no cloths, and it is almost needless to add that there were no napkins,
although these are considered so essential in France that even in the most
wretched auberge one is usually laid before the guest. Trappists, however,
have little need of them. At each place were a wooden spoon and fork, a
plate, a jug of water, and another jug--a smaller one--of beer, and a
porringer for soup, which is the chief of the Trappists' diet. Very thin
soup it is, the ingredients being water, chopped vegetables, bread, and
a little oil or butter. Until a few years ago no oily matter, whether
vegetable or animal, was allowed in the soup, nor was it permissible,
except in case of sickness, to have more than one meal a day; but the
necessity of relaxing the rule a little was realized. Now, during the six
summer months of the year, there are two meals a day, namely, at eleven and
six; but in winter there is still only one that is called a meal, and this
is at four. There is, however, a _gouter_--just something to keep the
stomach from collapsing--at ten in the morning. No flesh, nor fish, nor
animal product, except cheese and butter, is eaten by these Trappists
unless they fall ill, and then they have meat or anything else that they
may need to make them well. There is, however, very little sickness amongst
them. The living of each Trappist probably costs no more than sixpence a
day to the community. Assuming that the money brought into the common fund
by those who have a private fortune--the fathers, as a rule, are men of
some independent means--covers the establishment expenses and the taxation
imposed by the State, there must remain a considerable profit on the work
of each individual, whether he labours in the fields or in the dairy and
cheese rooms, or concerns himself with the sales and the accounts, or, like
the porter at the gate, tests with an instrument the richness of the milk
that is brought in by the peasants, lest they who have been befriended
by the monks in sickness and penury should steal from them in return. To
devote this surplus, obtained by a life of sacrifice compared to which
the material misery of the beggars whom they relieve is luxury, to the