About twenty-seven years ago, on the 19th of September, 1846, two children belonging to the hamlet of Abladens--the one a girl of fourteen, the other a boy of twelve years old--came down from the lofty pasturage of Mont Gargas, where they had been herding cattle, and told the following strange story. They had seen the Virgin Mary descend from heaven with a crucifix suspended from her neck by a gold chain, and a hammer and pincers suspended from the chain, but without any visible support. The figure sat down upon a large stone, and wept so piteously as shortly to fill a large pool with her tears. When the story was noised abroad, people came from all quarters, and went up the mountain to see where the Virgin had sat. The stone was soon broken off in chips and carried away as relics, but the fountain filled with the tears is still there, tasting very much, like ordinary spring water. Two priests of Grenoble, disgusted at what they believed to be an imposition, accused a young person of the neighbourhood, one Mdlle. de Lamerlière, as being the real author of the pretended miracle, on which she commenced an action against them for defamation of character. She brought the celebrated advocate Jules Favre from Paris to plead her cause, but the verdict was given in favour of the two priests. The "miracle" was an imposture! Notwithstanding this circumstance, the miracle came to be generally believed in the neighbourhood. The number of persons who resorted to the place with money in their pockets steadily increased. The question was then taken up by the local priests, who vouched for the authenticity of the miracle seen by the two children. The miracle was next accepted by Rome.[100] A church was built on the spot by means of the contributions of the visitors--L'Église de la Salette--and thither pilgrims annually resort in great numbers, the more devout climbing the hill, from station to station, on their knees. As many as four thousand persons of both sexes, and of various ages, have been known to climb the hill in one day--on the anniversary of the appearance of the apparition--notwithstanding the extreme steepness and difficulties of the ascent.