Next morning the bells began to ring as soon as it was light. I rose
and opened my shutters and saw the red sun rising from behind the
Magazine, and over the forest of Bonne-Fontaine. It might have been
five o'clock, and you could feel beforehand how hot it was going to be,
and the air was laden with the odor of the oak and beech and holly
leaves which were strewn in the streets. The peasants began to arrive
in companies, talking in the still morning. You could recognize the
villagers from Wechem, from Metting, from the Graufthal and Dasenheim,
by their three-cornered hats turned down in front and their square
coats, and the women with their long black dresses and big bonnets
quilted like a mattress hanging on their necks; and those from
Dagsberg, Hildehouse, Harberg, and Houpe with their large round felt
hats, and the women without bonnets and with short skirts, small,
brown, dry, and quick as powder, with the children behind with their
shoes in their hands, but when they reached Luterspech they sat down in
a row and put them on to be ready for the procession.
Some priests from the different villages, also came by twos and threes,
laughing and talking among themselves in the best of humor.
And I thought, as I rested my elbows on the window-sill, that these
people must have risen before midnight to reach here so early in the
morning, and that they must have come over the mountains walking for
hours under the trees, crossing the little bridges in the moonlight; as
I thought this I reflected that religion is a beautiful thing, that the
people in towns do not know what it is, and that for thousands upon
thousands of field laborers and wood-choppers, uncultivated and rude
beings, who at the same time were good and loved their wives and
children and honored their aged parents, supporting them and closing
their eyes in the hope of a better world; this was the only
consolation. And in looking at the crowd, I imagined that Aunt Gredel
and Catherine had the same thoughts, and I was happy to know that they
prayed for me. It grew lighter and lighter, and the bells rang while I
continued to look on. I heard Father Goulden rise and dress himself,
and a few minutes after he came into my chamber in his shirt-sleeves,
and seeing me so thoughtful, he exclaimed:
"Joseph, the most beautiful thing in the world is the religion of the
people."