CHAP. III.

FROM MORTAGNE TO RENNES, SOEURS DE LA CHARITÉ. ALENÇON, LAVAL, VITRÉ,
THE RESIDENCE OF THE CELEBRATED MADAME DE SÉVIGNÉ. RENNES.


I travelled by the diligence from Mortagne to Alençon and Laval: we
arrived at the former place to dinner, and at the latter to remain all
night. The carriage was filled with _Soeurs de la Charité_,

"Qui, pour le malheur seul connoissant la tendresse,
Aux besoins du vieil-age immollent leur jeunesse,"

on their way to different places in Bretagne, on charitable missions,
by the order of the Superior at Paris. Four of these were young and
beautiful women, none of whom could have attained the age of twenty;
yet these females had already devoted themselves to attend on the sick
and poor wherever their services might be required, for which purpose
they receive a suitable education, in an Hospital at Paris, in such
branches of medicine and surgery as may render them useful. They
are distributed throughout the kingdom to attend the hospitals and
prisons, which they do with the delicacy and attention peculiar to
their sex. Of all the classes of females who thus devote themselves to
a religious life, and to acts of charity, none are more respected, or
more truly serviceable to their fellow-creatures. Their dress consists
of a coarse brown jacket and gown, with a high linen cap, sloping down
over the shoulders, and a rosary hanging round their waist.