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that among his penitents, illness prevented many from quitting their houses. These were exactly the people who most needed his advice and the comforts of religion. Many representations had been made to him upon this account, and, though highly repugnant to his own wishes, he had found it absolutely necessary, for the service of Heaven, to change his determination, and quit his beloved retirement. The prioress applauded his zeal in his profession, and his charity towards mankind. She declared that Madrid was happy in possessing a man so perfect and irreproachable. In such discourse the friar at length reached the laboratory: he found the closet; the bottle stood in the place which Matilda had described, and the monk seized an opportunity to fill his phial unobserved with the soporific liquor. Then, having partaken of a collation in the refectory, he retired from the convent, pleased with the success of his visit, and leaving the nuns delighted by the honour conferred upon them.
He
