala, to which latter place they were sent in 1859.

We have before us a list of the houses of the Sisters in Massachusetts, nine in number, at which nearly seven thousand children are instructed, as well as over a thousand night-scholars; they have also more than five thousand attending Sunday-school. It is very much to be desired and hoped that so useful a body of religious may be everywhere as abundant as in this favored state; and yet there are not enough even there, and probably never will be. The words of our Lord are always verified: “The harvest indeed is great, but the laborers are few.” Still, there will, no doubt, be vocations when they are really asked for.

The _Life of Mother Julia_ is well and clearly printed, and beautifully bound; and the translation was made by an American lady fully qualified 286 for the task.

An excellent portrait of Mother Julia embellishes the book.

THE FOUR GREAT EVILS OF THE DAY. By Henry Edward, Archbishop of Westminster. London: Burns, Oates & Co. 1871. Pp. 142. For sale by The Catholic Publication Society, New York.

The Four Great Evils exposed in these four lectures are the Revolt of the Intellect against God, the Revolt of the Will against God, the Revolt of Society against God, the Spirit of Antichrist. The author shows how the revolt against the Roman Church and the Vicar of Christ results in atheism, immorality, social anarchy, and the disruption of the whole fabric of Christianity, involving the destruction of the human race, and of the world, the Catholic Church excepted, which is preserved by miracle to the end of time. These lectures are very timely, and ought to be read by every reflecting person. The Archbishop of Westminster is equal to the greatest of our modern prelates in his clear insight into Catholic principles, and thorough knowledge of the atheistic and communistic tendencies of Protestantism. Hence the respect, fear, and hatred with which he is regarded by the enemies of the church. One thing especially noticeable in these lectures, and which we have observed with peculiar pleasure, is the exhibition of the intellectual as well as moral degradation of modern infidelity. The superstition and absurdity into which the proud rebellion of the mind against the authority of the church has plunged it is shown by Archbishop Manning, in a different way from that employed by Dr. Newman, but with a force equally irresistible. We recommend all our intelligent readers, and we presume that all our readers are intelligent, who desire to master the true and pure principles of the Catholic religion in their relation to the errors and disorders of the day, to obtain and study carefully all the works of the Archbishop of Westminster.

A CRITICAL GREEK AND ENGLISH CONCORDANCE OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. Prepared by Charles F. Hudson, under the direction of Horace L. Hastings, editor of _The Christian_; revised and completed by Ezra Abbot, LL.D., Assistant Librarian of Harvard University. Second edition, revised. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co. 1871.

This handy little volume is evidently the result of a good deal of painstaking and conscientious labor. As the production of several hands, it is a monument of somewhat heterogeneous scholarship. It professes to be “critical”; and critical and scholarly we are sure it is, so far as it is indebted to the contributions of Dr. Ezra Abbot, a gentleman whose minute bibliographical knowledge is only equalled by his rare modesty, and by his readiness to place his learning at the disposal of others. To his careful hand, we take it, is due the collection of various readings as given by Griesbach, Lachmann, and the latest editions of Tischendorf and Tregelles. The student will find in this compilation a mass of information which we do not remember to have seen in so compact a form elsewhere. For the rest, the work will doubtless fulfil the purpose announced by the editor-in-chief, as a “book available to the mere English reader,” and will be welcomed by evangelical ministers of all denominations who may have felt more or less keenly the need of supplementing the defects in their early classical education by some easy artificial helps. How convenient, for example, when we run against the word γυνή, to find, on the authority of Messrs. Hastings and Hudson, that, in a given number of passages, the majority in fact, it signifies _woman_, undoubtedly _woman_, whereas in several other given passages, including 287 1 Cor. ix. 5, it means _wife_--even though there may be some misgivings about the “margin.” Whether or not it be “critical,” under cover of scholarship, to turn a supposed Greek concordance into nothing more nor less than a quiet vindication of the accuracy of the King James Version, we leave it to ordinary unbelievers to determine.

LIFE OF JOHN BUNYAN, with Notices of some of his Contemporaries, and Specimens of his Style. By D. A. Harsha, M.A., author of “Life of Philip Doddrige, D.D.,” etc. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co. 1871.

Nothing, we suppose, is more likely to strike the ordinary Catholic reader, supposing him even to waste his time over books of the kind, than the great meagreness and poverty of what are known by Protestants as religious lives. Even a non-Catholic, like Mr. Matthew Arnold, has somewhere commented on the superiority of Catholic biographies to Protestant ones, with that air of easy insolence which has made him anything but a pleasing subject for contemplation to the majority of his countrymen and co-religionists.

Mr. Harsha’s life of the allegorizing tinker of Bedford can boast of no advantage in this respect over other efforts of the same general description. It is not, we should say, the fault of the biographer, who seems to have genuine religious instincts, and to be principally hampered by his ignorance of what true spirituality means, and the poverty of the material he works in. These, however, are in his position necessary evils.

This book has other faults for which he is more actively responsible. A man who wonders that Bunyan should have been molested for his religious views under what he, perhaps facetiously, calls the “mild rule of Cromwell” (a characterization that John Evelyn would have been as slow to endorse as any Catholic Irishman of Zedah) and is puzzled to account for his freedom during the reign of the Second James, needs something besides an acquaintance with the _Pilgrim’s Progress_ and Bunyan’s sermons to qualify him for the task of a biographer. Perhaps, however, a thorough knowledge of history would be as successful an agent in the work of un-Protestantizing a sincere man as any other merely human one that could be named.

GRADUALE DE TEMPORE ET DE SANCTIS, juxta Ritum Sacrosanctæ Romanæ Ecclesiæ cum cantu Pauli V. Pont. Max. jussu reformato cui addita sunt officia postea approbata sub auspiciis Sanctissimi Domini Nostri Pii PP. IX. Curante Sacr. Rituum Congregatione, cum privilegio. Ratisbonæ, Neo-Eboraci et Cincinnatii: Sumptibus, chartis et typis Frederici Pustet.

About the time of the opening of the Œcumenical Council, the firm of F. Pustet were permitted by special indult to publish a revised edition of the Gradual known as the Medicean. A commission was appointed by the Sacred Congregation of Rites to undertake this revision, but the suspension of the Council and the political troubles ensuing prevented the completion of their labors. A dispensation, however, was granted to Mr. Pustet to publish and sell the work, adding the portion yet unrevised as it stands in the original edition. We reserve a fuller notice for some future date, when we hope to lay before our readers a critical essay on the various editions of the Gradual and other books of chant published in Europe and Canada.

