第 56 页

the inspiration which possessed him.

"Mary, we love thee!" he called.

And thereupon the crowd repeated in a lower, confused, and broken tone:

"Mary, we love thee!"

From that moment there was no stopping. The voice of the priest rang out

at full swing, and the voices of the crowd responded in a dolorous

murmur:

"Mary, thou art our only hope!"

"Mary, thou art our only hope!"

"Pure Virgin, make us purer, among the pure!"

"Pure Virgin, make us purer, among the pure!"

"Powerful Virgin, save our sick!"

"Powerful Virgin, save our sick!"

Often, when the priest's imagination failed him, or he wished to thrust a

cry home with greater force, he would repeat it thrice; while the docile

crowd would do the same, quivering under the enervating effect of the

persistent lamentation, which increased the fever.

The litanies continued, and Berthaud went back towards the Grotto. Those

who defiled through it beheld an extraordinary sight when they turned and

faced the sick. The whole of the large space between the cords was

occupied by the thousand or twelve hundred patients whom the national

pilgrimage had brought with it; and beneath the vast, spotless sky on

that radiant day there was the most heart-rending jumble of sufferers

that one could behold. The three hospitals of Lourdes had emptied their

chambers of horror. To begin with, those who were still able to remain

seated had been piled upon the benches. Many of them, however, were

propped up with cushions, whilst others kept shoulder to shoulder, the

strong ones supporting the weak. Then, in front of the benches, before

the Grotto itself, were the more grievously afflicted sufferers lying at

full length; the flagstones disappearing from view beneath this woeful

assemblage, which was like a large, stagnant pool of horror. There was an

indescribable block of vehicles, stretchers, and mattresses. Some of the

invalids in little boxes not unlike coffins had raised themselves up and

showed above the others, but the majority lay almost on a level with the

ground. There were some lying fully dressed on the check-patterned ticks

of mattresses; whilst others had been brought with their bedding, so that

only their heads and pale hands were seen outside the sheets. Few of

these pallets were clean. Some pillows of dazzling whiteness, which by a

last feeling of coquetry had been trimmed with embroidery, alone shone

out among all the filthy wretchedness of all the rest--a fearful

collection of rags, worn-out blankets, and linen splashed with stains.

And all were pushed, squeezed, piled up by chance as they came, women,

men, children, and priests, people in nightgowns beside people who were

fully attired being jumbled together in the blinding light of day.

And all forms of disease were there, the whole frightful procession

which, twice a day, left the hospitals to wend its way through horrified

Lourdes. There were the heads eaten away by eczema, the foreheads crowned

with roseola, and the noses and mouths which elephantiasis had

transformed into shapeless snouts. Next, the dropsical ones, swollen out

like leathern bottles; the rheumatic ones with twisted hands and swollen

feet, like bags stuffed full of rags; and a sufferer from hydrocephalus,

whose huge and weighty skull fell backwards. Then the consumptive ones,

with livid skins, trembling with fever, exhausted by dysentery, wasted to

skeletons. Then the deformities, the contractions, the twisted trunks,

the twisted arms, the necks all awry; all the poor broken, pounded

creatures, motionless in their tragic, marionette-like postures. Then the

poor rachitic girls displaying their waxen complexions and slender necks

eaten into by sores; the yellow-faced, besotted-looking women in the

painful stupor which falls on unfortunate creatures devoured by cancer;

and the others who turned pale, and dared not move, fearing as they did

the shock of the tumours whose weighty pain was stifling them. On the

benches sat bewildered deaf women, who heard nothing, but sang on all the

same, and blind ones with heads erect, who remained for hours turned

toward the statue of the Virgin which they could not see. And there was

also the woman stricken with imbecility, whose nose was eaten away, and

who laughed with a terrifying laugh, displaying the black, empty cavern

of her mouth; and then the epileptic woman, whom a recent attack had left

as pale as death, with froth still at the corners of her lips.

