"Ah! Virgin! Fie! think of your family, think of your chaste spouse! think of your son! think of God the father! Do you wish to dishonor the creator of heaven and earth? What will become of us, if you awaken his wrath? It is always on us, poor mortals, that his wrath falls, and we will have the plague again."--"_Ecce ancilla Domini!_ my friend. I am under the orders of the Most High, and what if it pleases him to send me an angel?" Della Preda did not know what reply to make, for he was too religious to question the eternal decrees. He contented himself with remarking to the madonna that if the Most High had sent her an angel, it was not apparently to have love with him. "Ah! Good Lord!" the Novella cried. "Moreover," continued Delia Preda, "I am at peace, for the angels have no sex. It is merely play. Ah, well! the question is controverted." "Ah! Good Lord! Ah! Good Lord!" the Novella cried. "Thus, Saint Ambrose, who has discussed angels at some length, does not pronounce himself in a peremptory way. He notes that some, having transgressed, were thrust 'into the world' and replaced in the celestial concert by the most meritorious virginities. How did they transgress, and must not this expression mean the flesh?..." "Ah! my angel!" the Novella cried. "Or perhaps they are epicene, like their name. This opinion was sustained but I believe it heretical, for these vases of purity, finding themselves endowed with two sexes, would have too many temptations. Tertullian, as well as Origen, grants them a body: I know that to be so, and I see what profane use they make of it. "Ah! I am about to lose all my illusions concerning angels: I must submit the case to the padre who taught me theology.... "If I call to mind my prayer-book, is it not written in the service of Saint-Cecilia: 'Valerian found Cecilia supplicating with an angel in her bed. Cecilia, moreover, had informed him beforehand: 'There is a secret, Valerian, I wish to tell thee: I have an angel of God for a lover; he watches over my body with an extreme jealousy.' Yes, I have read this in my prayer-book, in those holy pages where disrespect should not even appear. I read about holy loves, and of saints also, without a doubt, and these things oppress my heart. Pardon, madonna! Nevertheless you make me suffer and you make me weep; I no longer dare, ashamed of the spectacle which has disturbed my soul, lift my rude eyes towards your beatified eyes. You do what you wish, being a queen, and my only duty is to love, to suffer and to die if you so order it. "I do not understand at all, but what matter? Do I understand the mystery of the Holy Trinity? "If you have chosen, like the charming and blest maiden, an angel for lover, it is because it is the function of angels to be the lovers of virgins: it was so ordained by the Lord for all eternity.