Thou heardest me, O God! why should I complain. My happiness was complete, if it was short, and now thou hast granted the rest of my prayers, and my dear one is about to enter the bosom of the church, thus giving me the assurance that I shall see her again in that happy home where we shall both be lost in the beatific vision of thy boundless love." On the 27th of May, 1836, Madame de Ferronays knelt before an altar, arranged in her husband's room, on which the Abbé Martin de Mourien celebrated mass, and made her profession of the Catholic faith. {21} On the night of the 5th or 7th of June, she received her first communion at the same mass where Albert received his last. I will describe this pathetic scene in the words of Alexandrine herself. "Albert was in bed, be had not been able to rise. I knelt beside him, I took his hand, it was thus that we commenced the mass of Abbé Gerbert. As the mass advanced, Albert made me let fall his hand, this dear hand that was to me so sacred that in the most solemn hour of life I felt that I did not offend God in retaining it. Albert drew it from me, exclaiming, 'Go, go, belong only to God.' The Abbé Gerbert addressed a few words to me before giving me communion, then be gave it to Albert, then again I took his beloved hand; we expected every moment would be his last." No book could contain, no imagination could depict a scene more tenderly, more profoundly pathetic. At this point we read no more, we weep; it is to thee, O God! that the soul turns, to thee that the soul ascends, to thee who truly and really wert present in his chamber of suffering, walking so to speak on the waves of death, and saying, "Fear not, I am with thee." O my Protestant brethren: it is to you that this page seems to be dedicated; it is you who have formed the character of this young girl; it is to you that she owes the habit of living in the presence of God, to you she owes the loyalty, the perfect sincerity of her intentions and the zeal with which she purifies her conscience; at each moment guarding it as a stainless mirror which must ever reflect the image of God. She followed _you_ on the road to Emmaus, where Jesus explained to his disciples the sacred Scriptures; but like the disciples she has thrown down the book, it could not satisfy her; she has followed God to his holy table. By the bed of death, on the edge of the yawning abyss of irreparable separation, hymns and words disappear like useless sounds and barren discourses. Famished for hope and for consolation, the soul has need of stronger food. She must tear down the veil, and lay hold of God. O my Protestant brethren! read this history of a Christian, who was yours until the moment when stretching out her despairing hands toward nothingness, she came to us to be united in God with her dying husband. Read the sad but striking description of the days that follow the first communion. It is to you that I would dedicate the