Superior.

The struggle soon began, one of those covert, desperate, mortal struggles
which are waged under the cloak of ecclesiastical discipline. There was a
pretext for rupture all ready, a field of battle on which the longer
purse would necessarily end by conquering. It was proposed to build a new
parish church, larger and more worthy of Lourdes than the old one already
in existence, which was admitted to have become too small since the
faithful had been flocking into the town in larger and larger numbers.
Moreover, it was an old idea of Abbe Peyramale, who desired to carry out
the Virgin's orders with all possible precision. Speaking of the Grotto,
she had said that people would go "thither in procession"; and the Abbe
had always seen the pilgrims start in procession from the town, whither
they were expected to return in the same fashion, as indeed had been the
practice on the first occasions after the apparitions. A central point, a
rallying spot, was therefore required, and the Abbe's dream was to erect
a magnificent church, a cathedral of gigantic proportions, which would
accommodate a vast multitude. Builder as he was by temperament,
impassioned artisan working for the glory of Heaven, he already pictured
this cathedral springing from the soil, and rearing its clanging belfry
in the sunlight. And it was also his own house that he wished to build,
the edifice which would be his act of faith and adoration, the temple
where he would be the pontiff, and triumph in company with the sweet
memory of Bernadette, in full view of the spot of which both he and she
had been so cruelly dispossessed. Naturally enough, bitterly as he felt
that act of spoliation, the building of this new parish church was in
some degree his revenge, his share of all the glory, besides being a task
which would enable him to utilise both his militant activity and the
fever that had been consuming him ever since he had ceased going to the
Grotto, by reason of his soreness of heart.

At the outset of the new enterprise there was again a flash of
enthusiasm. At the prospect of seeing all the life and all the money flow
into the new city which was springing from the ground around the
Basilica, the old town, which felt itself thrust upon one side, espoused
the cause of its priest. The municipal council voted a sum of one hundred
thousand francs, which, unfortunately, was not to be paid until the new
church should be roofed in. Abbe Peyramale had alrea