Above the Grotto, in front of which Marie and Jeanne, eagerly bending to the ground were picking up pieces of dead wood, in the rustic niche formed by the rock, a woman of incomparable splendor stood upright, in the midst of a superhuman brightness.
The ineffable light which floated around her neither pained nor distressed the eyes, as does the brilliancy of sunshine. Far from this being the case, this aureole, intense as a pencil of rays, and calm as a profundity of shade, invincibly attracted the gaze, which seemed to bathe itself in it and rest on it with exquisite delight! It was, like the morning star, light combined with coolness. There was, in addition to this, nothing vague or vaporous in the Apparition herself. She had not the transitory form of a fantastic vision, she was a living reality, a human body which the eye pronounced palpable, like the flesh of us all, and which only differed from an ordinary person by its aureole and its divine beauty.
She was of middle height. She appeared to be quite young, and had the grace of the age of twenty years. But, without losing aught of its tender delicacy, this lustre, so fleeting in time, had in her the stamp of eternity, Further, in her features so divinely marked, there were mingled in some sort, but without disturbing their harmony, the successive and distinct beauties of the four seasons of human life. The innocent candor of the Child, the absolute purity of the Virgin, the tender seriousness of the highest of Maternities, and Wisdom superior to that of all accumulated ages, were summed up and melted into each other, without injuring the effect of each in this marvelous countenance of youthful womanhood. To what can we compare it in this fallen world, where the rays of the beautiful are scattered, broken and tarnished, and where they never appear to us without some impure admixture? Any image, any comparison would be a degradation of this unutterable type. No majesty existing in the universe, no distinction of this world, no simplicity here below, could convey any idea of it or assist us to comprehend it better. It is not with earthly lamps that we can render visible, and, so to say, light up the stars of heaven.
Even the regularity and the ideal purity of these features, in which nothing clashed, shields them from any attempt at description. Need we however say, that the oval curve of the countenance was infinitely graceful; that the eyes were blue and so sweet that they seemed to melt the heart of every one upon whom they turned their gaze? The lips breathed forth divine goodness and kindness. The brow seemed to contain supreme wisdom, that is to say, the union of omniscience with boundless virtue.
Her garments of an unknown texture, and doubtless woven in the mysterious loom which furnishes attire for the lilies of the valley, were white as the stainless mountain snow, and more magnificent in their simplicity than the gorgeous robe of Solomon in all his glory. Her robe, long and training, falling in chaste folds around her, suffered her feet to appear reposing on the rock, and lightly pressing the branches of the wild rose which trailed there. On each of them in their virgin nudity there expanded the mystic rose of a bright, golden color.
In front, a girdle—blue as the heavens—was knotted half-way round her body and fell in two long bands reaching within a short distance of her feet. Behind, a white veil fixed around her head and enveloping in its ample folds, her shoulders and the upper part of her arms, descended as far as the hem of her robe.
She wore neither rings, nor necklace, nor diadem, nor jewels of any description; none of those ornaments with which human vanity has decorated itself in all ages. A chaplet, with beads as white as drops of milk strung on a chain of the golden hue of harvest, hung from her hands, which were fervently clasped. The beads of the chaplet glided one after the other through her fingers. The lips however of this Queen of Virgins, remained motionless. Instead of reciting the rosary, she was perhaps listening in her own heart to the eternal echo of the Angelic Salutation, and to the vast murmur of the invocations coming from the earth.
She was silent; but later her own words, and the miraculous events which we shall have to recount, plainly testified that She was the Immaculate Virgin, the most august and holy Mary, mother of God.
This marvelous apparition gazed on Bernadette, who, in the first shock of amazement, had, as we have already said, sunk down, and without assigning any reason to herself, had suddenly prostrated herself on her knees.
Monday, March 2, 2026
Sunday, March 1, 2026
Our Lady of Lourdes - First Book Part 8
She was engaged in taking off her first stocking when she heard around her as it were, the sound of a blast of wind, rising in the meadow-tract with an indescribable character of irresistible might.
She believed it to be a sudden hurricane, and turned herself round instinctively. To her great surprise, the poplars which border the Gave were perfectly motionless. Not the slightest breeze stirred their still branches.
“I must have been deceived,” she said to herself. As she thought again about this noise, she did not know what to believe.
She began once more to remove her shoes and stockings.
At this moment, the impetuous roaring of this unknown blast became audible afresh.
Bernadette raised her head, gazed in front of her, and uttered, or rather strove to utter, a loud cry, which was stifled in her throat. She shuddered in all her limbs, and confounded, dazzled, and crushed in a certain manner by what she saw before her, she sank down, bowed herself entirely to the earth and fell on both knees.
A truly unheard-of spectacle had just met her gaze. The narration of the child; the innumerable interrogations which a thousand sharp-sighted and inquisitive minds have put to her since that period; the precise and minute particularities into which so many intellects on the watch for discrepancies have forced her to descend, allow us to trace—with a hand as sure of each detail as of the general physiognomy—the wonderful and astounding portrait of the marvelous Being who appeared at that instant to the eyes of the terrified and transported Bernadette.
She believed it to be a sudden hurricane, and turned herself round instinctively. To her great surprise, the poplars which border the Gave were perfectly motionless. Not the slightest breeze stirred their still branches.
“I must have been deceived,” she said to herself. As she thought again about this noise, she did not know what to believe.
She began once more to remove her shoes and stockings.
At this moment, the impetuous roaring of this unknown blast became audible afresh.
