e force for the patient partly, at any
rate, to cooperate."

Monsignor was silent. Again he felt bewilderment at the amazing
simplicity and common sense of it all.

"I am taking you," said the monk presently, "to the central
quarter--to the monastery proper. It is there that the main body
of the monks live. The church is remarkable. It is the third
largest monastic church in the world. . . . We are just entering
the quarter now," he added.

Monsignor leaned forward as the air darkened, and was in time to
see the great gates swinging slowly together again as if to meet
after the car had passed. It was still twilight as they sped on,
and he perceived that they were passing, with that extreme and
noiseless swiftness with which they had come, up some kind of
tunnel lit by artificial light. Then again there was a rush of
daylight and the car stopped.

"We must go on foot here," said the monk, and opened the door.

The priest, still marvelling, stepped out after him, and followed
through a postern door; and then, as he emerged, understood more
or less the arrangement of the buildings.

He stood on the edge of an enormous courtyard, perhaps five
hundred yards across. This was laid down with a lawn, crossed in
every direction with paved paths. But that at which he chiefly
stared was a church whose like he had never set eyes on before.
It was the sanctuary end, obviously, that faced him; the farther
end ran back into the high walls, pierced here and there by low
doors, with which the court was surrounded. The church itself
rose perhaps two hundred feet from floor to roof. It was straight
from end to end, the line broken only by a tall, severe tower at
the point where it joined the wall of the court; and running
round it, jutting out in a continuous block, like a platform, was
a low building, plainly containing chapels. The whole was of
white stone, unrelieved by carving of any kind. Enormous narrow
lancet windows showed above the line of chapels, springing
perhaps forty feet from the ground, and rising to a line
immediately below the roof. The whole gave an impression of
astounding severity and equally astounding beauty. It had the
kind of beauty of a perfectly bare mountain or of an iceberg. It
was graceful and yet as strong as iron; it was cold, and yet
obviously alive.

"Yes," said the monk, as they went across the court, "It is
impressive, is it not? It is the monastic church proper. It
can hold, if necessary, te