WHILE Bernadette’s lot and liberty were subject to such uncertainty, M. Jacomet, in full uniform, and wearing his scarf of office, was making the necessary preparations to execute, at the Rocks of Massabielle, the orders of the Prefect.
The report that Baron Massy had enjoined the spoliation of the Grotto had spread rapidly, and had caused much agitation in every quarter of the town. The entire population was thrown into a state of consternation, as if in the presence of some monstrous sacrilege.
“The Blessed Virgin has condescended to descend among us,” they said, “and to work miracles, and see how they receive her. It is enough to bring down the wrath of heaven.”
The coldest hearts were stirred with emotion; a mysterious effervescence displayed itself by degrees among the people and continued to increase. From its very commencement, and before the interview we have just described, the Curé Peyramale and the Priests of the town had suggested to all words of peace, and had endeavored to calm those who were most irritated.
“Dear friends,” said the Clergy, “do not compromise your cause by disorders; submit yourselves to the law, however bad it may be. If the Blessed Virgin takes any part in all these things, she is perfectly capable of turning them all to her own glory, and any violence on your part would be a want of faith towards her and an insult to her omnipotence. Look at the Martyrs; did they revolt against the Emperor? They owed their triumph to the very fact of not having combated.”
The moral authority of the Curé was great; but those who listened to him were hot-headed, and their hearts were indignant. Everything depended on the merest chance.
The religious objects and ex-votos deposited at the Grotto formed a considerable mass, and were too heavy to be transferred to the town by hand. M. Jacomet repaired to the Poste, kept by M. Barioze, to procure a cart and horse.
“I do not lend my horses for such purposes,” replied the Post-master.
“But you cannot refuse your horses to any one who is willing to pay for them!” exclaimed M. Jacomet.
“My horses are intended for the service of the Post, and not for business of this nature. I do not wish to have anything to do with this proceeding. Bring an action against me, if it suits you to do so. I refuse to let you have any of my horses.”
The Commissary went elsewhere. At all the hotels, at all the livery stables, which were pretty numerous at Lourdes, owing to its proximity to the different bathing places, at the houses of private individuals, to whom he addressed himself in despair, he met with similar refusals. His situation was truly a cruel one. The population, agitated and quivering with emotion, watched him thus going, to no purpose, from house to house, and were spectators of his successive disappointments. He heard the murmurs, the laughter and the bitter gibes of the crowd. The eyes of all scowled upon him as he pursued his painful and fruitless course across the squares and through the streets of the town. In vain did he successively increase the sum of money he offered for the loan of one horse and cart. He had been refused it by the very poorest, though he had offered as much as thirty francs, and the distance to the Grotto was not far.
The crowd, on hearing the sum of thirty francs mentioned, compared it with the thirty pieces of silver.
At length, at the house of a farrier, he found a girl who, for the sum offered, lent him what he needed.
When the multitude saw him issue from this house with the cart and horse, they were the more indignant, as the venal complaisance of the proprietor could not be excused by the urgency of want. The family was not poor.
Jacomet proceeded in the direction of the Grotto. The Sergents de Ville drove the cart. An immense crowd followed them. They were silent, somber and uneasy, as if they felt in themselves the accumulation of the awful electricity of a thunder-storm.
In this manner they reached the Rocks of Massabielle. As the cart could not be driven up to the very spot, it was halted at some little distance.
Under the vaulted roof of the Grotto there were tapers burning here and there, placed in candlesticks, adorned with moss and ribbons. Crosses, statues of the Virgin, religious pictures, necklaces and jewels of various kinds rested on the ground or in the cavities of the rock. In certain places carpets had been spread under the images of the Mother of God. Thousands of bouquets had been carried there in honor of Mary by pious hands, and the earliest blossoms of the Month of flowers diffused their fragrance and embalmed this rural sanctuary.
In one or two willow baskets and on the ground there glittered copper, silver, or gold pieces, amounting altogether to several thousand francs, the first spontaneous gift of the faithful towards the erection, on this spot, of a temple to the Immaculate Virgin―a pious offering, whose sacred character had struck with respect the audacity even of criminals, and in which, in spite of the facilities afforded by night and solitude, no robber up to that time had dared to lay a sacrilegious hand.
