Dr. Nicholson undertook the treatment at the lazaretto. By a certain

course of medicine, the details of which he kept a profound secret, and

with the aid of vapors, he wonderfully improved the physical condition

of the lepers, who in many instances indulged sanguine hopes of

recovery. Unfortunately, however, this physician suddenly abandoned his

profession, and, to the sorrow of his former patients, died three years

later. The lepers soon relapsed into their former hopeless state, and

since then no change has taken place.

“On our arrival at Tracadie,” said the sister, “we found twenty

inmates of the hospital, and since three more have been admitted.

These poor creatures, being firmly persuaded that we could cure

them, besieged us with entreaties for medicine, and were satisfied

with whatever we gave. At first I selected three who had undergone

no medical treatment; these three were also the only ones who

suffered from contraction of the extremities. The first, twenty-two

years of age, had been at the hospital four years, and as yet showed

the disease only in the contraction above mentioned, and in a

certain insensibility of the feet and hands. The second, fifteen

years old, had been in the hospital for two years, his hands and

feet were drawn up, and he suffered from a large swelling on the

left foot. This young fellow is very delicate, and suffers intensely

at times from spasms of the stomach. The third case is a lad of

eleven, who for two years has suffered from the disease. His hands

are twisted out of shape, and his body is covered with spots, red

and white; these spots are totally without sensibility. I have

administered to these patients the remedies as prescribed by Mr.

Fowle—_Fowle’s Humor Cure_, an American patent medicine. The first

and second patient experienced no other benefit from this remedy

than a certain vigor previously unfelt. To the third the sensibility

of the cuticle returned, but the spots remained the same. This in

itself is very remarkable, because in no previous case have these

benumbed or paralyzed parts regained their sensation. To another, a

patient of twenty-two, I gave the same remedy. For eight years he

had been a martyr to the virulence of the disease. When we arrived

at the lazaretto, we found his case to be one of the worst there.

His nose had fallen in; the lips were enormously puffed and swollen;

his hands equally so, and looked more like the paws of a bear than

like the hands of a human being. The saliva was profuse, but the

effort of swallowing almost futile. Soon after taking this same

medicine the saliva ceased to flow and he swallowed with comparative

ease.

“On the 23d of January he was, by the mercy of God, able to partake

of the holy communion, of which he had been deprived for four years.

His lips are now of their natural size, and he is stronger than he

has been for years. But the pains in his limbs are far worse than

they have ever before been. I have also given Fowle’s cure to all

the patients who had been under no previous medical treatment, and

invariably with beneficial results. In some the tint of the skin is

more natural; in others the swelling of the extremities is much

abated; but the remedy seems always to occasion an increase of pains

in the limbs, although it unquestionably acts as a tonic upon the

poor creatures. In all of them the mouth and throat improve with the

use of Fowle’s cure. And here let me say that this disease

throughout bears a strong resemblance to syphilis. In both diseases

the throat, the tongue, and the whole inside of the mouth are

ulcerated. In both diseases the voice is affected to such a degree

that it can hardly make itself heard. They cough frightfully, and

some time after our coming a leper presented himself for admission

at our hospital doors. The poor creature was covered with ulcers and

every night was bathed in a cold perspiration. After he had rested

for a few days, I gave him a powerful dose of _la liqueur

arsenicale_, which has since been repeated. The night-sweats have

disappeared, and the ulcers are healed, with the exception of one on

the foot. His lips are still unhealthy, but he is much stronger, and

the spots on his person are gradually disappearing.

“Two others, later arrivals have taken _la liqueur arsenicale_ and

have improved under its use. Suspecting that the origin of this

malady may be traced to another source, and remembering the opinion

of Dr. La Bellois, I gave the bichloride of mercury, in doses of the

thirty-second part of a grain, to the worst case in the hospital. It

is too soon, however, to judge of its effects. The improvement in no

one of these cases is rapid, but we trust that it is certain. We

look to God alone for the success for which we venture to hope. I

can find no statistics which will enable me to give you the number

of victims that have fallen under this dread malady of Tracadie. I

find, however, a letter from M. Gauvreau, bearing the date of

November 30, 1859, that sixty persons perished from its ravages in

the previous fifteen years, and that twenty-five of both sexes, and

of all ages, were then inmates of the lazaretto, awaiting there the

end of their torments.”

In 1862 Mr. Gordon said that he saw twenty-three patients at the

hospital, and the Sisters of the Hôtel Dieu found twenty there when they

reached the lazaretto, and have since admitted three in addition; it

does not seem, therefore, as if the “eldest sister of Death” had relaxed

her hold on this unhappy village. Yet if the disease can but be confined

to this locality, wonders will be achieved. Good care, regular medical

attendance, incessant vigilance, with intelligent adherence to hygienic

laws, may eventually cause its entire disappearance from our soil. Let

us hope that the faithful sisters will succeed in their good work; for

we ourselves, every one of us, have a personal interest in it.

Unfortunately, this good result is far from certain, as the Abbé

Gauvreau desires us to understand.

“One or more of these unfortunates,” he says, “feeling the insidious

approaches of the disease, and shrinking from the idea of the

lazaretto, have at times secretly escaped from Tracadie. They leave

Miramichi on the steamer, intending to land at Rivière-du-Loup, at

Kamouraska, perhaps at Quebec or at Montreal. As yet no ulcers are

visible, nor, indeed, any external symptoms which could excite the

smallest suspicion. On landing at some one of the places mentioned

they procure situations in different houses, and remain in them for

a month or two, perhaps, saying nothing all this time of their

symptoms to any one, not even to a physician. They eat with their

master’s family, and, even if they take the greatest precaution,

they convey this poisonous virus to their masters. When they have

reason to fear that suspicion is about being aroused, they depart,

but it is too late, and they go to scatter the contagion still

further.

“The following instance came under my own observation: A youth

suffering from this disease, and dreading the lazaretto, went to

Boston, where he secured a position on a fishing vessel, hoping that

the sea air, with the medicines that he would take, would effect his

cure. He soon found that these hopes were groundless, and was

obliged to enter the hospital in Boston, where, in spite of the care

and attention bestowed upon him by the physicians of the medical

school at Cambridge, he died, far from friends and home.”

One naturally asks, with a thrill of horror, whether, before the

admission of this poor creature to the hospital, he did not transmit to

his shipmates the poisonous virus that filled his own blood.

The total disappearance of this disease—if such disappearance may be

hoped for—will be due exclusively to the noble and untiring exertions of

the sisters. Tracadie and its afflicted population would not alone owe a

debt of eternal gratitude to these Hospital Nuns. America itself would

share this feeling. With an example like this of charity and

self-abnegation before us, we cannot cease to wonder at, and to deplore,

the narrow minds of those persons who condemn the monastic institutions

of the church. Let us compassionate all such; for to them light is

lacking, and they have yet to learn the great truth that the duty most

inculcated by the church, after the love of God, is the love of our

neighbors.

TESTIMONY OF THE CATACOMBS TO SOME OF THE SACRAMENTS.

In a former article,[31] whilst following Mr. Withrow and other

Protestant controversialists through their evasions and

misinterpretations of the evidence to be found in the Catacombs on

behalf of certain points of Catholic doctrine and practice, we pointed

out that prayers either _for_ the dead or _to_ them were the only two

articles on which it would be reasonable to look for information from

the inscriptions on the gravestones. We said that these prayers were

likely to find expression, if anywhere, by the side of the grave. As

they took their last look on the loved remains of their deceased friend

or relative, the affectionate devotion of the survivors would naturally

give utterance either to a hearty prayer for the everlasting happiness

of him they had lost, or to a piteous cry for help, an earnest petition

that he would continue to exercise, in whatever way might be possible

under the conditions of his new mode of existence, that same loving care

and protection which had been their joy and support during his life; or

sometimes both these prayers might be poured forth together, according

as the strictness of God’s justice, or the Christian faith and virtues

of the deceased, happened to occupy the foremost place in the

petitioner’s thoughts.

Footnote 31:

THE CATHOLIC WORLD, Dec., 1876, p. 371 Jan., 1877, p. 523.

When, therefore, we proceeded in a second paper to question the same

subterranean sanctuaries on another subject of Christian doctrine—the

supremacy of St. Peter—we called into court another set of witnesses

altogether: to wit, the paintings of their tombs and chapels. Exception

has been taken against the competency of these witnesses, on the plea

that they are not old enough; they were not contemporary, it is said,

with those first ages of the church whose faith is called in question.

To this we answer that the objection is entirely out of date; it might

have been raised twenty or thirty years ago, and it might have been

difficult at that time satisfactorily to dispose of it. Those were days

in which writers like M. Perrot in France could affect to pronounce

dogmatically on the age of this or that painting, solely on the evidence

of its style, without having first established any standard by which

that style could be securely judged. There are still a few writers of

the same school even at the present day, such as Mr. Parker in England,

who assigns precise years as the dates of these subterranean monuments

with as much confidence as if he had been personally present when they

were executed, and (we may add) with as wide a departure from the truth

as if he had never seen the pictures at all. Such writers, however, have

but few disciples nowadays. Their foolish presumption is only laughed

at; and it is not thought worth while seriously to refute their

assertions. Men of intelligence and critical habits of thought are slow

to accept the _ipse dixit_ of a professor, however eminent, upon any

subject; and all who have studied this particular subject—the paintings

in the Catacombs—are well aware that the question of their antiquity has

now been carried beyond the range of mere conjecture and assumption; it

has been placed on a solid basis of fact through the indefatigable

labors of De Rossi. Those labors have been directed in a very special

way towards establishing the true chronology of the several parts of the

Catacombs; and when this had been done, it was manifest to all that the

most ancient _areæ_ were also those which were most abundantly decorated

with painting, whilst the areæ that had been used more recently—_i.e._,

in the latter half of the fourth or beginning of the fifth century—were

hardly decorated at all. This gradual decline of the use of pictorial

decoration has been traced with the utmost exactness through the

successive _areæ_ of a single Catacomb; six or seven tombs being found

thus decorated in the first _area_, two in the second, one in the third,

none at all in the fourth; and the same thing has been seen, with more

or less distinctness, throughout the whole range of subterranean Rome.

