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 MAGIC AND MESMERISM 
 
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 THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 
 
 AND OTHEE TALES. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON 
 
 SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. 
 
 1843.
 
 8E3 
 v l 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 In the autumn of 184 — , a party of friends, 
 male and female, started from Manheim, on 
 an expedition up one of the lovely valleys that 
 shelter those mountain-streams, whose beauties 
 scarcely yield the palm to the proud Rhine, 
 whose tributaries they are. The party was 
 numerous ; and for the first two or three days, 
 all went right. But just as they were about to 
 escape from the worst roadside-inn it had yet 
 been their ill luck to fall in with, a mountain- 
 storm broke overhead with such fury, and of
 
 IV PREFACE. 
 
 such duration, as to render the narrow, pre- 
 cipitous road — bad enough in fair weather — 
 perfectly impassable for a few days, especially 
 for the ladies, whose fears magnified the incon- 
 veniences of the venture. 
 
 Thus weather-bound, in the fullest meaning 
 of the word — an incessant cold rain alternating 
 with a high sharp wind by day, and early 
 biting frosts by night, that made the smoky 
 stoves of mine host, crammed full of green- 
 wood, and his unswept, uncurtained rooms, a 
 luxury — the spirits of the society, and the 
 general stock of patience, was much tried. 
 Passing under silence those nameless priva- 
 tions, whose enumeration would fill a volume, 
 but which any traveller whom chance or ca- 
 price has led into the more unfrequented parts 
 of Germany will have no trouble in calling 
 back to his remembrance, I will barely hint 
 at the blue-devils that seized upon and tor-
 
 PREFACE. V 
 
 merited each in turn; and though to record 
 the sighs, and yawns, and sundry exclama- 
 tions, were a hopeless task, I will declare, that a 
 more complete specimen of immeasurable ennui 
 — ennui of the deepest, darkest hue — was never 
 seen. 
 
 There was not a musical instrument in the 
 whole house ! Not one of the ladies had strung 
 her blue or pink ribboned guitar on the top 
 of a bandbox — bandboxes having been most 
 ungallantly prohibited by the male portion of 
 the society. Not one of the gentlemen had 
 with him so much as a flute-cane, or had 
 smuggled even a Jew's-harp into his pocket ! 
 The heavy, iron-tipped oak, that helped to 
 climb the rocks, was alone a Vordre du jour ; 
 and the gentlemen's shooting-jackets boasted 
 little more in the way of musical resources 
 than pocket-combs. Draught or chess board — 
 nay, even the very oldest pack of cards — would
 
 VI PREFACE. 
 
 have been hailed with delight, had the landlord 
 of the Stork been able to produce any such ; 
 but he seemed not even to have an inkling of 
 such town-fangled notions, and there were no 
 other resources left the travellers but those 
 of their own conversational powers. As polite- 
 ness precludes controversy, and people invariably 
 tire of assenting to each other's propositions, 
 these soon flagged; and — in default of any of 
 those pink-bound volumes that Galignani strews 
 with so untiring a hand over all the highways 
 and by-ways of the Continent, and of which, 
 strange to say, not one copy had found its way 
 in the scanty luggage of the travellers, — it was 
 at last agreed that story-telling should fill up 
 the blank; and those who, in the course of 
 those few days' domestication, had betrayed the 
 slightest anecdotical powers, were now unmerci- 
 fully plied to exert those powers on an enlarged 
 scale. u Anything would do," the ladies said ;
 
 PREFACE. Vll 
 
 but when divers subjects were started, it came 
 to light, that " they did not like pure fiction ; 
 it required a master-hand to make anything 
 of it ; something that had really happened 
 always had an interest of its own that would 
 greatly aid the manner of the telling ;" — in short, 
 the historical was decided upon, una voce. 
 Needles were soon plied by delicate white 
 fingers, whilst the male portion of the audience, 
 with laudable feelings of tender reminiscences 
 of their schoolboy days, busied their hands 
 in cutting out figures on their sticks, or indent- 
 ing them in mine host's already much-damaged 
 tables. 
 
 The bravest among the gentlemen, then, de- 
 voted themselves to the slippery task of amusing 
 others. They succeeded, however, so well, that 
 it was suggested that the Tales which had whiled 
 away the ennui of a chosen few, might, per- 
 chance, render the same service to others, if
 
 Vlll PREFACE. 
 
 given a wider circulation by means of the Press. 
 In vain did he upon whom the chancy task of 
 Editing them was forced, grumble and represent 
 how under different circumstances the same 
 things assumed different aspects, and how much 
 the partiality of friendly listeners may blind 
 them to the defects of the productions they 
 patronise. All was of no avail; the fiat had 
 gone forth from lips that would take no denial, 
 and the Editor now, perhaps, stands committed 
 past redemption.
 
 THE CAPTAIN'S STORY. 
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM, 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 I was yet a very young man, and but just 
 gazetted as a second lieutenant, when my ill 
 luck ordained that I should be sent, with many 
 other English prisoners, to Toulon ; at which 
 place, Napoleon's name being held in even 
 more enthusiastic reverence than elsewhere, our 
 prospect of comfort was not re-assuring. 
 
 Many of my countrymen have complained 
 of the sufferings they endured, and the hard 
 treatment they met with, in this time of proba- 
 tion ; but I must confess much of this was 
 drawn upon them by their own obstinacy in 
 refusing to remain at large on parole — an alter- 
 native generally offered, and which, though it 
 b 2
 
 4 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 debarred the prisoner from any chance of an 
 early release, made, at least, the detention less 
 irksome. Of the few who preferred a compara- 
 tively free sejour in a town to the gloomy con- 
 finement of a prison, I was one of the first ; 
 and I soon found I had made proof of no small 
 sagacity in my choice. 
 
