Chapter III (4)

Jean-Louis, notwithstanding his sadness, could not help smiling at these hopeful words, spoken by this good and beautiful girl, so reasonable in all things, and still always so cheerful. He pressed her hand, and helped her set the table for supper. Michou, reflecting on these words of Solange, wisely remarked that the future being in the hands of God, who always concealed it from us through mercy or to grant us agreeable surprises, it was unbecoming in us to torment ourselves too much about it.

At which speech good Pierre, who never liked trouble, loudly applauded; and then, the repast being served, all sat down to table, and, while eating, conversed on various topics not the least connected with Muiceron.

XV.

According to his promise, Michou the next day paid an early visit to the Ragauds, accompanied by his old blackened pipe, which he always kept firmly between his teeth when he feared he might become impatient or angry in conversation. He said that, without it, the big words would rush out of his mouth before he had time to prevent them; but that, with it, while he smoked, shook it, or relighted it, he regained his composure, and gathered time to arrange his ideas. And never was _puffer_--as he called his pipe--more necessary than on this visit to Muiceron. Seeing his friends on the point of throwing themselves into the enemy's clutches, and knowing that remonstrance would avail nothing, he felt that anger and sorrow might carry him to any extremity--in words only, let it be well understood.

He found Ragaud seated before the door, shelling gray peas, while Pierrette was washing dishes; for, since she had commenced to feed the Perdreaux, all the crockery was in use, and they went to bed so late half the work remained for next day.

"I wish you good-morning," said Michou to his friends. "I see you are very busy, but I have only come to remain a few moments."

"Come in," said Pierrette.

"No, I prefer to remain outside," replied Michou. "I like the fresh air. Ragaud, do you feel inclined to do me a favor?"

"What a question!" said the good man. "I am always ready for that, my old friend."

"Thank you, it is not a very great request. Can you spare me Jean-Louis for a fortnight? I have twenty men at work in the wood of Montreux, and no one to oversee them. The young fellow can help me a great deal."

"Very willingly," said Ragaud; "the hemp is nearly ready, and I do not want Jeannet just now."

"He will take his meals with me," replied Michou, "and sleep at my house the nights. He will be obliged to work late; so you need not be uneasy if he does not return home sometimes."

"Agreed," said Ragaud. "Do you employ the wood-cutters of the neighborhood?"

"Deuce take it, no!" replied Michou. "I hire them right and left, and truly they are the stupidest asses. The way they talk makes one's hair stand up under his cap."

"Bah! what do they say?"

"Devilish nonsense! Why, they talk of nothing but revolution, overthrowing everything and everybody, massacring the nobility, and theft. I remember how my father, long ago, told me about the people before the Reign of Terror, and I imagine these men must be something of the same stamp. Some of them disappear sometimes; when they return, they speak in whispers, and, when I order them to go to work, you should see the way they glare at me. It is very well I don't know what fear means; but, reinforced by Jeannet, all will go well."

"Take him right away," said Ragaud; "and if he is not enough, well, send for me; I will give you a helping hand."

"You?" replied Michou, who commenced to mumble over his pipe. "You are too busy in this house with the wedding."

"Oh! it is not going to be to-morrow," said Ragaud; "the day of betrothal is not yet fixed. I leave all that to good M. Perdreau. He is taking a great deal of trouble; and I am glad he is, for I know precious little about legal matters."

"So, then, you don't bother yourself with anything?--very pretty conduct on your part."

"What should I do?" asked Ragaud innocently. "Each one has his part to play. M. Perdreau was brought up among books, and I at the plough. When he has the papers ready, he will tell me where to sign my name."

"And you will sign it?"

"Undoubtedly, after he has read them to me."

"All very nice," said Michou. "If I were in your place, I would sign without reading them; it would be more stupid...."

"What do you say?" asked Ragaud.

"I say," replied Jacques, "if you will allow me to offer a word of advice, you will not only make them read your daughter's marriage contract to you, but also have it read to others--to M. le Curé, for example; he is learned also--that he is."

"That would be insulting to M. Perdreau."

"Not at all. Two such learned men would soon understand each other. After all, you know, you must do as you think best. Good-morning! Thank you for Jean-Louis; send him to me quickly. I must hurry off to my rascally wood-cutters in the wood of Montreux."

And the game-keeper turned his back without waiting for an answer, puffing away at his pipe so tremendously his cap was in a cloud of smoke.

Ragaud continued to shell his peas, but it was easy to see he felt rather anxious. Nevertheless, when he had ended his work, he re-entered the house without showing any discomposure.

Jean-Louis left home that morning to spend a fortnight with Michou, depressed in spirits, but still hoping the best. On passing through Val-Saint, he stopped at M. le Curé's, who confirmed all that Michou had said about the Perdreaux. That dear, good man was much distressed, but could not think of any remedy for the evil; but he promised Jeannet to say Mass for the family, and highly approved of his leaving Muiceron for a time.

