etween the windows, of the beautiful apse. The windows,
faintly lighted up, added wonderfully to the effect. Surely the church
was not closed? We tried the west door, it yielded, and we entered.

The interior was in semi-darkness; a gloom that almost inspired awe; a
silence and repose which forbade the faintest echo of our footsteps.
Pillars and aisles and arches could be barely outlined. Everything
seemed dim and intangible; we felt that we were going through a vision,
there was so little that was real or earthly about it; so much that was
beautiful, mysterious, full of repose and saintly influence. The far
east end was lost in obscurity, and we could barely trace the outlines
of the splendid roof. Far down, near a confessional, knelt a small group
of hooded women, motionless as carven images. Their heads were bowed,
their whole attitude betrayed the penitential mood. There might have
been eight or ten at most, and they never stirred. But every now and
then a fair penitent issued from the confessional box; and, cloaked and
hooded, glided back to the seat she had lately occupied, and resumed the
penitential attitude. The ceremony was drawing near its end when we
entered, and when all was over they rose in a group and, noiselessly as
phantoms, like spirits from the land of shadows, passed down the long
aisle and disappeared into the night.

It was a strange hour for confession, and there must have been some
special reason for it. They were strangely dressed, too, in their silken
cloaks and hoods, as if they belonged to some religious order, or some
charitable institution. We wondered much.

When the west doorway had closed behind them, and not before, the priest
left his box, and we started as we recognised our fellow traveller. How
came it that he was confessing so soon after his arrival, or confessing
at all, in a church to which, as far as we knew, he was not attached?
His tall and portly form looked magnificent and commanding as he stepped
forth into the shadowy aisle, and, preceded by a verger, or suisse,
bearing a lighted flambeau and a staff of office, was soon lost in the
sacristy.

We lost ourselves in dreams. It is wonderfully refreshing to fall out of
the influence of the crowded and commonplace world into these silent
resting-places, which whisper so much of Heaven, and seem to breathe out
a full measure of the spiritual life. They seem steeped in a religious,
a celestial atmosphere; just as, on the Sabbat