The missionaries turned many from the evil of their ways: some sums of money were deposited in their hands to be by them restored to those who had been robbed or defrauded of them; these sums, so unexpectedly recovered, were in general given to the poor. I have read an account of the conduct of these missionaries to the galériens at Toulon, which was very interesting and edifying. On leaving Avignon they were accompanied for several miles by the people, who, by way of taking leave, tore the cassock off the back of the chief missionary and divided it into shreds, that all or as many as possible of their zealous admirers might have a relic. In this _procédé_ there was a little too much of the _fougue du midi_,[61] and the missionary by no means liked the process of popular canonization. How long the good effects of the mission may last is doubtful. It seems as if it were necessary that some strong excitement should exist in order that religion should be present to the mind. Holy men create this excitement to themselves by the aid of divine grace, and by prayer, a powerful mode of self-persuasion: for the multitude, this excitement must be created for them. I was assured by a very worthy and experienced curé, who remained in France during the whole of the revolution, that, in the reign of terror, when the churches were shut up, many followed the clergy into caverns and hiding-places, who afterwards could not be persuaded to go to church. I formed an acquaintance with an old gentleman of eighty-five years of age, who had served in the seven years war: he had been present at the affair of St. Cas. Two brothers, of a Lincolnshire family, every member of which I have always esteemed as a friend, were officers in the regiments landed on this occasion. I remember when a boy to have heard one of them relate how his brother called to him, when they were both driven back into the sea, to share a bottle of wine which chance had supplied. They were waiting for the boat to take them to their ship: there was no cork-screw; he broke off the neck of the bottle with his sword. It was pleasant to me, at such a distance of time and place, to meet with one whom this trifling anecdote could amuse. He spoke with respect, as does all the world, of English valour, but said, no one could conceive why they disembarked their troops on the coast, as it was utterly impossible for them to penetrate ten miles into the country: in this he was in accord with the English public at that time. He is dead; the brothers are dead: very few survive, who fought in the war concluded by the peace of Paris, in 1763.