noise which I hear is so frightful that I can no longer bear it; how, then, could I endure the sight of those horrors? "
Continuing her mysterious route, she saw an angel seated sadly on the curb of a well. " Who is that angel? " she asked of her guide. " It is," he replied, "the angel-guardian of the sinner in whose lot you are interested. His soul is in this well, where it has a special Purgatory." At these words, Lidwina cast an inquiring glance at her angel; she desired to see that soul which was dear to her, and endeavour to release it from that frightful pit. Her angel, who understood her, having taken off the cover of the well, a cloud of flames, together with the most plaintive cries, came forth.
" Do you recognise that voice? " said the angel to her. " Alas! yes," answered the servant of God. " Do you desire to see that soul? " he continued. On her replying in the affirmative, he called him by his name; and immediately our virgin saw appear at the mouth of the pit a spirit all on fire, resembling incandescent metal, which said to her in a voice scarcely audible, " O Lidwina, servant of God, who will give me to contemplate the face of the Most High?"
The sight of this soul, a prey to the most terrible torment of fire, gave our saint such a shock that the cincture which she wore around her body was rent in twain; and, no longer able to endure the sight, she awoke suddenly from her ecstasy.
The persons present, perceiving her fear, asked her its cause. " Alas!" she replied, " how frightful are the prisons of Purgatory! It was to assist the souls that I consented to descend thither. Without this motive, if the whole world were given to me, I would not undergo the terror which that horrible spectacle inspired."
Some days later, the same angel whom she had seen so dejected appeared to her with a joyful countenance; he