But sickness and suffering were no longer of consequence, since they were

all there, seated or stretched with their eyes upon the Grotto. The poor,

fleshless, earthy-looking faces became transfigured, and began to glow

with hope. Anchylosed hands were joined, heavy eyelids found the strength

to rise, exhausted voices revived as the priest shouted the appeals. At

first there was nothing but indistinct stuttering, similar to slight

puffs of air rising, here and there above the multitude. Then the cry

ascended and spread through the crowd itself from one to the other end of

the immense square.

"Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us!" cried the priest in his

thundering voice.

And the sick and the pilgrims repeated louder and louder: "Mary,

conceived without sin, pray for us!"

Then the flow of the litany set in, and continued with increasing speed:

"Most pure Mother, most chaste Mother, thy children are at thy feet!"

"Most pure Mother, most chaste Mother, thy children are at thy feet!"

"Queen of the Angels, say but a word, and our sick shall be healed!"

"Queen of the Angels, say but a word, and our sick shall be healed!"

In the second row of sufferers, near the pulpit, was M. Sabathier, who

had asked to be brought there early, wishing to choose his place like an

old _habitue_ who knew the cosy corners. Moreover, it seemed to him that

it was of paramount importance that he should be as near as possible,

under the very eyes of the Virgin, as though she required to see her

faithful in order not to forget them. However, for the seven years that

he had been coming there he had nursed this one hope of being some day

noticed by her, of touching her, and of obtaining his cure, if not by

selection, at least by seniority. This merely needed patience on his part

without the firmness of his faith being in the least shaken by his way of

thinking. Only, like a poor, resigned man just a little weary of being

always put off, he sometimes allowed himself diversions. For instance, he

had obtained permission to keep his wife near him, seated on a

camp-stool, and he liked to talk to her, and acquaint her with his

reflections.

"Raise me a little, my dear," said he. "I am slipping. I am very

uncomfortable."

Attired in trousers and a coarse woollen jacket, he was sitting upon his

mattress, with his back leaning against a tilted chair.

"Are you better?" asked his wife, when she had raised him.

"Yes, yes," he answered; and then began to take an interest in Brother

Isidore, whom they had succeeded in bringing in spite of everything, and

who was lying upon a neighbouring mattress, with a sheet drawn up to his

chin, and nothing protruding but his wasted hands, which lay clasped upon

the blanket.

"Ah! the poor man," said M. Sabathier. "It's very imprudent, but the

Blessed Virgin is so powerful when she chooses!"

He took up his chaplet again, but once more broke off from his devotions

on perceiving Madame Maze, who had just glided into the reserved

space--so slender and unobtrusive that she had doubtless slipped under

the ropes without being noticed. She had seated herself at the end of a

bench and, very quiet and motionless, did not occupy more room there than

a child. And her long face, with its weary features, the face of a woman

of two-and-thirty faded before her time, wore an expression of unlimited

sadness, infinite abandonment.

"And so," resumed M. Sabathier in a low voice, again addressing his wife

after attracting her attention by a slight movement of the chin, "it's

for the conversion of her husband that this lady prays. You came across

her this morning in a shop, didn't you?"

"Yes, yes," replied Madame Sabathier. "And, besides, I had some talk

about her with another lady who knows her. Her husband is a

commercial-traveller. He leaves her for six months at a time, and goes

about with other people. Oh! he's a very gay fellow, it seems, very nice,

and he doesn't let her want for money; only she adores him, she cannot

accustom herself to his neglect, and comes to pray the Blessed Virgin to

give him back to her. At this moment, it appears, he is close by, at

Luchon, with two ladies--two sisters."

M. Sabathier signed to his wife to stop. He was now looking at the

Grotto, again becoming a man of intellect, a professor whom questions of

art had formerly impassioned. "You see, my dear," he said, "they have

spoilt the Grotto by endeavouring to make it too beautiful. I am certain

it looked much better in its original wildness. It has lost its

characteristic features--and what a frightful shop they have stuck there,

on the left!"

However, he now experienced sudden remorse for his thoughtlessness.

