We took this for a hint that we were to ask no more questions, but we wondered all the more. Sister Filomena was the one of whom I have spoken before as being so very ugly. She was tall and boney, with particularly large hands and feet, and a masculine walk. She had a decided beard, and owing to some disease, I suppose, her face, and particularly her nose, were as red as an old toper's. She was a widow of some years standing when she took the vows, and before her conversion, she had lived much in the gay world of Toulon, where, despite her ugliness, she had been a great favorite, and had maintained a very popular salon. Sister Lazarus had caused to be transported to the vault a little earthen-ware furnace for charcoal, such as are much used in France. This she lighted, and served us each with a famous cup of chocolate—a luxury never enjoyed by us except on very grand feast days. I think smells are more powerful in awakening old associations than anything else. The smell of a fresh cup of chocolate always brings that scene vividly before me—the dimly-burning shaded lights, which made our pale faces doubly ghastly in appearance—the damp walls of whitish grey rock—the little chapel with its ornaments glittering as the tapers flared a little—I can see all this, and hear the soft drop and splash of water, regular almost as the ticking of a clock, which fell on our ears, and now and then a curious moaning sound coming no one knew from whence. "What is that?" said one of the sisters rather fearfully, as a louder moan than usual made itself felt rather than heard. "It is a sound always heard in these vaults," replied the Superior. "I used to hear in my day that it was the spirits of the poor souls that the old heathen imprisoned here and left to starve," said Sister Eustachie, who was very old and childish. "You don't think it is that, do you, Reverend Mother?" asked one of the nuns rather timidly. "No, my child, I think it is only the wind which finds entrance somewhere and cannot get out again, or some escape of imprisoned gas from the earth. Whatever it may be, it is but a sound," answered the Superior. "Let me beg of you, not to disturb your minds with idle fears. Let all lie down and rest while it is possible. Mother Assistant and myself will watch before the Holy Sacrament." I had no wish to lie down, nor, as I think, had any of the others, but in a convent, one learns to obey without a word—not so bad a lesson either, where young persons are concerned. So we lay down on our straw beds and covered ourselves as warmly as we could, and, despite their fears, I heard some of the nuns snoring in five minutes' time.