On the feast-days which I have mentioned, I was taken with my sisters to perform my stations at the various sanctuaries in the town, at St. Aaron's Chapel or the Convent of Victory; my ear was struck by the sweet voices of a hidden choir of women; the harmony of their chant mingled with the roar of the billows. When, in the winter, at the hour of Benediction, the Cathedral was filled by the multitude; when old sailors upon their knees, young women and children read their Hours with lighted tapers in their hands; when the congregation at the Benediction joined in singing the _Tantum Ergo_; when, in the intervals between the hymns, the Christmas squalls dashed against the panes of the Cathedral and shook the arches of the nave which had resounded with the manly tones of Jacques Cartier and Duguay-Trouin, I experienced an extraordinary feeling of religion. I had no need to be told by Villeneuve to fold my hands and invoke God by all the names which my mother had taught me; I saw the heavens opening, the angels offering up our incense and our prayers; I bowed my forehead: it was not yet laden with those cares which weigh upon us so terribly that we are tempted not to raise our heads after bending them at the foot of the altar. One sailor, the function concluded, would set sail all fortified against the night, while another would return to harbour and turn his steps to the illuminated dome of the church: thus religion and danger were constantly in sight one of the other, and their features were inseparable in my thoughts. I was hardly born before I heard speak of death: in the evening, a man went from street to street with a bell, calling upon Christians to pray for a brother deceased. Scarcely a year passed but vessels went under before my eyes, and as I played upon the beach the sea rolled to my feet the corpses of foreign men who had expired far from their native land. Madame de Chateaubriand said to me, as St. Monica said to her son: _Nihil longe est a Deo._ My education had been entrusted to Providence, which spared me none of its lessons. [Sidenote: My early love of religion.] Vowed as I was to the Virgin, I knew and loved my Protectress, whom I confused with my Guardian Angel: her portrait, which had cost my kind Villeneuve a half sou, was fastened with four pins over the head of my bed. I ought to have lived in the times when one said to Mary: "Sweet Lady of Heaven and Earth, Mother of Pity, Fountain of all Good, that carried Jesus Christ in thy precious womb, fair and most sweet Lady, I thank thee and entreat thee." The first thing I knew by heart was a sailors' hymn, which began: Je mets ma confiance, Vierge, en votre secours; Servez-moi de défense, Prenez soin de mes jours; Et quand ma dernière heure Viendra finir mon sort, Obtenez que je meure De la plus sainte mort[67].