Then, again, every casual visitor to them can see for himself that

before the abandonment of burial here—_i.e._, before the year 410—many

of the paintings were already considered old enough to be sacrificed

without scruple to the wishes of those who would fain excavate new tombs

in desirable sites. Men do not usually destroy to-day the paintings

which they executed yesterday; certainly they do not allow the

ornamentation which they have just lavished on the tombs of their

fathers to be soon effaced with impunity. We may be sure, then, that

those innumerable paintings which we see broken through in order to make

more modern graves must have been of considerable antiquity at the time

of their destruction. Then, again, it must not be forgotten that some of

these paintings were actually appealed to as ancient testimony in the

days of St. Jerome, on occasion of a dispute between that doctor and St.

Augustine as to the correct rendering of a particular word in his Latin

translation of the Scriptures. Finally, it is notorious that the fine

arts had rapidly decayed and the number of their professors diminished

before the days of Constantine—in fact, before the end of the third

century.

We cannot, however, pretend to give in these pages even a brief summary

of De Rossi’s arguments and observations whereby he establishes the

primitive antiquity of Christian art in the Catacombs. We can only

mention a few of the more popular and palpable proofs which can be

appreciated by all without difficulty; and we will only add that it is

now possible, under the sure chronological guidance of De Rossi, to

distinguish three successive stages in the development of painting in

the Christian cemeteries, the latest of which was complete when the

Constantinian era began, and the first falls hardly, if at all, short of

even apostolic times. This is no longer denied by the best instructed

even among Protestant controversialists; they acknowledge that painting

was used by the earliest Christians for the ornamenting of their places

of burial; only they contend that it was done “not because it was

congenial to the mind of Christianity so to illustrate the faith, but

because it was the heathen custom so to honor the dead.” The author of

this remark, however, has omitted to explain whence it comes to pass

that the great majority of the paintings which survive in the cemeteries

are more engaged in illustrating the mysteries of the faith than in

doing honor to the dead.

But we must not pursue this subject any further. We have said enough, we

think, to establish the competency of these paintings as witnesses to

the ancient faith, and we will now proceed to question them concerning

one or two principal mysteries of the faith—those that are called its

mysteries _par excellence_: its sacraments. We do not doubt that, if

duly interrogated, they will have some evidence to give. We say, if duly

interrogated, because it is the characteristic of ancient Christian art

to be eminently symbolical; it suggested rather than declared religious

doctrines and ideas, and it suggested them by means of artistic symbols

or historical types, which must be inquired into and meditated upon

before they can be made fully to express their meaning. This is of the

very essence of a symbol: that it should partly veil and partly manifest

the truth. It does not manifest the truth with the fulness and accuracy

of a written historical description, or it would cease to be a symbol;

on the other hand, it must not be so obscure as to demand a sibyl for

its interpretation; it must have a tendency to produce in the mind of

the beholder some leading feature of the object it is intended to

represent. And where should symbols of this kind be more abundantly

found for the Christian preacher or artist than in the histories of the

Old Testament? Ancient Christian art, says Lord Lindsay, “veiled the

faith and hope of the church under the parallel and typical events of

the patriarchal and the Jewish dispensations.”

We need not remind our readers that the principle of this method of

interpreting Holy Scripture has express apostolic sanction; but few who

have not studied the subject closely will have any adequate idea of the

extent to which it was followed in the ancient church. We will give a

single example, selected because it closely concerns the first mystery

of which we propose to speak—the Sacrament of Baptism.

Tertullian, who lived at the end of the second and beginning of the

third century, wrote a short treatise on this sacrament. This treatise

he begins by bringing together all that Holy Scripture contains about

water, with such minuteness of detail that he is presently obliged to

check himself, saying that, if he were to pursue the subject through all

Holy Scripture with the same fulness with which he had begun, men would

say he was writing a treatise in praise of water rather than of baptism.

From the first chapter of the Book of Genesis to the last of the

Evangelists, and even of the Apocalypse, he finds continual testimony to

the high dignity and sacramental life-giving power of this element. The

Spirit of God, he says, moved over it at the first; whilst as yet the

earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep,

and the heaven was as yet unformed, water alone, already pure, simple,

and perfect, supplied a worthy resting-place on which God could be

borne. The division of the waters was the regulating power by which the

world was constituted; and when at length the world was set in order,

ready to receive inhabitants, the waters were the first to hear and obey

the command and to bring forth creatures having life. Then, again, man

was not made out of the dry earth, but out of slime, after a spring had

risen out of the earth, watering all its surface. All this is out of the

first two chapters of Genesis; and here he makes a pause, breaking into

that apology which has been already mentioned. Then he resumes the

thread of his discourse, but passing much more briefly over the

remainder of the Old Testament. He notes how the wickedness of the old

world was purged by the waters of the Deluge, which was the world’s

baptism; how the waters of the Red Sea drowned the enemies of God’s

people and delivered them from a cruel bondage; and how the children of

Israel were refreshed during their wanderings through the wilderness by

the water which flowed continuously from the rock which followed them,

“which rock was Christ.” Then he comes to the New Testament, and briefly

but eloquently exclaims: Nowhere is Christ found without water. He is

himself baptized with it; he inaugurates in it the first manifestation

of his divine power at the wedding-feast in Cana; when he preaches the

Gospel, on the last and great day of the feast, he stands and cries,

saying, “If any man thirst, let him come to me and drink.” He sums up

his whole gift to man under the image of a fountain of water, telling

the Samaritan woman that he has living water to give, which shall become

in him that receives it a fountain of water springing up unto life

everlasting. When he gives instruction upon charity, he instances a cup

of cold water given to a disciple; he sits down weary at a well and asks

for water to refresh himself; he walks on the waves of the sea, and

washes his disciples’ feet; finally (Tertullian concludes), “this

testimony of Jesus to the Sacrament of Baptism continues even to the

end, to his very Passion; for, when he is condemned to the cross, water

is not absent—witness the hands of Pilate; nay, when wounded after death

upon the cross, water bursts forth from his side—witness the soldier’s

spear.”

There may be something in this symbolism that sounds strange to modern

ears; but we are not here criticising it; we have nothing to do with its

merits or demerits, but only with the fact of its general use—so general

that it was the one principle of exegesis which every commentator on

Holy Scripture in those days followed, and we have every right to

suppose that Christian artists would have followed it also. When,

therefore, we find in the Roman Catacombs (as, for example, the other

day in the cemetery of San Callisto) a glass vessel, very artistically

wrought, with fishes in _alto rilievo_ swimming round it in such a way

that, when full of water, it would have represented a miniature image,

as it were, of the sea, is it a mere fanciful imagination which bids us

recognize in such ornamentation a reference to holy baptism, and

conjectures that the vessel was perhaps even made for the administration

of that sacrament? It may be so; but we cannot ourselves think so; we

cannot at once reject the explanation as fanciful; the work of the

artist corresponds too exactly with the words of the theologian to allow

us to treat the coincidence as altogether undesigned. “We little fish

are born,” says Tertullian, “after the likeness of our great Fish in

water, and we cannot otherwise be safe than by remaining in the water.”

And we seem to ourselves to read these same words, written in another

language, in the beautiful vessel before us. We read it also in another

similar vessel, which looks as though it had come out of the same

workshop, yet was found in an ancient cemetery at Cologne; and in

another of bronze, dug up in the vineyard over the cemetery of

Pretextatus, that used to be shown by Father Marchi in the Kircherian

Museum at the Roman College. In all these instances we believe that this

is the best account that can be given, both of the original design of

the vessel and also of its preservation in Christian subterranean

cemeteries. However, if any one thinks otherwise, we do not care to

insist upon our explanation as infallibly certain. We will descend into

the Catacombs themselves, and look about upon the paintings on their

walls or the carving on their gravestones, and see whether baptism finds

any place there also.

And, first, we come across the baptism of our Lord himself. We are not

now thinking of the subterranean baptistery in the cemetery of Ponziano,

with the highly-decorated cross standing up out of the middle of it, and

Christ’s baptism painted at the side. For this is one of the latest

artistic productions in the Catacombs—a work of the eighth or ninth

century possibly. We are thinking, on the contrary, of one of the

earliest paintings in a most ancient part of the excavations, in the

crypt of Lucina, near the cemetery of Callixtus, with which, in fact, it

is now united. We shall have occasion to return to this same chamber

presently for the sake of other paintings on its walls having reference

to the Holy Eucharist; just here we only call attention to the baptism

of our Lord, which is represented in the space over the doorway. We do

not know of any other instance of this subject having been painted in

the Catacombs besides the two that we have mentioned, but it is quite

possible that others may be hereafter discovered; but of baptism as a

Christian rite, veiled, however, under its types and symbols, we have

innumerable examples.