Whilst he was chatting away, might not the Blessed Virgin be noticing one

of his neighbours, more fervent, more sedate than himself? Feeling

anxious on the point, he reverted to his customary modesty and patience,

and with dull, expressionless eyes again began waiting for the good

pleasure of Heaven.

Moreover, the sound of a fresh voice helped to bring him back to this

annihilation, in which nothing was left of the cultured reasoner that he

had formerly been. It was another preacher who had just entered the

pulpit, a Capuchin this time, whose guttural call, persistently repeated,

sent a tremor through the crowd.

"Holy Virgin of virgins, be blessed!"

"Holy Virgin of virgins, be blessed!"

"Holy Virgin of virgins, turn not thy face from thy children!"

"Holy Virgin of virgins, turn not thy face from thy children!"

"Holy Virgin of virgins, breathe upon our sores, and our sores shall

heal!"

"Holy Virgin of virgins, breathe upon our sores, and our sores shall

heal!"

At the end of the first bench, skirting the central path, which was

becoming crowded, the Vigneron family had succeeded in finding room for

themselves. They were all there: little Gustave, seated in a sinking

posture, with his crutch between his legs; his mother, beside him,

following the prayers like a punctilious _bourgeoise_; his aunt, Madame

Chaise, on the other side, so inconvenienced by the crowd that she was

stifling; and M. Vigneron, who remained silent and, for a moment, had

been examining Madame Chaise attentively.

"What is the matter with you, my dear?" he inquired. "Do you feel

unwell?"

She was breathing with difficulty. "Well, I don't know," she answered;

"but I can't feel my limbs, and my breath fails me."

At that very moment the thought had occurred to him that all the

agitation, fever, and scramble of a pilgrimage could not be very good for

heart-disease. Of course he did not desire anybody's death, he had never

asked the Blessed Virgin for any such thing. If his prayer for

advancement had already been granted through the sudden death of his

chief, it must certainly be because Heaven had already ordained the

latter's death. And, in the same way, if Madame Chaise should die first,

leaving her fortune to Gustave, he would only have to bow before the will

of God, which generally requires that the aged should go off before the

young. Nevertheless, his hope unconsciously became so keen that he could

not help exchanging a glance with his wife, to whom had come the same

involuntary thought.

"Gustave, draw back," he exclaimed; "you are inconveniencing your aunt."

And then, as Raymonde passed, he asked; "Do you happen to have a glass of

water, mademoiselle? One of our relatives here is losing consciousness."

But Madame Chaise refused the offer with a gesture. She was getting

better, recovering her breath with an effort. "No, I want nothing, thank

you," she gasped. "There, I'm better--still, I really thought this time

that I should stifle!"

Her fright left her trembling, with haggard eyes in her pale face. She

again joined her hands, and begged the Blessed Virgin to save her from

other attacks and cure her; while the Vignerons, man and wife, honest

folk both of them, reverted to the covert prayer for happiness that they

had come to offer up at Lourdes: a pleasant old age, deservedly gained by

twenty years of honesty, with a respectable fortune which in later years

they would go and enjoy in the country, cultivating flowers. On the other

hand, little Gustave, who had seen and noted everything with his bright

eyes and intelligence sharpened by suffering, was not praying, but

smiling at space, with his vague enigmatical smile. What could be the use

of his praying? He knew that the Blessed Virgin would not cure him, and

that he would die.

However, M. Vigneron could not remain long without busying himself about

his neighbours. Madame Dieulafay, who had come late, had been deposited

in the crowded central pathway; and he marvelled at the luxury about the

young woman, that sort of coffin quilted with white silk, in which she

was lying, attired in a pink dressing-gown trimmed with Valenciennes

lace. The husband in a frock-coat, and the sister in a black gown of

simple but marvellous elegance, were standing by; while Abbe Judaine,

kneeling near the sufferer, finished offering up a fervent prayer.

When the priest had risen, M. Vigneron made him a little room on the

bench beside him; and he then took the liberty of questioning him. "Well,

Monsieur le Cure, does that poor young woman feel a little better?"