Lourdes by Robert Hugh Benson
page 27 of 66 (40%)
page 27 of 66 (40%)
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already begun. The first case, which was proceeding as I entered, was
that of a woman (whose name I could not catch) who had been cured of consumption in the previous year, and who now came back to report a state of continued good health. Her brother-in-law came with her, and she remarked with pleasure that the whole family was now returning to the practice of religion. During this investigation I noticed also Juliette Gosset seated at the table, apparently in robust health. There followed Natalie Audivin, a young woman who declared that she had been cured in the previous year, and that she supposed her case had been entered in the books; but at the moment, at any rate, her name could not be found, and for the present the case was dismissed. I now saw a Capuchin priest in the room--a small, rosy, bearded man--and supposed that he was present merely as a spectator; but a minute or two later Dr. Boissarie caught sight of him, and presently was showing him off to me, much to his smiling embarrassment. He had caught consumption of the intestines, it seemed, some years before, from attending upon two of his dying brethren, and had come to Lourdes almost at his last gasp in the year 1900 A. D. Here he stood, smiling and rosy. There followed Mademoiselle Madeleine Laure, cured of severe internal troubles (I did not catch the details) in the previous year. Presently the Bishop of Dalmatia came in, and sat in his chair opposite me, while we heard the account of Miss Noemie Nightingale, of Upper Norwood, cured in the previous June of deafness, rising, in the case of one ear at least, from a perforation of the drum. She was present at the _piscines_, when on a sudden she had felt excruciating pains in the ears. The next she knew was that she heard the _Magnificat_ being sung |
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