 The French are, or at least were when I 
 knew them — but that's a long while ago — a 
 very polite, kindly race, and evinced a generous 
 sympathy in favour of the poor prisoners who 
 came in their way, of which I, at least, am a 
 grateful instance. I could not, however, afford 
 to remain an idler on the pave, and was soon 
 obliged to chalk out for myself some plan for 
 procuring a livelihood. Many in my situation 
 might have been tempted to adduce, as a motive 
 for so doing, the difficulty of receiving regular 
 remittances ; I owned the truth — I had none to 
 receive. 
 
 I knew something of music, more of draw- 
 ing, could paint very tolerably in water colours ; 
 in short, I was not deficient in that smattering 
 des arts d'aqrtmens, which — for at that time
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. O 
 
 artists did not everywhere abound as at present 
 — might, I thought, suffice to help me out of 
 my difficulties. I soon, indeed, got more pupils 
 than I had time to attend to, and found that 
 their kindness contributed even more to my 
 comfort than their money. In some families, 
 acquaintance ripened into friendship, or — what 
 generally answers as well, if not better, for 
 social enjoyment — into intimacy unfettered by 
 the duties and cares that friendship entails upon 
 its votaries. 
 
 Of these families, I must mention one in 
 particular. The father, though very rich, would 
 not afford his daughters the accomplishments 
 deemed so indispensable to modern education 
 at the usual costs, yet was not unwilling to 
 bestow board and lodging upon any one who 
 would consent to instruct them on those terms. 
 The proposal implied the comforts of a social, 
 though not a luxurious home, and was accepted 
 by me with infinite pleasure ; and a source of 
 pleasure it proved, in every sense, during the 
 many years of my captivity. 
 
 Doubtless, I could dwell with untiring com-
 
 6 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 placency upon these reminiscences of my youth, 
 and of those with whom its heyday was spent; 
 but as they might prove more wearisome than 
 interesting, and do not bear upon the point, 
 I will at once make you acquainted with the 
 only member of this family who has any refer- 
 ence to my story, and whose introduction I 
 may as well premise by stating, that, although 
 the most singular mortal that ever fell in my 
 way, he was at this period my constant com- 
 panion, and one of the men I have liked best 
 of all those, young or old, I ever associated 
 with, not excluding the officers of my mess. 
 
 Mr. Chaudon — this was his name — was past 
 sixty, at the head of no inconsiderable compe- 
 tency, a confirmed bachelor, and being god- 
 father, besides, to all the younger children, 
 great expectations were entertained of him ; a 
 circumstance that led my friends to make very 
 flattering advances to the old gentleman, who, 
 in his turn, availed himself of them in a manner 
 to justify the presumption that he meant to 
 repay them one day in full. Thus were we 
 continually thrown into each other's society;
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 7 
 
 and as I spoke French with great fluency, 
 despite the dissimilitude of our ages, tastes, 
 habits, and, above all, nationality, we soon 
 became great cronies. 
 
 In order to make you understand our dissi- 
 militude and points of attraction more clearly, 
 I must, even at the risk of being thought te- 
 dious, dilate a little on our characters and pecu- 
 liarities. Although barely twenty, and rather 
 good-looking than otherwise, I was more fond 
 of reading and thinking than most men pos- 
 sessed of these advantages, especially in the 
 profession I had embraced. Of a very cheerful 
 temperament, endowed with that most precious 
 of nature's gifts — which I have ever striven to 
 retain, through fair and foul — the power of being 
 easily pleased and amused, I was thus far quali- 
 fied to meet half way his natural bibliomania 
 and national gaiete de cceur*. But the leading 
 feature of my mind was coolness of judgment — 
 so, at least, I and my friends qualified it ; those 
 who w T ere not so well disposed towards me 
 called it w T ant of imagination: be that as it 
 may, anything out of the common routine of
 
 8 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 life and of the beaten track of ideas, has ever 
 appeared to me extravagant — preposterous, 
 and never took root in my brain. Some said 
 this was a happy gift; but so, probably, did 
 not think my companion, who was in nothing 
 more opposed to me than in this particular. 
 
 Monsieur Jules Chaudon's sixty years had 
 cooled none of the fire of youth. His over- 
 abundance of imagination, by leading him con- 
 stantly from the practical to the theoretical, 
 and rendering impossible the constant applica- 
 tion and persevering attention necessary to all 
 professions, but especially that which he had 
 adopted — the law — had materially interfered with 
 his advancement ; and never having risen above 
 mediocrity, in spite of strong natural powers, 
 he had, in consequence, retired from its arduous 
 duties even before his age justified the measure : 
 but his was the contemplative disposition and 
 the studious habit, which invest a life of ease 
 with charm. 
 
 During the twenty years that my worthy 
 friend had found himself at liberty to follow the 
 bent of his own inclinations, he had devoted
 
 MAGIC AND 3IES3IERISM. V 
 
 the greater portion of his time to reading. That 
 reading being, however, of the most promiscuous 
 kind, and the natural romance of his mind 
 tinging with peculiar interest the wilder and 
 more chimerical speculations of his and other 
 times, he soon suffered himself to be led away 
 by them, and became what the French so well 
 describe by the epithet "bizarre" which was 
 universally applied to him, although he was 
 otherwise held in great esteem for his acknow- 
 ledged talents. 
 
