Here there were
damsels engaged in pious meditation, from five years old upwards. They
send even the little ones to meditate, Clarice tells me; and there are
these infants kneeling before the flower-bedecked altars, rapt in
religious contemplation, like so many Thomas a Kempises. The young
meditators glanced shyly at us as we passed. When they had shown me
everything of special interest in the pleasant old place, Clarice and
Madelon ran off to dress for walking, in order to accompany us to
Cotenoir, where we were to dine.
It was quite a family party. Mademoiselle Lenoble was there, and papa. He
arrived at the chateau while Gustave and I were paying our visit to the
convent. He is in the highest spirits, and treats me with an amount of
affection and courtesy I have not been accustomed to receive at his
hands. Of course I know the cause of this change; the future mistress of
Cotenoir is a very different person from that wretched girl who was
nothing to him but a burden and an encumbrance. But even while I despise
him I cannot refuse to pity him. One forgives anything in old age. In
this, at least, it is a second childhood; and my father is very old,
Lotta. I saw the look of age in his face more plainly at Cotenoir, where
he assumed his usual _debonnaire_ man-of-the-world tone and manner, than
I had seen it in London, when he was a professed invalid. He is much
changed since I was with him at Foretdechene.
Pages:
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292