ent a
peaceful existence there, engaged in avocations of which she became very
fond. She was so delicate, so frequently ill, that she was employed in
the infirmary. In addition to the little assistance she rendered there,
she worked with her needle, with which she became rather skilful,
embroidering albs and altar-cloths in a delicate manner. But at times
she, would lose all strength, and be unable to do even this light work.
When she was not confined to her bed she spent long days in an
easy-chair, her only diversion being to recite her rosary or to read some
pious work. Now that she had learnt to read, books interested her,
especially the beautiful stories of conversion, the delightful legends in
which saints of both sexes appear, and the splendid and terrible dramas
in which the devil is baffled and cast back into hell. But her great
favourite, the book at which she continually marvelled, was the Bible,
that wonderful New Testament of whose perpetual miracle she never
wearied. She remembered the Bible at Bartres, that old book which had
been in the family a hundred years, and whose pages had turned yellow;
she could again see her foster-father slip a pin between the leaves to
open the book at random, and then read aloud from the top of the
right-hand page; and even at that time she had already known those
beautiful stories so well that she could have continued repeating the
narrative by heart, whatever might be the passage at which the perusal
had ceased. And now that she read the book herself, she found in it a
constant source of surprise, an ever-increasing delight. The story of the
Passion particularly upset her, as though it were some extraordinary
tragical event that had happened only the day before. She sobbed with
pity; it made her poor suffering body quiver for hours. Mingled with her
tears, perhaps, there was the unconscious dolour of her own passion, the
desolate Calvary which she also had been ascending ever since her
childhood.

When Bernadette was well and able to perform her duties in the infirmary,
she bustled about, filling the building with childish liveliness. Until
her death she remained an innocent, infantile being, fond of laughing,
romping, and play. She was very little, the smallest Sister of the
community, so that her companions always treated her somewhat like a
child. Her face grew long and hollow, and lost its bloom of youth; but
she retained the pure divine brightness of her eyes, the beau