 " They call me singular, original," he would 
 often say, " and make this a matter of reproach ; 
 but I accept the denomination as the highest 
 possible compliment, for neither virtue nor 
 genius are commonplace. Everybody, on the 
 contrary, must allow they are most unlike what 
 we observe in the generality of mankind ; and 
 by their very dissemblance from the inferiority 
 that, at every turn, meets and checks them, 
 often, alas ! jar, like a chord too tightly strung, 
 in the harmony of this world, where their aspi- 
 rations remain unsatisfied and their efforts mis- 
 understood." 
 
 b 3
 
 10 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 I used to laugh heartily at the frankness of 
 my friend's vanity; but if, like most of his 
 countrymen, he was addicted to much talking, 
 especially about himself, and even to boasting 
 on occasions, still did he more than counter- 
 balance these slight peculiarities by his many 
 and rare qualities. Most of my leisure hours 
 were devoted to his society; and this circum- 
 stance was doubly favourable to me, tending, 
 as it did, to exercise my intellectual faculties, 
 and to keep me out of harm's way, for the ladies 
 of the South of France are very fascinating, I 
 assure you. 
 
 One day, calling, according to my wont, to 
 share his demie tasse de cafe, after a very early 
 dinner, I was somewhat surprised to find him in 
 a less vivacious humour than ordinary. His 
 fit of silence embarrassed me ; and, par maniere 
 de contenance, I began to survey the various ob- 
 jects that surrounded me, although habit had 
 made them perfectly familiar. The small, white- 
 curtained windows, always opened to the mild 
 breezes of Provence, letting in the effulgence of 
 a southern sun through the tempering medium
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 11 
 
 of a couple of tall trees which shaded his little 
 flower garden — the perfume the latter exhaled 
 in that luxuriant clime — all this I had enjoyed 
 before. My eye wandered to the well-stored 
 bookcases on either hand of the door — to the 
 door itself with its Watteau panels, representing 
 puffy, rosy swains, making love in a very playful 
 and becoming manner by the intervention of 
 a flute or bagpipe, to smiling, courtly-looking 
 shepherdesses, with a profusion of roses and 
 sheep and doves, to enhance the poetry of the 
 conception — the quiet lamp on the console, 
 placed carefully in front of a dish of waxen 
 fruits under glass — the landscape over the door, 
 in which the village church did not forget to 
 chime the hour with more precision than many 
 a Bregue — the magnificent boule cabinet, no 
 longer appreciated for its own merits, retained 
 in a corner out of respect for the past — the 
 pictures, all daubs in their way, and merely 
 interesting as family portraits — the very prints, 
 hung round the wall, were known to me in 
 all their details. I gazed, mechanically, from 
 that representing the death of the unfortunate
 
 12 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 Louis XVI. to that of the Jcu de Paume and the 
 Coronation of Napoleon, lleminiscence, rather 
 than political opinion, seemed to have guided the 
 choice of those engravings, several of which 
 were portraits of celebrities contemporary with 
 himself — Mesmer, Pu} 7 segur, D'Eslon, and a few 
 others, whose names escape my memory, more 
 or less famous in the annals of magnetism. 
 
 " Strange men and bold, those," said Chau- 
 don, following the direction of my eyes as they 
 rested on the last named personages. 
 
 " Dreamers ! idle dreamers," I answered, with 
 a shrug — " dreamers, if not knaves and 
 villains." 
 
 " Far too sweeping a conclusion," said Chau- 
 don. " May not a science exist, though folly 
 and knavery may have abused it? May not 
 the fairest flowers spring up from the same soil 
 that will bear a toadstool ?" 
 
 " Perhaps," said I, " but the mere chimera of 
 the brain I consider to be a most barren ground, 
 productive of little better than the thorns of 
 disputation." 
 
 " Then you take upon yourself to deny, al-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 13 
 
 together, the existence of Mesmerism, and its 
 effects for good or for evil ?" 
 
 " I should, indeed, feel inclined to do so," I 
 replied, "but that I do not consider myself 
 sufficiently master of the subject to give a de- 
 cided opinion." 
 
 " Far be it from me to deny that Mesmerism 
 has had its charlatans and its victims — but so 
 has medicine, and yet what science is nobler ? 
 lias not religion itself had its abuses ?" 
 
 "But," I timidly urged, "public opinion has 
 so completely done justice by the votaries of 
 
 magnetism 
 
 " It is natural, my young friend," hastily in- 
 terrupted Chaudon," that the first who wander 
 through unknown regions, and bring back new 
 stores of ideas and facts to others, should ex- 
 pose themselves, by communicating them, to 
 ridicule and animadversion. For, strange to say, 
 fond as he thinks himself of change, and eager 
 as he is in its pursuit, all novelty is hateful to 
 man — but this is one of the many contradictions 
 of his nature. Thus we see ignorant people 
 ever ready to laugh at the simplest truth which
 
 14 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 has escaped their sphere of intelligence. Perfect 
 incredulity on all points is an infallible token of 
 the total absence of intellectual development; 
 none know how to credit what is new to them but 
 persons of cultivated understanding." 
 
 " True," said I; "but if it be folly to reject, 
 without investigation, any proposition whatever, 
 surely it is more foolish to admit any theory as 
 true without due proof." 
 
 " Granted," said the old man — " granted ; 
 but how few ever pause to balance a question, 
 however vital its import. The greater portion 
 of mankind decide at once, without being able 
 to adduce any better reason for their decision 
 than caprice or prejudice. I dare say your 
 opinions, my young friend, are not based on 
 firmer ground." 
 
 Without renouncing my scepticism, I grace- 
 fully yielded this point. 
 
 " I thought as much," said he ; " without 
 having duly weighed the arguments pro and con 
 in your own mind, merely because those are 
 stigmatized as enthusiasts and dreamers who 
 have given into the system. Fausse konte, my 
 young friend, and worldly prudence, are the
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 15 
 
 graves of science and discovery. Now, if you 
 will patiently listen to a few reasons I can 
 adduce in favour of the existence, if not the 
 merits of animal magnetism, I think I can con- 
 vince you, or, at least, lead you on the road to 
 conviction." 
 
