had I closed my eyes than I became a youthful gallant,
critical in women, dogs, and horses, prompt with dice and
bottle, free of hand and tongue; and when waking-time came
at dawn of day, it seemed to me as if I then fell asleep and
was a priest only in dreams. From this sleep-life I have
kept the memory of words and things, which recur to me
against my will; and though I have never quitted the walls
of my parsonage, those who hear me talk would rather think
me a man of the world and of many experiences, who has
entered the religious life hoping to finish in God's bosom
the evening of his stormy day, than a humble seminarist,
whose life has been spent in an obscure parish, buried deep
in woods, and far removed from the course of the world.

Yes, I have loved--as no one else has loved, with a mad and
wild passion so violent that I can hardly understand how it
failed to break my heart.

After rapidly sketching the history of the early seminary days of the
priest Romuald, his complete seclusion and ignorance almost of the very
names of world and woman, the tale goes on to the day of his ordination.
He is in the church, almost in a trance of religious fervour; the
building itself, the gorgeously robed bishop, the stately ceremonies,
seem to him a foretaste of heaven, when suddenly--

By chance I raised my head, which I had hitherto kept bowed,
and saw before me, within arm's length as it seemed, but in
reality at some distance and beyond the chancel rails, a
woman of rare beauty and royally apparelled. At once, as it
were, scales dropped from my eyes. I was in the case of a
blind man whose sight is suddenly restored. The bishop, but
now so dazzling to me, became dim, the tapers in their
golden stands paled like the stars at morning, and darkness
seemed to pervade the church. On this background of shade
the lovely vision stood out like an angelic appearance,
self-illumined, and giving rather than receiving light. I
dropped my eyelids, firmly resolving not again to raise
them, that so I might escape the distraction of outward
things, for I felt the spell more and more, and I hardly
knew what I did; but a minute afterwards I again looked up,
for I perceived her beauty still shining across my dropped
lashes as if with prismatic glory, and encircled by the