Few figures recur more frequently among the paintings in the Catacombs,

and none are more ancient, than that of a man standing in an open box or

chest, often with a dove, bearing an olive-branch in its mouth, flying

towards him. When this was first seen after the rediscovery of the

Catacombs in the sixteenth century, men set it down to be the picture of

some ancient bishop preaching in a pulpit, and the Holy Ghost, under the

form of a dove, inspiring him as to what he should say, according to the

legend told of St. Gregory the Great and some others. Nobody now doubts

that it was intended for Noe in the ark; not, however, the historical

Noe and the historical ark—for nothing could be more ludicrously false

to the original—but those whom that history foreshadowed: Christians

saved by the waters of baptism and securely housed in the ark of the

church. Some persons, who seem to take a perverse delight in assigning a

pagan rather than a Christian origin to everything in the early church,

account for the difference between the Biblical and the artistic

representation of the ark by saying that the Christian artist did but

copy a pagan coin or medal which he found ready to his hands. It is

quite true that certain coins which were struck at Apamea in Phrygia

during the reigns of Septimius Severus, Macrinus, and Philip the

elder—_i.e._, at different periods in the first half of the third

century—exhibit on one side of them a chest, with a man and a woman

standing within it, and the letters ΝΩ, or ΝΩΕ, written on the outside;

and that these figures were intended to be a souvenir of the Deluge,

which held a prominent place in the legends of Phrygia. It is said that

the town of Apamea claimed to derive its secondary name of κιβωτός, or

ark, from the fact that it was here that the ark rested; and it is quite

possible that the spread of Christian ideas, gradually penetrating the

Roman world, and filtering into the spirit even of those who remained

attached to paganism, may have suggested the making of the coins we have

described; but it is certain, on the other hand, that we can claim

priority in point of time for the work of the Christian artists in the

Catacombs. The coins were struck, as we have said, in the beginning of

the third century; the earliest Christian painting of the same subject

is assigned to the beginning of the second.

But whatever may be the history of the forms under which Noe and the ark

are represented, there can be no question as to their meaning. We have

the authority of St. Peter himself (1 iii. 20, 21) to instruct us upon

this point; and Tertullian does but unfold what is virtually contained

in the apostle’s words when he says that the ark prefigures the church,

and that the dove sent out of the ark and returning with an olive-branch

was a figure of the dove of the Holy Spirit, sent forth from heaven to

our flesh, as it emerges from the bath of regeneration. And if we quote

Tertullian again as our authority, this is not because he differs in

these matters from other Christian writers who preceded or followed him,

but because he has written at greater length and specially on that

particular subject with which we are now engaged. St. Augustine, writing

two hundred years later, gives the same explanation, and says that “no

Catholic doubts it; but that it might perhaps have seemed to be a merely

human imagination, had not the Apostle Peter expressly declared it.” It

is, then, from no private fancy of our own, but simply in conformity

with the teaching of all the ancient doctors of the church, that we

interpret this scene of a man standing in an ark, and receiving an

olive-branch from the mouth of a dove, as expressing this Christian

doctrine: that the faithful obtain remission of their sins through

baptism, receive from the Holy Spirit the gift of divine peace—that

peace which, being given by faith in this world, is the gage of

everlasting peace and happiness in the next—and are saved in the

mystical ark of the church from the destruction which awaits the world.

And if the same scene be rudely scratched on a single tomb, as it often

was, and sometimes with the name of the deceased inscribed upon the

chest, we can only understand it as denoting a sure and certain hope on

the part of the survivors that their departed friend, having been a

faithful member of the church, had died in the peace of God and had now

entered into his rest.

We pass on to another of the Biblical stories mentioned by several of

the Fathers as typical of baptism; and we will select as our specimen of

it a painting that was executed about the very time that Tertullian was

writing his treatise on that sacrament. It is to be seen more than once

on the walls of a series of chambers which open out of a gallery in the

Catacomb of San Callisto, not far from the papal crypt. The first figure

that greets us from the wall on the left-hand side as we enter these

chambers is Moses striking the rock and the water gushing forth. Are we

to look upon this as a mere historic souvenir of the Jewish legislator,

or are we to see in it a reference to Christian baptism? The artist in

the present instance does not allow us to doubt. Side by side with it he

has painted a fisherman, and we need not be reminded who it was that

compared the work of the Christian apostle to that of fishermen; and

immediately he adds, with still greater plainness of speech, a youth

standing in the water, whilst a man pours water over his head. Finally,

he fills the very little space that remains on the wall with the picture

of a paralytic carrying his bed, and it would be easy to show that the

Fathers recognized in the pool of Bethsaida, to which place this history

belongs, a type of the healing waters of baptism. Was it possible for

the Christian artist to set forth the sacrament more unequivocally?

There is no legend to interpret the painting, but surely this is not

needed. The mystery is veiled, indeed, from all who were uninstructed;

but it was perfectly intelligible to all the baptized; it was veiled

under types and symbols taken partly from the Old Law and partly from

common life.

We need hardly say that this same figure of Moses striking the rock

occurs in scores of other places throughout the Catacombs; but we have

selected this particular specimen, both because it appears with a more

copious _entourage_ of other symbols determining its sense beyond all

dispute, and also because it is here brought, as we shall presently see,

into immediate proximity with the other sacrament, to which it is a

necessary gate of introduction—the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. But

before we pass on to examine the symbols of the Holy Eucharist, let us

first inquire whether there is anything further about baptism to be

gleaned from the Catacombs—not now from their paintings, but from their

inscriptions.

We must remember that the most ancient inscriptions were very brief—very

often the mere name of the deceased and nothing more, or a short

ejaculatory prayer was added for his everlasting happiness. It is clear

that we should search here in vain for any mention of the sacraments. By

and by, when it became usual to say something more about the deceased,

to mention his age and the date of his death or burial, or other similar

particulars, perhaps room might be found also for saying something about

his baptism. Accordingly, there are not wanting monuments of the fourth

or fifth centuries which tell us that the deceased was a neophyte, or

newly illuminated—which means the same thing: viz., that he had been

lately baptized—or that he had lived so many months or years after he

had received the initiatory sacrament of the Christian covenant.

Occasionally, also, a faint reference may be found to another

sacrament—the Sacrament of Confirmation. This was often, or even

generally, administered in olden times immediately after baptism, of

which it was considered the complement and perfection. “From time

immemorial,” says Tertullian (_ab immemorabili_), “as soon as we have

emerged from the bath [of regeneration] we are anointed with the holy

unction.” Hence it is sometimes doubtful which sacrament is intended, or

rather it is probable that it was intended to include both under the

words inscribed on the epitaphs—the verbs _accepit_, _percepit_,

_consecutus est_ (the same as we find in the fathers of the same or an

earlier age), used for the most part absolutely, without any object

whatever following them; but in one or two cases _fidem_ or _gratiam

sanctum_ are used. An epitaph of a child three years old adds:

_Consecuta est D. vi. Deposita viii. Kal. Aug._ Another says simply:

_Pascasius percepit xi. Kal. Maias_; and a third: _Crescentia q. v. a.

xxxiii. Accepit iii. Kal. Jul._ A fourth records of a lady that she died

at the age of thirty-five: _Ex die acceptionis suæ vixit dies lvii._; to

which we append another: _Consecutus est ii. Non. Decemb. ex die

consecutionis in sæculo fuit ad usque vii. Idas Decemb._ This last

inscription is taken from a Christian cemetery in Africa, not in Rome;

but it was worth quoting for its exact conformity with the one which

precedes it. In both alike there is the same distinction between the

natural and the spiritual age of the deceased—_i.e._, between his first

and his second birth. After stating the number of years he had lived in

the world, his age is computed afresh from the day of his regeneration,

thus marking off the length of his spiritual from that of his merely

animal life.

A Greek inscription was found a few years since on the Via Latina,

recording of a lady who had belonged to one of the Gnostic sects in the

third century, that she had been “anointed in the baths of Christ with

his pure and incorruptible ointment”—an inscription which probably

refers to two separate rites in use among the Gnostics, in imitation of

the two Christian sacraments. Of a Christian lady buried in Spoleto, her

epitaph records that she had been confirmed (_consignata_) by Pope

Liberius; this, of course, belongs to the middle of the fourth century.

And we read of a boy who died when he was a little more than five years

old: _Bimus trimus consecutus est_—words which were a veritable enigma

to all antiquarians, until the learned Marini compared with them the

phrases of Roman law, _bima trima die dos reddita_, _bima trima die

legatum solutum_, and pointed out that as these phrases undoubtedly

signified that such a portion of the dowry or legacy was paid in the

second year, and such another portion in the third, so the corresponding

words in the Christian epitaph could only mean that the deceased had

received something when he was two years old, and something else when he

was three; and although the particular gifts received are not mentioned

because of the _disciplina arcani_, we can have no difficulty in

supplying baptism and confirmation. De Rossi adopts this interpretation;

indeed, it does not seem possible to suggest any other.