Meanwhile, the Ragauds acted as though they were bewitched. During the first week after the departure of Jeannet, his name was scarcely mentioned, even by Pierrette. They appeared to have lost all recollection of the services the excellent-hearted boy had rendered his adopted parents. No one thought of him or noticed him when he returned sometimes late at night from his hard day's work; and, had it not been for the good Luguets, poor Jean-Louis would have been as isolated in the world as if he had been brought up in a foundling asylum--his first destination. But God did not abandon him, and, although always very sad, he did not lose courage. Every evening, whether he returned or not to Muiceron, he visited his friends, and there, with Pierre and Solange, he recovered his good-humor, or at least maintained his gentleness and resignation. His friendship for Solange increased day by day. He suspected nothing, nor she either; for although very friendly and intimate, they only felt toward each other like brother and sister. However, all was known in the village--better, perhaps, than elsewhere--and the gossips commenced to say that the devout Solange jumped at marriage as quickly as any other girl. Several of the girls even commenced to tease her about him; all of which she received gently, and smiled without being displeased, contenting herself with the remark that, after all, she might choose worse; and her work was continued more faithfully than ever.

One evening, when Pierre and his parents remained rather late at the fair at Andrieux, which is three good leagues from Ordonniers, and which is only reached by roads very difficult to travel in the bad season, Jeannet, as usual, went to the Luguets, and was surprised to find Solange all alone. She blushed slightly when she saw him, not from embarrassment, however, but only, I imagine, because she remembered the reports that were circulating in the village. Jeannet took his usual seat, which was always near hers. The month of November was nearly ended, and that morning Michou had told Jean-Louis that Jeannette's betrothal would take place a little before Christmas, and the marriage soon after. The poor fellow was overwhelmed with sorrow; he poured all his grief into Solange's ear, and so great was his confidence in her that he allowed himself to weep in her presence.

"You have lost your courage and become thoroughly hopeless," said Solange gently. "I don't like that in a man, still less in a Christian."

"How can I help it? Am I made of stone?" replied Jeannet, his head buried in his hands. "Alas! alas! Solange, I believed your words. I thought that God would have mercy on us, and that this unfortunate marriage would not take place."

"I don't see that it has yet," replied Solange. "In the first place, they only speak of signing the contract a month from now, and up to then the mill will turn more than once; and, after all, does not God know better than we what is good for us, poor blind things that we are?"

"That is true; but to see Jeannette the wife of that man, without faith or fear of God or law; to see my old father and dear, good mother reduced to want; to be obliged to leave the country, and never see Muiceron again! For think, Solange, that Jeannette, when she signs her marriage contract, will know that I am not her brother! I will not wait to be told that my place is outside of the house. God knows I have worked for my parents, and their tenderness never humiliated me, but to receive a benefit from Isidore--no, never!" cried Jean-Louis, raising his eyes that flashed with honest pride.

"You are right in that," said Solange quietly; "but listen a moment, ... and first sit down there," she added, gently placing her hand on his arm. "Come to your senses. There, now, can you yet listen patiently to me?"

"Go on," said Jean-Louis obediently; "you need not talk long to calm me."

"Well," resumed Solange, resting her elbow on the table in such a manner that her sweet face nearly touched Jeannet's shoulder, "I will repeat again that the story is not yet ended; but as this good reason is not weighty enough for your excited brain, I beg you will tell me why you think Jeannette will despise you when she will learn that you are not her brother."

"But how can you expect it to be otherwise, my dear friend? Is it not against me that I seem to be installed in her house for life? that I have had half the hearts of her parents? Do you think that Isidore, who detests me, will not tell a thousand falsehoods to prejudice her against me? Ah! Solange, I have suffered terribly during the last month; but to see Jeannette regard me as an intruder; to have her crush me with her scorn, and make me feel that I am a foundling, picked up from the gutter--it is beyond all human strength, and the good God will not compel me to endure such agony. I will not expose myself to such a trial."

"But what can you do? You cannot get work in the country without running the risk of meeting her at every turn."

"I will manage it," said Jean-Louis. "France is a kind mother, Solange, and has never refused food to one of her sons, even though he had no name but the one given in baptism. I know that my dear father intended to procure a substitute for me; but, in the present situation, I can no longer accept a cent of Jeannette's inheritance, which will one day be Isidore's."

"Good," said Solange. "But wait another moment. All this is still in the future, since you can only be drawn next year; so put that aside. I will only say that you have spoken like a good-hearted fellow, for which I don't compliment you, as I knew you were that before. But, to return to what we were speaking of, why do you think you will be scorned by Jeannette? Come, now, tell me all. You love the little thing? and ... more than a brother loves a sister?"

"Ah!" cried Jeannet, hiding his face, which he felt crimsoning, like a young girl surprised, "you drag the last secret from my heart. Yes, I love her, I love her to madness, and that adds to the bitterness of my despair. May God pardon me! I have already confessed it, but with my great sorrow is mingled a wicked sentiment. Solange! I am jealous; I know it well. What can you expect? I was so before I knew it, and I cannot drive it from me. Did I ever feel that she was not my sister? No, not once until the day that there was question of her marriage; and yet," added he clasping his hands, "God, who hears me, knows that if she had chosen one worthy of her, I would have had the strength to conquer it for the sake of her happiness. But so many misfortunes have made me what I am, and--what I only avow to you--incapable of surmounting my jealousy and dislike."

