vent and entered the parlour, where they declared firmly that they would remain till the request was granted. The superior in great agitation entreated them to depart and not provoke a scandal. "I am but a feeble woman," she said, "and the bishop has forbidden me to allow you to see your sister."
Throughout the day the two men remained at their post seated in the parlour. Emissaries ran to and fro between the convent and the bishop's palace. The house was like a disturbed ant-heap. Sisters passed and repassed, peeped in and withdrew. Voices were heard in discussion in the passages. But the two men would not budge.
At last night drew on. It would never do to allow them to pass it in this holy prison. At last, pale and trembling, the superior entered, and said, "Monseigneur has consented."
Soubirous was then conducted to the infirmary. The whole community of twenty nuns, and all the serving sisters, were there crowded about the bed. On it Soubirous caught a glimpse of the white face of his sister with her great burning eyes looking at him, and tears rolling down her cheeks. The dying girl in a feeble voice said, "The fathers will give you work. They have promised it." That was all. The head sank back on the pillow, and more tears flowed. Soubirous was then hustled out of the room, and he never more saw Bernadette.
To-day this man is well-to-do. He has a shop and a house, and fears God and the Fathers of the Grotto. So ended this poor martyr to the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception.[1] The annual number of pilgrims who visit the grotto amounts
- ↑ Bonnefon, Lourdes et ses tenanciers. Paris, 1906. The value of this book is in the second part, that contains the hitherto unpublished documents from the Paris and Departmental archives relative to the course of development of the Lourdes story.