THE GRAND DEMONSTRATION in Baltimore and Washington, D. C., in honor of the XXVth Anniversary of the Election of Pius IX. to the Chair of St. Peter, June 17, 18, 19. A.D. 1871. Baltimore: John Murphy & Co.

It would be scarcely possible to add anything on the general subject of this handsome brochure--the theme of so many thousand eloquent pens 288 and voices. The celebration in the Province of Baltimore, however, was an exceptional one, as became the oldest See in the United States. Besides the addresses, letters, and resolutions, etc., which we naturally look for in such a publication, it includes encyclical and other letters from His Holiness, and some historical and chronological matter which the reader will find highly useful.

THE MARTYRS OF THE COLISEUM; or, Historical Records of the Great Amphitheatre of Ancient Rome. By the Rev. A. J. O’Reilly, Missionary Apostolic at St. Mary’s, Capetown. London: Burns, Oates, & Co. 1871. For sale by the Catholic Publication Society, New York.

The basis of the narratives of this volume is furnished by the ancient _Acts of the Martyrs_. The story of several of the most illustrious martyrs of the early ages is told by the author, according to history and legend, with some embellishments of imagination, poetry, and fancy. There is also an account of the history of the Coliseum itself, as far as knowledge or probable conjecture can furnish it. The author’s style is warm, exuberant, and brilliant. The volume is instructive and entertaining, and ought to be a favorite, with young people especially.

MANUAL OF PIETY, for the use of Seminarians. Second American Edition. Baltimore: Published by John Murphy & Co., 182 Baltimore Street. 1872.

This is a new edition of an excellent and well-known manual for seminarians. It can hardly be too highly commended either as regards matter or form. It contains an immense amount of matter in a very small space, and the type is clear and beautiful.

MR. ROBERT CODDINGTON has in press, and will publish about Christmas, _The Vicar of Christ; or, Lectures upon the Office and Prerogatives of our Holy Father the Pope_, by Rev. Thomas S. Preston, pastor of St. Ann’s Church, New York, and Chancellor of the Diocese. It will be published uniform in style with the other volumes of Father Preston’s lectures.

The Catholic Publication Society will publish, November 1, _Mary, Queen of Scots, and Her Latest English Historian_, a narrative of the principal events in the life of Mary Stuart, with some remarks on Mr. Froude’s _History of England_, by James F. Meline. This work will contain not only the thorough criticism of Mr. Froude’s _History of England_ as far as made in the five articles on the subject in THE CATHOLIC WORLD--articles which have attracted general attention, and put Mr. Froude upon his defence--but also a complete narrative of the life of Mary Stuart, with a review of those volumes of Mr. Froude’s history not noticed in the articles.

MR. P. DONAHOE, Boston, will soon publish _To and from the Passion Play at Oberammergau, Bavaria_, from the pen of the Rev. George H. Doane, Chancellor of the Diocese of Newark. It will be dedicated to the Rt. Rev. J. R. Bayley, D.D., Bishop of Newark.

KELLY, PIET & CO. announce as in press _The Martyrs of the Coliseum_, by Rev. A. J. O’Reilly.

BOOKS RECEIVED.

From CHARLES SCRIBNER & CO., New York: The Holy Bible according to the Authorized Version (A.D. 1611), with an Explanatory and Critical Commentary, and a Revision of the Translation, by Bishops and other Clergy of the Anglican Church. Edited by F. C. Cook, M.A., Canon of Exeter. Vol. I. Part 1. Genesis-Exodus.

From KAY & BROTHER, Philadelphia: A Collection of Leading Cases in the Law of Elections in the United States, with Notes and References to the latest Authorities. By Frederick C. Brightly.

THE 289

CATHOLIC WORLD.

VOL. XIV., No. 81.--DECEMBER, 1871.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, by REV. I. T. HECKER, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.

THE RECENT EVENTS IN FRANCE.

We have no occasion to dwell on the disastrous events of the war of the second French Empire with Prussia, nor on the still more disastrous results of the feeble efforts of the improvised republic to drive back the German armies from French soil. They are too painful to be dwelt on, and are, probably, as well known to our readers as to ourselves. We may, however, remark that we regard it as a mistake to represent the war as unprovoked by Prussia. The party that declares the war is not always responsible for it. Prussia, by her duplicity, her aggressive spirit, and her menacing attitude to France, gave to the French government ample reason, according to what has long been the usage with European nations, for declaring the war.

We have never been the partisans of Louis Napoleon; but it is only simple justice to say that by his concessions of January, 1870, he had ceased to be the absolute sovereign of France, and had become a constitutional monarch, like the Queen of Great Britain and Ireland, and the declaration of war against Prussia in July of the same year was not his personal act, but the act of the Liberal ministry and the French people, influenced, not unlikely, by the secret societies that had sworn the Emperor’s destruction. Perhaps, when the facts are better known, it will be clearly seen that the Emperor had really no alternative but war with Prussia, or the loss of the French throne for himself and dynasty. Though unprepared, he chose the war, as offering at least a chance of success, and it is not improbable that the result would have been less disastrous both for him and the nation if he had been loyally sustained by the French people, and had not had a more formidable enemy in his rear than in his front. The influences that compelled him to consent to the declaration of war were unfriendly to him, and both before and after the declaration were, not unlikely, indirectly controlled by that astute but unprincipled diplomatist, Bismarck, at present Chancellor of the new German Empire, and through 290 whose adroitness Germany has been Prussianized.