While he spoke thus, beautiful Solange smiled, not like a scornful woman, who has no pity for feelings to which she is insensible, but like a mother who is sure of consoling her sick child. Her clear, tranquil eyes rested upon Jean-Louis, who gradually raised his, that he might look at her in his turn; for everything about this girl of twenty years was so gentle and calm, and at the same time so good, one always expected to receive consolation from her.

"You wish to scold me?" said Jean-Louis. "If so, do it without fear, if you think I am in fault."

"Not at all," she replied; "there is nothing wrong in what you have confided to me, Jeannet. I pity you with my whole heart, only I scarcely understand you."

"Why so, Solange? You are, however, very kind, and certainly have a heart."

"I hope so," said she; "but when a creature is loved so dearly, she should be esteemed in every respect."

"Don't I esteem Jeannette? O Solange! why do you say that?"

"But I only repeat what you first said, my child," she replied in her maternal tone, which was very sweet in that young mouth. "You think her capable of despising you, and imagine that she will disdain you when she learns the misfortune of your birth; therefore, you do not esteem her, and so, I repeat, I can't understand such great affection."

"You can reason very coolly about it," said Jeannet; "but if your soul were troubled like mine, you would not see so clearly to the bottom of things."

"It is precisely because you are so troubled that the good God permits this conversation to-night," she replied. "Let me tell you now why I still hope. Jeannette at this moment sins by the head, but her heart is untouched; and here is the proof: the secret you so dread her knowing she has known as well as either of us for more than three months. Have you seen any change in her manner?"

"Oh! is it possible?" cried Jeannet. "And who told her?"

"I myself," answered Solange. "She had heard at the château some words dropped by Dame Berthe, which excited her curiosity. After her sickness, when I went to stay with her, she one day asked an explanation of her doubts; and as I feared, if she questioned others, she would not be properly answered, I told her all."

"You did right; and what was her reply?"

"She threw herself in my arms, and thanked me," said Solange. "For more than an hour she spoke of her great affection for you, which time had augmented instead of diminishing. She wept for your misfortune, and thanked God that her parents had acted so well, as by that act they had given her a brother; and never did I see her so gentle, tender, and kind. She made me promise I would never tell you that she knew your secret; but the poor child did not then foresee the necessity that compels me to speak to-night on account of your wicked thoughts."

"Dear, dear Jeannette!" said Jean-Louis, with tears in his eyes.

"I have heard lately," continued Solange, "that she came near sending off Isidore, because he presumed, thinking she knew nothing, to make some allusion to the subject. She declared that she considered you her brother, and those who wished to be friends of hers must think the same."

"Say no more," said Jeannet. "I will love her more than ever."

"No," replied she, "it is useless. Only don't despair. Take courage, for there is always hope when the heart is good; and the moment this poor child, who is now acting without reflection, will know she should despise Isidore, she will dismiss him and drive him away as she would a dangerous animal."

"But will she ever know it?" said Jean-Louis.

"Hope in God," replied the pious girl. "Has he ever yet abandoned you?"

"Beg him to make me as confident as you," said he, looking at her with admiration. "What good you do me! How can I repay you, Solange, for such kind words?"

"Perhaps," said she seriously--"perhaps, one day, I may ask you to do me a great service."

"Really! Let me know it now. I will be so happy to serve you."

"Yes? Well, then, I will," replied Solange, after a moment's hesitation. "You have laid bare your heart to me; I will return your confidence. Jean-Louis, I also have a secret love in my soul, and I will die if I do not obtain what I desire."

"You!" said Jeannet, astonished; "you, dear Solange! I always thought you so quiet and so happy in your life."

"It is true," said she, sighing. "I look so, because I cannot let people see what they could not understand. But with you, Jean-Louis, it is different; I can tell you everything."

"I hope, at least," said Jeannet, smiling, "that he whom you love is worthy of your esteem."

"Oh! yes," she replied, crossing her arms on her breast, while her pale, beautiful face crimsoned with fervor--"oh! yes, for he whom I love is the Lord our God. I wish to be a Sister of Charity, Jeannet, and until then there will be no happiness on earth for me."

Jean-Louis for a moment was dumb with surprise at this avowal; then he knelt before her, and kissed her hands.

"I might have suspected it," said he, much moved; "you were not made to live the ordinary life of the world. God bless you, dear Solange, and may his holy angels accompany you! But what can I do to aid you in your holy wishes?"

"Much," she replied; "you can inform my parents, and afterwards console them; reason with Pierre, who will be half crazy when he hears of my departure; and perhaps you can even accompany me to Paris, for I am afraid to go alone. I have never been away from home, and I would not dare venture on that long journey."

"But, dear Solange, you will need a great deal of money for that."

"Oh!" said she, laughing, "do you think me a child? For two years I have deprived myself of everything, and I have more than enough. See," she added, opening a little box, which she kept hidden under a plaster statue of the Blessed Virgin, which stood near her bed. "Count!"

"Three hundred francs!" said Jeannet, after having counted; "and ten, and twenty, and thirty more--three hundred and sixty, besides the change. There are nearly four hundred francs."