Bernadette raised her head, gazed in front of her, and uttered, or rather strove to utter, a loud cry, which was stifled in her throat. She shuddered in all her limbs, and confounded, dazzled, and crushed in a certain manner by what she saw before her, she sank down, bowed herself entirely to the earth and fell on both knees.
A truly unheard-of spectacle had just met her gaze. The narration of the child; the innumerable interrogations which a thousand sharp-sighted and inquisitive minds have put to her since that period; the precise and minute particularities into which so many intellects on the watch for discrepancies have forced her to descend, allow us to trace—with a hand as sure of each detail as of the general physiognomy—the wonderful and astounding portrait of the marvelous Being who appeared at that instant to the eyes of the terrified and transported Bernadette.
Our Lady of Lourdes - First Book Part 7
The three girls, strolling in this manner, had reached the end of the Ile du Chalet, directly opposite the triple excavation forming the Grotto of Massabielle, which we have endeavored to describe. They were only separated from it by the course of the mill-stream, which was ordinarily very considerable, and which bathed the feet of the rocks.
Now, it happened that on that very day, the mill of Savy was undergoing repairs, and the water had been turned off as much as possible above. The canal was, consequently, very easy to cross, though not altogether dry, and the channel was exceedingly narrow.
Branches of dead wood fallen from the various wild trees and shrubs which grew in the fissures of the rock were thickly scattered over this lonely spot, which the accidental drainage of the canal rendered more easy of access at the moment than was usually the case.
Delighted with this fortunate discovery, and as active and diligent as Martha in the Gospel, Jeanne and Marie quickly took off their wooden sabots and forded the little stream.
“The water is very cold,” they observed, on reaching the opposite bank and putting on their sabots again.
It was the month of February, and these torrents from the mountain, freshly issuing from the eternal snows to which they owe their source, are usually of an icy temperature.
Bernadette less active or less eager, and being besides far from robust, was still on this side of the little stream. The idea of fording this feeble channel was quite embarrassing to her. She had also to take off her stockings, while Marie and Jeanne wore nothing but sabots; and, hearing the exclamation of her companions, she feared the coldness of the water.
“Throw two or three large stones into the middle of the stream,” she said to them, “so that I may pass over without wetting my feet.”
The two gleaners of wood were already arranging their little fagot and did not care to lose any time in suspending their operations.
“Do as we did,” answered Jeanne; “go in barefooted.”
Bernadette submitted, and leaning against a fragment of rock which was there, began to take off her shoes and stockings. It was about noon, and the Angelus might sound at any moment from all the towers of the Pyrenean villages.
Now, it happened that on that very day, the mill of Savy was undergoing repairs, and the water had been turned off as much as possible above. The canal was, consequently, very easy to cross, though not altogether dry, and the channel was exceedingly narrow.
Branches of dead wood fallen from the various wild trees and shrubs which grew in the fissures of the rock were thickly scattered over this lonely spot, which the accidental drainage of the canal rendered more easy of access at the moment than was usually the case.
Delighted with this fortunate discovery, and as active and diligent as Martha in the Gospel, Jeanne and Marie quickly took off their wooden sabots and forded the little stream.
“The water is very cold,” they observed, on reaching the opposite bank and putting on their sabots again.
It was the month of February, and these torrents from the mountain, freshly issuing from the eternal snows to which they owe their source, are usually of an icy temperature.
Bernadette less active or less eager, and being besides far from robust, was still on this side of the little stream. The idea of fording this feeble channel was quite embarrassing to her. She had also to take off her stockings, while Marie and Jeanne wore nothing but sabots; and, hearing the exclamation of her companions, she feared the coldness of the water.
“Throw two or three large stones into the middle of the stream,” she said to them, “so that I may pass over without wetting my feet.”
The two gleaners of wood were already arranging their little fagot and did not care to lose any time in suspending their operations.
“Do as we did,” answered Jeanne; “go in barefooted.”
Bernadette submitted, and leaning against a fragment of rock which was there, began to take off her shoes and stockings. It was about noon, and the Angelus might sound at any moment from all the towers of the Pyrenean villages.
Friday, February 27, 2026
Our Lady of Lourdes - First Book Part 6
The three children soon left the town behind them, and crossing the bridge, reached the left bank of the Gave. They passed by the mill of M. de Laffitte, and gaining the Ile du Chalet, sought here and there for small fragments of wood, in order to make a little faggot.
By degrees they descended the meadow, following the course of the Gave. The frail child, to whom the mother had hesitated in granting permission to leave the house, walked somewhat in the rear. Less fortunate than her two companions she had not yet found anything, and her apron was empty, while her sister and Jeanne were already furnished with a little load of chips and small branches.
Clad in a worn-out and patched black dress, her delicate visage framed in the white capulet which covered her head, and fell back on her shoulders, with coarse sabots on her feet, she displayed an innocent and rustic grace which charmed the heart even more than the eye.
She was short for her age. Although her childish features were somewhat tanned by the sun, they had lost nothing of their native delicacy. Her hair, black and soft, was almost concealed by her kerchief. Her brow, which was tolerably lofty, was marked by lines of incomparable purity. Under her well-arched eyebrows, her brown eyes—sweeter in her even than blue—possessed a calm and profound beauty, whose magnificent limpidity had never been troubled by any evil passion. It was the simple eye spoken of in the Gospel. The mouth, wonderfully expressive, served as the index of a soul in which habitual goodness and compassion for suffering of every kind held undisputed sway.
Her physiognomy was pleasing, owing to its sweetness and intelligence, and her whole person possessed an extraordinary attraction, which sensibly affected the most elevated regions of the soul. What then was this attraction. I was going to say this ascendancy, and this secret authority in this poor ignorant child clothed in rags. It was the greatest and the rarest thing in the world—the Majesty of Innocence.