It now also appears that the disaster of Sedan was far less the fault of the Emperor than of his marshals, who acted without his orders, and without concert with one another. If Marshal MacMahon had fallen back on the capital, as Trochu says he advised, instead of attempting to relieve Metz, and given the nation time to rally and concentrate its forces, it is probable the empire would have been saved, and the Prussians been ultimately defeated and driven beyond the Rhine. Even after the disaster of Sedan, the integrity of French territory might have been saved, and peace obtained on far less onerous terms than those which were finally imposed by the conqueror after the surrender of Paris, but for the Parisian mob of the 4th of September, which compelled the Corps Législatif to pronounce, illegally of course, the escheat of the Emperor and the empire, to proclaim the republic, and to suffer a so-called government of defence to be improvised. The disaster of Sedan was great, but it was a mere bagatelle in comparison with that of the revolution effected by the Parisian mob acting under the direction of the secret societies, whose destructive power and influence were so well and so truthfully set forth by Disraeli in his _Lothair_, one of the most remarkable books recently published, and which shows that its author fully understands the great questions, movements, and tendencies of modern society. That revolution was the real disaster, and Paris, not Prussia or Germany, has subjugated France. The French, excepting a few lawyers, journalists, literary dreamers, and the workingmen of the cities and towns, who demanded “_la république démocratique et sociale_,” had no wish for a republic, and were, and are, decidedly anti-republican at heart. The men composing the so-called government of defence were, for the most part, men who had not, and could not inspire it, the confidence of the nation, were men without faith or solid principle, theorists and declaimers, utterly destitute both of civil and military capacity, distrusted, if not detested, by all Frenchmen who retained any sense of religion or any love of country surpassing their love for their own theories. France, perhaps, could have been saved by a loyal support of the empire, and a hearty co-operation with the Imperial government under the Empress-Regent, even after the disaster of Sedan, but not by overthrowing it, and plunging the nation into the revolutionary abyss. The government of defence only hastened the catastrophe by defaming the Imperial government, calumniating it, and publishing every sort of falsehood against it that malice could invent or render plausible, as the event has proved, and all the world is beginning to see and admit.

But for the socialistic revolution, it is now known that, even after the surrender of the Emperor, the Imperial government could have obtained peace without any mutilation of French territory, and on terms, if hard, at least such as could be borne. France would have suffered the mortification of defeat, and would have been compelled to indemnify, as a matter of course, Prussia for the expenses of the war; but she would have suffered no loss of territory, and would have remained, defeated indeed, but not conquered. Europe would have mediated effectually in her favor, for the balance of power requires her preservation; but the European nations could not intervene in favor 291 of a revolution which was a menace to each one of themselves, and Prussia would not and could not treat with a revolutionary committee that had no legal existence and no power to bind the nation.

The insurrection of Paris on the 18th of March, 1871, against the Versailles government, was only the logical continuation of that of the 4th of September against the empire. The same party that made the one made the other. An omnibus would hold nearly all the republicans in France that differ essentially or in principle from the Paris Commune, and its suppression after a fearful struggle is the condemnation of the revolution that overthrew the empire, and also of the government that suppressed it. Its suppression, so absolutely necessary if France or French society is to subsist, was simply the revolution condemning and killing itself. No government can be founded on the revolutionary principle, for that principle is destructive and can found nothing; and hence it is that every revolution is compelled to devour itself; and to be able to reconstruct and maintain political or social order, it must deny its own principle, and as far as possible undo its own work. Yet the Commune is only “scotched, not killed,” and will rear its head again in the first moment a new political crisis comes. A republic of law and order, respecting and maintaining the rights of person and property, such as we regard our own, is at present impracticable in every nation in Europe, with the single exception of Switzerland, for it has no basis in the interior life, the antecedents, the manners, customs, and usages of the people. It was by the aid of non-republican France that the Parisian insurgents were put down. There is in Europe no political _via media_ practicable as yet between the absolutism of Cæsar and the absolutism of the people. Either Cæsar is in the place of God, or the people; and the only religion this nineteenth century tolerates is either monarchical absolutism or popular absolutism; and European society, as we see, only swings like a pendulum from the one to the other, and finds no liberty or chance for free development under either. Its real progress is suspended.

At this moment, France lies prostrate with the iron heel of the conqueror on her neck, and that conqueror, Prussia, a power that never was known to have a noble or generous sentiment, and that has 1806 to avenge. Prussia has not yet relaxed her hold on her prostrate foe, and will not of her own accord, so long as a single sign of life remains. France has now no legal government, no political organization, and, what is the worst, recognizes no power competent to reorganize her society, and reconstitute the state, and has recognized none since the revolution of 1789. Since that worldwide event, she has had no government which she felt herself bound in conscience to obey, or towards which she had any genuine sentiment of loyalty. No government has been able to count on the national support if it became unfortunate, and ceased to gratify the national pride or vanity. The principles of 1789, avowedly accepted as the basis of his government by the Emperor, are destructive of the very sentiment of loyalty, and deny the obligation in conscience of the people to obey authority any longer than it suits their convenience. If a plebiscitum or the popular vote could create a legal government, Louis Napoleon was and is still the legal sovereign of the French people, and, through them, of France. But the nation never had any sentiment of loyalty towards 292 him, and abandons him as it did his greater uncle the moment he becomes unsuccessful. It never felt that it owed him allegiance, and how could it since he professed to hold from it? His government was based on a plebiscitum, and could it bind the nation? It was created by the people, was their creature, and can the creator be loyal to or bound by his own creation? The nation can be bound only by a power above itself and be loyal only to an authority that comes from a source independent of the people.

Louis Napoleon held from 1789, and had the weakness to believe in plebiscitums. He seems never to have understood that universal suffrage can only create an agency, not a government. He was a disciple of the political philosophers of the eighteenth century, who erected revolution into a principle. These philosophers of the eighteenth century made no account of the continuity of the national life, of national habits, customs, and usages, and assumed that the convention might draw up an entirely new constitution according to an abstract and preconceived theory, without regard to the antecedents or past life of the nation, and without any support in the spiritual or supernatural order above the nation, get it adopted by a plurality of votes, and safely rely on _l’intérêt bien entendu_, or enlightened self-interest, to preserve it and secure its successful practical workings as the fundamental law of the nation. The whole history of France for nearly a century, without any reference to our own experience, refutes the absurd theory of the philosophers, or sophists, rather. A French gentleman, still living, told us, before the recent collapse of the second French Empire, that he had witnessed seventeen revolutions or changes of government in his native country, and he is in a fair way of living to see the number increased at least to a score. No government created by and held from the people can govern the people; and, if reason alone or the calculations of interest were sufficient to sustain a government, no government or political constitution would be necessary. Paper constitutions are worthless, save so far as they express the living constitution of the nation. “Constitutions,” Count de Maistre has well said, “are generated, not made”; and the merit of the American constitution is in the fact that it was born with the American people, not made by them.

