into the world deaf and dumb. The unfortunate
mother believed the calamity a punishment for her own sin. "Ah, would,"
said she, "that the affliction had fallen only upon me! Wretch that I
am, my innocent child is punished for my offence!" This, idea haunted
her night and day; she pined and could not be comforted. As the child
grew up, and wound himself more and more round her heart, his caresses
added new pangs to her remorse; and at length (continued the narrator)
hearing perpetually of the holy fame of the Tomb of Cologne, she
resolved upon a pilgrimage barefoot to the shrine. "God is merciful,"
said she; "and He who called Magdalene his sister may take the mother's
curse from the child." She then went to Cologne; she poured her tears,
her penitence, and her prayers at the sacred tomb. When she returned to
her native town, what was her dismay as she approached her cottage to
behold it a heap of ruins! Its blackened rafters and yawning casements
betokened the ravages of fire. The poor woman sank upon the ground
utterly overpowered. Had her son perished? At that moment she heard
the cry of a child's voice, and, lo! her child rushed to her arms, and
called her "mother!"

He had been saved from the fire, which had broken out seven days before;
but in the terror he had suffered, the string that tied his tongue had
been loosened; he had uttered articulate sounds of distress; the curse
was removed, and one word at least the kind neighbours had already
taught him to welcome his mother's return. What cared she now that
her substance was gone, that her roof was ashes? She bowed in grateful
submission to so mild a stroke; her prayer had been heard, and the sin
of the mother was visited no longer on the child.

I have said, dear Gertrude, that this story made a deep impression upon
Lucille. A misfortune so nearly akin to that of St. Amand removed by the
prayer of another filled her with devoted thoughts and a beautiful hope.
"Is not the tomb still standing?" thought she. "Is not God still in
heaven?--He who heard the guilty, may He not hear the guiltless? Is He
not the God of love? Are not the affections the offerings that please
Him best? And what though the child's mediator was his mother, can
even a mother love her child more tenderly than I love Eugene? But if,
Lucille, thy prayer be granted, if he recover his sight, _thy_ charm
is gone, he will love thee no longer. No matter! be it so,--I shall at
least have made him happy!