Did the parents recover from it? Yes, they became accustomed to it. Human nature can become accustomed to anything. Their fate seemed better, not because it was better, but because, not getting worse, they got used to it and were able to stand it better. The first theory upon which the people settled was that the disappearance of their children was due to fairies, to evil genii, to a supernatural and mysterious enemy--that this mysterious enemy was supernatural, they did not doubt. This belief served to increase the pangs of their grief and to render the unknown and undiscoverable fate of their beloved ones more horrible to contemplate and more difficult for the parents to bear. They felt themselves incapable and incompetent to war against this mysterious, devastating, supernatural force; hence they resigned themselves to the affliction, considering it to have been sent upon them by Almighty God as a punishment for their sins. They did not know what sins they had committed, but felt sure that nothing they had done would justify even Almighty God in the abduction of the little ones who had not been at fault, and the torture of the parents incident thereto; so they rebelled against their fate. The disappearance of children did not at first create great excitement among the people; their disappearance was explained in a natural manner: some accident had happened to them, possibly they had fallen into one of the many rivers and were drowned; the lakes and rivers were plentiful, their waters deep, their currents swift, the banks steep. One child here in one province, another child there in a distant province--such a disappearance did not count for much and did not unduly or wonderfully excite the people; but when it came to spread over the entire country and, by the comparison and the overlapping of searches and the employment of officers, it was discovered that this beast of extermination, this great, powerful, mysterious, supernatural visitor or power, was making itself felt throughout the entire country, and that no house was safe, that no parent could say with certainty that his own child might not be taken next morning--then the country became excited, alarmed, and, finally, terror-stricken. At last it became apparent that these ravages were confined to a given district, a circle of country approximately bounded by the present cities of Vannes, Rennes, Angers, La Rochelle, and so opening to the ocean. Of this circle, Nantes was approximately the centre. This condition continued, growing more acute year by year. Each year new families were stricken, and the terror became more widely spread.