them grotesquely, innocently mocking them, telling stories that made them laugh till the tears came and playing a thousand pranks.  At times they would measure their feet, to see whose were the smallest, compare the white plumpness of their arms, see whose nose had the infirmity of blushing after supper, count their freckles, tell each other where their skin marks were situated, dispute whose complexion was the clearest, whose hair the prettiest colour, and whose figure the best.  You can imagine that among these figures sanctified to God there were fine ones, stout ones, lank ones, thin ones, plump ones, supple ones, shrunken ones, and figures of all kinds.  Then they would quarrel amongst themselves as to who took the least to make a girdle, and she who spanned the least was pleased without knowing why.  At times they would relate their dreams and what they had seen in them.  Often one or two, at times all of them, had dreamed they had tight hold of the keys of the abbey.  Then they would consult each other about their little ailments.  One had scratched her finger, another had a whitlow; this one had risen in the morning with the white of her eye bloodshot; that one had put her finger out, telling her beads.  All had some little thing the matter with them.

“Ah! you have lied to our mother; your nails are marked with white,” said one to her neighbour.

“You stopped a long time at confession this morning, sister,” said another.  “You must have a good many little sins to confess.”

As there is nothing resembles a pussy-cat so much as a tom-cat, they would swear eternal friendship, quarrel, sulk, dispute and make it up again; would be jealous, laugh and pinch, pinch and laugh, and play tricks upon the novices.

At times they would say, “Suppose a gendarme came here one rainy day, where should we put him?”

“With Sister Ovide; her cell is so big he could get into it with his helmet on.”

“What do you mean?” cried Sister Ovide, “are not all our cells alike?”

Thereupon the girls burst out laughing like ripe figs.  One evening they increased their council by a little novice, about seventeen years of age, who appeared innocent as a new-born babe, and would have had the host without confession.  This maiden’s mouth had long watered for their secret confabulations, little feasts and rejoicings by which the nuns softened the holy captivity of their bodies, and had wept at not being admitted to them.

“Well,” said Sister Ovide to her, “have you had a good night’s rest, little one?”

“Oh no!” said she, “I have been bitten by fleas.”

“Ha! you have fleas in your cell?  But you must get rid of them at once.  Do you know how the rules of our order enjoin them to be driven out, so that never again during her conventional life shall a sister see so much as the tail of one?”

“No,” replied the novice.

“Well then, I will teach you.  Do you see any fleas here?  Do you notice any trace of fleas?  Do you smell an odour of fleas?  Is there any appearance of fleas in my cell?  Look!”