side
door, for night sacraments, chatting in a friendly way.

Suddenly I found myself transported into my confessional. The chapel was
full of ladies who all bowed at my approach. I entered my narrow box,
the key of which I had. I arranged on the seat the air-cushion which is
indispensable to me on the evenings preceding great church festivals,
the sittings at that season being always prolonged. I slipped the
white surplice which was hanging from a peg over my cassock, and, after
meditating for a moment, opened the little shutter that puts me in
communication with the penitents.

I will not undertake to describe to you one by one the different people
who came and knelt before me. I will not tell you, for instance, how one
of them, a lady in black, with a straight nose, thin lips, and sallow
complexion, after reciting her Confiteor in Latin, touched me infinitely
by the absolute confidence she placed in me, though I was not of her
sex. In five minutes she found the opportunity to speak to me of her
sister-in-law, her brother, an uncle who was on the point of death whose
heiress she was, her nephews, and her servants; and I could perceive,
despite the tender benevolence that appeared in all her words, that she
was the victim of all these people. She ended by informing me she had
a marriageable daughter, and that her stomach was an obstacle to her
fasting.

I can still see a throng of other penitents, but it would take too
long to tell you about them, and we will confine ourselves, with your
permission, to the last two, who, besides, impressed upon my memory
themselves particularly.

A highly adorned little lady rushed into the confessional; she was
brisk, rosy, fresh. Despite her expression of deep thoughtfulness,
she spoke very quickly in a musical voice, and rattled through her
Confiteor, regardless of the sense.

"Father," she said, "I have one thing that is troubling me."

"Speak, my child; you know that a confessor is a father."

"Well, father--but I really dare not."

There are many of these timid little hearts that require to be
encouraged. I said, "Go on, my child, go on."

"My husband," she murmured confusedly, "will not abstain during Lent.
Ought I to compel him, father?"

"Yes, by persuasion."

"But he says that he will go and dine at the restaurant if I do not let
him have any meat. Oh! I suffer terribly from that. Am I not assuming
the responsibility of all that meat, father?"

This young wife