It seems, then, that there is not much evidence to be derived from the

Catacombs as to the Sacrament of Confirmation; that, on the contrary,

which has reference to the Holy Eucharist is most precious and abundant,

and it is generally to be found in juxtaposition with monuments which

bear testimony to the Sacrament of Baptism. The chamber in the crypt of

Lucina which gives us the oldest painting of the baptism of our Lord

gives us also what are probably the oldest symbolical representations of

the Holy Eucharist; and certainly the chambers in the cemetery of San

Callisto, in which we have just seen so many and such clear

manifestations of the Sacrament of Baptism, contain also the most

numerous and the most perfect specimens of the symbolic representations

of the Holy Eucharist carried to their highest degree of development,

yet still combined with mysterious secrecy. Before enumerating these in

detail it will be best to make two or three preliminary remarks helping

to clear the way before us. First, then, we may assume as known to all

our readers, both that the doctrine about the Blessed Sacrament belonged

in a very special way to the discipline of the secret, and also that

from the very earliest times one of the most common names under which

our Blessed Lord was spoken of was the _fish_, because the letters which

go to make up that word in Greek were also the initials of the words

Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour. And, secondly, we must say a few

words about the different circumstances under which a fish appears in

the artistic decorations of the Catacombs; at least, of the different

kinds of feasts or entertainments in which it seems to be presented as

an article of food. These feasts may be divided into three classes:

First, the fish merely lies upon a table—a sacred table or tripod—with

one or more loaves of bread by its side, and not unfrequently with

several baskets full of bread on the ground around it; secondly, bread

and fish are seen on a table, at which seven men are seated partaking of

a meal; and, thirdly, they are seen, perhaps with other viands also, at

a feast of which men and women are partaking indiscriminately, and

perhaps attendants also are there, waiting on the guests, pouring out

wine and water, hot or cold. Paintings of this latter class have not

uncommonly been taken as representing the _agapæ_, or love-feasts, of

the early church. But this seems to be too literal an interpretation,

too much out of harmony with the symbolical character of early Christian

art. More probably it was meant as a representation of that

wedding-feast under which image the joys of heaven are so often set

forth in Holy Scripture; and in this case it is not necessary to suppose

that there was any special meaning in the choice of fish as part of the

food provided, unless, indeed (which is not at all improbable), it was

desired to direct attention to that mystical food a participation in

which was the surest pledge of admission to that heavenly banquet,

according to our Lord’s own words: “He that eateth this bread shall live

for ever.” However, it is not necessary, as we have said, to suppose

this; it is quite possible that in these instances the fish may have

been used accidentally, as it were, and indifferently, or for the same

reason as it sometimes appears on pagan monuments—viz., to denote the

abundance and excellence of the entertainment.

Paintings of the first class, however, are much too peculiar to be thus

explained, neither is there anything resembling them in the works of

pagan artists which could have suggested them; and those of the second

class, we hope presently to show, can only have been intended to

represent a particular scene in the Gospel history. It is only with

paintings belonging to one or other of these two classes that we need

concern ourselves to-day. And, first, of the bread and fish when placed

alone, without any guests at all. In the crypt of Lucina it appears

twice on the wall opposite our Lord’s baptism, and in a very remarkable

form indeed. The fish is alive and apparently swimming, and he carries

on his back a basket full of loaves, in the middle of which is a vessel

of glass containing some red liquid. What can this mean? Nobody ever saw

anything like it in nature. We know of nothing in pagan art or mythology

which could have suggested it. Yet here it finds a place in the chamber

of a Christian cemetery, and as part of a system of decoration, other

parts of which were undoubtedly of a sacred character. Is this alone

profane or meaningless, or does not rather its hidden sense shine forth

distinctly as soon as we call to mind the use of the fish as a Christian

symbol on the one hand, and the Christian doctrine about the Holy

Eucharist on the other? The fish was Christ. And he once took bread and

broke it, and said, This is my body; and he took wine and blessed it,

saying, This is my blood; and he appointed this to be an everlasting

ordinance in his church, and promised that whosoever should eat of that

bread and drink of that chalice should inherit everlasting life. Here

are the bread and the wine and the mystical fish. And was it possible

for Christian eyes to attach any other meaning to the combination than

that it was intended to bring before them the remembrance of the

Christian mysteries, whereby death and the grave were robbed of all

their gloom, being only the appointed means of entrance to a

never-ending life? If anybody is tempted to object that the vessels here

represented as containing the bread and wine are too mean ever to have

been used for such a purpose, we must remind him that it had already

been put on record by archæologists, before the discovery of this

monument, that the early Christians in the days of poverty and

persecution continued to use vessels of the same humble materials as had

been used in the sacrificial rites of Jews and Gentiles before them, and

that these were precisely such as are here represented. Nay, further

still, that even when vessels of gold and silver had come into use in

the church, still there were exceptional times and circumstances when it

was lawful, and even praiseworthy, to return to the more simple and

ancient practice. St. Jerome praises St. Exuperius, Bishop of Toulouse

in his day, because, having sold the church-plate to relieve the

pressing necessities of the poor, he was content to carry the body of

Christ in a basket made of wicker-work, and the blood of Christ in a

chalice of glass. Most assuredly St. Jerome would have been at no loss

to interpret the painting before us.

But let us now pass on into the cemetery of San Callisto, and enter

again the chamber in which we saw Moses, and the fishermen, and the

ministration of baptism, and the paralytic. Let us pursue our walk round

the chamber, and immediately after the paralytic, on the wall facing the

doorway, we come to the painting of a three-legged table with bread and

fish upon it, a woman standing on one side in the ancient attitude of

Christian prayer, and a man on the other stretching out his hands over

the fish and the bread, as though he were blessing them. Can it be that

we have here the act of consecration of the Holy Eucharist, as in the

adjacent wall we had the act of baptizing, only in a somewhat more

hidden manner, as became the surpassing dignity of the greater mystery?

Nobody, we think, would ever have disputed it, had the dress of the

consecrator been somewhat more suited to such an action. But his breast

and arm and one side of his body are considerably exposed, as he

stretches out his arm from underneath his cloak; and modern taste takes

exception to the exposure as unseemly in such a time and place. We have

no wish to put a weapon into the hands of the anti-ritualistic party.

Nevertheless, we believe that it is pretty well ascertained that at

first no vestment was exclusively appropriated to the celebration of

Mass. We are not sure that Dean Stanley was in error when he wrote the

other day that St. Martin, the Apostle of Gaul and first Bishop of

Tours, wore a sheepskin when he officiated, and that “he consecrated the

Eucharistic elements with his bare arms coming through the sheepskin.”

And at any rate it is certain that in the days of Tertullian, to which

the picture before us belongs, many ministers of Christ’s word and

sacraments used the pallium as the dress most suitable to their own

profession. The writer we have named published a short treatise on the

subject, in which, with his usual wit and subtlety, he commends its use,

and he concludes with these words: “Rejoice, O Pallium! and exult; a

better philosophy claims thee now, since thou hast become the vestment

of a Christian.” Forty years later a fellow-countryman of this writer,

St. Cyprian, expressed a strong objection to the dress, both as immodest

in itself and vainglorious in its signification. Thus everything

conspires to support the interpretation which the picture itself

suggests and the age to which it has been assigned; and we conclude with

confidence that those who first saw it never doubted that it was meant

to set before them the most solemn mystery of their religion.

They would have recognized the same mystery again without hesitation,

under another form, in the painting which follows immediately

afterwards, in which seven men are seen seated at a table, partaking of

bread and fish. Our own thoughts, as we look at it, fly naturally to the

last chapter of the Gospel according to St. John, where such an incident

as this is minutely described after the miraculous draught of fishes

which was the occasion of it. But unless we are very familiar with the

writings of the Fathers, our thoughts would probably go no further; they

would rest in the mere letter of the narrative; we should not penetrate

beneath the surface, and see (as all the Fathers saw), in every

circumstance related, a prophetic figure of the whole history of the

church: first, the immense number of souls caught in her net, then the

union of those souls with Christ, “the fish that was already laid on the

hot coals” (_Piscis assus, Christus passus_), their incorporation with

him through partaking of that living Bread which came down from heaven,

and consequently their sure hope of abiding with him for ever in the

world to come. This is no private or modern interpretation; it is drawn

out at greatest length by St. Augustine; but it is to be found also in

all other patristic commentaries on Holy Scripture; and the marvellous

unity, not only in dogmatic teaching, but even in the use of allegories

and artistic symbols, which reached from east to west in the ancient

church, warrants us in assuming that it was not unknown to him who

selected this scene as the central piece of decoration for the principal

wall of this chamber.

Next after it he painted Abraham with his son Isaac, the ram, and the

faggot for the sacrifice—a type both of the sacrifice on Mount Calvary

and (in a yet more lively manner) of the unbloody sacrifice still

perpetually renewed on Christian altars.

Thus there is the most exact similitude between the illustrations used

to set forth the Holy Eucharist on the one wall and those of holy

baptism on the other. Both sacraments are at the same time veiled from

unbelievers, yet indicated to the faithful, by types taken from the

history of the Old Law, by incidents belonging to the life of Christ,

and by representations, sufficiently simple yet obscure, of the actual

manner of their administration. And then the last wall was reserved for

the setting forth of our resurrection, in the example of Lazarus, which

was, in truth, the natural end and completion of all that the sacraments

led to.

