plain, gave out but a subdued, rumbling
sound.

Before beginning, however, the young priest had examined the book. It was
one of those little works of propaganda issued from the Catholic
printing-presses and circulated in profusion throughout all Christendom.
Badly printed, on wretched paper, it was adorned on its blue cover with a
little wood-cut of Our Lady of Lourdes, a naive design alike stiff and
awkward. The book itself was short, and half an hour would certainly
suffice to read it from cover to cover without hurrying.

Accordingly, in his fine, clear voice, with its penetrating, musical
tones, he began his perusal as follows:--

"It happened at Lourdes, a little town near the Pyrenees, on a Thursday,
February 11, 1858. The weather was cold, and somewhat cloudy, and in the
humble home of a poor but honest miller named Francois Soubirous there
was no wood to cook the dinner. The miller's wife, Louise, said to her
younger daughter Marie, 'Go and gather some wood on the bank of the Gave
or on the common-land.' The Gave is a torrent which passes through
Lourdes.

"Marie had an elder sister, named Bernadette, who had lately arrived from
the country, where some worthy villagers had employed her as a
shepherdess. She was a slender, delicate, extremely innocent child, and
knew nothing except her rosary. Louise Soubirous hesitated to send her
out with her sister, on account of the cold, but at last, yielding to the
entreaties of Marie and a young girl of the neighbourhood called Jeanne
Abadie, she consented to let her go.

"Following the bank of the torrent and gathering stray fragments of dead
wood, the three maidens at last found themselves in front of the Grotto,
hollowed out in a huge mass of rock which the people of the district
called Massabielle."

Pierre had reached this point and was turning the page when he suddenly
paused and let the little book fall on his knees. The childish character
of the narrative, its ready-made, empty phraseology, filled him with
impatience. He himself possessed quite a collection of documents
concerning this extraordinary story, had passionately studied even its
most trifling details, and in the depths of his heart retained a feeling
of tender affection and infinite pity for Bernadette. He had just
reflected, too, that on the very next day he would be able to begin that
decisive inquiry which he had formerly dreamt of making at Lourdes. In
fact, this was one of the reasons which