Yesterday the dressed-up figures going about the streets were anything but attractive, but there were others elsewhere at which the angels would smile. M. l’Abbé Baunard, director of the _catéchisme_ of Sainte-Croix, a few days ago organized a lottery, with the produce of which some little girls, disguised as scullions, gave yesterday an excellent dinner to the old people of the Little Sisters of the Poor. This feast of charity was a charming idea, bringing together under the eye and the blessing of God smiling and happy childhood with suffering and afflicted decrepitude――poverty and riches, two sisters in the great Catholic communion. And the twins were not there! Our good _curé_ in Brittany requested _as a favor_ that they might make their First Communion in his church. The good _abbé_ is preparing them for it, and the ceremony is fixed for the 2d of July, the Feast of the _Magnificat_. We are all in deep mourning for my Aunt de K――――, and neither visit nor receive company this winter; thus we shall have more leisure for our different works. Adrien and Raoul were present at the funeral. My mother feels this death very much. Bought a pamphlet by the great bishop. It is admirable――worthy of Bossuet. What a portrait of the Christian Frenchwoman! What vehement and sublime indignation against those who would make this noble type disappear from _our_ France! What nobility of soul! Oh! if all fathers, if all mothers, heard these accents, which proceed from a more than paternal heart, how they would reflect upon themselves, and long to become worthy of the mission entrusted to them by Providence. Poor France! what will become of her? I was glad to hear one of the _vicaires_ of Sainte-Croix, M. Berthaud, in speaking of the horoscope of the impious against religion, say: “Prophecy for prophecy. I prefer to believe the words of the Count de Maistre, the noble genius who saw so deeply and so far into the events of the present time, and who said fifty years ago: ‘In a hundred years France will be wholly Christian, Germany will be Catholic, England will be Catholic; all the peoples of Europe will go into the basilica of St. Sophia at Constantinople to sing a _Te Deum_ of thanksgiving.’” God grant it may be so! Lizzy announces to me the mourning of Isa, who is not well enough to write to me. “There is a yoke upon all the children of Adam.” These words of Holy Scripture often come into my mind as I see all around me darkened by mourning. _Spes unica!_ Hope remains, and the love of God shows heaven open. Dear sister of my life, this letter, begun yesterday, is to contain yet a third funereal announcement: Nelly has been suddenly summoned from this world. I know how much you loved her. Thus this time of penitence opens for us. Dead!――Nelly, in her spring-time, her grace, her youth; dead, after a long and holy prayer, which had preceded a walk with Madame D――――.