We have not left ourselves space to speak at length of the miracles of

changing water into wine, or the multiplication of the loaves and

fishes, as other figures of the Holy Eucharist often to be seen in the

Catacombs. That they were painted there in this sense we cannot doubt,

when we consider how they were connected with that sacrament in the

sermons and catechetical instructions of the early church. In the first

miracle the substance of water was changed into the substance of wine;

in the second a limited substance was, by Christ’s power, so multiplied

as to be made present in a thousand places at once, capable of feeding a

thousand persons, whereas a minute before it had been only present in

one place and was sufficient only to satisfy the appetite of one. The

analogy is obvious; but these miracles do not seem to have entered so

early into the system of decoration of the Catacombs (except in a very

fragmentary and indirect manner), neither do they anywhere enter into so

long and beautiful a series of mystical figures, as those others which

we have been just now examining. Those form a series of rare and very

special interest. They are repeated, as we have already said, in several

successive chambers, whose date can be determined, by a number of

concurrent indications, as not later than the first quarter of the third

century. In these chambers the same histories and the same symbols are

repeated in the same style, freely changed in their arrangement and in

some accessories of the composition, yet constant in their hidden

meaning and theological sense; and that sense is briefly this: the idea

of a new life imparted to the Christian soul by baptism, fed by the Holy

Eucharist, and continued uninterruptedly throughout eternity.

TWO MAY CAROLS.

BY AUBREY DE VERE.

DARKNESS.

The authentic Thought of God at last

Wanes, dimly seen, through Error’s mist:

Upon that mist, man’s image cast

Becomes the new God-Mechanist.

The vast _Idea_ shrivels up:

Truth narrows with the narrowing soul:

Men sip it from the acorn’s cup:

Their fathers drained the golden bowl.

Shrink, spelled and dwarfed, their earth, their skies;

Shrinks in their hand their measuring-rod;

With dim, yet microscopic eyes

They chase a daily-dwindling God.

His temple thus to crypt reduced,

For ancient faith is space no more,

Or her, its Queen.[32] To hearts abused

By sense, prime truths are true no more.

Footnote 32:

Father Newman has, I think, remarked that in the Protestant scheme

there is _not room_ for Mary.

LIGHT.

The spirit intricately wise

That bends above his ciphered scroll

Only to probe, and analyze,

The self-involved and sunless soul,

_Has_ not the truth he holds—though plain;

For truth divine is gift, not debt:—

Her living waters wouldst thou drain?

Let down the pitcher, not the net!

But they, the spirits frank and meek,

Nor housed in self, nor science-blind,

Who welcome truths they did not seek;—

Truth comes to them in every wind.

Beside his tent’s still open door,

With open heart, and open eye,

The patriarch sat, when they who wore

That triad type of God drew nigh.

The world of faith around us lies

Like nature’s world of life and growth:

Seeing, to see it needeth eyes

And heart, profound and simple both.

LETTERS OF A YOUNG IRISHWOMAN TO HER SISTER.

FROM THE FRENCH.

NOVEMBER 16, 1869.

Thérèse has followed her sister.... At the last moment reason returned;

she looked at her mother and said: “Here is Mad; give me your blessing!”

O my God! it is, then, true—the nest is empty.

Kate, how are Berthe and Raoul to be consoled?

NOVEMBER 22, 1869.

Margaret is here again—a ray of sunshine after the storm, in this

dwelling, twice visited by death. Oh! how we wept in embracing her. And

with what affection she hastened to Berthe, this devastated,

disinherited, wounded, and bleeding heart! “How shall we leave this

cemetery now?” said my mother to Gertrude. Oh! I would wish to remain

here with her. To return to Orleans, to find their traces everywhere,

would be too much grief. What a crushing blow! What incredible,

unforeseen suddenness! It is enough to take away one’s reason. Raoul

speaks no more, hears no more, sees no more; Berthe is in tears: we have

to console and support them. Help us with your prayers, happy Kate, who

witness no death! In the middle of the park are two trees which Raoul

planted on the day his daughters were born. They are to be transplanted

to their tombs. Dear children, so united, so beautiful, and inseparable,

even in death! O the mother! what sorrow is hers. Ought children to die

before their mother?

Mme. de T—— is heroic in self-denial, and yet these deaths revive all

her troubles. Ah! who could have foretold that my happiness would so

soon have declined, and that God would so quickly have claimed his

portion of our treasure! See, here are Gertrude and Berthe—two mothers

without children: Ellen and Edith in eternity; Marcella at Naples. I now

experience an indescribable apprehension, and count the beloved heads by

which I am still surrounded.... I remember the L—— family, carried off

in one year.

A radiant letter from Marcella, who does not yet know of our mourning.

_Beati qui lugent!_ Let us love God, let us love God!

It is in him that I cherish you, my Kate.

NOVEMBER 28, 1869.

All our Ireland in letters of fraternal condolence. The saintly Isa

speaks to me sweetly of the happiness of the souls thus called away, and

exhorts me to perfect love. Lizzy invites me to cross the Channel to

receive the consolations of those whom I consoled formerly. Sarah and

the others comfort me in our beloved tongue. O Kate! it was so

beautiful, our peaceful home, with its assembly of children and

grandchildren, forming, as it were, a glorious crown around my venerated

mother; and now a void has been made, the birds have spread their wings,

and, like the dove from the ark, return no more.

O charming towers, silent witnesses of our happiness! O vast sea, coming

to murmur at our feet! O flowers they loved! O thickets where their

voices, fresh and pure, resounded! O lawn whereon they tried their

earliest steps; dear abode which witnessed their growth! O forests

through which they sped along, lively and swift of foot, in chase of

butterflies or of their favorite dog! O solitary paths which they so

often traversed to go and lavish on the poor their gold and their

love!—speak to us of _them_, and of _them_ always.

Dear Kate, pray for the desolate parents. “All my future has vanished,”

says Berthe. May God be with her! Everything else is very small in

trials so great as these. My mother begs you to ask for fifty Masses at

Fourvières; we have not the strength to write.

Life, the sunshine, and blue sky—all have disappeared. Adieu, dear

sister.

DECEMBER 5, 1869.

Adrien is reading to us _Herminie de la Bassemoûturie_, a true narrative

of a life of suffering and humiliation, borne with a courage so heroic

and supernatural that one’s heart kindles at it. Margaret is going away,

perhaps to-morrow. On the 30th Heaven sent Lucy a dear little daughter,

who was baptized yesterday without any pomp. Gertrude was godmother, and

the godfather is a brother of my pretty sister’s. They have called this

little daughter of Brittany _Anne_—a good name.

_Dec. 6._—I have just returned from accompanying our friends as far as

to D——. Emmanuel continued to send me kisses while the carriage went

slowly away.... Dear Margaret! how much I regret her. Everybody loves

her, wherever she goes. Now we are alone.... Johanna, Paul, and their

children leave us this evening to spend some months at Paris. I never

tell you about Arthur and Edward, whose vacation is over, and who are

very good friends together. The _abbé_ remains with us, that we may not

be deprived of daily Mass. From henceforth follow me in thought into the

great drawing-room, once so bright with the dear young creatures whom I

so loved, and there you will see, in her large easy-chair, my mother,

whom grief has aged, with your Georgina on a low chair at her feet.

Gertrude, with needlework in her hands, occupies the other side of the

fire-place, Berthe is near her, then Adrien, René, Raoul, Edouard, and

the _abbé_ round the table, near which is seated also the charming Lucy.

But a ray from on high pierces the sombre veils: our dear ones see God;

they contemplate him in eternal ecstasy. I had bought at Orleans a

poetic little picture—a lily broken on earth, which flowered again in

heaven—and underneath it a verse of the beautiful lines by Mlle.

Fleuriot on the death of _Alix_. How this lily recalls Picciola to my

mind! René is working at a miniature which he intends to give to Berthe:

in the foreground the twins are embracing a poor old man; in the

distance are two lilies on a tomb and two doves taking flight. I am

continuing the _History of the Popes_; it will be for Marguerite and

Alix.

How I wish you were here! My heart aches for Berthe, formerly so happy,

and so lonely now. Ah! what burning tears are those that spring from the

hearts of mothers when God takes back from them the precious ones lent

them for a day. O remediless grief, deep void, unfathomable abyss!

Yes, we shall remain in Brittany. The noise of the festivities of this

world would be to us a martyrdom; but I am athirst for my Kate, and it

seems as if I shall be stronger when her gentle hand has laid balm upon

my wounds. René and I will be in Paris on the 23d for a few days.

Mistress Annah shed many tears at the moment of leave-taking. Margaret

was pale and greatly moved; why should there be any separations, sister?

Ah! doubtless because earth would be too delightful. May God be always

with you!

DECEMBER 12, 1869.

Do you know that Overbeck is dead? Edith MacMoor sends me long and

interesting details from Rome. Edith has taken up her abode in the city

which is the fatherland of Catholics, and her old sympathy with me, she

says, has reawakened before the _Sibyls_. Dear, ardent soul, always so

amiable! O our artist, so beloved, so admired! The world is no more

anything to me but a _Campo Santo_.

Have you heard of the _Pearl of Antioch_? I am reading this Christian

romance with René.

On the 8th we observed as a special festival the opening of the great

sittings of this Council which will crown with a new glory the reign of

Pius IX. Our life is quite monastic: no more joyous laughter rings along

the corridors; silence—the “first power in the world,” as the Père

Lacordaire called it—dwells with us. We are in mourning for our beloved

children, and these dark dresses are of a solemn sadness which strikes

our visitors. Every day, no matter what the weather may be, René

accompanies me to the cemetery. In spite of the cold, there are flowers,

and this marble is almost _joyous_. The _Revue_ gives an interesting

story—“Laurence,” an account of a young girl who wished to die because

her sister, on whom she lavished all her love, had departed to heaven. I

do not think that Thérèse wished for death, but think rather that

Picciola asked of God that she might share her felicity.

