The society of the Trappists consisted of about eighty monks, chiefly Germans and French, with a few of our own countrymen, under governance of one of their number called Father Urbain.[131] Had they remained, they anticipated an accession to their number of about two hundred monks from Europe. Their discipline was equally severe with that of the order in ancient times. Their diet was confined to vegetables, and of these they partook sparingly but once in twenty-four hours: the stern vow of perpetual silence was upon them; no female was permitted to violate their retreat, and they dug their own graves. Their location, however, they found by no means favourable to health, notwithstanding the severe simplicity of their habits. During the summer months fevers prevailed among them to an alarming extent; few escaped, and many died. Among the latter was Louis Antoine Langlois, a native of Quebec, more familiarly known as François {171} Marie Bernard, the name he assumed upon entering the monastery. He often officiated in the former Catholic church of St. Louis, and is still remembered by the older French inhabitants with warm emotions, as he was greatly beloved. The Trappists are said to have been extremely industrious, and some of them skilful workmen at various arts, particularly that of watchmaking; insomuch that they far excelled the same craft in the city, and were patronised by all the unruly timepieces in the region. They had also a laboratory of some extent, and a library; but the latter, we are informed, was of no marvellous repute, embracing chiefly the day-dreams of the Middle Ages, and the wondrous doings of the legion of saints, together with a few obsolete works on medicine. Connected with the monastery was a seminary for the instruction of boys; or, rather, it was a sort of asylum for the orphan, the desolate, the friendless, the halt, the blind, the deaf, and the dumb, and also for the aged and destitute of the male sex. They subjected their pupils to the same severe discipline which they imposed upon themselves. They were permitted to use their tongues but two hours a day, and then very _judiciously_: instead of exercising that "unruly member," they were taught by the good fathers to gesticulate with their fingers at each other in marvellous fashion, and thus to communicate their ideas. As to juvenile sports and the frolics of boyhood, it was a sin to dream of such things. They all received an apprenticeship to some useful trade, however, and were no doubt trained {172} up most innocently and ignorantly in the way they should go. The pupils were chiefly sons of the settlers in the vicinity; but whether they were fashioned by the worthy fathers into good American citizens or the contrary, tradition telleth not. Tradition doth present, however, sundry allegations prejudicial to the honest monks, which we are bold to say is all slander, and unworthy of credence. Some old gossips of the day hesitated not to affirm that the monks