rs. From children, too,
the food of Christian doctrine has not been withheld on Sundays;
and with the children arranged in the form of a procession we went
out during Lent to the military barracks, where after delivering
sermons we reaped fruit not to be ashamed of.

The congregation of scholastics begun this year has made the best
of progress. Every month, according to the rules, they make their
confession to the priest, and partake of the divine food. On feast-days
they spend the afternoons in listening to spiritual reading and in
commemorating the examples of the saints. The solemn feasts of the
Blessed Virgin they celebrate with the greatest fervor and joy. On one
of these they go with their cloaks cast off, each with a silver ewer
and basin in his hands, and carry food to the prisons, marching in the
finest order and system; and with great readiness and humility they
serve the unhappy men. They are believed to have taken their manner
of procedure, in all respects, from the congregation at Rome. The
privileges of the Sodality, also, have so much attracted laymen that it
has been necessary to divide them into two orders. As for the adult men
and householders who look forward to spending Sundays and feast-days
to advantage in the Sodality, the father-visitor has made a beginning,
by delivering to them familiar exhortations, and narratives of pious
examples taken from the Lives of the Saints; and we have every reason
to hope that the undertaking will succeed to the greater glory of
God, with the most noble of advantages to the city. Even now there
are some who, having heard one or another sermon, have entered upon
more holy and profitable ways of living than they followed before.

A beginning was also made this year in selecting some saint's name
by lot (a custom introduced in some towns); and there has been a
great concourse of people. One man was plunged into the sea along
with many others in the naval battle with the Dutch already spoken
of; but because he invoked the name of his patron, St. Nicanor, who
had fallen to his lot that month, he was rescued from that danger in
which the others were swallowed up; and by swimming a whole league
at last got to shore, to his own great wonder.

The number of those confessing and communicating this year has
surpassed that of any previous year, for upon their old devotion has
been heaped up new, kindled by the torches of calamity. The quarrels
of many have also been brought