Lucy is well, and thanks you for your sisterly prayers. We are expecting

news from Margaret and Marcella. Mary and Ellen write regularly to

Berthe and to me. Good and kind hearts, full of gentleness and

affection!

Kate dearest, what do you say to my idea?—the adoption of these children

would console my sister. Would it be well to propose it to her?

I find René changed. Pray for us.

DECEMBER 15, 1869.

Margaret sends me her Journal since the departure, every line of which

is redolent of poetry and affection. Emmanuel is hourly asking for us.

Marcella sends me pages bathed with tears: “Why did you allow me to go

away, dear and generous friend? I feel that your soul would have taken

refuge with mine in these sad days.”

Kate, what, then, is happiness, since it lasts so short a time?

Marcella is going to spend the winter at Rome; Anna continues to grow

both taller and stronger, “but the departure of her friends makes her

wish for heaven, and everything gives me the presentiment that in a few

years my beloved one will enter a convent. You will scold me for

thinking this so long beforehand, but you will agree with me that her

piety is beyond what is ordinary. I have so unlearnt happiness that I

live always in uncertainty.” A friend of Adrien’s tells him of the

reception given at Naples to the happy family party: Mme. de V—— is

allied to the Princess of X——. How fair a future has opened before my

friend! “To return to Rome, where so many of my memories linger, was my

earnest desire; blessed be God, who permits it to be realized!”

René is writing to you. Good-by for to-day, dearest sister!

DECEMBER 18, 1869.

Read an admirable pastoral letter by Mgr. Berthaud. “It is a fountain of

living water, a springing fountain,” writes Louis Veuillot, who has the

happiness to be in Rome.

Berthe yields to the entreaties of her mother, who begs her to go to her

in her old castle on the banks of the Rhine. Lucy is going away at the

same time to show her sisters the beautiful little Anna, her rosebud. I

look forward with fear to the feeling of solitude which will seize upon

us after they are gone. O my God! these will all return, but thou

keepest thine angels.

The happy Karl sends the most fraternal letters that he has ever yet

addressed to me. He is now in retreat, almost ready to mount the steps

of the altar and accomplish Ellen’s last desire. “I am never lonely,” he

writes. What ardor consumes him! How he burns to shed his blood for

Christ! “My whole soul springs forth towards those disinherited souls

who know not God! If you still take an interest in your unworthy

brother, wish for him crosses, trials, sorrows, and persecutions. But I

am not worthy to participate in the Passion of my Redeemer, and it may

be that my cross may be the burden of a useless life.” Saintly friend!

noble heart! His director, who is a relative of our good _abbé_, never

wearies in his praises of Karl. According to all probability, he will

set out for Marseilles the day after his ordination, where the first

ship that sails will take him on board. What am I, my God, by the side

of this brother left me by Ellen?

I am coming to see you, dear Kate, to refresh myself with you—a too

rapid apparition, too fleeting a happiness, and one in which I scarcely

can believe.

DECEMBER 22, 1869.

Dear Kate, this sacrifice must also be made. Yesterday a frightful

accident threw us all into the greatest agitation. My mother’s horses

ran away. The footman, losing all presence of mind with terror, leaped

down and was killed by the fall. He was taken up quite mutilated....

Horrible! horrible! My mother has fever; we remain. The unfortunate

Antoine will be buried to-morrow morning. He leaves three children. He

was an excellent Christian, and was preparing to make his Christmas

communion.... I am writing to Karl, and at the same time to the

venerable superior to obtain permission for our friend to give us one or

two days previous to quitting France and Europe.

My mother was coming back from the town, whither we had all gone to take

those of our party who were leaving. René and I were to have taken our

departure this evening. All in this world is nothingness, except the

pure and holy love of God. I had so set my mind on this journey that I

can only give it up by doing violence to my heart. But if the shock my

mother has undergone should bring on an illness, I should never forgive

myself for having gone away.

Pray, dear Kate!

DECEMBER 25, 1869.

My mother is better, dear sister, although the doctor condemns her still

to repose. The good _curé_ is very unwell, and, since my mother would

not have been able to attend the midnight Mass, the _abbé_ offered to

say it at the parish church. Ah! if the twins had been here. We left the

house at ten. What a night! What impressions! In a clear and calm night,

with the sky spangled with thousands of stars, to go through

hedge-bordered paths to this old Breton church, so vast and so full; the

singing, the sounds of the organ played by René, the _Gloria in

Excelsis_, so sweet and grand, the numerous communions, the

dimly-lighted sanctuary—all these things had about them an indescribable

old-world poetry, a certain interior and heavenly charm, which made me

ask if we were not at Bethlehem, and if we were not suddenly about to

behold with our bodily eyes, like the shepherds, the adorable new-born

Saviour in the manger. “The Cedar of Lebanon is gone forth from the

hyssop in our valley.” Lord Jesus, grant thy blessing upon France!

It is two years to-day since Ellen entered into glory. With what ecstasy

_she_ must behold Karl at the altar! Dear Kate, I know not what

atmosphere is surrounding me, but it seems to me that every sorrow

brings me nearer to God.

My mother was visibly affected on reading your kind lines; how she loves

us! Gertrude is more saintly than ever; her self-denial is increasing.

She has owned to me that she never loses the presence of God. We five

form a severe group, in which the highest questions are discussed.

Gertrude is on fire when she speaks of charity. There is no sort of

mortification in which she does not take delight; how I startled her

yesterday by coming suddenly upon her as she was exchanging her shoes

for those of a beggar! She fasted on bread and water the three last days

of Advent, and has asked me if I would go with her barefoot to the

crucifix on the mountain, the path to which is covered with brambles.

You see she is a worthy imitator of the _Acta Sanctorum_.

_A Dieu_, best beloved!

DECEMBER 28, 1869.

Karl arrives on the 31st. Dear Kate, his letter showed me heaven. Good

news of everybody, and my mother is in the drawing-room. So the year is

about to end—this year, so eventful, and so plentiful in tears! O my

God! how many loving looks follow me no more. In my meditation this

morning I asked myself whether I am yet submissive and resigned. Alas! I

truly wish whatever God wills, but I am weak.

Just now two little birds came and perched on my window, fluttering as

if wanting to come in. I opened it gently and crumbled a cake for them,

and the pretty little hungry creatures pecked up the crumbs gladly. Then

they flew away, and I began to think of the two sweet birds which,

almost before we were aware, have flown away also. I was so proud of

this beautiful family, so happy to belong to it! Oh! you know well,

Kate, that it is above all for the sake of the poor father, the

sorrowing mother, that I regret these two attractive creatures! Raoul

writes that Berthe is more calm, and he thinks she will remain some time

where she is. What an image of death is this silence and the solitude

that now surrounds us! I work hard, take long walks, teach two little

boys their catechism, and yet, in spite of everything, as soon as René

is no longer there, as soon as I recall the past, my heart is ready to

break.

“Take care, my dear daughter,” my mother says to me. “Strengthen your

soul; throw yourself upon God.” And Gertrude: “The thought of God

softens everything. He has permitted it—let us submit; let us live in

heaven.”

Would that we could go thither together, dear sister!

Accept all my best wishes for the New Year—wishes for every day and

every hour, for your earthly and eternal happiness.

JANUARY 5, 1870.

Dear Kate, how good God is! This is the cry of my heart, crushed beneath

the weight of its gratitude. Karl has been our Good Samaritan. If Berthe

and Raoul could only hear him! What unction in his words!

He made his appearance like the angel of Providence amongst us. It was

in the evening. René had gone to wait for him; we had heard no noise,

when the door opened.... It was he! There was a moment of emotion and

tears, and when he consented to bless us, and I saw him in the light, I

understood the words of Gertrude: “He has found true happiness.” Then

his Mass the next day, the Communion, and Thanksgiving said aloud, the

chanting of the _Magnificat_ and of the _Lætatus_—it was heaven. This

impression still remains; thanks to a concurrence of circumstances in

which I perceive the intervention of our good angels, the newly elect of

the priesthood remains with us until the 20th—an unhoped-for and most

precious favor. Alas! shall we see him again?

He has given me a little book which he had kept by permission of his

superior; you are aware that this generous Karl despoiled himself of

everything before giving _himself_ also to God. This _Basket of

Eucharistic Flowers_ is full of sweetness to my heart. I find in it some

verses on Picciola—not mine, but the flower—and the heavenly utterances

of the pious Marie Jenna, my favorite poetess. Listen to this:

“Oui, cette vie en larmes est féconde;

J’ai peu vécu, j’ai déjà bien souffert.

Mon Dieu, j’ai soif, et les routes du monde

Ne me sont rien qu’une aride désert.

Mais à tes pieds mon âme se repose.

O tendre Ami, Divin Consolateur,

Qu’importe à moi de perdre toute chose,

Si je te garde, amour de mon Sauveur!”[33]

Footnote 33:

Yes, this our life is plentiful in tears.

Though I am young, still I have suffered much.

My God, I thirst! and this world’s weary ways

Are but an arid desert unto me.

But at thy feet my soul finds her repose,

O tender Friend and Comforter Divine!