"There will be when I am paid for what I am now embroidering," said she. "Is that enough?"

"Ten times too much," replied Jeannet. "Poor dear Solange! what happiness to think that I shall see you until the last moment!"

"And afterwards again," said she gaily; "the white cornets are made to go over the world. We will meet again, don't fear!"

It is truly said that example is better than precept. Jean-Louis became a man again before that beautiful and pious girl, so brave and so good. His heart was comforted, his soul strengthened. He would have blushed now to weep about his sorrows, when Solange was about to sacrifice her whole life to the sorrows of others. She commenced to play her part of Sister of Charity with him, and God doubtless already blessed her; for never did balm poured into a wound produce a more instant effect.

They finished their little arrangements just as the Luguets returned home. Pierre was rather gay, as he could not go to the fair without drinking with his friends; and when a man's ordinary drink is water colored with the skins of grapes, half a pint is enough to make him feel jolly.

Therefore, when he found Solange and Jeannet in conversation, looking rather more serious than usual, he commenced to look very wise, whistled, winking from one to the other, to let them know he understood what was going on. Jean-Louis was seated near the fire, and pondered over the mutual confidences made that evening. He paid little attention to Pierre's manœuvres; but Solange saw them, and, while laying the cloth for supper, begged her brother to explain, in good French what was on his mind.

"Yes, yes, my pretty one!" said he, trying to put his arm around her waist, something which she did not permit even in him; "we know something about you."

"Nothing very bad," she replied, laughing; "here I am before you in flesh and blood, and you see I am not at all sick."

"Don't be so sly," he answered; "this is not the time. We returned from the fair with lots of acquaintances, and every one told us you were going to be married, and that your bans would be published next Sunday."

"It is rather too soon," said Solange quietly; "the consent of the parents will be needed, and I don't know yet whether it will be given. And to whom shall I be married? Those people who are so well informed should have told you that."

Thereupon Pierre, without answering, struck Jean-Louis on the shoulder.

"Look up, sleepy-head!" cried he in his ear. "Can you tell me who is going to marry my sister Solange?"

"Who? What?" answered Jeannet, like one coming out of a dream. "What are you talking about?"

"I say that you and Solange can keep a secret famously," said he, rather spitefully. "It is well to keep it secret, when you are only thinking of marriage, and I don't object to your first arranging it between yourselves; but now that everybody knows it except us, it is rather provoking for the family."

"You are crazy," said Jean-Louis.

"A big baby, at least," said Solange, shrugging her shoulders.

"All very well," said Pierre; "we know what we know. We say nothing further. When you choose to speak of your affairs, well, we will be ready to listen to you."

Jeannet was about to reply, but Luguet and his wife, who all this while had been in the barn, giving a look at the cattle, to see that all was safe for the night, re-entered the room, and Solange motioned to Jean-Louis not to continue such a useless conversation before her parents.

But whether Pierre was more obstinate than usual that night on account of the wine in his head, or whether his great friendship for Jeannet inflamed his desire for the alliance, certain it is he would not give up his belief in the approaching marriage, and continued throughout supper to make jokes and clack his wooden shoes underneath the table; in fact, he acted like a boy who is sure of his facts and loves to torment people. Jean-Louis several times was on the point of telling him to be quiet, but Solange, with her gentle smiles, always prevented him.

You can well perceive this confirmed Pierre in his belief that they understood each other, as honest lovers have the right to do; so that, if he was a little doubtful on his return from the fair, he was no longer so at the end of the supper, and went to bed so firmly persuaded that he would soon have Jeannet for brother-in-law, they could easier have cut off his right hand than make him believe to the contrary.

TO BE CONTINUED.

EPIGRAM.

TO DOMITIAN, CONCERNING S. JOHN, COMMANDED TO BE CAST INTO A CALDRON OF BURNING OIL.

Thou go unpunish'd? That shall never be,
Since thou hast dar'd to mock the gods and me.
Burn him in oil!--The lictor oil prepares:
Behold the saint anointed unawares!
With such elusive virtue was the oil fraught!
Such aid thy olive-loving Pallas brought![198]

--CRASHAW.

FOOTNOTES:

[198] The allusion is to wrestlers anointing themselves to prevent their adversaries grasping them.

NANO NAGLE:

FOUNDRESS OF THE PRESENTATION ORDER.

There is no fact more apparent or more full of significance in the history of the church than the constant acting and reacting upon each other of races and nations in the perpetual struggle between civilization and religion with barbarism and infidelity, light with darkness. While the faith seems dimmed and its professors the victims of persecution in one land, in another the torch of learning and piety is slowly but surely kindling into brilliancy, and the ardor of apostolic zeal is being awakened, even by the supineness and apostasy of its neighbors. That this should be permitted or ordained by divine Providence is a mystery to all, but its effects can easily be perceived by any ordinary student of history.