France was originally constituted by the king, the nobility, the church, with some feeble remains of the old Roman municipalities, subsequently revived and expanded into the _tiers-état_. The balance of her original constitution had been disturbed, it is true; the church and the nobility had been greatly enfeebled by the inordinate growth of monarchy on the one hand, and the expansion of the communal power on the other; but these four fundamental elements of her national constitution still subsisted in more or less force down to the Revolution of 1789. That revolution swept away king, church, and nobility, and proclaimed the _tiers-état_ the nation, without any political organization or power to reconstitute legal or legitimate government. No nation is competent to constitute itself, for till constituted it is only a mass of individuals, incapable of any legal national act. Since then France has been trying in vain to make something out of nothing, and been continually alternating between the mob and despotism--despotism suppressing the mob, and the mob deposing despotism. She at this moment has no legal government, and the French 293 people recognize no power able to reconstitute the state. Her old monarchical constitution, tempered by the church and her old nobility, and restrained by provincial customs, usages, privileges, and franchises, is swept away, and nothing remains of her political life that can serve as the germ or basis of reorganization, or the re-establishment of authority, competent, legally or morally, to bind the nation, restore order, and protect liberty.

Worse than all else is the fact that 1789 swept away the church as a power in the state, and left the state it wished to constitute without any moral support, or power not dependent on the nation to sustain it. It threw the management of public affairs into the hands of men and parties that had no faith in God, who hated or despised religion, and believed only in themselves and the perfectibility of the species. This was the greatest evil of all. A nation may be politically disorganized, and yet be able to recover and re-establish a legal government, if it retains religion as an organized power, independent of the nation; for it then retains a power that has its source in the supernatural, above the people, and able to bind the national will in conscience, and give consistency and a divine sanction to the national ordinations. The first Napoleon had sense enough to see something of this, and to understand that he could not reorganize disorganized France without calling in religion to his aid; he therefore solicited a concordat from the Holy See, and re-established the church. But he had not sense enough to see and understand that even the church could not aid him if holding from himself, or if subjected in her administration to his own or the national will. He committed the usual mistake of secular sovereigns, that of insisting on keeping the control of the ecclesiastical administration in their respective dominions each in his own hands, of using the church to control his subjects, but allowing her no authority over himself.

Nothing can exceed the short-sightedness of secular sovereigns in seeking to keep religion in their respective dominions subject to their will as an adjunct of the police, rather than an independent power holding from God, and alike supreme over sovereigns and subjects. The present hostility to the church, even in old Catholic nations, is in no small measure owing to the fact that the sovereigns have sought to use her to preach submission, resignation, and patience to their subjects, and to uphold the authority of the government, however forgetful of its duties, tyrannical, or oppressive. They have sought to make her their instrument in governing or, rather, misgoverning their subjects, without the liberty to exercise the power which, as the representative of the divine authority on earth, she holds from God, to remind them of their duty to govern their subjects wisely and justly, to rebuke and place them under interdict, and even to declare their power forfeited when they persistently violate the law of God and oppress the people. They thus render her odious to the lovers of freedom. Hence we see the revolution far more bitter against the church than against the sovereigns, who, having rendered her odious by denying her the freedom and independence which are her right, and without which she can render no service either to power or to liberty, have everywhere abandoned her to the tender mercies of her enemies, in the vain hope of conciliating the revolution and saving their own heads. They throw her now as a sop to Cerberus. 294

The power of religion to sustain authority against the insurrection and rebellion of subjects, and liberty against the tyranny of the prince, is in her being an organic power in the nation, but independent of the national will, holding from God, not from the nation or its sovereign, and free to declare and apply the divine law alike to prince and people. Nationalized, she has no support outside of the nation, no power not derived from it, and can give the nation only what it already has in itself. It must follow, not lead the nation, and share its fate, which it has no power to avert. What can the Russian Church do to restrain the tyranny of the Czar? Or the Church of England to check the progress of the revolution now going on and threatening to sweep away king, nobility, and the church first of all? What can it do before the democracy become omnipotent? Why is it that no Gentile nation has ever shown any recuperative energy, but because Gentilism, as the name implies, is nationalism, and the nation has in it only a national religion, and nothing outside, above, or independent of the national authority? The Gentile religion, deprived of catholicity, had to follow the nation, and to share its corruption and its fate. When the nation fell, it fell with it; and the nation, when it fell, fell for ever, and disappeared from the list of nations. Protestantism in its essential principle is a revolt against catholicity, and the subjection of religion to the national will. It is essentially a revival of nationalism, or Gentilism, and hence a Protestant nation has no recuperative energy, and, were it to fall, its fall would be like that of a Gentile nation, a fall without the power to rise again. So it must be with every nation that has only a national or a nationalized religion.

Napoleon, who wished the church only as an adjunct of his own power, never understood anything of all this. He saw that the church was more conservative than Protestantism, and in fact so by virtue of her Catholicity, that she had a stronger hold on the French people, and could serve him better than any Protestant sect; but he did not see that the church, sought for a political end, is necessarily powerless even to that end, and that she serves a political end only when she is sought for her own sake, recognized and supported for a religious end, or as the free and independent kingdom of God on earth. Not understanding this, he refused her unrestrained liberty, and sought by his own legislation to subject her in his own dominions to his own will, and to compel her either to support his policy or to feel the full weight of his vengeance. She must support him, wear his livery, do his bidding, hold his enemies to be her enemies, or he would not tolerate her at all. She, as the church of God, could not accept this position and sink into a mere national church, however powerful the nation. She asserted her independence, and her independence alike of him and those he professed to govern. He commanded her to obey him: she refused. He quarrelled with her, dragged her supreme pontiff from his throne, despoiled him of his estates, imprisoned him, was excommunicated, became powerless before his enemies, was defeated, lost his throne, and was sent by his conquerors to fret his life away as a prisoner of England on the barren isle of St. Helena, leaving French society hardly less disorganized than he found it.

