Each house of this nature has its peculiarities: at the beginning of this century Écouen was one of those places in which the childhood of children is passed in an almost august gloom. At Écouen a distinction was made between the virgins and flower-girls in taking rank in the procession of the Holy Sacrament. There were also the "canopies," and the "censers," the former holding the cords of the canopy, the latter swinging the censers in front of the Holy Sacrament, while four virgins walked in front. On the morning of the great day it was not rare to have people say in the dormitory,--"Who is a virgin?" Madame Campan mentions a remark made by a little girl of seven to a grown-up girl of sixteen, who walked at the head of the procession, while she, the little one, remained behind: "You are a virgin, but I am not one." CHAPTER V. AMUSEMENTS. Above the refectory door was painted in large black letters the following prayer, which was called the "White Paternoster," and which had the virtue of leading persons straight to Paradise. "Little white Paternoster, which God made, which God said, which God placed in Paradise. At night, when I went to bed, I found three angels at my bed,--one at the foot, two at the head, and the good Virgin Mary in the middle,--who told me to go to bed and fear nothing. The Lord God is my father, the good Virgin is my mother, the three apostles are my brothers, the three virgins are my sisters. My body is wrapped up in the shirt in which God was born: the cross of Saint Marguerite is written on my chest. Madame the Virgin weeping for the Lord went into the fields and met there M. St. John. 'Monsieur St. John, where do you come from?' 'I have come from the _Ave Salus_'. 'You have not seen the Lord, have you?' 'He is on the tree of the cross, with hanging feet, nailed-up hands, and a little hat of white-thorn on his head.' Whosoever repeats this, thrice at night and thrice in the morning, will gain Paradise in the end."[1] In 1827, this characteristic orison had disappeared beneath a triple coat of whitewash, and at the present day it is almost effaced from the memory of those who were young girls then, and old women now.