sky is
silvery grey, and if the sun lights it up it turns pale golden yellow;
seen from near, its skin is like a nibbled biscuit, a siliceous
limestone eaten into holes; at other times, when the sun is setting, it
turns crimson and appears like some vast and exquisite shrine, all rose
colour and green; and in the twilight it is blue, and seems to
evaporate into violet.

"And those porches!" he went on. "That of the royal front is the least
variable; it remains of a cinnamon-brown half-way up, of a dull
pumice-grey as it rises; that on the south side, more eaten into by
lichens, is wearing green, while the arches on the north, with their
stones like concrete full of shells, suggest to the fancy a sea-grotto
left high and dry."

"Well, our friend, are you dreaming?" said Madame Bavoil, tapping him on
the shoulder.

"This Carmelite convent you see is a very austere house," said she, "and
as you may suppose, grace abounds;" and when Durtal murmured,--

"What a contrast between this dead spot and the railway that runs past
it, always in a stir!" she exclaimed,--

"Do you suppose that anywhere else you will find, side by side, such an
image of the contemplative life and the active life?"

"And what must the nuns think as they hear these continual departures
for the outer world? Those who have grown old in the convent would, of
course, despise these calls, these invitations to live; the quietude of
their spirits must increase as they find themselves protected for ever
from the perils which the noisy rush of the trains must bring before
them every hour of the day and night; they will feel more drawn to pray,
for those whom the chances of life carry away to Paris, or bring back to
the country, outcasts from the city. But the postulants--the novices? In
the hours of desertion, of doubt as to their vocation, which must come
over them, is it not appalling to think of the constantly revived
memories of home, of friends, of all that they have left to shut
themselves up for ever in a convent?

"As each asks herself whether she can endure watching and fasting, must
it not be a permanent temptation to rebel against being buried alive in
a tomb?

"And I cannot help thinking of the appearance as of a reservoir that the
style of building gives to this Carmel. The image is precise, for the
convent is indeed a reservoir into which God dips to draw forth the good
works of love and tears, and restore the balance of the scales in whic