hrew herself entirely
into his hands, even more so than he wanted. She was of ripe age,
extremely vehement for a woman of forty-seven, depraved and ready for
anything, ready to do him service of whatever kind, no matter what he
might do or be, whether he were a sinner or a saint.

This Guiol, besides her Carmelite daughter at Marseilles, had another,
a lay-sister to the Ursulines of Toulon. The Ursulines, an order of
teaching nuns, formed everywhere a kind of centre; their parlour, the
resort of mothers, being a half-way stage between the cloister and the
world. At their house, and doubtless through their means, Girard saw
the ladies of the town, among them one of forty years, a spinster,
Mdlle. Gravier, daughter of an old contractor for the royal works at
the Arsenal. This lady had a shadow who never left her, her cousin La
Reboul, daughter of a skipper and sole heiress to herself; a woman,
too, who really meant to succeed her, though very nearly her own age,
being five-and-thirty. Around these gradually grew a small roomful of
Girard's admirers, who became his regular penitents. Among them were
sometimes introduced a few young girls, such as La Cadiere, a
tradesman's daughter and herself a sempstress, La Laugier, and La
Batarelle, the daughter of a waterman. They had godly readings
together, and now and then small suppers. But they were specially
interested in certain letters which recounted the miracles and
ecstacies of Sister Remusat, who was still alive; her death occurring
in February, 1730. What a glorious thing for Father Girard, who had
led her to a pitch so lofty! They read, they wept, they shouted with
admiration. If they were not ecstatic yet, they were not far from
being so. Already, to please her kinswoman, would La Reboul throw
herself at times into a strange plight by holding her breath and
pinching her nose.

* * * * *

Among these girls and women the least frivolous certainly was
Catherine Cadiere, a delicate, sickly girl of seventeen, taken up
wholly with devotion and charity, of a mournful countenance, which
seemed to say that, young as she was, she had felt more keenly than
anyone else the great misfortunes of the time, those, namely, of
Provence and Toulon. This is easily explained. She was born during the
frightful famine of 1709; and just as the child was growing into a
maiden, she witnessed the fearful scenes of the great plague. Those
two events seemed to have