The pope laid his hands upon their heads and blessed them. "Have confidence," he said, "you will get well and will do much work for God's glory," and at the same moment they were restored to health. Pius bade them keep silence as to what had happened, but the facts spoke for themselves. At their entrance, the two nuns had hardly had strength to drag themselves along; at their exit they walked like strong and healthy women. Their cab driver, an unimaginative man of sturdy common sense, refused to take them back to their convent. "No," he said, "I will take back the two I brought or their dead bodies." "But we are the two you brought," they insisted. "No," repeated the vetturino, "the two I brought were half dead; you are not in the least like them." At another public audience was a man who carried his little son, paralysed from birth and unable to stand. "Give him to me," said Pius; and taking the child on his knee, he began to talk to another group of pilgrims. A few minutes later the child slipped down from the pope's knee and began to run about the room. That the touch of a holy man, or the garments he has worn, or even his shadow falling on the sick should have power to cure them, is vouched for by Holy Scripture.[*] "Perhaps so," say some, "but the age of miracles has passed." The age of miracles has not passed, nor will it ever while there is faith on the earth; for faith, as Jesus Christ Himself said, alone makes miracles possible. At Nazareth even His almighty power could not work them, because of the unbelief of the people. Where the age of faith has passed, the age of miracles has passed with it, but in the Church of Christ they both endure. [*] Acts v 15 and vi 12; Matt. xiii 58. More marvellous still than the graces obtained by the touch of Pius X were those obtained--sometimes at a great distance--by his blessing and his prayers. In one of the convents of the Sacred Heart in Ireland was a young nun suffering from disease of the hip-bone. For eight months she had not put her left foot to the ground, as any weight on it caused acute pain. The disease was making rapid progress. In the October of 1912 the superioress of the convent, having heard of a cure obtained through the prayers and blessing of the Holy Father, determined to have recourse to him. She told a little girl of six, the daughter of the convent carpenter, to write to the pope, asking him to bless the dear Mother who was ill, and to pray for her. During the night of the 29th October the sick nun suddenly realized that the pain had entirely left the injured hip--so entirely that she was able to turn and lie on it. The next morning she sat up in bed and asked to be allowed to try to walk. She got up, made her bed and walked to the church, where she knelt for some time in prayer. It was then that she was told of the letter to the pope. "I did not know what had happened," she said, "all that I knew was that the pain was gone and that I could walk."