tionary tribunal. I come to claim your promise. I am going to take the children to Vincennes to their little sister, and there I shall prepare them for this terrible blow.' Prepared as I had long been, I was terribly disturbed. At last I said, 'Leave me to change my dress, and pray to God to give me strength to fulfil my promise.' We found the poor children playing as merrily as possible. The sight and the thought of what they were about to hear, and of their meeting with their poor little sister, made my heart bleed. I went to the palace between one and two. It was impossible to get in... I returned about five o'clock, and, after another hour of tedious expectation, I saw by a movement in the crowd that the prison door was about to open. I placed myself close to the entrance; for the last fortnight it had been impossible to gain entrance into the court. The first cart was filled, and came towards me. It contained eight ladies of most edifying demeanour. Seven were unknown to me; the last, to whom I was very near, was the Maréchale de Noailles. I felt a momentary ray of hope when I saw her without her daughter-in-law and her granddaughter; but, alas! they immediately appeared in the second cart. Madame de Noailles was in white, which she had worn ever since the death of her father-in-law and mother-in-law, the Maréchal and Maréchale de Mouchy. She did not look more than four-and-twenty at the utmost. They had hardly taken their places when I saw the daughter show her mother all her wonted tender affection. I heard those around me say, 'Look at that young woman, how earnestly she is speaking to the other.' I seemed to hear what they were saying: 'Mama, he is not there;-look again ;—I assure you, Mama, he is not there, nothing escapes me.' They forgot that I had told them it would be impossible for me to get into the court. The first cart remained close to me for at least a quarter of an hour. It passed on; the second came forward; I drew nearer ; they did not see me. I turned back, went a long way round, and placed myself at the entrance of the Pont au Change in a conspicuous position. Madame de Noailles cast her eyes all around her. She passed on, and had not seen me. I followed them along the bridge, separated from them by the crowd, but still near them. Madame de Noailles still looked intently for me in vain. Madame d'Ayen's face bespoke visible anxiety. Her daughter redoubled her efforts without success. I was tempted to give it up. I said to myself, I have done what I could. The crowd will be the same everywhere; it will be impossible for me to see them.' I was about to withdraw, when the sky darkened, thunder was heard in the distance. I said to myself, I will try again.' By a short cut I arrived before the carts in the Rue S. Antoine, nearly opposite to the too celebrated prison of La Force. There a violent wind arose; the storm burst in its fury; flashes of lightning and claps of thunder rapidly succeeded each other; the rain fell in torrents. I took shelter under the door-way of a shop, which, to this day, I cannot look at without emotion. In one moment the street was swept: not a person was to be seen except in the door-ways, the shops, and at the windows. There was now no order in the procession. Those on horseback and on foot hastened their pace and the carts also. They came to the little S. Antoine, and I was still undecided. The first passed before me. By a hasty and

...

almost involuntary movement I left the shop and followed the other. I was alone with my penitents. Madame de Noailles caught sight of me, and her smile seemed to say: There you are at last, oh! how thankful we are; we have been long looking for you. Mama, there he is.' Madame d'Ayen revived. All my irresolution ceased. I felt by the grace of God filled with extraordinary courage. Bathed with sweat and rain, I continued to walk close by them. . . . The storm was at its height, the wind more and more impetuous. The poor old Maréchale de Noailles was terribly tormented by it; her large cap was blown aside and exposed some of her grey hairs. She tottered on the miserable plank on which she was seated, her hands tied behind her back. She was insulted by the cries of some who were standing there, notwithstanding the rain. She bore it all with great patience. At last we came to the cross-way before the Faubourg S. Antoine. I went forward, looked all round, and said to myself: This is the best place to give them what they so earnestly desire.' The cart was going slower; I turned towards them, making a sign to Madame de Noailles which she perfectly understood. 'Mama, M. Carrichon is going to give us absolution.' Then they bent their heads with an expression of penitence, contrition, hope, and piety. I raised my hand, and with my head covered, I pronounced the form of absolution, and then the words which follow it very distinctly and with supernatural attention. They united their intention more fervently than ever. I shall never forget that beautiful sight. From that moment the storm abated, the rain diminished, and seemed to have been sent only to render that solemn absolution possible. I blessed God for it, and they also. Their deportment betokened content, security, and joy. At last we reached the fatal spot; the scaffold was before us. The carts stopped, the guards surrounded them, and then a more numerous circle of spectators, the greater part laughing and amusing themselves at this horrible spectacle. I shuddered to be among them. While the executioner with two assistants was helping the ladies to descend from the first cart, Madame de Noailles was looking for me: she perceived me. How many things did she express to me by those animated, sweet, expressive eyes, now raised to heaven, now fixed upon me in a way which would have brought observation upon me if my neighbours had not been otherwise occupied. I drew my hat over my brow without losing sight of her. I seemed to understand all that she would say; the expression of her countenance was so touching and so eloquent that the spectators said one to another: 'Oh! how happy that young woman looks, how she raises her eyes to heaven, how she prays; but what good will it do her?'