 " Most willingly," said I. 
 
 " Then we will adjourn to the beach, and, in 
 the face of nature's sublimest work, discuss one 
 of her deepest mysteries." 
 
 The old bonne had soon helped my friend to 
 exchange his flowered silk robe de chambre for 
 a coat of somewhat antediluvian fashion — for he 
 still clung to former habits, and had renounced 
 neither his queue, powder, nor shoe-buckles ; 
 and having donned this somewhat antiquated 
 apparel, he sallied forth with me to enjoy the 
 invigorating sea breeze. Hardly had we come 
 within view of the waves, when he took up the 
 subject of discussion precisely where we had 
 left it, with the air of one who sets regularly in 
 for a prose. I confess I had forgotten it al- 
 together. 
 
 " Mesmerism," said he, " might, perhaps, as 
 justly be called sympathy ; that word, more
 
 16 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 familiar to our understanding, will bring the 
 notion of the thing more clearly to our minds. 
 It is the great link that binds man, not only to 
 man, but to the creation throughout all its 
 parts, and causes everything in nature to act 
 upon the rest in some way or other. Every 
 object of which we are conscious must, I hold, 
 be made evident to us merely by sympathy ; 
 and where sympathy ceases, there must percep- 
 tion cease also. No one thinks of denving the 
 influence of the emanations from plants, waters, 
 and mines upon the human body. If, then, 
 these inanimate things possess a spirit that 
 escapes them in an impalpable form, indepen- 
 dently of their more palpable qualities, — if in 
 animal life we do not doubt the power of the 
 snake to fascinate its fluttering victim, why 
 should man, the most perfect of created things, 
 be incapable of emitting a portion of his spirit 
 in an invisible, but no less active manner." 
 
 " Maladies are catching," said I, laughing, 
 " but they can hardly be called the workings of 
 the spirit ; but beyond that " 
 
 " Arc not sighs, yawns, and laughter infec-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 17 
 
 tious ? — does not the sight of a clouded brow 
 chill the spirit as much as that of a sunny one 
 cheers it? These are the involuntary, sponta- 
 neous results of this great agent called sympathy. 
 Its guidance into any given channel by the 
 power of volition is termed magnetism ; and 
 since the one can hardly be denied, why should 
 the other be deemed impossible ?" 
 
 " But if no delusion," I persisted, " why 
 should so simple a theory find so few partisans ?" 
 
 " Its very simplicity is its greatest enemy, 1 ' 
 replied my companion. " Remember Co- 
 lumbus' egg. Why, most of us, in the details of 
 every-day life, unconsciously practise or yield 
 more or less to the influence of magnetism. 
 The low monotonous song by which the nurse 
 seeks to calm the cries of a troublesome infant — 
 the chafing of the hand, by which the most 
 ignorant will seek to soothe pain — the stern look, 
 by which madness may be quelled and brute 
 nature tamed — all these are results of the same 
 cause. But let us proceed to bolder specula- 
 tions, and trace the power of sympathy beyond 
 the physical, into the mystic world. Whence is
 
 18 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 it that dreams so often shadow forth to us 
 coming events, though in a misty, doubtful 
 form? How is it that our own thoughts are 
 apt to reflect facts, and suggest consequences, 
 the most unlike what bare supposition founded 
 on probability would have prompted, which 
 yet subsequent events justify ; that some people 
 have been known to foresee the time and 
 manner of their death years before it actually 
 took place ; or how to account for that most 
 ordinary phenomenon — so ordinary as to have 
 passed into a proverb — the sudden appearance 
 among us of those we talk of, even when least 
 expected ; or of the letter, at whose delay we 
 but that moment wonder; or of an object to 
 which chance alone directed our thoughts; — 
 and yet who has not often experienced some- 
 thing of this sort himself? In short, the endless 
 catalogue of presentiments and coincidences, 
 sympathies and antipathies, all come, as I be- 
 lieve, within the range of magnetism, and are 
 but effects of that primary cause. I will not 
 pursue this theory in all its branches, it would 
 lead us too far, and, perhaps, make us lose
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 19 
 
 sight altogether of the point de depart, for it is a 
 field for thoughts as infinite as space." 
 
 "Yes," said I, laughing, "your world of 
 thought is indeed illimited; it is, in good 
 sooth, that of dreams. Chaudon, of course you, 
 who admit so willingly and defend so warmly, 
 the fashionable bubbles of modern philosophy, 
 will not dare to laugh at the follies and delu- 
 sions of our forefathers — astrology and its long 
 chain of errors." 
 
 " I consider astrology at best but an idle 
 question put to nature, which, if answered, 
 could produce no useful result. But I have 
 not the slightest doubt the planets have as 
 much influence upon our constitutions as they 
 exert over other sublunary bodies. So far there 
 may be some foundation for the medical system 
 of the Arabs, so much in favour during the 
 Middle Ages." 
 
 " When physicians," said I, laughing, " suf- 
 fered their patients to die of the disease, whilst 
 they were quietly awaiting the proper moment 
 indicated by the stars to administer the saving 
 potion."
 
