"This is meet and right; but it does alter the fact that the memory of those celestial alleviations, those first, lost joys is crushing to the soul.
"O Holy Virgin, Holy Virgin, have pity on the rickety souls that struggle on so painfully when they are no longer upheld by Thee! Have pity on the bruised souls to whom every effort is painful; on the souls whom nothing can console, to whom everything is affliction! Take pity on the homeless, outcast souls, the wandering souls, unable to settle and dwell with their kind, the tender, budding souls! Take pity on all souls such as mine! Have pity on me!"
And before quitting the Mother he would often visit Her in those depths where, since the Middle Ages, the faithful no longer seek her; he would light an end of taper, and, turning aside from the nave of the crypt, follow the curved line of the wall along the entrance passage as far as the sacristy of this underground church, where in the ponderous stone-work was a door strengthened with iron-work.
Through and down a little flight of steps, he reached a cellar which was the ancient martyrium where, of old, in time of war the ciborium was concealed. An altar stood in the middle of this well, dedicated in the name of Saint Lubin. In the crypt the distant hum of the bells, the sounds of life in the cathedral above, could still be heard; here, nothing! It was like being in the tomb. Unfortunately, some squalid, square columns whitened with lime-wash, built on the altar to give support to Bridan's group in the choir above, spoilt the barbaric simplicity of this _oubliette_, forgotten, lost in the night of ages, and underground.
He went up again comforted nevertheless, accusing himself of ingratitude, and asking himself how he could dream of leaving Chartres and going away from the Virgin, with whom he could thus so easily converse in solitude whenever he would.
On other days, when it was fine, he would take for the object of his walk a convent whose existence had been revealed to him by Madame Bavoil. One afternoon he had met her in the square, and she had said to him,--
"I am going to see the little Jesus of Prague at the Carmelite convent here. Will you come with me, our friend?"