according to the fashion of the period, beside the image of those things of which the Eternal Father had deprived His angels, and which in the good prelate did not want for amplitude.  Madame the abbess having informed the sisters of the precious message of the good archbishop they came in haste, curious and hustling, as ants into whose republic a chestnut husk has fallen.  When they undid the breeches, which gaped horribly, they shrieked out, covering their eyes with one hand, in great fear of seeing the devil come out, the abbess exclaiming, “Hide yourselves my daughters!  This is the abode of mortal sin!”

The mother of the novices, giving a little look between her fingers, revived the courage of the holy troop, swearing by an Ave that no living head was domiciled in the breeches.  Then they all blushed at their ease, while examining this habitavit, thinking that perhaps the desire of the prelate was that they should discover therein some sage admonition or evangelical parable.  Although this sight caused certain ravages in the hearts of those most virtuous maidens, they paid little attention to the flutterings of their reins, but sprinkling a little holy water in the bottom of the abyss, one touched it, another passed her finger through a hole, and grew bolder looking at it.  It has even been pretended that, their first stir over, the abbess found a voice sufficiently firm to say, “What is there at the bottom of this?  With what idea has our father sent us that which consummates the ruin of women?”

“It’s fifteen years, dear mother, since I have been permitted to gaze upon the demon’s den.”

“Silence, my daughter.  You prevent me thinking what is best to be done.”

Then so much were these archiepiscopal breeches turned and twisted about, admired and re-admired, pulled here, pulled there, and turned inside out—­so much were they talked about, fought about, thought about, dreamed about, night and day, that on the morrow a little sister said, after having sung the matins, to which the convent had a verse and two responses—­“Sisters, I have found out the parable of the archbishop.  He has sent us as a mortification his garment to mend, as a holy warning to avoid idleness, the mother abbess of all the vices.”

Thereupon there was a scramble to get hold of the breeches; but the abbess, using her high authority, reserved to herself the meditation over this patchwork.  She was occupied during ten days, praying, and sewing the said breeches, lining them with silk, and making double hems, well sewn, and in all humility.  Then the chapter being assembled, it was arranged that the convent should testify by a pretty souvenir to the said archbishop their delight that he thought of his daughters in God.  Then all of them, to the very youngest, had to do some work on these blessed breeches, in order to do honour to the virtue of the good man.