 20 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 "Every system has its flaws. It is in vain 
 that human ingenuity shifts its ground. Per- 
 fection is not attainable," said Chaudon, gravely; 
 " and I am sometimes tempted to fear, that, even 
 in these enlightened times of ours, excess of 
 light often blinds us to what our ancestors saw 
 and our descendants may yet see. Science, 
 my young friend, has its rotations, like every 
 other thing in this world. The wheel is eter- 
 nally revolving, and objects are lost sight of in 
 the movement, to appear again after the neces- 
 sary lapse of forgctfulness. It is thus that rea- 
 lity and speculation now stand forth from, and 
 then sink back into, the shadows of time ; that 
 opposite systems are now enthusiastically ad- 
 mitted, anon rejected with scorn; and that human 
 knowledge is ever turning round truth, as does 
 the earth around the sun, like it to feel the 
 alternation of night and day. There can be no 
 doubt but many things we now rail or laugh 
 at will one day be taken up again with avidity. 
 Magnetism, classified by Mesmer, was known 
 throughout all ages, and has served, in turn, to 
 the deceptions of the priests of Isis and those
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 21 
 
 of other and more modern creeds — was familiar 
 to the natural philosophers of the Dark Ages, 
 and formed the groundstone of those cures by 
 sympathy that created so much wonder in 
 these simple days. Magnetism, in fact, and 
 the vague dreams it may inspire, the errors it 
 sometimes gives rise to, the crimes to which 
 it has in many instances undeniably minis- 
 tered, — magnetism, veiled and unrecognised, 
 was the source of most of those trials for sor- 
 cery and magic to which we could find no 
 key, except by admitting this science and its 
 phenomena." 
 
 " In short," said I, " according to your views, 
 magnetism existed always and everywhere — 
 cest tout, dans tout." 
 
 " Assuredly, my young friend ; that makes part 
 of my theory of the harmony of nature." 
 
 " You feel, doubtless," said I, " the beauty 
 of these lines — 
 
 " ' From harmony, from heavenly harmony, 
 This universal frame began ; 
 From harmony to harmony, 
 Through all the compass of the notes it ran, 
 The diapason closing full in man.'"
 
 22 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " I confess, they have ever appeared to me 
 fraught with the deepest meaning." 
 
 Chaudon listened to my translation of these 
 beautiful lines, imperfect as it was, with evi- 
 dent satisfaction. 
 
 " We feel alike there," he said, warmly grasp- 
 ing my hand. " Ah, my young friend, Milton 
 was a mighty spirit — a natural philosopher, as 
 well as poet ! I have no doubt, had he lived 
 in our days, he would have been a devoted 
 adherent of Mesmer." 
 
 I could not refrain from laughing heartily 
 at a thought which seemed to me so truly 
 preposterous. 
 
 " And why not ?" asked my old friend, red- 
 dening very much at the same time — "and 
 why not, pray ? Is it not a sublime thing even 
 to dream of a power that could heal both mind 
 and body, renovate the wearied spirit in the 
 sinking frame, and cause the lamp of life to 
 burn with a fresh glow, when about to sink for 
 ever ? Think what a sublime mission were that 
 of the good man here below, if he could infuse 
 a portion of his vigour, mental and corporeal, 
 into the misled and the suffering ; if he could,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 23 
 
 by this means, make wickedness openly avow 
 and turn away from its dark designs, alleviate 
 but a few of those multifarious evils that afflict 
 our organs, defeat what is bad, and promote 
 what is excellent. This was poor Mesmer's 
 dream — worthy indeed of a philanthropic genius 
 like his — when he first conceived that respon- 
 sive nerves could enable the magnetizer not 
 only to read the thoughts, but even to guide 
 the will and the feelings of the being subjected 
 to his influence, empowering him, like a mighty 
 conqueror, to cast the spirit he had enslaved 
 into chains." 
 
 " You allow, then," said I, " that Mes- 
 mer was a mere visionary? — his system a 
 dream ?" 
 
 " Nay, I fear, you have misunderstood me," 
 he replied. " I would assert, that its happier 
 influences are still a matter for much doubt. 
 I must in conscience admit they rather exist 
 in the contemplation of the well-intentioned 
 than in the regions of reality; nor am I less 
 prepared to own that its dangers so far out- 
 balance its possible and speculative advantages, 
 as to make its general practice a great evil."
 
 24 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " It were an ample field lor quackery and 
 the grossest deception/' I exclaimed, " if given 
 fair play." 
 
 " Far worse than that," he replied. " My 
 views on this subject, delusive, extravagant, as 
 they are deemed on many others, have been 
 sobered down by a very sad story, so early 
 grafted on my memory as to have sunk into 
 my very soul, and which has inspired me at 
 once with a firm belief in, and a salutary terror 
 of, the power of magnetism, by associating it 
 in my mind with the very worst species of 
 abuse of which it is capable. This morning, 
 whilst rummaging among papers long laid aside 
 as useless, and well-nigh forgotten, my eye 
 lighted upon some documents referring to this 
 same affair; and the sight awakened a long 
 train of painful reminiscences, which your pre- 
 sence alone, to confess the truth, but partially 
 dispelled. I have more than half a mind to 
 relate the melancholy tale to you, in support 
 of that agency's power whose very existence 
 you deny, and as, alas ! but too melancholy 
 a proof of the misery it may inflict."
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 25 
 
 " Indeed," said I, eagerly, " you could not 
 clothe your proofs in a more acceptable form, 
 I assure you. I'll swallow any hook, if baited 
 with a story." 
 
 " Ay ; but alas ! it is no fiction," said the old 
 man, with a deep sigh ; " and, I dare say, enough 
 of the thousands of volumes written at the time 
 have escaped the fury of the Jesuits, to enable 
 you to satisfy your curiosity without the help 
 of my poor narration." 
 
 I had no trouble in seeing through this art- 
 less coquetry of the storyteller, and pleaded 
 my preference for verbatim instruction with 
 so good a grace, that I soon obtained the nar- 
 rative, which I will endeavour to repeat, word 
 for word, as it was given me (so far, at least, 
 as my memory will permit), although I am 
 afraid I never can do it justice as it came from 
 the lips of my good old friend. 
 
