answer,--"go to your kitchen, and you will find food." In fact, that very afternoon several persons came to visit them, bringing abundance of all kinds of provisions, so that the Sisters were lost in astonishment, and silently adored the providence of that God, who never abandons those that trust in Him. CHAPTER IX. THE RULES OF THE CONGREGATION, AND ESTABLISHMENT OF MISSIONS. After having formed and established her community at Ville-Marie, as we have seen, and provided suitable buildings and funds to sustain them in the exercise of their duties in a newly-settled country; having also secured and registered the letters patent that confirmed their right, as a legally authorized Congregation, she next turned her attention to three things, still necessary to the perfection of her Institute, namely, to procure a sufficient number of subjects, to provide for them approved rules, and to establish missions. At first it was not difficult to procure subjects, as they presented themselves from all parts, being attracted, not by temporal interests, or any selfish motive, but simply by the odor of the virtues of Sister Bourgeois and her first saintly companions. But she did not receive indifferently all that presented themselves. She was quite insensible to such advantages as high birth, riches, and the brilliancy of natural or acquired talents, which are sometimes more dangerous than useful, preferring that those she received should have good common sense, an unblemished character, and solid virtue, without which qualifications she received no one. If she did not exact from her subjects the most sublime perfection, she required at least that they should have a desire to acquire it in proportion as God was pleased to bestow it on them. Let us hear her own words on the subject, as found in a letter, in which with simplicity she first addresses the ever Blessed Virgin: "My good Mother, I ask from you neither wealth, nor honor, nor the pleasures of this life for our community. I only beg of you to obtain for me, that God may be well served in it, and that we may never receive proud or presumptuous subjects, who keep the world and its maxims in their hearts, who are scoffers and untruthful, and who do not study to reduce to practice the maxims of your Divine Son, maxims which He taught us from the pulpit of the Cross, and which you have observed with so much exactness." Then, addressing those who presented themselves for admission, she adds: "Yes, all who wish to be received into this community, must resolve to renounce not only the principles and maxims of the world, but must also resolve to renounce _themselves_, and overcome their bad habits and inclinations. They must try to sever the natural ties that bind them to friends and relatives, as _merely_ human attachments uselessly preoccupy the mind. I warn them that they will be employed in lowly occupations, which are painful to nature; that they will be sent on missions with a