presented with pictures of heroic self-devotion and generous
self-sacrifice, such as it would be gratifying to see in our own
country. Many of the forms of charity met with in Catholic states
had their rise in one enthusiastically benevolent man, the
celebrated Vincent de St Paul. Born in 1576, on the skirts of the
Pyrenees, and brought up as a shepherd-boy--possessed of course of
none of the advantages of fortune, this remarkable man shewed a
singular spirit of charity before he had readied manhood. He became
a priest; he passed through a slavery in one of the African
piratical states, and with difficulty made his escape. At length we
see him in the position of a parish pastor in France, exerting
himself in plans for the improvement of the humbler classes, exactly
like those which have become fashionable among ourselves only during
the last twenty years. His exertions succeeded, and generous persons
of rank enabled him to extend them. In a short time, he saw no fewer
than twenty-five establishments founded in his own country, in
Piedmont, Poland, and other states, for charitable purposes.
Stimulated by this success to increase his exertions, he quickly
formed associations of charitable persons, chiefly females, for the
succour of distressed humanity. It was a most wonderful movement for
the age, and must be held as no little offset against the horrible
barbarities arising from religious troubles in the reign of Louis
XIII. Among Vincent's happiest efforts, was that which established
the _Sisters of Charity_, a sodality of self-devoted women, which
exists in vigour at the present day.

During a lengthened residence in Prague, we have had much
satisfaction in visiting the establishment of the Sisters, and
inquiring into their doings. The house, which was founded in the
seventeenth century, and contains seventy inmates, is situated near