 Here, he began, — seating himself at a point 
 from whence he could command equally the 
 town and the sea, — here, in sight of the theatre 
 where the scenes I am about to relate were 
 
 vol. i. c
 
 26 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 enacted, where the heroes of the story fretted 
 away their hour on the human stage, where 
 every object our eyes rest upon has probably 
 been gazed at by them a hundred times over — 
 here, where their feet must often have trod, I 
 feel I can best talk of them, their sorrows, their 
 deceptions; and you will perceive that mag- 
 netism alone can account for things so passing 
 strange, that they will appear beyond belief, 
 and yet for the truth of which I can vouch ; 
 for my father, from whom I had all the details, 
 was himself deeply implicated in the affair. 
 Indeed, he not only related it to me, but talked 
 of the matter over and over again ; and I still 
 possess the papers concerning it, which he had 
 carefully preserved. 
 
 It was early in the year 1726, when my 
 father, Monsieur Jules Chaudon, then a young 
 man, left his native town, Marseilles, to come 
 and practise here as an avocat. He knew no 
 one in Toulon, except an old relation of his, 
 who had caused him to be bred up to his own 
 profession, intending to pass over to him his 
 clientette, when he grew old and tired, and
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 27 
 
 bequeath him his fortune at his death. The 
 first epoch had arrived; and it was on this 
 account that my father, although an only son, 
 was sent forth from home to try his fortune in 
 life. The old gentleman was a confirmed vale- 
 tudinarian; and my father's existence would 
 have been but a dull one, had not the solici- 
 tude of his parents provided him with those 
 means of honest recreation, which are a young 
 man's best safeguard on entering life, against 
 illicit and degrading amusements. He had 
 letters of introduction to two of the most re- 
 spectable families of the city. One such, in 
 a provincial town, where society is so confined 
 to coteries and classes, is sufficient to open to 
 every tolerably connected young man the doors 
 of that society to which he b}' birth belongs ; 
 and when once admitted, his own misconduct 
 can alone close them against him. 
 
 I know, now-a-days, young men, far from 
 seeking such quiet circles, vote them dull and 
 stupid, and avoid them as they would the 
 plague, caring for nothing but noisy and doubt- 
 ful company ; that horses, actresses, and orgies, 
 c2
 
 28 ' MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 appear to them the zenith of fashion and the 
 acme of enjoyment. But it was not so in my 
 father's day; and had it been, I think I may 
 safely aver that such would not have been his 
 inclination. 
 
 One of these letters was addressed to a cer- 
 tain Madame Cadieres, the widow of a rich 
 merchant, who kept a very good house, and 
 was a lady of some figure in this city. She 
 was the mother of four children, one of whom, 
 her eldest son, was married, and had left the ma- 
 ternal roof; but the three others — two sons, 
 who were preparing for the clerical profession, 
 and a daughter — still resided with her when my 
 father first visited the family. 
 
 Before entering upon the history of this fa- 
 mily and its connexion with my father, I think 
 it advisable to give you an idea of the first im- 
 pression its various members produced upon 
 him, and describe his youthful feelings as cir- 
 cumstantially as I may. This will help to bring 
 more vividly before you the actors of the drama 
 which I am about to recount. 
 
 His recollection of that first visit was so
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 29 
 
 strong, and he so often recurred to it in the 
 latter years of his life, that every detail of it is 
 as present to my mind as if I had actually been 
 there. Upon the strength of his introduction, 
 given by a very near relation of Madame Ca- 
 dieres — perhaps, also, upon that of his future 
 expectations — he was at once invited to join 
 her party at her country-house, situated within 
 a convenient walk from the town, where he was 
 received with a frank and hearty cordiality, 
 which is now fast fading away even from our 
 southern provinces. 
 
 It was then customary to dine at the hour 
 when lunch is now served; and this neces- 
 sitated another meal between dinner and sup- 
 per, that generally went by the name of colla- 
 tion, at which, however, nothing solid was ever 
 offered — fruits and creams in summer, comfits 
 and cakes in winter, were its only ingredients. 
 The family were at collation when my father 
 entered. Madame Cadieres was taking her 
 coifee with a few respectable-looking matrons, 
 at one end of the room ; whilst a group of 
 laughing young girls, clustered round a marble
 
 30 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 table at the further extremity, were enjoying 
 their strawberries and cream. They were in 
 the very sweetest season of life, just budding 
 into womanhood — for the most part, of that 
 rich, dark, voluptuous beauty peculiar to our 
 clime, and laughing with the exhilarating 
 merriment which is a no less distinguishing 
 characteristic of its sunny influence. 
 
 My father was at first so dazzled with this 
 galaxy of loveliness, that he could scarcely dis- 
 cern any individuality in the fair assemblage ; 
 but his attention and admiration soon became 
 exclusively rivetted on one as dissimilar in 
 form and expression to the others as, in his 
 eyes at least, she was superior. Although 
 rather below than above the middle stature, her 
 figure was sufficiently rounded to betray her 
 age — she was just turned seventeen, and moulded 
 into the perfection of grace. Her hair, simply 
 parted on the brow and brought to the back of 
 her head in a wreath of tresses, which seemed 
 by their weight to set at defiance the thraldom 
 of the combs and sky-blue ribbons that con- 
 fined them, was of so brilliant a hue, that it
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 31 
 
 well deserved the term golden. Her eyes 
 generally sought the ground with a modesty of 
 expression that seemed the chief characteristic 
 of her physiognomy, and imparted to it an un- 
 nameable charm; but when raised, they were 
 of a blue, brilliant and vivid as the purest sum- 
 mer sky, and as calm and serene in aspect. 
 Her features were delicate and regular; no 
 smile hovered round her small and well-formed 
 mouth ; her looks were grave beyond her years, 
 even unto severity ; her skin, dazzlingly fair as 
 though it had caught a reflection from the 
 snows of the North, did not contrast more with 
 the dark complexions of her companions than 
 did the composure of her countenance and 
 bearing with the animation that distinguished 
 them. My father always told me that, in the 
 midst of this group, she put him in mind of a 
 Christian virgin surrounded by the houris of 
 the Mahomedan Paradise. 
 