We have not yet told her name. Her Patron was a great Doctor of the Church—whose genius sheltered itself more especially under the protection of the Mother of God—the author of the Memorare, “Remember, O most pious Virgin Mary,” the admirable Saint Bernard. However, in accordance with a custom which is not without its charm, the great name given to this humble peasant girl had taken a child-like and rustic form. The little girl bore a pretty name, graceful like herself—she was called Bernadette.
She followed her sister and her companion along the meadow by the mill and searched, but in vain, among the grass for some morsels of wood for the hearth at home.
Such must have been the appearance of Ruth, or of Naomi, going to glean in the fields of Boaz.
By degrees they descended the meadow, following the course of the Gave. The frail child, to whom the mother had hesitated in granting permission to leave the house, walked somewhat in the rear. Less fortunate than her two companions she had not yet found anything, and her apron was empty, while her sister and Jeanne were already furnished with a little load of chips and small branches.
Clad in a worn-out and patched black dress, her delicate visage framed in the white capulet which covered her head, and fell back on her shoulders, with coarse sabots on her feet, she displayed an innocent and rustic grace which charmed the heart even more than the eye.
She was short for her age. Although her childish features were somewhat tanned by the sun, they had lost nothing of their native delicacy. Her hair, black and soft, was almost concealed by her kerchief. Her brow, which was tolerably lofty, was marked by lines of incomparable purity. Under her well-arched eyebrows, her brown eyes—sweeter in her even than blue—possessed a calm and profound beauty, whose magnificent limpidity had never been troubled by any evil passion. It was the simple eye spoken of in the Gospel. The mouth, wonderfully expressive, served as the index of a soul in which habitual goodness and compassion for suffering of every kind held undisputed sway.
Her physiognomy was pleasing, owing to its sweetness and intelligence, and her whole person possessed an extraordinary attraction, which sensibly affected the most elevated regions of the soul. What then was this attraction. I was going to say this ascendancy, and this secret authority in this poor ignorant child clothed in rags. It was the greatest and the rarest thing in the world—the Majesty of Innocence.
We have not yet told her name. Her Patron was a great Doctor of the Church—whose genius sheltered itself more especially under the protection of the Mother of God—the author of the Memorare, “Remember, O most pious Virgin Mary,” the admirable Saint Bernard. However, in accordance with a custom which is not without its charm, the great name given to this humble peasant girl had taken a child-like and rustic form. The little girl bore a pretty name, graceful like herself—she was called Bernadette.
She followed her sister and her companion along the meadow by the mill and searched, but in vain, among the grass for some morsels of wood for the hearth at home.
Such must have been the appearance of Ruth, or of Naomi, going to glean in the fields of Boaz.
Wednesday, February 25, 2026
Our Lady of Lourdes - First Book Part 5
On the 11th of February, 1858, was inaugurated the week of profane enjoyments, which, according to immemorial custom, precedes the austerities of Lent. The weather was cold and somewhat overcast, but very calm. The clouds remained motionless in the depths of heaven. There was no breeze to agitate them and the atmosphere was entirely still. Occasionally there fell a few drops of rain. On that day the diocese of Tarbes, in accordance with the peculiar privileges of its Proper Office, was celebrating the memory and the feast of the illustrious Shepherdess of Saint Geneviève.
It was eleven o’clock in the morning by the parish church of Lourdes.
While joyful assemblies and parties were almost everywhere in preparation, a poor family, lodged in a wretched dwelling in the Rue Petits-fossés, had not even wood for cooking their scanty meal.
The father, still young, was a miller by trade, and had for a short time kept a little mill situated to the north of the town on one of the streams which flow into the Gave. This business, however, required a certain amount of capital, as the lower-classes are not in the habit of paying ready money for having their corn ground, and consequently the poor miller had been obliged to relinquish the little mill, where his exertions, instead of placing him in easy circumstances, had served only to plunge him into deeper poverty. Waiting for better days he worked hard — not at home, for he had nothing in the world, not even a small garden — but all around, for some of his neighbors, who employed him from time to time as a day-laborer.
His name was François Soubirous, and he was married to a very respectable woman, Louise Casterot, who was a good christian and kept up the courage of her husband.
They had four children, two girls, the eldest of them being about fourteen years old, and two boys much younger; the last born being between three and four years old.
It was only within the last fortnight that their eldest daughter, a weakly child, had been living under the same roof with them. This is the little girl destined to take an important part in our narration, and we have carefully studied all the peculiarities and details of her life.
At her birth, her mother, then very much out of health, had been unable to suckle her, and had placed her out to nurse in a neighboring village, Bartrès, where the infant remained after being weaned. Louise Soubirous had become a mother for the second time; and the care of two children at the same time, would have detained her at home, and prevented her from going out to daily labor in the fields, which, however, she could easily do as long as she only had one child at the breast. For this reason the parents allowed their eldest to remain at Bartrès. They paid five francs a month for her board, sometimes in money, but more frequently in kind.
When the little girl was old enough to make herself useful, and there was some idea of taking her back to her parent’s house, the good peasants, who had brought her up, perceived that they had formed a strong attachment to her, and regarded her almost as one of their own children. From that day they kept her without charge, and employed her in tending their sheep. Thus she grew up in the midst of the family which had adopted her, passing all her days in solitude on the lonely declivities, where her humble flock grazed.
