ross themselves.

"And look at Pupasse's sins! Oh, but they are long! _Ma chere_, but
look! But look, I ask you, at them!"

The longest record was of course the most complimentary and honorable
to the possessor, as each girl naturally worked not only for
absolution but for fame.

Between catechisms and instructions Madame Joubert would have "La Vie
des Saints" read aloud, to stimulate their piety and to engage their
thoughts; for the thoughts of first communicants are worse than flies
for buzzing around the forbidden. The lecture must have been a great
quickener of conscience; for they would dare punishment and cheat
Madame Joubert, under her own eyes, in order surreptitiously to add a
new sin to their list. Of course the one hour's recreation could not
afford time enough for observation now, and the little girls were
driven to all sorts of excuses to get out of the classroom for one
moment's peep through the shutters; at which whole swarms of them
would sometimes be caught and sent into punishment.

Only two days more. Madame Joubert put them through the rehearsal,
a most important part of the preparation, almost as important as
catechism--how to enter the church, how to hold the candle, how to
advance, how to kneel, retire--everything, in fact.

Only one day more, the quietest, most devotional day of all. Pupasse
lost her sins!

Of course every year the same accident happened to some one. But it
was a new accident to Pupasse. And such a long list!

The commotion inside that retreat! Pupasse's nasal whine, carrying her
lament without any mystery to the outside garden. Such searching of
pockets, rummaging of corners, microscopic examination of the floor!
Such crimination and recrimination, protestation, asseveration,
assurances, backed by divine and saintly invocations! Pupasse accused
companion after companion of filching her sins, which each after
each would violently deny, producing each her own list from her own
pocket,--proof to conviction of innocence, and, we may say, of guilt
also.

Pupasse declared they had niched it to copy, because her list was the
longest and most complete. She could not go to confession without her
sins; she could not go to communion without confession. The tears
rolled down her long thin nose unchecked, for she never could remember
to use her handkerchief until reminded by Madame Joubert.

She had committed it to memory, as all the others had done theirs;
but how was she to kno