What matters it to me if I lose all,

But still keep thee, my dearest Saviour’s love!

And this cry of the soul:

“Jesus, pour seul bonheur, ah! donnez-moi des larmes

Que vous consolerez.”[34]

Footnote 34:

Jesus, for my sole happiness, oh! give me tears

Which thou wilt wipe away.

JANUARY 10, 1870.

Karl has spoken to me much of you, dear sister. He wishes that his last

sculpture in Europe should be for our chapel: René and his brothers have

for some time past been working at a pulpit; the principal figure will

be our missionary’s work. He has consented to let me prepare his

baggage. Kate, I was complaining of our solitude, and now it has become

sweet to me, because I love God more. Oh! what a blessing to the soul it

is to love.

I am slipping these few words in with René’s, and send you a thousand

loving messages.

JANUARY 14, 1870.

Impossible not to give you the history of our day, although it is very

late. I wished to go to Auray with Karl, and my mother felt strong

enough to go with us. On the way we met with a German, poor as Job, a

true disciple of Luther, his Bible in his hand. His gentle and

melancholy air interested us. We entered into conversation with him,

Karl preached to him, he came with us to Auray, and when we came out of

the church he told us that his mother was a Catholic, that the sight of

our fervor had touched him, etc., etc. In short, we brought him back

with us to the château, and Karl is going to catechise him and finish

his conversion. You see the good Saint Anne has indeed had a hand in

this. Is it not a charming episode?

15th.—Letters: 1st, Margaret, who sends you her heartful of good wishes;

2d, Marcella, with the chronicle of the Council and the account of an

audience with the Holy Father; 3d, Lizzy, who wants to make me admire

her Daniel; 4th, Lucy, who is impatient to come back, because her pretty

Anne cannot be happy without us, says our amiable sister; 5th, my Kate.

I mention all in chronological order; you know very well that you are

first in order of affection. But how short it is, dearest! Tell me soon

the reason of this brevity; you must have so much to say!

_A Dieu_, my dearest Kate. All and each of the happy inhabitants of my

Brittany offer you their homage and respect.

JANUARY 19, 1870.

Well, dearest, he leaves us to-morrow—this friend, this good brother and

generous priest. Our German is converted, but for reasons of prudence

the baptism is deferred. The worthy man does not wish to quit us, and

does his utmost to render himself useful. He is passionately fond of

music, and teaches it to our pastors, who in return _strengthen_ him (as

he says) in the catechism. How sadly we shall miss Karl! But then,

souls, souls! Ah! I would not keep him back, even if I could.

I have had a strange dream. I was with you in your cell. You seemed to

be asleep; I spoke to you, but you did not answer me. I went to kiss

you, and in this kiss I felt so strange a thrill, as if your beautiful

face had been of marble, that I woke, crying out in a manner which

alarmed René. It is in vain that I say to myself again and again that it

is but a dream; the impression remains—a profound terror, and an anguish

which oppresses my heart. Write to me; reassure me, dear Kate. I have

lost faith in happiness. What am I saying? So long as I belong to God,

and nothing can separate me from him, shall I not have the only

happiness worthy of the name?

Karl promises to write to us. He is going to China, that literary

country, where barbarism and civilization are so strangely mingled. My

mother, _the Adriens_, and we are putting together our savings to give

them to the dear missionary, that with them he may have more facilities

in his work of gaining souls. How I bless fortune on these occasions!

A thousand lovingnesses, dear sister—the dearest of sisters.

JANUARY 26, 1870.

We accompanied Karl to his ship, which I visited, and which we saw start

on her voyage. Thus he is now between sea and sky, exposed to tempests.

Oh! “how beautiful are the feet of those” who have left all—family,

friends, country, repose, comforts, enjoyments—to go in search of the

lost sheep. It seems to me that the angels of faith and love must spread

their wings over the vessel and keep far away all contrary winds.... We

seem as if impregnated with sanctity. Grief is a powerful lever to raise

one to God and to transform souls!

You do not write. René is uneasy and tries in vain to conceal his

anxiety from me. Did you receive his letter of the 24th? Dear Kate, if

you are ill, send one word and we will hasten to you. O my God! Ill!

You! Could it be possible? That terrible dream is always before my eyes.

You will scold me, dearest.... Remember that for some months past I have

suffered so much that even the thought of a misfortune overwhelms me.

Oh! may God guard you, darling Kate, my sister, my soul. Take care of

yourself for the love of me.

My mother entreats you to write; she suffers on account of my anxiety.

My God! grant that that may have been only a dream.

JANUARY 29, 1870.

Still nothing; perhaps your letter is lost.... May God protect you! The

_Univers_ pleases me. Mgr. Berthaud has had a triumph at Sant’ Andrea

della Valle—the dear church where we have prayed. “His imagery is rich

and abundant,” writes Louis Veuillot, “because his faith keeps alive in

him a perpetual enthusiasm for the works, the mercies, and the love of

God. His thoughts are an endless song. What he says he sees; what he

sees he admires and adores. External things, enveloped and, as it were,

transpierced by the rays of the divine Sun, appear to him as magnificent

as he describes them to be. Things are the works of God; men are the

children of God, divinities in flower, called by their adoption to the

ineffable glory of the divine union. As soon as they are in their way,

their vocation, their order, their accidental defects are effaced; there

is no more ugliness, there are no more rags, no more miseries—all is

already transfigured, already at the attainment of its end, and the

lyre, vibrating to the touch of a sacred enthusiasm, gives forth sounds

at once vehement and sublime.”

What eulogy! What style!

Mgr. Mermillod made a magnificent discourse at Saint Louis des Français,

on the perpetuation in the church of the Gospel scene of the Magi. “The

action of God in the world, the redemption of souls, the perpetuity and

definition of the truth, all repose upon these three great weaknesses: a

Child at Bethlehem, a Host in the tabernacle, an aged man at the

Vatican.”

Kate dearest, I admire, but nothing dispels my preoccupation, the

dominant note of my thoughts—you! yourself! Why this silence? I must

know it! Write to me; I am suffering....

JANUARY 31, 1870.

It is here, on my writing-table, this white page on which you have

traced but one word.... “It was not a dream!” We start at once; this

note will precede us by a few hours. Oh! live for me, my beloved sister;

ask God to cure you.

My God, I have so often prayed thee to preserve her to me—to let her

live as long as I!

* * * * *

JOURNAL OF GEORGINA AFTER HER SISTER’S DEATH.

FEBRUARY 15, 1870.

O amare! O perire tibi!

O advenire ad Deum!

Still would I write to you, beloved sister who have left me! Oh! can

this be possible? You, my Guardian Angel! It is in heaven that I now

look for you, that I now behold you—in heaven, your true home—in heaven,

where you have found again our mother. O my God! my God! Always shall I

remember this last journey, of which you were the object; the anguish on

the way, the haste to arrive, the chill that fell on my heart at the

gate of the convent. Oh! you knew that I could not bear to see you

suffer; and then, perhaps, you might think you would recover, for I

cannot believe that you desired to die.... Ah! to see you dying; to

embrace you, watch by you, hear the last effusions of that tenderness to

which my mother had bequeathed me; to see this flame, which was my life,

die out, and yet not die myself—Kate, Kate, I can think only, speak

only, of you!

I have been very ill. I feel weak, very weak—almost discouraged to live.

Tell me that you are not gone away; soul of my sister, speak to my soul!

Oh! how it seems to me as if I had lost everything. You it was who gave

so great an interest to my life, animating everything with your

affection. And now....

FEBRUARY 28.

Dear Kate, obtain strength for me. I desire to live for René. Why did

you not stay with us, my beloved? I have bitter regrets.... I should

have wished to nurse you, to keep you here. O foolishness of love! what

right have I to wish to keep you from your own country? Dear sister, the

correspondence which was my daily delight must not end: I will write my

journal for _you_. God, who is so good, even when he separates two

hearts which were one, could not refuse anything to his elect. Ask him,

then, my sister, that you may every day come to me, if even only for an

instant. Oh! would that I could see you. It seems to me that with you

all died; that nothing more will ever in this world smile on me, that

the eternal mourning of my soul can never more be comforted. Our friends

write to me. Margaret and Marcella weep with me. My mother, Adrien,

Gertrude, and René are full of unspeakable tenderness and solicitude

towards me; and yet I have scarcely any response to make them but my

tears. All is night around me: the Sun has set.

Oh! speak to me, Kate—only one word, one vibration of your dear voice,

one of your smiles. Is it true, my God, that for twenty-five days past

this face so dearly loved has been covered with a shroud?

Is it true? Has death indeed come between us? Had we not enough of

absence and of separation, that other mourning of the soul? I still hear

her last word.... Oh! who will give me back my past joys, fled away, and

the affection which enfolded all?

Adrien is reading me the _Beatitudes_, by Mgr. Landriot. There are some

admirable conferences on the divine words, _Beati qui lugent_. “There

are,” says the Père Lacordaire, “tears in all the universe; and they are

so natural to us that even if they had no cause, they would flow

_without_ cause, solely from the charm of that ineffable sadness of

which our soul is the deep and mysterious well.” Again: “Melancholy is

the great queen of highly sensitive souls; she touches them without

their knowing how or why, in a secret and unexpected moment. The ray of

light which gladdens others brings veils to them; the festive rejoicing

which moves and delights others pierces them with an arrow. It is with

much difficulty that God and our Lord can scatter from the heart which

loves them these vain and chilling clouds; the suffering is so much the

more difficult to vanquish from having a less real cause.”