 In spite of all his efforts he could not keep 
 his eyes off this little circle, and had barely pre- 
 sence of mind sufficient to answer the polite, 
 encouraging observations addressed to him by
 
 32 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 the matrons whilst sipping their favourite beve- 
 rage. At last, Madame Cadieres very conside- 
 rately conducted him towards the party he so 
 much longed, but had not the courage, to join, 
 saying, at the same time, it was not fair to keep 
 him away from the society best suited to his 
 age. 
 
 " My dear Catherine," said Madame Cadieres, 
 addressing one of the young ladies, " this is the 
 stranger of whom I spoke to you this morning 
 — he is to be for the future Vami de la maison, 
 and it is in this light I wish you and your 
 brothers to treat him from this evening forth. 
 Pray, my dear, endeavour to make him as com- 
 fortable as you can amongst you until their 
 return." 
 
 At this address all eyes were, for one instant, 
 raised to my father's blushing countenance ; the 
 next they were demurely fixed on the floor. 
 Mademoiselle Cadieres invited him to be seated; 
 the tones of her voice were singularly clear 
 and decided, but very sweet ; and he perceived 
 with delight that the speaker was the very girl 
 whose personal appearance had so much struck
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 33 
 
 him. The mother then retired, leaving the 
 young people to make acquaintance as they 
 best could. 
 
 Like all strictly brought up young men whose 
 youth has been free from premature excess, my 
 father was, at this period of his existence, pain- 
 fully shy in the presence of females, especially 
 of the young and beautiful ; so that, even while 
 he felt it a delight to look at them from afar, it 
 was a proportionable agony to be placed in 
 juxtaposition with them, and compelled to 
 endure the formidable battery of their bright 
 eyes. Happy the man, my young friend, who, 
 like him, has known youth in the full meaning 
 of the word — has suffered from the bashfulness 
 natural to its first phases — has yielded to its 
 warm impulses — enjoyed its freshness of feeling, 
 and has not been blighted in the bud by the 
 hotbed of a forced and premature experience ; 
 like him will the timid, ardent boy grow up to 
 vigorous manhood, and know a green old age. 
 The young men of our days are older at twenty 
 than the septuagenarians of the past generation. 
 Manhood, real sterling manhood, such as can 
 c3
 
 34 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 only be based on regularity of conduct and 
 steadiness of mind, is fast passing away alto- 
 gether from my degenerate countrymen. For- 
 give this digression of an old grumbler. I 
 cannot omit now and then moralizing, espe- 
 cially when talking with the young, to whom I 
 think my opinions and advice may be of some 
 use. 
 
 My father soon found that his awkwardness 
 excited the risible faculties of his young com- 
 panions in no ordinary degree, who exchanged 
 nods and looks and smiles anything but flatter- 
 ing to his vanity. Mademoiselle Cadieres and 
 another young lady, called Eleonore Raymond, 
 whom my father observed for the first time as a 
 plain, nay, the only plain one of the party, 
 endeavoured by their gravity to check this 
 inhospitable merriment, and he felt grateful for 
 the support thus afforded him. 
 
 But vain were the endeavours of the former 
 to make him take any share in the conversation 
 that was going forward, or partake of the colla- 
 tion ; his excessive embarrassment for a time 
 neutralized all the effects of her kindness, and
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 35 
 
 of his keen sense of the ridicule attached to his 
 want of assurance. Still no one felt pity for 
 him but Catherine ; the others finished by 
 fairly giving way to their mirth, which Made- 
 moiselle Raymond, although far from joining, 
 did not attempt to palliate by any gracious 
 display of sympathy on her own part, nor did 
 she in any way assist Catherine in her weary 
 task of relieving him from his state of trial. 
 At last his power of volition triumphed over 
 his sheepishness ; and he became more able to 
 attend to what was passing around him, if not 
 actually to mix in it. 
 
 The repast, which had seemed to him in- 
 sufferably long while it lasted, soon came to 
 what he now considered a too early termination. 
 The whole party passed into the garden, where 
 the elder ladies sauntered carelessly about, 
 whilst the younger sought divertisement at a 
 swing, and apparently found it, if a judgment 
 might be formed from the peals of laughter that 
 soon issued from the thick grove within which 
 the swing was placed. Mademoiselle Cadieres 
 stood at the entrance, in the attitude of a not
 
 36 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 very interested spectator ; and my father gazed 
 at her from the parlour door, with an admiration 
 which, little as he was conscious of the fact, 
 was depicted in every line of his speaking phy- 
 siognomy. 
 
 My father, in his day, was reckoned the 
 handsomest man in Toulon. Cast in a Hercu- 
 lean mould, his figure was devoid of all clumsi- 
 ness, and his swarthy countenance bore evi- 
 dence, in its correct but somewhat stern lines, 
 that the strength of his mind corresponded with 
 that of his frame. He looked, what nature had 
 turned him out, a fine specimen of a vigorous, 
 fiery, and resolved race ; but his vigour was 
 tempered by goodness, his fire by reason, and 
 his resolves were guided by wisdom. In short, 
 if ever man came nigh unto perfection, that 
 man was my father ; and I, his son, am not the 
 only person now living who can bear testimony 
 to this assertion. 
 