Her knowledge of prayers was entirely confined to the Chaplet. Either because her foster-mother had recommended this to her, or because it was the simple want of her innocent soul, everywhere and at all times, while engaged in watching her flock, she was in the habit of reciting this prayer of the simple. In addition to this, she amused herself quite alone with those natural play-things, which motherly providence provides for the children of the poor, who, in this respect, as indeed in all others, are more easily satisfied than those of the rich. She used to play with stones, which she piled up in little childish buildings; with the plants and flowers, which she gathered here and there; with the water of the brook, into which she threw immense fleets of blades of grass, following them with her eye as they floated downwards; and lastly, with the lamb which was the object of her preference in the flock intrusted to her care. “Of all my lambs,” she said one day, “there is one I love more than all the rest.” “And which is that,” she was asked. “The one I love,” she replied, “is the smallest;” and it was her greatest pleasure to caress it in frolicsome sport.
Compared with other children, she was herself like this poor little feeble lamb which she loved. Although she had already attained her fourteenth year, you would have never supposed her to be more than eleven or twelve. She was subject to an oppressive asthma, which, without rendering her absolutely sickly, caused her sometimes great suffering. She bore her misfortune patiently, and accepted her physical pains with that tranquil resignation which appears so difficult to the rich, but which the poor seem to find naturally and without effort.
In this innocent and lonely school, the poor shepherd-girl learned, perhaps, what is to the world unknown: the simplicity, which is so pleasing to God. Far removed from the contagion of impurity, ever communing with the Virgin Mary, and passing her time and her hours in crowning Her with prayers while telling her beads, she preserved that entire candor, that baptismal purity, which the breath of the world, even among the best, so soon tarnishes.
Such was the soul of this child, limpid and peaceful as those unknown lakes which are buried in the midst of lofty mountains, and in which all the splendors of heaven are silently reflected. “Blessed are the pure in heart,” says the Gospel, “for they shall see God.”
These great gifts are hidden gifts, and the humility which possesses them, is often unconscious of them. The young maiden had now reached her fourteenth year, and if all those who accidentally came in contact with her felt themselves attracted towards, and secretly fascinated by her, she was herself entirely unconscious of it. She regarded herself as one of the last, and the most backward children of her age, and in point of fact, she could neither read nor write. In addition to this she was wholly unacquainted with the French language, and knew nothing but her own poor Pyrenean patois.
She had never been taught the catechism, and in this respect her ignorance was extreme. “Our Father, Hail Mary, I believe in God, Glory be to the Father,” recited in the course of the Chaplet, constituted the extent of her religious knowledge.
After the foregoing details, it is unnecessary to add, that she had not yet made her first communion. It was in fact with the view of preparing her for this, and sending her to the catechism class, that the Soubirous had just withdrawn her from the retired village, where her foster-parents resided, and had brought her to their own house, at Lourdes, notwithstanding their exceeding poverty.
It was about a fortnight since she had returned to the dwelling of her parents. Her mother treated her with every possible care and attention, as her asthma and her general fragility of appearance caused her much anxiety. While the rest of the children of the Soubirous went about in nothing but their sabots, this child wore stockings; while her sister and brothers were always running about in the open air, she was almost constantly employed in the house. The poor child accustomed to be in the open air, would have preferred going out.
The day was Shrove-Tuesday; it had struck eleven o’clock, and these poor people had not the wood necessary to prepare their mid-day meal.
“Go and gather some on the bank of the Gave, or on the common,” said the mother to Marie, her second daughter.
As in many other places, the poor in the commune of Lourdes, possessed the right of picking up any dry branches which the wind might have blown down from the trees, and any dead wood which might have been washed down by a flood, and left among the rocks along the course of the river.
Marie put on her sabots, an operation which her elder sister, of whom we have just been speaking, the little shepherd-girl of Bartrès, regarded with envy.
“Allow me to follow her,” she said to her mother, “I will also bring back my little bundle of wood.”
“No,” answered Louise Soubirous: “you have a cough, and it would make you worse.”
In the mean time, a young girl from the next house, Jeanne Abadie, about fifteen years old, had entered, and volunteered to go with them to pick up some wood. They all joined in urging the mother to give the required permission, and at length she consented.
The child at the moment had a handkerchief wrapped round her head and knotted on the side as is the custom with the peasant women in the South. This did not appear sufficient to the mother.
“Take your capulet,” she said to her.
The capulet is a very graceful article of dress, peculiar to the races of the Pyrenees, and partakes of the nature of the kerchief and the mantle. It is a kind of hood, of very coarse cloth, sometimes white as the fleece of a sheep, sometimes of a brilliant scarlet, which covers the head and falls back over the shoulders, as far down as the loins. When the weather is very cold or windy, the women bring it in front, and carefully envelope in it their neck and arms. When they find it too warm for this garment, they fold it up square, and carry it on their heads, like a kind of quadrangular berret.
The capulet of the little shepherd-girl of Bartrès was white.
It was eleven o’clock in the morning by the parish church of Lourdes.
While joyful assemblies and parties were almost everywhere in preparation, a poor family, lodged in a wretched dwelling in the Rue Petits-fossés, had not even wood for cooking their scanty meal.
The father, still young, was a miller by trade, and had for a short time kept a little mill situated to the north of the town on one of the streams which flow into the Gave. This business, however, required a certain amount of capital, as the lower-classes are not in the habit of paying ready money for having their corn ground, and consequently the poor miller had been obliged to relinquish the little mill, where his exertions, instead of placing him in easy circumstances, had served only to plunge him into deeper poverty. Waiting for better days he worked hard — not at home, for he had nothing in the world, not even a small garden — but all around, for some of his neighbors, who employed him from time to time as a day-laborer.