Oh! the cause of my sorrow, can I forget it? Kate, obtain strength for

me. How truly I feel you present!

MARCH 5.

We are come back to Brittany. They say that I have become a mere shadow.

Kate dearest, I wish to be courageous, but my poor human nature gives

way on this Calvary. O my memories! They are a golden book in which I

read every hour, in which every leaflet recalls my other self, her

devotedness and love. Your papers have been given to me—the private

pages which God alone has read with me. How you have loved me! Dearest,

I weep no more, except over myself. You were hungering for heaven, as

were Mad and Thérèse, Ellen and Edith. Oh! gone—you also, you my

guardian angel!

I wanted to write, to relieve myself a little; my heart swelled, and I

could do nothing but sob. I have fearful moments. Oh! speak to me, Kate.

Last night I seemed to witness your death again. Oh! those eyes, those

eyes which I almost worshipped—I had to close them. Kate, what is

happiness? Mine has fled away like a cloud, and I seek after it in vain.

I know that you are happy, and yet my selfishness grieves. Pray for your

Georgina!

MARCH 8.

Strange blindness of heart! You were to me so sweet, so infinitely

precious, that the thought of an _adieu_ without ever meeting here again

had never occurred to me.

You were six years old when you imprinted your first kiss on the brow of

your Georgina. Our most distant memories show me your beloved image. You

never left me; the sight of you was a talisman that stopped my tears;

your voice taught me my first baby-words. Oh! this union of ours from

the very cradle was my mother’s pride—this mother, so beloved and so

beautiful, who saw herself over again in you. You did not know that you

were fair; you early disdained earthly frivolities; and how much it must

have cost you, later, to remain in the world for me!

Everywhere you were surrounded by sympathy and respect; your sisterly

devotion made you an aureole. Kate, who was like you?

Tell me that you hear me, that you see me every day. How shall I live

without you? A great void has been made in me; my heart is like a

desert. Ah! I loved you too well, and our God is a jealous God.

I adore his will, and, in spite of my inexpressible desolation, I kiss

his divine hand beneath the blow which overwhelms me. I desire to become

truly your sister by sacrifice and love.

Help me! I know not how to climb up Calvary!

MARCH 10.

No, I cannot believe that it is at an end; that I have no more a sister.

At times I believe myself to be under the influence of a nightmare. My

black dress—this sombre vestment which made me afraid—is become dear to

me since I wear it for you; but ... what faintings of heart! In what an

ocean of grief my soul is plunged!

To-day I wished to go out and visit my poor; my strength failed. Kate,

sorrow is killing me.

MARCH 12.

An unexpected consolation—a visit from the Père de G—-. His touching,

penetrating words roused me. Pardon me, Kate! I was cowardly. God

forbids not tears, but he forbids despair. Alas! formerly I comforted

others, and now I am unwilling to accept any solace in my trouble; I

wish for no truce to my regret. Oh! be happy, soul of my sister. Obtain

for me grace to love much, more than ever, all who suffer, all the elect

of misfortune. The gentle Abbé Perreyve used to say: “The greater part

of souls would remain closed to other souls, if they had not suffered;

trial bruises them, and compels them to shed around them floods of

love.”

I loved them already—these dear poor of the good God! But I feel that my

time belongs to them, that I owe myself also to those who love me, and

that it remains to me to pray and suffer while I love.

Help me, dear Kate, help me!

MARCH 15.

How kind René is, dear Kate, and how fraternal! He understands my wish

to write to you still, to continue my life so violently cut in twain,

and unceasingly to speak to you. I am stronger, but not yet resigned.

Can one be resigned to such a loss?

I saw yesterday a young girl whom Gertrude knows, and who has opened her

heart to me as to a friend. With what ardor of desire she dreams of the

religious life! God permits her to be cruelly tried: her mother is

utterly opposed to her departure. There are several other sisters, one

of whom shares the aspirations of my new acquaintance. How they both

suffer! Would that a heavenly light might illuminate the heart of their

mother, who little comprehends the martyrdom of her children! How

everything is at cross-purposes in this poor world! People are saddened

by things at which they ought to rejoice, and _vice versâ_. Mothers, who

have had experience of the cares and pains of marriage and the

world—mothers, who know too well the sum of happiness that may be

expected from even the best-assorted unions—make themselves miserable at

the mere thought of their daughters’ union with God, as if he were not

the Supreme Good, the Spouse _par excellence_, the faithful Friend, the

plenitude of every virtue and of love! Ah! it is because everything in

this world has its shades and its defects, and because few souls know

truly how to love.

Thus is it that there is a mixture and alloy in my affection for you

when I weep for you so bitterly, dear sister of my life!

Nothing can separate our souls. I am yours in life and death!

MARCH 18.

Berthe’s brother has just sunk under a malignant fever. The poor widow

is ill of grief. Three such beautiful children, whom he loved so much—so

many powerful bonds which bound him to this world so suddenly broken—all

this makes the grief immense. Gertrude said to me: “Why, then, are those

mourned for who enter the port—those who go hence to rest in God? They

only who remain behind are really to be pitied.” Ah! what deadly

affliction must not our friend feel, widowed of her happiness, which

nothing can restore to her—nothing, until that hour when, delivered in

her turn from this life sown with crosses, she too shall see God, and,

with God, him whom she weeps!

Kate, would that I could see you and embrace you again as in that last

hour! Everywhere death, everywhere mourning!

MARCH 21.

Count de Montalembert died on the 13th of March. It is a great funereal

date. May God receive him into his glory! I was just now hearing some

beautiful pages by Alfred Nettement, dead also the 14th of November—dead

in the breach, in those combats of pen and thought so worthy of

admiration and of enthusiasm when their object is the defence of the

church. Our dear M. de Riancey is also dead, faithful, to his last

moment, to this proscribed monarchy, which sees its best defenders

falling one by one. O my God! what losses. Kate, if I could forget you

for a single instant, would not these deaths lead me back to the thought

of you?

Adrien has given me _The Book of All who Suffer_, by M. Gautier. How

well this good brother was inspired!

Marcella, Margaret, Lizzy, Isa, and so many other kind hearts write to

me frequently, but nothing can replace my Kate!

APRIL 1.

Dear sister, I have suffered fearful pains for ten days past. My good

René has been to me like a Sister of Charity. I am like Thérèse, I

cannot live without my other _self_. Oh! to see you, to hear you, to

kneel by you, and kiss your beloved hands.

Until now I did not know what separation meant. I remember with a sort

of remorse how joyous my first letters were after that first farewell

which was to be so soon followed by a farewell that seems eternal. I saw

you as having attained the object of your dreams. I entered with glad

heart into this new life where all was golden. Kate, I am ungrateful!

God has permitted me to know no other troubles than those which should

not be such to the Christian—death, the beginning of true life for those

who love God. Help me, that I may be strong; my sadness clouds so many

brows!

APRIL 8.

Nelly, who flattered herself that she would recover, has bid adieu to

this poor world, in which she suffered so terribly, although possessing

numerous certainties of happiness, if it be true that anything can be

certain here below, even when one is only twenty years old.

My new young friend visits me often; her fervent piety and the ardor of

her desires find an echo in my heart. You were thus, O sister of my

soul! at her age, in that spring-time of life thrice happy and thrice

blessed when one belongs to God.

APRIL 15.

The Duchess de Berry died on the 10th, at her castle in Upper Styria,

far from Naples, far from France, far from her son. Yet another grand

figure disappeared! Kate, do you remember our presentation to this

heroine? But she is now with you, in the true fatherland of souls, far

from agitations and sufferings. Call us, call us, all together—all our

_corner of Brittany_; I, too, am athirst for heaven.

What a day was this Good Friday! Made four times the _Way of the Cross_

for the souls in purgatory. Is there any possibility that you are in

that place of expiation, dear Kate? Oh! tell me, or rather assure me,

that you are in heaven. Gaston yesterday asked his mother to show him

Mme. Kate up in the sky; he believes that you have become a star.

Charming belief!

APRIL 16.

A year ago, and I was full of joy and hope. O my happy days with my

sister! you have for ever fled away.

APRIL 17.

God be praised! I saw you this morning.... Oh! do not let me be told

that it is a dream. I _saw_ you, dear Kate; your beautiful hair falling

over your shoulders, and you were smiling. Happiness enough for one

whole day!

Christ is risen! The weather is splendid; we are in the full bloom of

spring; bright sunshine, songs of birds, verdure everywhere; joy in our

souls. Kate, I weep no more; you are in heaven!

APRIL 19.

Walk with Amélie, the future _religieuse_ of whom I spoke to you. She

relieves herself a little to me of some of the desolation that fills her

heart. She is not allowed to depart, and yet the delay requested is

expired. Her grief makes my heart ache, and I would that it were given

me to smooth for her the way to the cloister. For that I should be

obliged to go out, to visit the mother; and as soon as I see any one I

burst into tears. Do you blame me for the fidelity of my regrets? In

listening to Amélie I understand what you must have undergone when once

the Lord’s choice was clearly manifested. Pardon me for having wished

still to hold you back!

Gertrude, our saint _par excellence_, speaks admirably of heaven. Lucy

weeps with me, and makes her pretty Anne wipe away my tears. Kate, will

you read this?