"They now descended from the carts. I thanked God that I had not waited till that moment to give them the absolution; we could not have united ourselves so tranquilly to give and receive this great grace as we had done on the way. I left my place, and came and faced the wooden staircase which led to the scaffold. The Maréchale de Noailles was opposite to me, in mourning for her husband. She was seated on a block of wood or stone, with her large eyes fixed. I had not forgotten to do for her what I had done for so many others. The rest were ranged in two lines on the side [New Series:]

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opposite to the Faubourg S. Antoine. I looked for Madme d'Ayen and her daughter. I saw the mother in an attitude of devotion, simple, noble, resigned, and wholly absorbed in the sacrifice which she was about to make to God by the merits of His Divine Son, free from all disquietude; she looked, in short, as I used to see her when she had the happiness to receive Holy Communion. That sight I shall never forget; it is ineffaceable. I often seem to see her in that attitude. God grant that I may benefit by the recollection. The Maréchale de Noailles was the third to ascend the altar of sacrifice; six ladies followed. Madame d'Ayen was the tenth, well pleased, as it seemed to me, to die before her child. The executioner snatched off her cap. As it was fastened by a pin which he had not withdrawn, her hair was violently torn from her head, causing an expression of pain to appear on her features. The mother disappeared; her sweet and loving daughter took her place: when I looked upon her in her white dress, looking much younger than she was, like a gentle little lamb ready for the slaughter, I seemed to myself to be witnessing the martyrdom of one of the young virgins or holy women of the primitive Church. What happened to her mother happened also to her. There was the same momentary expression of pain, and then the same calmness, the same death. She is very happy,' cried I interiorly, when her body was thrown into that dreadful receptacle. Madame de Noailles, as well as her mother, had addressed some earnest exhortations to their companions in death, and among others to a young man who had uttered a fearful blasphemy in her hearing. As she was about to mount the bloody staircase leading to the scaffold, she turned her angelic countenance upon him and said, For God's love, Monsieur, say I forgive them." "

Five years passed after this tragic day before the three surviving sisters met to spend a few weeks together in Holland. Before they parted they agreed to unite together every evening in spirit, and to say the following prayers composed by the three.

"The souls of the just are in the hand of God, and the torment of death shall not touch them. In the sight of the unwise they seem to die; and their departure is taken for misery, and their going away from us for utter destruction; but they are in peace, and though in the sight of men they suffered torments, their hope is full of immortality. O Lord, who hast made thy light and thy truth to shine upon them, to lead them to thy holy mountain and to make them enter into thy sanctuary, have mercy on us.

"O Lord, who hast been their support and their strength, have mercy

on us.

"O Lord, who hast created them for Thy glory, protected them by Thy power, saved them by Thy mercy, have mercy on us.

"O Lord, who art now their refuge and their everlasting reward, have mercy on us.

"Be mindful of that mercy which Thou showest from generation to

generation on those that fear Thee. We beseech Thee, O Lord, save the children of Thine handmaid. In Thee, O my God, have they put their trust. Thou wilt not suffer us to be confounded for ever. We beseech Thee, O Lord, save the children of Thy handmaid.

"PRACTICE.

"Let us seek to enter into the same dispositions as these dear victims when preparing for death. In union with them let us meditate upon their happiness while we cease not to say with the Church, requiem æternam dona

eis Domine.

