ect him
at any risk. Prior Saint-Jean arose, and looked forth--with wonder. A
brief spell of sunshine amid the rain had clothed the vale with a
marvel of blue flowers, if it were not rather with remnants of the blue
sky itself, fallen among the woods there. But there too, in the little
courtyard, [170] the officers of justice are already in waiting to take
him, on the charge of having caused the death of his young server by
violence, in a fit of mania, induced by dissolute living in that
solitary place. One hitherto so prosperous in life would, of course,
have his enemies.

The monastic authorities, however, claim him from the secular power, to
correct his offence in their own way, and with friendly interpretation
of the facts. Madness, however wicked, being still madness, Prior, now
simple Brother, Saint-Jean, is detained in a sufficiently cheerful
apartment, in a region of the atmosphere likely to restore lost wits,
whence indeed he can still see the country--vallis monachorum. The one
desire which from time to time fitfully rouses him again to animation
for a few moments is to return thither. Here then he remains in peace,
ostensibly for the completion of his great work. He never again set
pen to it, consistent and clear now on nothing save that longing to be
once more at the Grange, that he may get well, or die and be well so.
He is like the damned spirit, think some of the brethren, saying "I
will return to the house whence I came out." Gazing thither daily for
many hours, he would mistake mere blue distance, when that was visible,
for blue flowers, for hyacinths, and wept at the sight; though blue, as
he observed, was the colour of Holy Mary's gown on the illuminated
page, the colour of hope, of merciful [171] omnipresent deity. The
necessary permission came with difficulty, just too late. Brother
Saint-Jean died, standing upright with an effort to gaze forth once
more, amid the preparations for his departure.

NOTES

142. *Published in Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Nov. 1893, and now
reprinted by the kind permission of the proprietors.

154. *Or sundial, as some maintain, though turned from the south.

154. +Latin Vulgate (ed. Saint Jerome) Psalm 126, verse 1: "canticum
graduum Salomonis nisi Dominus aedificaverit domum in vanum
laboraverunt qui aedificant eam nisi Dominus custodierit civitatem
frustra vigilavit qui custodit." King James Bible's translation: "When
the Lord turned again the capti