The Restoration which followed was a return toward legitimacy, and under it France actually recuperated with a rapidity which seems 295 marvellous to unbelievers. But it humiliated the nation, because it was imposed on it by foreign bayonets, and its work of reparation and expiation necessarily made it unpopular with all who had profited by the plunder and confiscations of the Revolution, or by the wars of the Empire. The spirit of 1789 still possessed a large portion of the population. The Bourbons returned, also, with the old Gallican traditions of the relation of church and state, which had lost the monarchy, and prepared the people for the old revolution. They would have the church, indeed, but they would never recognize her rightful supremacy; and, though giving France really the best government she had had for a long time, they at length fell before the intrigues of a younger branch of the family, supported by the combined factions of the Bonapartists, republicans, and socialists.

The monarchy of July or the Barricades was, notwithstanding the pretences of the _juste milieu_, or doctrinaires, a purely revolutionary government, improvised in the interests of disorder, without a shadow of legality, and without anything, in the nation or in religion, on which it could rest; and from the first it was spurned by the legitimists, the old national nobility, by the peasantry, the larger part of the republicans, and supported only by the _bourgeoisie_, or business classes, and the Bonapartists, the latter of whom hoped to make it a stepping-stone to the restoration of the Napoleonic empire. It had no hold on the nation, no power to reconstitute it on a solid and permanent basis; and so, as a new generation appeared on the stage, it fell without a struggle before the Parisian mob. It was indifferent rather than avowedly hostile to the church, but it gave free scope to the infidel press, warred against the Jesuits, and maintained the infidel university in the monopoly of education. It, however, indirectly served the cause of religion by the little court favor the bishops could obtain, and who, in consequence, retired, and looked after the interests of religion in their respective dioceses, so that when a Parisian mob overthrew the citizen-king in February, 1848, and proclaimed the republic, the church was really more influential in France than she had been since 1682. She had influence enough to displace the party that made the revolution from the control of public affairs, to defeat and crush the reds and communists in the terrible days of June, 1848, to save French society from utter dissolution, and maintain order under a republic proclaimed by the friends of disorder. We are far from being convinced that, if the bishops and clergy had continued to show the energy in supporting the republic that they did in wresting it from the control of the infidels and destructives, they would not have been able to reconstitute French society on a Catholic and a republican basis, to the advantage alike of religion and society.

Certain it is, the church, though not officially supported by the republic, and had many and bitter enemies in France, was freer under it than she had been since the great Western Schism, and had a fair opportunity to prove to the world that she is wedded to no particular form of government or political organization, and can subsist as well, to say the least, in a republic as in a monarchy. We thought at the time, and we still think, though no enemy to monarchy and no blind defender of republicanism, that the French bishops and clergy committed a grave blunder in abandoning the republic and surrendering 296 French society to the nephew of his uncle--a member of the Carbonari, a known conspirator against the Pope in 1832, and a favorite with the red republicans and socialists. It would be difficult to estimate the damage they did to France and to the cause of religion throughout the world. It will cost, perhaps, centuries of bitter struggle and suffering on the part of Catholics, to repair the sad effects of that blunder. But French Catholics had for ages been accustomed to rely on royal support, and they lacked the robust and vigorous habits under God of self-reliance. The bishops and clergy could easily have marched to a martyrs’ death, but they had with all their experience never learned the folly of putting their trust for the church in princes. They remembered the Reign of Terror; they remembered, also, the flesh-pots of Egypt, and shrank from the hunger, thirst, and fatigue of the desert.

The new emperor found the French people divided into three principal parties--the church or Catholic party, which included the Bourbonists and the better part of the Orleanists; the republican party, properly so-called; and the socialistic or extreme radical party, represented in the recent civil war by the communists of Paris and of all Europe. His policy on commencing his reign was avowedly to keep the control of all these parties in his own hands, by leaving each party something to hope from his government, and allowing no one to gain the ascendency, and, as far as possible, engrossing the whole nation in the pursuit of material goods. He acknowledged the sovereignty of the nation, professed to hold from 1789, and favored universal suffrage, which was in accordance with the views of the republican party; he adopted measures to secure employment to the working-men of the cities and towns, among whom was the great body of the socialists, or communists, by his encouragement of expensive national and municipal works; and, to retain his hold on them and to protect himself from the assassins of the secret societies, he made his Italian campaign, drove the Austrians out of Italy, and prepared the way for Italian unification, and for despoiling the Holy Father of his temporal possessions and sovereignty; raised the salaries paid to clergy as servants of the state, and repaired churches and abbeys as national monuments at the national expense, to please and secure the church party. But he suppressed the freedom the church had enjoyed under the republic, maintained the “organic articles” of his uncle, and all the old Gallican edicts and legislation against the freedom and independence of the church in full force, trusting that she would see a compensation for her loss of liberty in the increased pomp and splendor of her worship or the gilded slavery to which he reduced her.

The recrudescence of infidelity, atheism, or materialism was a marked feature under the Second Empire, and the influence of religion daily and hourly declined; and all the wisdom and energy of the government seemed exerted to _despiritualize_, if we may be allowed the word, the French nation, to extinguish whatever remained of its old chivalric sentiments and its old love of glory, once so powerful in every French heart, and to render the nation intent only on things of the earth, earthy. His policy, being always that of half-measures, disguised as moderation, was not suited to make him true friends. His Italian campaign against Austria was pushed far enough to make Austrians his 297 enemies, but not far enough to make friends of the Italians. His consent to the annexation to Sardinia of the Italian duchies, the Neapolitan kingdom, and the Æmilian provinces of the Holy See, was enough to alienate the friends of international law, and to offend all conservatives and Catholics who had any sense of right or religion; but not enough, so long as he protected the Holy Father in the sovereignty of the city of Rome, to gain him the good-will of the infidels, communists, secret societies, or of the partisans of Italian unity. His policy of never pushing matters to extremes, and of winning and controlling all parties, by leaving each something to hope from him, but never what any one specially desired, necessarily resulted, as might have been foreseen, in offending all parties, and in gaining the confidence of no one. He had by his half-and-half measures succeeded in alienating all parties in France, and, by his Crimean war, his Italian policy, and his half-league with Bismarck to drive Austria out of Germany and increase the territory and power of Prussia, had succeeded equally well in losing the confidence of all the European nations with which he had any relations, and in finding himself without an ally or a friend.

