“All was profound calm for a few days, but the storm was to come soon enough. On the fourth evening after the confession, I was sitting alone in my cell, when I heard an unusual bustle in the convent. The bell was rung,--the new porter seemed in great agitation,--the Superior hurried to the parlour first, then to his cell,--then some of the elder monks were summoned. The younger whispered in the galleries,--shut their doors violently,--all seemed in agitation. In a domestic building, occupied by the smallest family, such circumstances would hardly be noticed, but, in a convent, the miserable monotony of what may be called their internal existence, gives an importance,--an interest, to the most trivial external circumstance in common life. I felt all this. I said to myself, “Something is going on.”--I added, “Something is going on against me.” I was right in both my conjectures. Late in the evening I was ordered to attend the Superior in his own apartment,--I said I was ready to go. Two minutes after the order was reversed, and I was desired to remain in my cell, and await the approach of the Superior,--I answered I was willing to obey. But this sudden change of orders filled me with an _indefinite_ fear; and in all the changes of my life, and vicissitude of my feelings, I have never felt any fear so horrible. I walked up and down, I repeated incessantly, “My God protect me! my God strengthen me!” Then I dreaded to ask the protection of God, doubting whether the cause in which I was engaged merited his protection. My ideas, however, were all scattered by the sudden entrance of the Superior and the four monks who had attended him on the visit previous to the confession. At their entrance I rose,--no one desired me to sit down. The Superior advanced with a look of fury, and, dashing some papers on my table, said, “Is that your writing?” I threw a hurried and terrified eye over the papers,--_they were a copy of my memorial_. I had presence of mind enough to say, “That is not my writing.” “Wretch! you equivocate, it is a copy of your writing.”--I was silent.--“Here is a proof of it,” he added, throwing down another paper. It was a copy of the memoir of the advocate, addressed to me, and which, by the influence of a superior court, they had not the power of withholding from me. I was expiring with anxiety to examine it, but I did not dare to glance at it. The Superior unfolded page after page. He said, “Read, wretch! read,--look into it, examine it line by line.” I approached trembling,--I glanced at it,--in the very first lines I read _hope_. My courage revived.--I said, “My father, I acknowledge this to be the copy of my memorial. I demand your permission to read the answer of the advocate, you cannot refuse me this right.” “Read it,” said the Superior, and he flung it towards me.