M. Jacomet cleared the balustrade constructed by the workmen of Lourdes, and entered the Grotto. He appeared agitated. The Sergents de Ville were near him; the crowd which had followed him watched him, but did not utter any cries. There was something alarming in the outward tranquillity of this multitude.
The Commissary began by securing the money. Then, extinguishing the candles, one by one, and collecting the chaplets, crosses, carpets, and various articles with which the Grotto was filled, he handed them over to the Sergents de Ville to stow away in the cart. The poor fellows seemed to be disgusted with the business they were engaged in, and displayed much feelings of sorrow and respect as they carried to the cart all the articles of which Jacomet stripped the Grotto, honored and sanctified but a short time since by a visit from the Mother of God, the gushing forth of the Fountain, and by the cure of the sick.
Owing to the cart being at some distance from the Grotto, all this occupied some time. M. Jacomet called a little boy who happened to be there, a little in front of the crowd.
“Here, take this picture and carry it to the cart.” The little boy stretched out his hands to take hold of the frame. Another child at his side called out to him:
“Wretch! what are you going to do? God will punish you.”
The child started back in terror, and no fresh order on the part of the Commissary could induce him to come to the front again.
There was something―I know not what―convulsive in the movements of the Commissary. When he picked up the first bouquet, it was his intention, as he looked upon it as a thing of no value, to throw it into the Gave, but a vague murmur in the crowd arrested him in the act. He appeared to understand that the measure of the popular impatience was full to the brim, and that the least incident might cause it to overflow. The bouquets were then, with all the other articles, transferred to the cart.
A moment afterwards a statuette of the Virgin fell to pieces in the hands of the Commissary, and this little incident produced once more a terrible sensation in the crowd.
When the Grotto was stripped of everything, M. Jacomet wished to carry off even the balustrade. For this purpose he required an axe. Some men who were shaping wood in a saw-pit attached to M. Laffite’s mill refused successively to lend him one. Another workman, who was employed at some little distance from the others, dared not resist him and suffered him to take his axe.
M. Jacomet took the business in hand himself and struck the balustrade several blows with the axe. As it was not strongly made, it immediately yielded.
The sight of this act of material violence, the spectacle of this man striking the wood with the axe, produced more effect on the multitude than anything that had occurred before and was followed by a menacing explosion. The Gave was close at hand, deep and rapid in its course, and a few moments of égarement would have been sufficient to have induced the crowd―in one of those irresistible paroxysms of rage to which crowds are sometimes subject―to hurl the unfortunate Commissary into its waters.
Jacomet turned round towards them and showed his countenance pale and distracted.
“What I am doing,” he said, with apparent regret, “I am not doing of my own accord, and it is with the greatest regret that I find myself obliged to put it into execution. I am acting in obedience to the orders of the Prefect. I must obey the higher authorities, however much it may cost me. I am not responsible for this and you must not bear any grudge against me.”
Some voices from among the crowd exclaimed;
“Let us remain calm and abstain from violence; let us leave everything in the hands of God.”
The advice and activity of the Clergy produced their fruits, and there was not any disorder. The Commissary and the Sergents de Ville drove the cart without any obstacle to the Mayoralty, where they deposited all the articles they had collected at the Grotto. The money was handed over to the Mayor.
In the evening, for the purpose of protesting against the Prefect’s measures, an innumerable multitude repaired to the Grotto, which was suddenly filled with flowers and illuminated. Only, in order to obviate the seizures of the tapers by the Police, should they come for that purpose, every one held his own in his hand, and on his return, carried it back to his own house.
The next day much sensation was caused among the people by the occurrence of two events.
The girl, who had lent M. Jacomet the cart and horse, fell from the top of a hay-loft and broke one of her ribs.
The same day, the man who had lent the Commissary the axe for the destruction of the balustrade at the Grotto, had both his feet crushed by the fall of a beam which he wished to place on his bench.
To the eyes of the Free-thinkers this appeared to be an irritating and untoward coincidence. The multitude regarded the double accident as a punishment from Heaven.
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