The elections of 1869 disclosed the very unsatisfactory fact that he really had no party in France, and no support but his own creatures, and if he still retained a feeble majority in the popular vote, say of five hundred thousand votes out of an aggregate of six millions and a half, it was from a dread of another revolution, rather than from any attachment to him personally or to his government. This led him to a new line of policy, to abandon _personal_ government, to make large concessions to what is called self-government, and to throw himself into the arms of the apparently moderate liberals, as distinguished on the one hand from the church party, and on the other from the socialists, communists, or destructives, that is, of the feeblest and least popular party in France, and consented to the war against Prussia as his only chance of recovering, by military success, if he gained it, his popularity with the nation. His military expedition having failed, because he had, so to speak, _unmartialized_ his empire, and because he was not really backed by the French people, he was obliged to surrender himself a prisoner of war with his army at Sedan, and his dynasty was expelled by a mob. He had abandoned the Holy Father in order to serve the liberals at home and abroad, deserted the cause of God, and God, and even the liberals, deserted him.

France is to-day not only prostrate under the iron heel of the Prussian, but is without any government in which any party in the nation has any confidence, and, if she recovers at all, her recovery must be slow and painful, and subject to numerous relapses. Prussia, as we have said, will not readily let go her hold, and never, so long as she can help it, suffer her to rise from her present condition. The remote cause is 1789, or rather the causes that led to that uncalled-for and most disastrous revolution; but the proximate cause we must look for in the lack of wise and practical statesmanship in Louis Napoleon, who sought to govern France according to a preconceived theory, worked out in his closet or his solitary studies. When he took the reins of government, the Catholic party were really in the ascendant; and, had he been a wise and practical statesman, he would have seen that the only chance of reorganizing and governing 298 France was not in laboring to maintain an equilibrium of parties, but in throwing himself resolutely on the side of the party, in studying and sustaining, without any compromise with the enemies of God and society, real Catholic interests, and in surrounding himself by thorough-going Catholic statesmen. Catholicity alone offered any solid basis for the state or for authority, order, or liberty. The other parties in the nation were all, in varying degrees, the enemies alike of authority and liberty, and none of them offered any solid basis of government. He should, therefore, have placed his whole confidence in Catholic France, and set them aside, and, if they rebelled, have suppressed them, if necessary, by armed force. Had he done so, and acted in concert with the Holy Father and the religious portion of the nation, he would have reorganized France, given solidity to his power, and permanence to his throne. But from policy or from conviction he chose to hold from 1789, and was incapable of understanding that no government that tolerates the revolutionary principle, or is based on infidelity or the rejection of all spiritual or supernatural authority above the nation, can stand. So-called self-government, without the church of God, teaching and governing all men and nations in all things spiritual, is only a delusion, for the nation needs governing no less than the individual.

But as we have already hinted, there are remoter causes of the present condition of France, and, we may add, of all old Catholic nations; and Catholics must not throw all the blame of that condition on the governments or the revolutionary spirit of 1789, still so rife. They have been and still are the great majority in all these nations, and why should they not be held responsible for the prevalence of the revolutionary spirit, and for the bad secular governments they have suffered to oppress the church? Why have they suffered an anti-Catholic public opinion to grow up and become predominant? Why have they suffered the rights and interests of religion to be sacrificed to the falsely supposed rights and interests of the secular order? Can they pretend that no blame attaches to them for all this?

France has, at least since the death of Philip the Second of Spain, been the foremost Catholic nation of the world, and for a much longer time the leader of modern civilization; and in her we may see the causes that have produced her own fall and that of the other old Catholic nations. France, in this her supreme moment, has not, we believe, a single Catholic in the administration. The president is a believer in no religion; the minister of foreign affairs is no Christian, and besides is a man of very small abilities; the minister of worship and instruction says he is moral, but he is certainly no Catholic. The transition government, opposed as it is by all the other parties in the nation, of course must at present seek to gain the support of the bishops and clergy, or what we call the church party. In Spain, though the majority are Catholics and have votes, the government is in the hands of the enemies of the church. In Italy, a handful of infidels and miscreants are able, though the great body of the people are Catholics and have votes, to control the nation, to violate with impunity every principle of private right and of international law, to confiscate the property of the church and of religious orders, and to despoil the Holy Father, take possession of his capital, and hold him a prisoner in his palace. Why is this 299 suffered? Why is France and every other old Catholic nation ruled by men who have no regard for the church and are opposed to her freedom and independence? Whence in modern times comes this undeniable political inanity of Catholics? Why is it that popular literature, science, and public opinion are throughout the world decidedly anti-Catholic?

Certainly this is not owing to the inaptitude of Catholics as such; for, through all the ages from the fall of the Western Roman Empire to the taking of Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks in the fifteenth century, Catholics were the governing class, and in no period of human history have civilization and the progress of society so rapidly advanced as during this period, which Digby calls the Ages of Faith. It is not, again, owing to any loss of life or vigor in the church herself, as is evinced by the success of her missions in Protestant nations and among savage and barbarous tribes. It is only in old Catholic nations that the church loses ground, and this proves that the cause is not in her. It can be traced to no Catholic cause, but must be traced to some defect in the Catholic administration in these old Catholic nations themselves. Catholics protect Catholic interests better, and have more influence in public affairs in Prussia, in Great Britain and Ireland, in Holland, and the United States, than in Austria, France, Spain, or Italy. Why is this?

One reason we may perhaps find in the failure of pious and devout Catholics to consider the difference between their duties in a Catholic state and what were their duties in the early ages under the pagan emperors. Under the pagan emperors, power was in the hands of their enemies, as it is in infidel, heretical, and schismatical nations now, and they had no political responsibility. All that was incumbent on them was to cultivate the private virtues, to do their best to sanctify their souls, to obey the constituted authorities in all things not contrary to the law of God, and, when the laws of the empire or the edicts of the emperors commanded them to do what the Christian law forbids, to refuse obedience and submit cheerfully to the penalty of disobedience, which in most cases we know was martyrdom. But when the empire became Christian, and especially when Christendom was reconstituted by the conversion of the barbarian nations that succeeded to the empire, the position and duties of Catholics or Christians in some respects changed. Power passed to their hands, and they became responsible for its exercise, and it was their duty to keep it in their own hands, and conform the national legislation and administration to the law of Christ. Catholics then incurred as Catholics a political responsibility which they had not under the pagan emperor, and which they were not free to throw off. The popes always understood this, and acted accordingly; but the ascetic discipline which enjoined detachment from the world was by many devout and earnest souls construed to mean detachment from all part or interest in the political order or the government of Christendom. In consequence, the affairs of state fell, as under the pagan empire, into the hands of Cæsar, or of those who were more ambitious to acquire honors and power than to protect and promote the interests of religion.

