the
most obstinate stand for principle; and to yield to popular
superstition, is that worthy of a man who has been instructed? At the
same time it raised a great anger in my mind that all that should be
thought of was a thing so trivial. That they should have given
themselves, soul and body, for a little money; that they should have
scoffed at all that was noble and generous, both in religion and in
earthly things; all that was nothing to them. And now they would insult
the great God Himself by believing that all He cared for was a little
mass in a convent chapel. What desecration! What debasement! When I went
to M. le Cure, he smiled at my vehemence. There was pain in his smile,
and it might be indignation; but he was not furious like me.

'They will conquer you, my friend,' he said.

'Never,' I cried. 'Before I might have yielded. But to tell me the
gates of death have been rolled back, and Heaven revealed, and the great
God stooped down from Heaven, in order that mass should be said
according to the wishes of the community in the midst of the sick wards!
They will never make me believe this, if I were to die for it.'

'Nevertheless, they will conquer,' M. le Cure said.

It angered me that he should say so. My heart was sore as if my friend
had forsaken me. And then it was that the worst step was taken in this
crusade of false religion. It was from my mother that I heard of it
first. One day she came home in great excitement, saying that now indeed
a real light was to be shed upon all that had happened to us.

'It appears,' she said, 'that Pierre Plastron was in the hospital all
the time, and heard and saw many wonderful things. Sister Genevieve has
just told me. It is wonderful beyond anything you could believe. He has
spoken with our holy patron himself, St. Lambert, and has received
instructions for a pilgrimage--'

'Pierre Plastron!' I cried; 'Pierre Plastron saw nothing, ma mere. He
was not even aware that anything remarkable had occurred. He complained
to us of the Sisters that they neglected him; he knew nothing more.'

'My son,' she said, looking upon me with reproving eyes, 'what have the
good Sisters done to thee? Why is it that you look so unfavourably upon
everything that comes from the community of St. Jean?'

'What have I to do with the community?' I cried--'when I tell thee,
Maman, that this Pierre Plastron knows nothing! I heard it from the
fellow's own lips, and M. le Cure was present and hea