His name was François Soubirous, and he was married to a very respectable woman, Louise Casterot, who was a good christian and kept up the courage of her husband.
They had four children, two girls, the eldest of them being about fourteen years old, and two boys much younger; the last born being between three and four years old.
It was only within the last fortnight that their eldest daughter, a weakly child, had been living under the same roof with them. This is the little girl destined to take an important part in our narration, and we have carefully studied all the peculiarities and details of her life.
At her birth, her mother, then very much out of health, had been unable to suckle her, and had placed her out to nurse in a neighboring village, Bartrès, where the infant remained after being weaned. Louise Soubirous had become a mother for the second time; and the care of two children at the same time, would have detained her at home, and prevented her from going out to daily labor in the fields, which, however, she could easily do as long as she only had one child at the breast. For this reason the parents allowed their eldest to remain at Bartrès. They paid five francs a month for her board, sometimes in money, but more frequently in kind.
When the little girl was old enough to make herself useful, and there was some idea of taking her back to her parent’s house, the good peasants, who had brought her up, perceived that they had formed a strong attachment to her, and regarded her almost as one of their own children. From that day they kept her without charge, and employed her in tending their sheep. Thus she grew up in the midst of the family which had adopted her, passing all her days in solitude on the lonely declivities, where her humble flock grazed.
Her knowledge of prayers was entirely confined to the Chaplet. Either because her foster-mother had recommended this to her, or because it was the simple want of her innocent soul, everywhere and at all times, while engaged in watching her flock, she was in the habit of reciting this prayer of the simple. In addition to this, she amused herself quite alone with those natural play-things, which motherly providence provides for the children of the poor, who, in this respect, as indeed in all others, are more easily satisfied than those of the rich. She used to play with stones, which she piled up in little childish buildings; with the plants and flowers, which she gathered here and there; with the water of the brook, into which she threw immense fleets of blades of grass, following them with her eye as they floated downwards; and lastly, with the lamb which was the object of her preference in the flock intrusted to her care. “Of all my lambs,” she said one day, “there is one I love more than all the rest.” “And which is that,” she was asked. “The one I love,” she replied, “is the smallest;” and it was her greatest pleasure to caress it in frolicsome sport.
Compared with other children, she was herself like this poor little feeble lamb which she loved. Although she had already attained her fourteenth year, you would have never supposed her to be more than eleven or twelve. She was subject to an oppressive asthma, which, without rendering her absolutely sickly, caused her sometimes great suffering. She bore her misfortune patiently, and accepted her physical pains with that tranquil resignation which appears so difficult to the rich, but which the poor seem to find naturally and without effort.
In this innocent and lonely school, the poor shepherd-girl learned, perhaps, what is to the world unknown: the simplicity, which is so pleasing to God. Far removed from the contagion of impurity, ever communing with the Virgin Mary, and passing her time and her hours in crowning Her with prayers while telling her beads, she preserved that entire candor, that baptismal purity, which the breath of the world, even among the best, so soon tarnishes.
Such was the soul of this child, limpid and peaceful as those unknown lakes which are buried in the midst of lofty mountains, and in which all the splendors of heaven are silently reflected. “Blessed are the pure in heart,” says the Gospel, “for they shall see God.”
These great gifts are hidden gifts, and the humility which possesses them, is often unconscious of them. The young maiden had now reached her fourteenth year, and if all those who accidentally came in contact with her felt themselves attracted towards, and secretly fascinated by her, she was herself entirely unconscious of it. She regarded herself as one of the last, and the most backward children of her age, and in point of fact, she could neither read nor write. In addition to this she was wholly unacquainted with the French language, and knew nothing but her own poor Pyrenean patois.
She had never been taught the catechism, and in this respect her ignorance was extreme. “Our Father, Hail Mary, I believe in God, Glory be to the Father,” recited in the course of the Chaplet, constituted the extent of her religious knowledge.
After the foregoing details, it is unnecessary to add, that she had not yet made her first communion. It was in fact with the view of preparing her for this, and sending her to the catechism class, that the Soubirous had just withdrawn her from the retired village, where her foster-parents resided, and had brought her to their own house, at Lourdes, notwithstanding their exceeding poverty.
It was about a fortnight since she had returned to the dwelling of her parents. Her mother treated her with every possible care and attention, as her asthma and her general fragility of appearance caused her much anxiety. While the rest of the children of the Soubirous went about in nothing but their sabots, this child wore stockings; while her sister and brothers were always running about in the open air, she was almost constantly employed in the house. The poor child accustomed to be in the open air, would have preferred going out.
The day was Shrove-Tuesday; it had struck eleven o’clock, and these poor people had not the wood necessary to prepare their mid-day meal.
“Go and gather some on the bank of the Gave, or on the common,” said the mother to Marie, her second daughter.
As in many other places, the poor in the commune of Lourdes, possessed the right of picking up any dry branches which the wind might have blown down from the trees, and any dead wood which might have been washed down by a flood, and left among the rocks along the course of the river.
Marie put on her sabots, an operation which her elder sister, of whom we have just been speaking, the little shepherd-girl of Bartrès, regarded with envy.
“Allow me to follow her,” she said to her mother, “I will also bring back my little bundle of wood.”
“No,” answered Louise Soubirous: “you have a cough, and it would make you worse.”
In the mean time, a young girl from the next house, Jeanne Abadie, about fifteen years old, had entered, and volunteered to go with them to pick up some wood. They all joined in urging the mother to give the required permission, and at length she consented.
