common bed, or a tressel like that of a hospital, a little coloured
print of St. Michael adorning the wall overhead. The bed-covering was
cleanly, but patched in many places, and bespeaking much poverty, and
the black 'soutane' of silk that hung against the wall seemed to show
long years of service. The few articles of any pretensions to comfort
were found in the sitting-room, where a small book-shelf with some
well-thumbed volumes, and a writing-table covered with papers, maps, and
a few pencil-drawings, appeared. All seemed as if he had just quitted
the spot a few minutes before; the pencil lay across a half-finished
sketch; two or three wild plants were laid within, the leaves of a
little book on botany; and a chess problem, with an open book beside it,
still waited for solution on a little board, whose workmanship clearly
enough betrayed it to be by his own hands.

I inspected everything with an interest inspired by all I had been
hearing of the poor priest, and turned over the little volumes of his
humble library, to trace, if I might, some due to his habits in his
readings. They were all, however, of one cast and character--religious
tracts and offices, covered with annotations and remarks, and showing
by many signs the most careful and frequent perusal. It was easy to see
that his taste for drawing or for chess were the only dissipations he
permitted himself to indulge. What a strange life of privation, thought
I, alone and companionless as he must be! and while speculating on the
sense of duty which impelled such a man to accept a post so humble and
unpromising, I perceived that on the wall right opposite to me there
hung a picture, covered by a little curtain of green silk.

Curious to behold the saintly effigy so carefully enshrined, I drew
aside the curtain, and what was my astonishment to find a little
coloured sketch of a boy about twelve years old, dressed in the tawdry
and much-worn uniform of a drummer. I started. Something flashed
suddenly across my mind, that the features, the dress, the air, were not
unknown to me. Was I awake, or were my senses misleading me? I took
it down and held it to the light, and as well as my trembling hands
permitted, I spelled out at the foot of the drawing, the words 'Le Petit
Maurice, as I saw him last.' Yes, it was my own portrait, and the words
were in the writing of my dearest friend in the world, the Pere Michel.
Scarce knowing what I did, I ransacked books and paper