This has been more especially the case since the opening of modern history or the rise of Protestantism; and we find among devout Catholics intent on saving their own souls a feeling that there is an incompatibility between politics and religion, and that he who would 300 serve God must leave the affairs of state to men of the world; which is, in effect, to deliver them over to the control of men who are servants of Satan rather than servants of God. The state has, therefore, been given over to the Enemy of souls, because Catholics were led, through a one-sided asceticism, to neglect to keep it in their own hands, and the church has been suffered to be despoiled, her pontiffs, priests, and religious have been suffered to be massacred, for the lack of a little resolution and energy on the part of Catholics to defend their religion and the sacred rights of their church and of society entrusted to their courage and fidelity. Thus a handful of Jansenists, Protestants, Jews, and infidels in France were permitted to establish a reign of terror over twenty-five millions of Catholics, exile their bishops, massacre or banish their priests and religious, suppress religious houses, close the churches, prohibit Catholic worship, abolish religion itself, decree that death is an eternal sleep, and substitute for the worship of the living God the idolatry of an infamous woman, placed upon the altar and adored as the goddess of Reason. All this time, while all these horrors were enacted in the name of the nation, the twenty-five millions of Catholics, except in Brittany and La Vendée, made hardly a show of resistance, and suffered themselves to be led as sheep to the slaughter, forgetful that they owed it to France and to Christendom to sustain and govern their country as a Christian or Catholic nation. It is a duty to pray, and to pray always, but sometimes it is a duty for Christians to fight, and to have not only the courage to die in the battle for a holy cause, but to generous souls the far more difficult courage, the courage to kill. We have observed among French Catholics no lack of courage against a foreign foe, even in a war of more than doubtful necessity or justice, but a fearful lack of courage against the domestic foe, as in the late communist insurrection of Paris. They seem restrained by scruples of conscience.

Another reason may probably be found in the fact already hinted, that the mass of Catholics have been trained and accustomed to rely on external authority; to look for protection and support not to God and themselves, but to the secular government. They have not been accustomed to rely on spiritual authority alone, but on the secular sovereign as a sort of _episcopus externus_. This had no evil consequences so long as the secular sovereign was faithful, and acted only under the direction and authority of, and in concert with, the Supreme Pontiff; but it had a most disastrous effect when the sovereign acted in ecclesiastical matters in his own name, and when he turned against the Pope, and sought to subject the church in his dominions to his own control or supervision, which was not seldom the case. But the clergy and people, accustomed to look to the secular authority to guard the fold against the entrance of the wolves, became slack in their vigilance and remiss in acquiring habits of self-reliance, and, with the inspirations of the Holy Ghost, of self-defence. Consequently, when kings and princes ceased to keep guard, or when they turned wolves themselves, as in the Protestant revolt, the flock was powerless, knew not to whom to look for support, and had no resource but to yield themselves to be devoured by schism, heresy, or apostasy. This is now the case with the great body of the Catholic people in all old Catholic countries. With the vain hope of conciliating the revolution and preserving their thrones, the 301 sovereigns of Europe, without a single exception, have abandoned or turned against the church, and there is not one on whom the Holy Father can count. He is alone, with the kings and princes of the earth either hostile or indifferent to him, while the old habit of relying on the secular authority for support, for the moment at least, paralyzes nearly the whole body of Catholics in all old Catholic nations.

Another reason, growing out of the last, may be found in the habit that has grown up since the rise of Protestantism, of relying on the external almost to the exclusion of the internal authority of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost dwells in the church, and teaches and governs through her as his external organ; he dwells also in the souls of the faithful, and inspires and directs them, and gives vigor, robustness, and self-reliance to their piety. Protestantism assailed the external authority of the church, and made it necessary for Catholics to turn their attention to its defence, and to show that no spirit that disregards it, or that does not assert it and conform to it, can be the spirit of truth, but is the spirit of error, in reality anti-Christ, who, the blessed Apostle John tells, was already in his time in the world; yet it may be that the defence of what we call the external authority of the Holy Ghost, or authority of the church as a teaching and governing body, has caused some neglect in the great body of the faithful of the interior inspirations and guidance of the Holy Ghost in the individual soul. No Catholic will misunderstand us. We appreciate as much as any one can the external authority of the church, her supremacy, her infallibility; we accept _ex animo_ the supremacy and infallibility of the successor of St. Peter in the See of Rome, as defined in the recent Council of the Vatican, and should be no better than a Protestant if we did not; but that external authority is not alone, or alone sufficient, as every Catholic knows, for the soul, and its acceptance is not sufficient for salvation. The Holy Ghost must dwell in the individual soul, forming “Christ within, the hope of glory.” We do not mean to imply that any of our ascetic writers or spiritual directors overlook the need of the interior inspirations and guidance of the Holy Spirit, or fail to give it due prominence, but that its authority has not had due prominence given it in our controversial literature and in our expositions of Catholic faith intended for the public at large.

All these reasons have combined to reduce France, so long the foremost Catholic nation in the world, to her present pitiable condition, hardly more pitiable than that of Italy, Spain, Austria, and the Spanish and Portuguese states of this continent. What is the remedy, or is there none? We do not believe there is no remedy. We do not believe it, because the church proved her power in France under the Republic of 1848, which originated in hostility to her still more than to monarchy; we do not believe it, for we see Catholicity still able to convert the heathen; we do not believe it, because we see Catholicity vigorous and flourishing, and every day gaining ground in Protestant nations, where the church has no external support, and receives no aid from the state, and is thrown back on her own resources as the kingdom of God on earth, as she was under the pagan emperors. These facts prove that she is by no means effete, or incapable of making further conquests. Her decline in old Catholic nations is no sign of weakness or decay in her, but is due to the 302 imperfect training, to the timidity and helplessness of her children, deprived as they are of their accustomed external supports.