The child at the moment had a handkerchief wrapped round her head and knotted on the side as is the custom with the peasant women in the South. This did not appear sufficient to the mother.
“Take your capulet,” she said to her.
The capulet is a very graceful article of dress, peculiar to the races of the Pyrenees, and partakes of the nature of the kerchief and the mantle. It is a kind of hood, of very coarse cloth, sometimes white as the fleece of a sheep, sometimes of a brilliant scarlet, which covers the head and falls back over the shoulders, as far down as the loins. When the weather is very cold or windy, the women bring it in front, and carefully envelope in it their neck and arms. When they find it too warm for this garment, they fold it up square, and carry it on their heads, like a kind of quadrangular berret.
The capulet of the little shepherd-girl of Bartrès was white.
Tuesday, February 24, 2026
Our Lady of Lourdes - First Book Part 4
It was necessary to describe somewhat minutely the country destined to be the scene of the events we are about to relate. It is of no less importance to indicate beforehand what light, or I should rather say what profound moral truth lights up the starting point of this history, in which, as will be seen, the hand of God has visibly appeared. These reflections will retard us but an instant in the commencement of our recital.
It appears almost superfluous to point out the strong contrasts to be met with in this world, in which the wicked and the good, the rich and the poor are mingled together, and the cottage of the indigent is sometimes separated but by a single wall from the abode of opulence. On one side, all the pleasures of a life of ease, agreeably organized in the midst of the comforts and elegance of luxury; on the other, the horrors of want, cold, hunger, disease—the melancholy procession of human sufferings. Around the former, adulation, visits and loud professions of friendship; around the others, indifference, solitude, desertion. People of the world shun the poor man and leave him out of all their schemes, either because they fear the importunity of his actual or silent appeals, or because they dread the sight of his fearful destitution, as a reproach to themselves. The rich, forming themselves into an exclusive circle which they call “good society,” consider all outside of themselves as having only as it were a secondary existence, unworthy of their attention—all those in fact who do not belong to the class of “gentlemen.” When they employ a workman, even when they are charitably disposed and succor the poor, they treat him as a protégé, as an inferior. They do not act towards him with that simple intimacy with which they would conduct themselves towards one of their own set. With the exception of some rare christians, no one treats the poor man as his brother or his equal. With the exception of the Saints—alas! few and far between in our day—who would ever think of showing him the respect they deem due to a superior? In the world, properly so called, in the great world the poor man is absolutely forsaken. Overwhelmed with the weight of labor, worn out with want, despised and abandoned, would it not appear as though he were cursed by the Creator of the earth? Ah! it is just the contrary; he is the beloved one of the universal Father. While the World has been cursed for ever by the infallible word of Christ, it is the poor, the suffering, the humble, the insignificant who are the “good society” in the eyes of God, the chosen company in which his heart delights. “Ye are my friends,” he tells them in his Gospel.
He does more. He identifies himself with them and only opens the kingdom of heaven to the rich on condition of their having been the benefactors of the poor. “Inasmuch as ye have done it to one of the least of these little ones, ye have done it unto me.”
So, when the Son of God came upon earth, it was His will to be born, to live and to die in the midst of the poor—to be Himself poor. It was from among them He chose his Apostles, his principal disciples, the first-born of his Church. In the long history of that Church, it was upon the poor that He generally poured forth his choicest spiritual graces. In all ages—with some slight exceptions—Apparitions, Visions, especial Revelations, have been the privilege of the poor and little ones whom the world despises.
When God, in His wisdom, deems fit to manifest himself sensibly to men by these mysterious phenomena, He descends, as do the kings of the earth when traveling, into the houses of His ministers or of His particular friends. And this is the reason of His habitual choice of the dwellings of the poor and the humble.
For nearly two thousand years past has the word of the Apostle been verified, “God hath chosen what is weak according to the world to confound that which is powerful.”
The recital undertaken by us will perhaps furnish some proof of these high truths.
It appears almost superfluous to point out the strong contrasts to be met with in this world, in which the wicked and the good, the rich and the poor are mingled together, and the cottage of the indigent is sometimes separated but by a single wall from the abode of opulence. On one side, all the pleasures of a life of ease, agreeably organized in the midst of the comforts and elegance of luxury; on the other, the horrors of want, cold, hunger, disease—the melancholy procession of human sufferings. Around the former, adulation, visits and loud professions of friendship; around the others, indifference, solitude, desertion. People of the world shun the poor man and leave him out of all their schemes, either because they fear the importunity of his actual or silent appeals, or because they dread the sight of his fearful destitution, as a reproach to themselves. The rich, forming themselves into an exclusive circle which they call “good society,” consider all outside of themselves as having only as it were a secondary existence, unworthy of their attention—all those in fact who do not belong to the class of “gentlemen.” When they employ a workman, even when they are charitably disposed and succor the poor, they treat him as a protégé, as an inferior. They do not act towards him with that simple intimacy with which they would conduct themselves towards one of their own set. With the exception of some rare christians, no one treats the poor man as his brother or his equal. With the exception of the Saints—alas! few and far between in our day—who would ever think of showing him the respect they deem due to a superior? In the world, properly so called, in the great world the poor man is absolutely forsaken. Overwhelmed with the weight of labor, worn out with want, despised and abandoned, would it not appear as though he were cursed by the Creator of the earth? Ah! it is just the contrary; he is the beloved one of the universal Father. While the World has been cursed for ever by the infallible word of Christ, it is the poor, the suffering, the humble, the insignificant who are the “good society” in the eyes of God, the chosen company in which his heart delights. “Ye are my friends,” he tells them in his Gospel.
