EARLY REMINISCENCES
kindly, simple-minded man, as are the majority of the French clergy. He had a balcony, a pergola, over which grew a vine. The rich yellow grapes hung within reach, and I was allowed to take as many as I liked, whilst we sat and talked. He had but a scanty library ; from it he lent me Quintus Curtius, and pressed on me a pamphlet on the Apparition of La Salette, that was exciting much dispute in France at the time.
On the anniversary of the Apparition in 1847, as many as sixty thousand pilgrims visited the plateau of La Salette. Priests and even bishops were fools enough to participate in the demonstration. And lo ! an indelible evidence of the truth of the Apparition of the Virgin was discovered, in that, where she had sat on the stone, her posteriors had left as an impress—a portrait of Christ. There was an illustration given in the pamphlet lent me by the curé. "C'est un peu fort!" said I. "C'est a se faire moquer par les incroyants." "Ah! que voulez-vous?" answered that dear priest. "Les incroyants se moquent de tout."
In September, 1851, Archbishop Philibert issued a pastoral, in which he declared for the genuineness of the Apparition, and Pope Pius IX granted indulgences to all those who should visit the spot, and he further required that the day of the Revelation should be kept holy in all the churches of the diocese of Grenoble. Can anyone who is gifted with common sense believe in Papal Infallibility ?
A notable procés took place, in which the fraud was exposed. A Mile de la Merliere had dressed for the occasion, and had drilled two ignorant children. Proof was produced in Court that Constance de la Merliere had actually purchased the costume in which she dressed up for the Apparition, and other proofs were brought forward completely exposing the fraud. The Court pronounced against her. She appealed to a higher Court, but this latter confirmed the condemnation already pronounced. As to the unfortunate, but honest clergy who had shown up the trickery — what became of them ? I can pretty well guess.
It is the misfortune of the Romanist clergy that they are so completely under the control of the bishops, who stand cowering before the Pope, like curs expecting a whipping. This is due to the giving to them Faculties to be renewed or withdrawn at the end of every seven years; this makes them subservient to the