"Let us hope to receive new benedictions for the fulfilment of the duties of our state, each according to her need. Let us beseech the Lord to increase in us His love, and to accomplish in us His will. Let us unite our prayers to those of the Church militant, of the Church suffering, but, still more, of the Church triumphant, by this perpetual canticle. Amen. Alleluia.

"As the disciple of Elias, when he saw him ascending to heaven, asked for a double portion of his spirit, let us ask their spirit, that we may be able to follow their footsteps upon earth. We have seen them weeping as they cast their seed upon the ground; one day we shall see them returning with joy, bearing their sheaves with them. Alleluia. Alleluia. Alleluia.

"Thou didst make them pass through fire and water to bring them to a place of refreshment. Alleluia.

"In Thee, O Lord, is the fountain of life, and in Thy light do they now see light. Alleluia.

"Thou hast been pleased to deliver them from all their troubles, that their eternal joy may be to sing Thy praise. Alleluia.

"As Azarias, Ananias, and Misael blessed the Lord in the furnace, so the three sisters now left in this vale of tears, desire to glorify Him in the midst of their sorrow."

If Madame d'Ayen seemed fitted above all things to be a mother, Madame de Lafayette was above all things distinguished as a wife. Her devotion to the icy pedant, her husband, who was not, however, icy to her, nor, to do him justice, to his family or friends in general, surpassed even the ordinary love of woman. It not only nerved her to face danger and obloquy for him, and to share with him exile and captivity, but it unhappily verged upon such idolatry as should be paid by no Christian to any mortal being, and which is specially dangerous to a Christian wife wedded to an unbelieving husband. One thing, however, it left untouched-her faith as a Catholic Christian. She could adopt his political theories and use the republican shibboleths of the time, but the citoyenne Lafayette ever held fast to the faith of her childhood; nor could her attachment to her husband, or her regard for his popularity,

ever induce her to hear the mass of a constitutional priest, or in any way to hold communion in sacris with those who had rebelled against the authority of the Church. Nay, though she bore with their presence, as private individuals, at the general's table, she pointedly absented herself when the assermenté Bishop of Paris came to dine with him on his installation. No consideration could induce her to receive him as her diocesan. Her witty and free-thinking aunt, Madame de Tessé, said that her devotion was a medley of the Catechism and the Declaration of Rights. The unswerving integrity of Madame de Lafayette's faith, under circumstances so trying, is the more remarkable from the fact that, in her early girlhood, she had been so painfully beset by doubts, that her mother thought it expedient to defer her first communion, which was not made till after her marriage, at the age of sixteen. But though it left her faith intact, and never interfered with the conscientious discharge of all her religious obligations, it may be that it was the absorbing nature of her attachment to her husband which prevented her from attaining that high degree of interior perfection which so admirably characterized Madame de Montagu.

The details of Madame de Lafayette's last illness are touchingly given in a letter from her husband, written at the close of a union of thirty-four years. "She was fourteen and I was sixteen," he says, "when her heart first identified itself with all that affected me." Her illness, of more than a month's duration, was one long delirium, full of beautiful and pious fancies, pervaded by the master-passion of her life, never so freely and fully expressed before. "Had her mind," says M. de Lafayette, "been in its usual state, she would have thought it her duty to fix her thoughts upon what she called her sins, aud to distract them from the sentiments which filled all the faculties of her soul." The details which he gives are deeply mournful, for it is clear that the sentiment which had constituted her earthly happiness, had ever been troubled by an undercurrent of deep anxiety for the soul in which her own was bound up. Amid all her illusions," says her husband, "she only deceived herself with regard to me for a few moments, in which she persuaded herself that I had become a fervent Christian." It was but momentary, and accompanied by doubts and questions which proved that it was less an illusion than an intense desire.

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Are you not a Christian?' she said to me one day, and as I made no answer—“Ah! I know what you are, you are a Fayettiste.' 'You think I am very proud,' replied I, 'but are you not a little of the same opinion yourself?' 'Oh! yes,' cried she, with all my heart, I would give my life for that sect.""

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