He does more. He identifies himself with them and only opens the kingdom of heaven to the rich on condition of their having been the benefactors of the poor. “Inasmuch as ye have done it to one of the least of these little ones, ye have done it unto me.”
So, when the Son of God came upon earth, it was His will to be born, to live and to die in the midst of the poor—to be Himself poor. It was from among them He chose his Apostles, his principal disciples, the first-born of his Church. In the long history of that Church, it was upon the poor that He generally poured forth his choicest spiritual graces. In all ages—with some slight exceptions—Apparitions, Visions, especial Revelations, have been the privilege of the poor and little ones whom the world despises.
When God, in His wisdom, deems fit to manifest himself sensibly to men by these mysterious phenomena, He descends, as do the kings of the earth when traveling, into the houses of His ministers or of His particular friends. And this is the reason of His habitual choice of the dwellings of the poor and the humble.
For nearly two thousand years past has the word of the Apostle been verified, “God hath chosen what is weak according to the world to confound that which is powerful.”
The recital undertaken by us will perhaps furnish some proof of these high truths.
Monday, February 23, 2026
Our Lady of Lourdes - First Book Part 3
Such was the state of Lourdes ten years ago. The railroad did not then pass by it, nor was it indeed in contemplation. One marked out more direct appeared to be intended beforehand for the line of the Pyrenees.
The whole of the town and the fortress, as we have already observed, are situated on the right bank of the Gave, which after breaking — in its course from the south — against the enormous rock that serves as a pedestal to the castle, makes immediately a bend at right angles and takes suddenly a westerly direction.
An ancient bridge, built some little distance above the first houses of the town, serves as a means of communication with the country, meadows, forests and mountains on the left bank.
On this last bank, a little above the bridge and opposite to the castle, a large canal is formed from the water of the Gave. This canal rejoins its parent stream about a kilometre further down, after passing the rocks of Massabielle, the base of which it washes.
The long island formed by the Gave and this canal is one vast and verdant tract of meadow land and is known by the name of l’Ile du Chalet, or more commonly le Chalet.
The mill of Savy, the only one on the left bank, is built across the canal and serves as a bridge between the island meadow and the main land.
In 1858 there was scarcely a wilder, more savage or solitary spot in the environs of the busy little town we have described, than the Rocks of Massabielle, at the foot of which the mill-stream rejoined the Gave.
A few paces above this junction, on the bank of the stream, the abrupt rock was pierced at its base by three irregular caverns, curiously placed above each other and communicating with one another like holes in a gigantic sponge.
The singularity of these caverns renders them somewhat difficult to describe.
The first and the largest was on a level with the ground. It had almost the appearance of a booth at a country fair, or of a badly shaped and very high oven cut vertically through the centre, so as only to form a semi-dome. The entrance in the shape of an arch very much askew was about thirteen feet high. The breadth and depth of the grotto could not have been less than three times its height. The rock sloped back from the entrance, like the roof of a garret seen from below, and became narrower on either side.
Above, somewhat to the right of the spectator, were two superimposed apertures in the rock, forming as it were annexes or dependencies of this larger one.
Viewed from the outside the principal of these two openings was oval in form and about the size of a window in a house or a niche in a church. It sloped slightly up as it receded; then, at the depth of about six feet, forked; one branch descending to the grotto beneath, the other turning back on itself as far as the exterior of the rock and forming the second upper aperture of which we have spoken, but being of no importance except that it gave light in every way to this supplementary cavity.
An eglantine or wild rose, springing from a fissure in the rock, trailed its long branches at the base of this niche-like orifice.
At the foot of this little series of caverns, which the eye could take in at a glance, but of which it is very difficult by mere description to convey a correct idea, the mill-stream rushes over a chaos of enormous rocks, fallen from the mountains, to reunite with the Gave five or six paces below.
The grotto was exactly in front of the Ile du Chalet which, as we have already observed, was formed by the Gave and the canal.
These caverns were called the Grotto of Massabielle from the name of the rocks of which it formed a part. In the patois of the country “Massabielle” signifies “Old Rocks.”
Lower down on the banks of the Gave there was a steep and rugged hillock which, as well as these rocks, belonged to the commune of Lourdes, and where the poor of the town used to bring their pigs to feed. On the approach of a storm the grotto served them as a place of shelter, as also to the few fishermen who were wont to fish with nets in this part of the Gave.
As in all caverns of this nature the rock was dry in fine weather and slightly humid when it rained. This occasional humidity and imperceptible dripping of the wet season was only observable on one side, that to your right on entering. It is precisely on this side that the rain usually comes, driven by the westerly wind; and the rock being very slender and full of clefts in this place suffered in the same way as do houses with the same exposure and built with indifferent mortar.
The left side and the bottom not being thus exposed were always as dry as the floor of a drawing-room. The accidental humidity of the western wall served even to set off by contrast the burning dryness of the northern, eastern and southern portions of the grotto.
Above this triple cavity arose almost in a peak the enormous mass of the Rocks of Massabielle, garlanded in many a place with ivy and box, heather and moss. Tangled brambles, hazels and wild roses, a few trees, whose branches were often broken by the wind, extended their roots into the fissures of the rocks, wherever the falling in of the mountain or the breath of heaven had afforded them a handful of earth for their nourishment. The eternal sower, He whose invisible hand fills the immensity of space with suns and planets, He who has produced out of nothing the ground on which we tread, the vegetable and animal kingdoms, the Creator of so many millions of men who have peopled the earth, and so many millions of angels who people heaven, that God, whose wealth is boundless and power unlimited, does not intend that a single atom should be lost in the immense regions of his works. And this is why He leaves nothing barren which is capable of production; this is why over the entire extent of our globe innumerable germs float in the air, covering the vegetation wherever it appears, were there only room for the existence of a blade of grass or for the growth of the tiniest moss.