For proof of this mutation and transition we need not go beyond our own day and generation. Europe of the XIXth century presents a spectacle, if not alarming, at least discouraging to many who have the cause of Christianity sincerely at heart. In one country we perceive a direct attack on the Sovereign Pontiff, wholesale spoliation of his temporal possessions, restriction of his personal liberty, and a general onslaught on the religious orders--those most efficient agents for the propagation of morality, charity, and intelligence--which surround him--and that, too, by a prince of Catholic origin and education, who claims the right to govern twenty millions of subjects. In another we have a stolid, sordid _imperator_, instigated by a more intellectual but not less arbitrary minister, not only claiming complete dominion over the lives and property of twice that number, but assuming also the right to dictate the terms upon which they shall worship their Maker, what shall be their faith, and who may be their teachers and guides in the way of salvation.

Again, in such countries as Austria, France, Spain, and Belgium, until very recently considered the bulwarks of Catholicity on the Continent, indifferentism, communism, and open infidelity, if not yet triumphant, have certainly of late made rapid strides towards power and authority, and to the human eye seriously threaten the very existence of society, of all order and all law, human and divine, in those distracted nations. And still, a prospect such as Europe now presents, though seemingly gloomy, is actually full of hope and promise. While the hitherto supine Catholics of the Italian peninsula are being aroused into earnestness by the outrages daily perpetrated on the Holy Father and the religious orders, and their co-religionists of Germany are forming themselves into a solid, compact, and energetic array in defence of their rights, elsewhere the cause of the church is progressing with a rapidity and uniformity that equally astonishes and alarms her enemies.

Take our own republic, for example, with its seven archbishops, its forty-nine bishops, thousands of priests, and millions of earnest and obedient spiritual children, where a century ago a priest was an object of curiosity to most of the people, and a Catholic was generally regarded with less favor than is now shown the Chinese idolaters. Now, what has wrought this change; what has scattered broadcast over this vast continent, and engrafted in the heart of our vigorous young republic the doctrines of the church, but the persecutions which our co-religionists have endured and are still enduring, in the Old World? To the irreligious maniacs of the French Revolution, to the penal code of Great Britain, and now to the mendacity of Victor Emanuel and the truculent tyranny of Bismarck, are we mainly indebted, under Providence, for the origin, growth, and increase of Catholicity among us. Like a subterranean fire, the spirit of the church can never be repressed. Subdued in one place, it will burst forth in another with redoubled force, intensified by the very attempts made to confine it.

Then let us look at England--England which among the nations was the land of the Reformation; who not only stoned the prophets, but whose annals for nearly three centuries are the most anti-Catholic and intolerant to be found in the records of modern history. She, also, as in the early ages of her conversion, felt the effect of continental barbarism and persecution. At the very time when the faith seemed to have been utterly extirpated within her boundaries, the French Revolution drove to her shores many Catholics, lay and clerical, of gentle birth, cultivated manners, and varied accomplishments, and to those exiles does she owe primarily the revival in her bosom of the religion planted by S. Augustine. She has now sixteen archbishops and bishops, sixteen hundred priests, over one thousand places of worship, where assemble large congregations, including many of the most eminent and distinguished of her sons.

The Catholics of Ireland, always true to the faith and loyal to the head of the church, were common sufferers with their co-religionists across the Channel, and, though in a different manner and at an earlier period, they were equally the gainers with those of England, and from causes almost similar. The property of that cruelly tried people was not only confiscated by the penal laws, their clergy outlawed, and their persons subjected to all sorts of pains and penalties, but they were denied the poor privilege of acquiring the principles of the commonest education. The consequences of such persecution, continued generation after generation, were what might have been, and no doubt was, expected to be--that the people, persistently refusing to yield to cajolery or threats in matters of conscience, within two centuries after the "Reformation" had almost universally sunk into abject poverty and secular ignorance. In fact, had it not been for their traditional knowledge of the great truths of religion, and the instruction sometimes stealthily given them by some fugitive priest in remote mountains and the fastnesses of the bogs, they must inevitably have degenerated into something like primitive barbarism.

However, such an anomalous state as this could not last for ever. All Christendom was about to cry out against it, and an incident occurred in 1745, under the administration of the celebrated Lord Chesterfield, which awakened at home general attention to the wretched manner in which four-fifths of the inhabitants of the country were obliged to worship their Creator. It happened that in that year a small congregation was assembled secretly in an old store, in an obscure part of Dublin, to hear Mass, when the floor gave way, and the entire body was precipitated to the ground below. F. Fitzgerald, the celebrant, and nine of his parishioners, were killed, and several others severely injured. The viceroy, who, whatever may have been his other faults, was certainly less bigoted than his predecessors, thereupon took the responsibility of allowing the Catholics, under certain restrictions, to open their chapels, and worship in public. This limited concession was the commencement of a new era in the affairs of the Irish Catholics. The number of priests began to increase; churches, rude and small of necessity, sprang up here and there, generally in secluded localities, as if afraid to show themselves; and incipient efforts for the education of the masses of both sexes were soon noticed.

