"Ah, and how I put myself in line with all my calculations! In taking shelter here I thought myself pretty sure of my soul, and that my body would trouble me; whereas just the contrary has been the case.
"My stomach has grown vigorous and shown itself fit to support an effort of which I should never have thought it capable, and my soul has been below everything, vacillating and dry, so fragile, so feeble!
He walked about, lifted from earth by a confused joy. He grew vaporized in a sort of intoxication, in a vague etherization, in which arose, without his even thinking of formulating words, acts of thanksgiving; it was an effort of thanks of his soul, of his body, of his whole being, to that God whom he felt living in him, and diffused in that kneeling landscape which also seemed to expand in mute hymns of gratitude.
The hour which struck by the clock in the portico reminded him it was breakfast time. He went to the guest-house, cut himself a slice of bread and butter with some cheese, drank half a glass of wine, and was about to go out again when he reflected that the horary of the offices was changed.
"They must be different from those of the week," he thought; and he went up into his cell to consult his placards.
He found only one, that of the rule of the monks themselves, which contained the regulations for the Sunday practices for the cloister; and he read:
EXERCISES OF THE COMMUNITY FOR ALL ORDINARY SUNDAYS.
1. Rise. Little Office. Prayer till 1.30. 2. Grand Canonical Office chanted. 5.30. Prime, Morning Mass, 6 o'clock. 6.45. Chapter Instructions. Great Silence. 9.15. Asperges, Tierce, Procession. 10. High Mass. 11.10. Sext and special examination. 11.30. Angelus, Dinner. 12.15. Siesta, Great Silence.
2. End of Repose. None. 4. Vespers and Benediction. 5.45. Quarter of an hour for Prayer. 6. Supper. 7. Reading before Compline. 7.15. Compline. 7.30. Salve, Angelus. 7.45. Examination of conscience and Retreat. 8. Bed time, Great Silence.
Note.--After the Cross of September, no siesta. None is at 2 o'clock; Vespers at 3; Supper at 5; Compline at 6, and bed time at 7.
Durtal copied this rule for his use on a scrap of paper. "In fact," he said to himself, "I have to be in chapel at 9.15 for Asperges, High Mass and the Office of Sext, afterwards at 2 for None, then at 4 for Vespers and Benediction, and lastly at 7.30 for Compline.