And in the same way, O Divine Sower! thy graces, like an invisible dust of fruitful seeds, float around our souls on the watch for a fertile soil. And if we are so barren, it is because we present to Thee sometimes hearts harder and more arid than the rock, sometimes beaten paths for ever trodden by the feet of the passers by, sometimes thickets of thorns solely occupied by rank weeds which choke the good seed.
The whole of the town and the fortress, as we have already observed, are situated on the right bank of the Gave, which after breaking — in its course from the south — against the enormous rock that serves as a pedestal to the castle, makes immediately a bend at right angles and takes suddenly a westerly direction.
An ancient bridge, built some little distance above the first houses of the town, serves as a means of communication with the country, meadows, forests and mountains on the left bank.
On this last bank, a little above the bridge and opposite to the castle, a large canal is formed from the water of the Gave. This canal rejoins its parent stream about a kilometre further down, after passing the rocks of Massabielle, the base of which it washes.
The long island formed by the Gave and this canal is one vast and verdant tract of meadow land and is known by the name of l’Ile du Chalet, or more commonly le Chalet.
The mill of Savy, the only one on the left bank, is built across the canal and serves as a bridge between the island meadow and the main land.
In 1858 there was scarcely a wilder, more savage or solitary spot in the environs of the busy little town we have described, than the Rocks of Massabielle, at the foot of which the mill-stream rejoined the Gave.
A few paces above this junction, on the bank of the stream, the abrupt rock was pierced at its base by three irregular caverns, curiously placed above each other and communicating with one another like holes in a gigantic sponge.
The singularity of these caverns renders them somewhat difficult to describe.
The first and the largest was on a level with the ground. It had almost the appearance of a booth at a country fair, or of a badly shaped and very high oven cut vertically through the centre, so as only to form a semi-dome. The entrance in the shape of an arch very much askew was about thirteen feet high. The breadth and depth of the grotto could not have been less than three times its height. The rock sloped back from the entrance, like the roof of a garret seen from below, and became narrower on either side.
Above, somewhat to the right of the spectator, were two superimposed apertures in the rock, forming as it were annexes or dependencies of this larger one.
Viewed from the outside the principal of these two openings was oval in form and about the size of a window in a house or a niche in a church. It sloped slightly up as it receded; then, at the depth of about six feet, forked; one branch descending to the grotto beneath, the other turning back on itself as far as the exterior of the rock and forming the second upper aperture of which we have spoken, but being of no importance except that it gave light in every way to this supplementary cavity.
An eglantine or wild rose, springing from a fissure in the rock, trailed its long branches at the base of this niche-like orifice.
At the foot of this little series of caverns, which the eye could take in at a glance, but of which it is very difficult by mere description to convey a correct idea, the mill-stream rushes over a chaos of enormous rocks, fallen from the mountains, to reunite with the Gave five or six paces below.
The grotto was exactly in front of the Ile du Chalet which, as we have already observed, was formed by the Gave and the canal.
These caverns were called the Grotto of Massabielle from the name of the rocks of which it formed a part. In the patois of the country “Massabielle” signifies “Old Rocks.”
Lower down on the banks of the Gave there was a steep and rugged hillock which, as well as these rocks, belonged to the commune of Lourdes, and where the poor of the town used to bring their pigs to feed. On the approach of a storm the grotto served them as a place of shelter, as also to the few fishermen who were wont to fish with nets in this part of the Gave.
As in all caverns of this nature the rock was dry in fine weather and slightly humid when it rained. This occasional humidity and imperceptible dripping of the wet season was only observable on one side, that to your right on entering. It is precisely on this side that the rain usually comes, driven by the westerly wind; and the rock being very slender and full of clefts in this place suffered in the same way as do houses with the same exposure and built with indifferent mortar.
The left side and the bottom not being thus exposed were always as dry as the floor of a drawing-room. The accidental humidity of the western wall served even to set off by contrast the burning dryness of the northern, eastern and southern portions of the grotto.
Above this triple cavity arose almost in a peak the enormous mass of the Rocks of Massabielle, garlanded in many a place with ivy and box, heather and moss. Tangled brambles, hazels and wild roses, a few trees, whose branches were often broken by the wind, extended their roots into the fissures of the rocks, wherever the falling in of the mountain or the breath of heaven had afforded them a handful of earth for their nourishment. The eternal sower, He whose invisible hand fills the immensity of space with suns and planets, He who has produced out of nothing the ground on which we tread, the vegetable and animal kingdoms, the Creator of so many millions of men who have peopled the earth, and so many millions of angels who people heaven, that God, whose wealth is boundless and power unlimited, does not intend that a single atom should be lost in the immense regions of his works. And this is why He leaves nothing barren which is capable of production; this is why over the entire extent of our globe innumerable germs float in the air, covering the vegetation wherever it appears, were there only room for the existence of a blade of grass or for the growth of the tiniest moss.
And in the same way, O Divine Sower! thy graces, like an invisible dust of fruitful seeds, float around our souls on the watch for a fertile soil. And if we are so barren, it is because we present to Thee sometimes hearts harder and more arid than the rock, sometimes beaten paths for ever trodden by the feet of the passers by, sometimes thickets of thorns solely occupied by rank weeds which choke the good seed.
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