In this latter great work of benevolence the most zealous and efficient was the lady whose name heads this article. She seems to have been endowed by Providence with all the gifts, mental and moral, necessary to constitute her the pioneer of that host of noble women who, since her time to the present, have devoted themselves to the education and training of the females of Ireland. Born of an ancient and thoroughly Catholic family of considerable wealth and wide popular influence, she grew up amid home scenes of comfort, peace, and charity, a devout believer in the sanctity of religion, and in perfect accord with the instructions of indulgent but watchful parents. The position her father held among his poorer and less fortunate neighbors, his charity to the needy, and his protection to the helpless, afforded her, even in her extreme youth, many opportunities of studying the wants of the distressed, and of sympathizing with their afflictions: principles which, then perhaps nourished in her heart unconsciously, were in after-years destined to grow and fructify into those nobler deeds of charity that have made her memory so cherished and revered.

Honora, or, as her friends and beneficiaries loved to call her, Nano Nagle, was the daughter of a gentleman named Garret Nagle, of Ballygriffin, near Mallow, in the county of Cork, where she was born A.D. 1728. Through both parents she was related, not only to many of the old Catholic houses, but to several of the most influential Protestant families in the South; which is only worthy of remark as furnishing a clew to the fact of her parents' wealth and social standing in times when those of the proscribed religion were not only disqualified from accumulating or holding property in their own right, but were personally objects of contempt and contumely to the dominant class. It may also, perhaps, account for the impunity with which Mr. Nagle, despite the numerous statutory enactments, was enabled to send his favorite child to the Continent to complete an education the rudiments only of which could be obtained in the privacy of her family.

Accordingly, at an early age, Nano quitted her pleasant and cheerful home by the Blackwater for the retirement and austerity of a convent on the banks of the Seine, in which institution she acquired all the accomplishments and graces then considered befitting a young lady of position.

Having entered school a mere girl from a remote part of a semi-civilized country, untutored, undeveloped, and, it is even said, a little petulant and self-willed, she now, at her twenty-first year, emerged from the shadow of the convent walls into the sunshine of Parisian life, an educated, beautiful, and self-sustained woman. Her family had many friends in the French capital, particularly in the households of the Irish Brigade officers and other Catholic exiles, and her entrance into the best society was unimpeded, and was even signalized by rare scenes of festivity and mutual gratification. Her native _naïveté_ and buoyancy of spirits, tempered with all the well-bred courtesy and dignity of a French education under the old _régime_, made her a general favorite; and though it does not appear that she was in the least spoiled by the admiration and adulation that everywhere awaited her, there is little doubt that she participated in the fashionable dissipations of the gay capital with all the ardor and impetuosity latent in her disposition. Admitted to such scenes, it is little wonder that for a time she forgot the land of her birth, its persecutions and tribulations, its degraded peasantry and timid and degenerate aristocracy. One so young and so capable of appreciating the refinements and elegancies of the most cultured city in Europe, might well have been excused if she found it difficult to exchange them for the obscurity and monotony of a remote provincial town.

But the spell which at this time bound her was soon to be broken. The still, small voice of duty and conscience was soon to find a tongue and speak to her soul with the force almost of inspiration. The circumstances of this radical change in her life are thus graphically described in a very valuable book recently published:

"In the small, early hours of a spring morning of the year 1750,
a heavy, lumbering carriage rolled over the uneven pavement of
the quartier Saint Germain of the French capital, awakening the
echoes of the still sleeping city. The beams of the rising sun
had not yet struggled over the horizon to light up the spires
and towers and lofty housetops, but the cold, gray dawn was far
advanced. The occupants of the carriage were an Irish young lady
of two-and twenty, and her chaperon, a French lady, both fatigued
and listlessly reclining in their respective corners. They had
lately formed part of a gay and glittering crowd in one of the
most fashionable Parisian _salons_. As they moved onward, each
communing with her own thoughts, in all probability reverting
to the brilliant scene they had just left, and anticipating the
recurrence of many more such, the young lady's attention was
suddenly attracted by a crowd of poor people standing at the yet
unopened door of a parish church. They were work-people, waiting
for admission by the porter, in order to hear Mass before they
entered on their day's work.

"The young lady was forcibly struck. She reflected on the hard
lot of those children of toil, their meagre fare, their wretched
dwellings, their scanty clothing, their constant struggle to
preserve themselves and their families even in this humble
position--a struggle in many a case unavailing; for sickness, or
interruption of employment, or one of the many other casualties
incidental to their state, might any day sink them still deeper in
penury. She reflected seriously on all this; and then she dwelt
on their simple faith, their humble piety, their thus 'preventing
the day to worship God.' She contrasted their lives with those of
the gay votaries of fashion and pleasure, of whom she was one. She
felt dissatisfied with herself, and asked her own heart, Might
she not be more profitably employed? Her thoughts next naturally
reverted to her native land, then groaning under the weight of
persecution for conscience' sake--its religion proscribed, its
altars overturned, its sanctuaries desolate, its children denied,
under grievous penalties, the blessings of free education.