The remedy is not, as De Lamennais contended, in breaking with the sovereigns and forming an alliance with the revolution; but in training her children to those interior habits and robust virtues that will enable them to dispense with the external props and supports of civil society, and in asserting for herself in old Catholic nations the freedom and independence she has here, or had in pagan Rome, though it be done at the expense of her temporal goods and of martyrdom. The people of God, under the Old Law, sought support in an arm of flesh; the arm of flesh failed, and they were carried away into captivity. The arm of flesh fails the people of God again. There are Christians, but there is no longer a Christendom. Modern society is hardly less pagan than the ancient society the church found when she went forth from Jerusalem to convert the world. There is no reliance to be placed in the horsemen and chariots of Egypt. The whole world is to-day, as in the time of the apostles, a _missionary_ world; and, perhaps, the greatest embarrassment of the Holy Father is encountered in the fact that Catholics in old Catholic nations cannot see it, but persist in being trained and governed as they were when there was a Christendom. Everywhere the church is by the defections of the governments become again in all nations a missionary church, and her bishops and priests need everywhere to be trained and formed to be wise, persevering, and effective missionaries. Catholics must everywhere be made to understand that it is not the church that needs the state, but the state that needs the church.

France without the church has no power to reorganize the state. She has not yet subdued the revolutionary elements which have so confused her, nor loosed the hold of the conqueror upon her throat, and her present improvised government deserves the confidence of no party in the nation. In itself, the Thiers government is utterly powerless. It needs the church, and cannot stand without her. French Catholics should understand this, and boldly assume the lead of public affairs, if they are men and love their country, and make, as they now can, the republic, under an emperor, king, or president, it matters not much which, a truly Catholic republic, and France, now so low and weak, may become again the nucleus, as under Clovis and St. Clotilde, of a reconstructed Christendom, constituted differently as to politics, it may be, but unchanged as to religion from that which has now passed away. The church never dies, never changes, and cannot be other than she is; but the political organization of Christendom may change with time and events. It changed when the barbarian nations displaced the Roman Empire; it changed when Charlemagne closed the barbarous ages, and opened the way for the feudalism of the middle ages; it changed again when, through the revolution inaugurated by Luther, absolute monarchy succeeded to feudalism in Catholic hardly less than in Protestant Europe; and it may change again when order succeeds to the present revolutionary chaos. It is not likely that Christendom will be reconstructed on its old political basis, whether it is desirable that it should be or not, and, for ourselves, we think that all who hope to see it so reconstructed are sure to be disappointed. We think it not 303 improbable that, when Christendom is reconstituted, it will be politically, on a republican and anti-monarchical basis. Pure absolutism, whether that of Cæsar or that of the people, is incompatible with the recognition of the divine sovereignty, and consequently with religion. Neither form of absolutism can form the political basis of a reconstructed Christendom; but the probabilities are that, when things settle into their places, and the new order begins to emerge, it will be based on some form of republicanism, in which the organic people will take the place of the monarch.

The present condition of things is certainly sad; but we see nothing in it that should lead us to despair of the future. Catholics in old Catholic nations have needed, and perhaps still need, to learn that this church can subsist and conquer the world without any external support of the secular government, but that secular government cannot subsist and discharge properly its duties to society without the church. We who live in Protestant countries, and see society daily dissolving before our eyes, have no need to be taught that lesson; we have already learned it by heart. But the mass of Catholics in old Catholic nations, even of the educated as well as the uneducated, as yet only imperfectly understand it, and consequently render it difficult, if not impossible, for the church to adopt fully and promptly the measures she might judge the most proper to meet the wants of the times. They do not see that the old Christendom has gone, beyond the hope of recovery. Providence, it seems to us, has permitted the present state of things as necessary to disembarrass the church of their inopportune conservatism, and to force them to learn and profit by the lesson which every day becomes more and more necessary for them to heed, if the prosperity of religion is to be promoted, the salvation of souls to be cared for, and the preservation of society assured. The measures taken are severe--very severe, but there are scholars that can be made to learn only by the free use of the ferula. Especially do the Catholics of France need to learn this lesson, for in no other country have Catholics made their religion so dependent on the secular order.

The fall of France, notwithstanding the faith, piety, and charity of so large a portion of her people, will probably prove only a temporary injury to Catholic interests. France has fallen because she has been false to her mission as the leader of modern civilization, because she has led it in an anti-Catholic direction, and made it weak and frivolous, corrupt and corrupting. Providence is severely punishing her; but he has not, we trust, cast her off for ever. She has in her bosom still millions of Catholics, and these have only to come forward in the strength of their religion, displace the enemies of God, take themselves the management of the affairs of the nation, and show the wisdom and energy they did in 1848, when they put down the red republicans and socialists. They will then enable France, in spite of the grasp of the conqueror and the fierce opposition of the destructives, to recover, slowly and painfully, it may be, but nevertheless to recover, and to prove herself greater and more powerful than ever. When France becomes once more a really Catholic nation, the revolution will be extinguished, infidelity will lose its popularity, atheism will no longer dare show its head, and a reaction in favor of the church will take place, so strong and so irresistible 304 that the whole world will be affected by it, and the nations that have so long been alienated from unity will be brought back within the fold.

The only obstacle to this grand result which we see is in the timidity, in the lack of energy on the part of Catholics in the assertion and defence of their religion, or in their want of courage to confide alone in God for success. Adversity, we think, can hardly fail to reform and reinvigorate them, and to direct their attention to their true source of strength as Catholics or the children of God. They will learn from it to adhere more closely to the Chair of Peter, and to rely more on the internal direction of the Holy Ghost, and less on the aid of the secular order. No doubt, the present state of things imposes additional labors as well as sufferings on the bishops and clergy in old Catholic nations, and requires some modifications of the education of the priesthood now given in our seminaries. Our Levites must be trained for a missionary world, not for an old Catholic world; but this need alarm no one; for the greater the labors and sacrifices in the service of God, the greater the merit and the reward.

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A MEMORY.[77]

’Twas only a prayer I heard In that vast cathedral grim, Where incense filled the air And vesper lights burnt dim.

’Twas only a woman’s form, Kneeling with upturned face, That looked through the pictured altar Up to the throne of grace.

Clasped in her small white hands An amber rosary telling; While from her glorious eyes Teardrops fast were weelling.

No thought for the world without, No thought for the stranger near, As pausing and sobbing she murmured, “O Mother of sorrows, hear!”

And I, in a land of strangers, Joined in the pleader’s prayer: Praying for her that I knew not, To Her who I felt was there.

[77] By one who is not a Catholic.

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THE HOUSE OF YORKE. 305