It would seem as if even the ingenuity of charity had left nothing undone for the gratification of the poor savages, but it was not so. One day that Father Lalemant visited the school-room, the children gathered round him with an air of mystery and importance, as if burdened with some weighty secret. "Look at our clothes, Father," they said; "you can see that they are faded and worn, and, as our Mothers do not give us new ones, we cannot look as smart as the French girls, which makes us sorrowful." Much amused, the Father reported the complaint of the little ones to the Venerable Mother. Without showing the least surprise at it, or reminding the children of all her generosity, she at once provided each with a new red dress, adding new shoes and stockings, and assisting to prepare the finery with her own hands, lest, as she said, any impression of sadness might connect itself with the memory of their first instruction in the faith, and the Divine seed be thus hindered from striking deep root and producing rich fruit. Madame de la Peltrie had provided for the maintenance of six seminarists, but this number had gradually swelled to eighteen, all of whom were not only supported but likewise clothed from the common fund. The adult Indians who crowded to the monastery for instruction, also expected and invariably received hospitality, which was, moreover, occasionally extended to the families of the pupils. The pecuniary resources of the convent were wholly inadequate to meet so many claims on its charity, and at the same time, defray its own moderate expenditure. But the self- denying Mothers struggled bravely through their poverty, and by the generous aid of benefactors in France, they managed not only to continue their alms to the adults and to retain their seminarists, but by degrees considerably to increase the number of these last.