Our sisters were, I suppose, much like any other collection of ladies of the same age and breeding, except that the sense of living under the ban of persecution and suffering for the truth's sake gave a kind of elevation to their characters not always found in convents. Mother Prudentia once told me that, at a visitation made by the Bishop or some other great functionary, the nuns then in the convent had been offered the choice of entering any other religious house they pleased; but not a single one had availed herself of the permission. The good ladies kept their hours very strictly, revered the constitutions and rules of their order as much as the Scripture itself, or perhaps a little more, considering that they knew a good deal more about them, sang endless litanies and read all the books they had. In their hours of labor they worked in the garden and orchard, made beautiful cakes and sweetmeats (I only wish I had Sister Lazarus' receipt book), and were especially famous for their candied fruits, very few of which were ever tasted within the convent walls. They did a great deal of embroidery and made lovely lace with the needle. Mother Angelique had disapproved of fancy-work, but the lace and embroidery were too important as sources of revenue to be disregarded. Now and then a sister disappeared for a few days, and then it was understood that she was in retreat,—that is, she shut herself up for a special season of fasting and prayer. The rules of convents are such that one may live in a religious house as a pupil for years and yet know very little of the interior workings of the family; but we were so few in number, and so poor withal, that we were thrown very much together. The three elder pupils mostly kept by themselves, and we saw very little of any of them except Desireè. She would sometimes condescend to play with us, and usually ended by leading us into some scrape. She was the only one destined by her friends for the veil, and certainly she had the least vocation for a religious life. Marguerite and Athenais were grave, serious-minded girls, and would, I think, gladly have remained in the house; but their friends had different views for them, and they were taken away to be married. I have said the house was a large one, and had once been very magnificent. There were two long rows of cells for the nuns, who formerly numbered fifty or sixty. There was a range of superb apartments formerly allotted to the abbess, but they were shut up and disused. The house was built around two courts, which were connected by a tall Gothic arch. The court, about which were the offices and the rooms in which we lived, was paved with fine slabs of marble, many of which, in my time, were cracked, broken, and displaced.