again; would be jealous, laugh and pinch, pinch and laugh, and play
tricks upon the novices.

At times they would say, "Suppose a gendarme came here one rainy day,
where should we put him?"

"With Sister Ovide; her cell is so big he could get into it with his
helmet on."

"What do you mean?" cried Sister Ovide, "are not all our cells alike?"

Thereupon the girls burst out laughing like ripe figs. One evening
they increased their council by a little novice, about seventeen years
of age, who appeared innocent as a new-born babe, and would have had
the host without confession. This maiden's mouth had long watered for
their secret confabulations, little feasts and rejoicings by which the
nuns softened the holy captivity of their bodies, and had wept at not
being admitted to them.

"Well," said Sister Ovide to her, "have you had a good night's rest,
little one?"

"Oh no!" said she, "I have been bitten by fleas."

"Ha! you have fleas in your cell? But you must get rid of them at
once. Do you know how the rules of our order enjoin them to be driven
out, so that never again during her conventional life shall a sister
see so much as the tail of one?"

"No," replied the novice.