"She felt at once that there was a great mission to be fulfilled,
and that, with God's blessing, she might do something towards
its fulfilment. For a long time she dwelt earnestly on what we
may now regard as an inspiration from heaven. She frequently
commended the matter to God, and took the advice of pious and
learned ecclesiastics; and the result was that great work which has
ever been since, and is in our day, a source of benediction and
happiness to countless thousands of poor families in her native
land, and has made the name of Nano Nagle worthy of a high place on
the roll of the heroines of charity."[199]

Miss Nagle then set out for Ireland, firmly determined to commence the noble work so suddenly contemplated and so maturely considered; but on her arrival in Cork, she found her friends exceedingly lukewarm, and the amount of ignorance and destitution in that city so appalling that she shrank from the very magnitude of the difficulties to be overcome, and began to fear that she had, in a moment of enthusiasm, overrated her ability and mistaken her vocation. This was natural. What could a young lady, scarcely entered on womanhood, delicately nurtured, and hitherto accustomed only to the society of the most fastidious--what could such a frail scion of aristocracy do to remove even an infinitesimal part of the incubus of poverty, ignorance, and crime, the result of centuries of misgovernment, which then weighed so heavily on the people?

She therefore resolved to visit the French capital again to consult eminent clerical friends, and to lay before them all her doubts and difficulties. They heard her explanations and arguments with attention, weighed her objections with proper gravity, and finally, having dispelled her doubts and strengthened her self-confidence, assured her that in their opinion--and it was a unanimous one--God had evidently called her to be the succor and comfort of her afflicted countrywomen--a decision which subsequent events proved to have been little short of prophetic. Thus reassured, and casting aside once for all the allurements of life, the rational pleasures which youth, beauty, and wealth might reasonably command, Miss Nagle resolved to eschew the things of the world for ever, and devote herself heart and soul to the self-imposed duties from the performance of which she had lately shrunk, more from a consciousness of the weakness of her position than from any lack of intention to perform them faithfully. The resolve she so solemnly made then she kept till the day of her death, thirty years afterwards, with unflinching fortitude and fidelity.

In 1754 we find her back in Cork, steadily but quietly, almost secretly, as the spirit of the times demanded, initiating her crusade against squalor and ignorance. With what precocious circumspection she commenced her labors is best shown in a letter to a friend, Miss Fitzsimmons, then in the Ursuline Convent at Paris. The extract is long, but it will repay perusal, as it may be considered an exact reflex of the working of her strong, simple, but thoroughly earnest mind. She writes under date July 17, 1769:

"When I arrived, I kept my design a profound secret, as I knew, if
it were spoken of, I should meet with opposition on every side,
particularly from my own immediate family; as, to all appearances,
they would suffer from it. My confessor was the only person I told
of it; and as I could not appear in the affair, I sent my maid to
get a good mistress, and to take in thirty poor girls. When the
little school was settled, I used to steal there in the morning.
My brother thought I was in the chapel. This passed on very well
until, one day, a poor man came to him, to speak to me to take
his child into my school; on which he came in to his wife and me,
laughing at the conceit of a man who was mad and thought I was in
the situation of a schoolmistress. Then I owned that I had set
up a school; on which he fell into a violent passion, and said
a vast deal on the bad consequences that may follow. His wife is
very zealous, and so is he; but worldly interests blinded him at
first. He was soon reconciled to it. He was not the person I most
dreaded would be brought into trouble about it; it was my uncle
Nagle, who is, I think, the most disliked by the Protestants of any
Catholic in the kingdom. I expected a great deal from him. The best
part of my fortune I have received from him. When he heard it, he
was not at all angry at it; and in a little time they were so good
as to contribute largely to support it. And I took in children by
degrees, not to make any noise about it in the beginning. In about
nine months I had about two hundred children. When the Catholics
saw what service it did, they begged that, for the convenience of
the children, I would set up schools for children at the other end
of the town from where I was, to be under my care and direction;
and they promised to contribute to the support of them. With this
request I readily complied, and the same number of children that
I had were taken in; and at the death of my uncle, I supported
them all at my own expense. I did not intend to take boys, but my
sister-in-law made it a point, and said she would not allow any
of my family to contribute to them unless I did so; on which I
got a master, and took in only forty boys. They are in a house by
themselves, and have no communication with the others."

This letter, it will be observed, was written fifteen years after the first school was founded, and already there were in active operation, in various parts of the city, two schools for boys and five for girls, all under the supervision of Miss Nagle, and supported from her private purse, or by a contribution of one shilling per month, which she was in the habit of collecting from a few of the more wealthy of the citizens. In these nurseries of intelligence and morality--model schools, in fact--the children of both sexes were taught to read and write, to say their daily prayers, learn the catechism, and, in the case of the older girls, to acquire a familiarity with such useful work as befitted their condition. Those who were of sufficient age heard Mass every morning, went to confession monthly, and to communion as frequently as their confessor considered advisable.

