priest must be honored, and woe to the poor nun who failed to move with sufficient alacrity; no punishment short of death itself was thought too severe for such criminal neglect.  Sometimes it would happen that I would be engaged in some employment with my back to the door, and not observe the entrance of a priest until the general movement around me would arrest my attention; then I would hasten to “make my manners,” as the ceremony was called; but all too late.  I had been remiss in duty, and no excuse would avail, no apology be accepted, no forgiveness granted; the dreaded punishment must come.

While the nuns are thus severely treated, the priests, and the Holy Mother live a very easy life, and have all the privileges they wish.  So far as the things of this world are concerned, they seem to enjoy themselves very well.  But I have sometimes wondered if conscience did not give them occasionally, an unpleasant twinge; and from some things I have seen, I believe, that with many of them, this is the fact.  They may try to put far from them all thoughts of a judgment to come, yet I do believe that their slumbers are sometimes disturbed by fearful forebodings of a just retribution which may, after all, be in store for them.  But whatever trouble of mind they may have, they do not allow it to interfere with their worldly pleasures, and expensive luxuries.  They have money enough, go when, and where they please, eat the richest food and drink the choicest wines.  In short, if sensual enjoyment was the chief end of their existence, I do not know how they could act otherwise.  The Abbesses are sometimes allowed to go out, but not unless they have a pass from one of the priests, and if, at any time, they have reason to suspect that some one is discontented, they will not allow any one to go out of the building without a careful attendant.

My Superior here, as in the White Nunnery, was very kind to me.  I sometimes feared she would share the fate of Father Darity, for she had a kind heart, and was guilty of many benevolent acts, which, if known, would have subjected her to very serious consequences.  I became so much attached to her, that my fears for her were always alarmed when she called me her good little girl, or used any such endearing expression.  The sequel of my story will show that my fears were not unfounded; but let me not anticipate.  Sorrows will thicken fast enough, if we do not hasten them.

I lived with this Superior one year before I was consecrated, and it was, comparatively, a happy season.  I was never punished unless it was to save me from less merciful hands; and then I would be shut up in a closet, or some such simple thing.  The other four girls who occupied the room with me, were consecrated at the same time.