In supervising so many schools, and constantly instructing hundreds of pupils, whose moral as well as mental culture had been neglected hitherto most wofully, this heroic woman's self-imposed labors, it may well be imagined, were of the most arduous description, and we are not surprised to find that her health began to show signs of giving way. "In the beginning," she says, "being obliged to speak for upwards of four hours, and my chest not being so strong as it had been, I spat blood, which I took care to conceal, for fear of being prevented from instructing the poor. It has not the least bad effect now. When I have done preparing them at each end of the town, I feel like an idler that has nothing to do, though I speak almost as much as when I prepare them for their first communion. I find not the least difficulty in it. I explain the catechism as well as I can in one school or other every day; and if every one thought as little of labor as I do, they would have little merit. I often think that my schools will never bring me to heaven, as I only take delight and pleasure in them. You see it has pleased the Almighty to make me succeed when I had everything, I may say, to fight against. I assure you I did not expect a farthing from any mortal towards the support of my schools; and I thought I should not have more than fifty or sixty girls until I got a fortune; nor did I think I should in Cork. I began in a poor, humble manner; and though it has pleased the divine will to give me severe trials in this foundation, yet it is to show that it is his work, and has not been effected by human means. I can assure you that my schools are beginning to be of service to a great many parts of the world. This is a place of great trade. They are heard of; and my views are not for one object alone." The fortune here so delicately alluded to was left her by her uncle Nagle, who, profoundly penetrated with a sense of her discretion and of her devotion to the friendless, bequeathed her the bulk of his property. It was a very considerable sum, and was unstintingly devoted by her to further the great objects she had ever in view.

As her schools multiplied, and the attendance on each increased, with a rapidity that astonished every one, Miss Nagle saw the absolute necessity of calling in other and, if possible, organized assistance, that thus, by making her system more perfect, she might perpetuate the good work already so auspiciously begun. She therefore resolved on a bold measure--one that could have entered only the mind of a dauntless spirit, fortified by implicit faith in the protection of Providence. She determined, in fact, despite the many inhuman and ingenious penal statutes against monastic institutions, to establish a convent in Cork.

For this purpose, some time previous to the date of the above letter, four young ladies, representing some of the best families in the neighborhood, were sent to the Ursuline Convent of S. Jacques, in Paris, to enter their novitiate, while Miss Nagle, with her usual generosity and prudence, set silently to work to build a suitable house for their reception on their return. That event took place in 1771, and marks a new era in the history of the church in Ireland and England. The young novices who thus not only abandoned the allurements of the world, home, friends, and future, to serve God, but braved the terrors of the penal laws and the sneers of the anti-Catholic rabble, deserve to have their names handed down for the admiration and homage of their sex in every age and clime. They were "Miss Fitzsimmons, the special friend and correspondent of the foundress; Miss Nagle, her relative; Miss Coppinger, of the Barryscourt family, and cousin of Marian, Duchess of Norfolk; and Miss Kavanagh, related to the noble house of Ormonde." They were accompanied by Mrs. Margaret Kelly, a professed sister of the Ursuline Convent of Dieppe, none of the sisters of S. Jacques being willing to undertake so hazardous an enterprise.

They arrived in May, and on the 18th of September following took formal possession of their convent, and from that day may be dated the reintroduction of the conventual order into the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.[200]

Thus in the wise designs of God, while the Encyclopedists and the secret societies of the Continent were maturing their plans of attack on the church and her institutions, when monasteries, convents, colleges, and hospitals from one end of Europe to the other, already feeling the premonitory symptoms of that monstrous earthquake of immorality and infidelity which was soon to be felt throughout Christendom, were shaking to their very foundations, in an obscure little city in the South of Ireland were planted the seeds of religion and Christian instruction which have since grown up and produced such marvellous fruits. The incident becomes even more interesting when we consider that the five ladies who commenced this beneficent work were all educated in that country and city, which ere long were to furnish the deadliest enemies of Catholicity.

It is not to be supposed that so daring an act as that of the intrepid Nano could pass unnoticed. Though the sisters studied the greatest seclusion, it was at one time proposed by the local authorities to enforce the laws against them; but better counsels prevailed, and the humble community grew rapidly in popularity and usefulness. A few months after its establishment, a select school, with twelve young ladies as pupils, was founded, and this number was quickly augmented by children from the more wealthy Catholic families of the adjoining counties. There are now five houses of this order in Ireland.

At first Miss Nagle lived in the convent; but her impatient soul, her burning love for the children of the lowly, was not yet satisfied; for though the good Ursulines devoted all their available time to the instruction of the poor, while perfecting in the higher branches of education those destined in turn to become teachers, she felt that another and a more comprehensive organization was necessary to combat so vast an array of popular error, ignorance, and destitution. A society that would devote itself, as she had so long done, individually, exclusively, and gratuitously to the service of the impoverished and untrained masses was what she desired, and what she felt called upon to form and direct. With that indomitable energy which I ever characterized her, though enfeebled in health, reduced in fortune, and prematurely old from incessant labor, at the age of forty-four she retired from the companionship of her friends and _protégés_, the Ursulines, to a house adjacent to the convent, purchased by herself, and, gathering around her some pious women, formed a society that was to be known as "Of the Presentation of Our Blessed Lady in the Temple." The objects of this association were: "Going through the city, looking after poor girls; inducing them to attend school, and instructing them in their religion; and, further, visiting, relieving, and consoling the sick poor in their own homes and in the public hospitals--duties analogous to those now discharged by the Sisters of Charity and Sisters of Mercy."[201] Being approved by the bishop of the diocese, the Rt. Rev. Dr. Moylan, it began its pious labors on Christmas day, A.D. 1777, by entertaining at dinner fifty poor persons, the foundress being the presiding genius, or rather angel, of the entertainment. She also established, in connection with the home, an asylum for aged females.