 Of his personal advantages, as well as of his 
 undisguised and ardent admiration of her 
 daughter, Madame Cadieres seemed very lei- 
 surely taking cognizance from a short distance,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 37 
 
 and after a somewhat prolonged examination, 
 of which he was scarcely aware of being the ob- 
 ject, she came up to him, and at once embarked 
 upon a conversation that caused him no small 
 surprise. 
 
 " My daughter," she said, " seems to have 
 found favour in your eyes?" My father felt 
 himself blushing crimson. " Do not be dis- 
 tressed," she continued, kindly. " If you think 
 her pretty, you are of one mind with all Toulon, 
 I believe, and there is nothing offensive in it ; 
 but it reminds me that I have a duty to perform 
 with regard to yourself. Forewarned, fore- 
 armed, as the saying goes ; I had better let you 
 at once into the secret of my Catherine's views. 
 She never means to marry ; so, you see, it were 
 no use in the world your falling in love with 
 her." 
 
 My father was even more astonished at the 
 manner than at the matter of the good lady's 
 communication, but could not help owning in 
 his secret heart there was some ground for the 
 warning, premature as it was, since he felt so 
 unwilling to receive it. Some remark of his,
 
 38 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 trite and commonplace, elicited further expla- 
 nation. 
 
 " Yes," she said, " Catherine is a singular 
 being — gifted beyond the gifts of ordinary 
 women — and who, unless I be much mistaken, 
 will run through no ordinary course of life. I 
 cannot help thinking, and many of my friends 
 are of the same opinion, that she will one day 
 shine forth as a brilliant light of sanctity. She 
 is, and has always been, an angel — why may 
 she not become a saint ?" 
 
 My father thought it was something very 
 like a fall instead of a promotion to quit an 
 angelship for a saintship ; but he was too pru- 
 dent to give vent to the juvenile sarcasm, and 
 suffered the old lady to proceed, who, nattered 
 by his deep attention, opened her communi- 
 cative vein. 
 
 " She intends to devote herself wholly to 
 religion, and to permit no earthly affections to 
 interfere with this great object of her life. From 
 earliest childhood, piety has been the corner stone 
 of her existence. I could cite to you instances 
 of her faith and charity for eight days running,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 39 
 
 and never have done. So perfect a creature 
 never was ; so meek and humble — so uncon- 
 scious of her merits, yet so abounding in Chris- 
 tian virtues ; her first communion alone would 
 furnish matter for a volume ; her soul was more 
 spotless than her veil, and her fervour amazed 
 and confused even the reverend Father Alexis 
 himself. One instance of her singular devotion 
 will suffice. Imagine, sir, that when scarcely 
 turned of seven, a delicate, puny child — for my 
 Catherine never was strong, — she insisted upon 
 tending the sick at the hospital, where, on 
 account of a contagious disease raging within its 
 walls, even the most necessary attendance failed 
 the poor invalids. But Heaven spared her to 
 me then, to make, I doubt not, an example of 
 her in this land ; and in these days of growing 
 unbelief such examples are indeed needful." 
 
 " Mademoiselle Cadieres seems, indeed, from 
 your account, a person of no ordinary cha- 
 racter,*' observed my father, mechanically, as 
 she paused in her narration. 
 
 " Ordinary ! certainly not !" exclaimed the 
 eager mother. " In infancy she disliked and
 
 40 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 avoided the idle games of other children — cast 
 away from her the toys in which they de- 
 lighted. As she grew, vanity and frivolity, the 
 thirst for admiration and love of dress, that 
 mostly influence other young women, had no 
 hold on her. Books of devotion were her 
 dearest companions; to aid the poor, to con- 
 sole the afflicted, her chief pleasures. Thus 
 has she from day to day improved in virtue 
 and grace, until she is the wonder of all who 
 know her. She begins already to be much 
 talked of. I do not wonder at it, nor shall I 
 be astonished at anything she may turn out, for 
 I myself was very pious, and always prayed 
 above all things that my children might be so 
 too. I knew I bore no ordinary being in my 
 bosom even before her birth. I could not 
 touch aught that had life in it — not a mouthful 
 of anything coarse or nutritive could pass my 
 lips ; like the hermits of yore, herbs were my 
 food and water my drink until after she was 
 born." 
 
 " Perhaps," said my father, " you destine 
 Mademoiselle Catherine to the veil ?"
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 41 
 
 At these words a shade passed over Madame 
 Cadieres' countenance ; she looked as if they 
 had caused a disagreeable chord to vibrate 
 within her, and she resumed, in a less emphatic 
 and animated tone — 
 
 u Well, my dear young friend, I have given 
 you fair warning, so look to your heart. If 
 you were to fall in love with my daughter, I 
 should not be the one to rebuke you, assuredly ; 
 but I am convinced you would only expose 
 yourself to a severe disappointment. Now let 
 me give you another piece of advice, which 
 may be equally useful if you are wise enough 
 to avail yourself of it. I know it to be the 
 wish of your parents that you settle early in 
 life. Among these young ladies you will find 
 many unexceptionable matches, and I do not 
 think you have any refusal to apprehend on 
 their part. There's Marie Langieres, the best 
 soul alive, though a little indolent, perhaps 
 languid, but the duties of a housewife soon 
 drill activity into a young girl ; she has many 
 relations in the magistracy, and has good ex- 
 pectations. Mademoiselle Guyol, too, is very
 
 42 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 lively and pretty, though somewhat flighty and 
 coquettish, but marriage tames down all super- 
 abundance of spirit, and once fairly settled, she'll 
 grow steady enough, I dare say. She has an 
 uncle, a judge, in Montpelier, who might be of 
 use to you in your profession. Marie Reboul 
 and Mademoiselle la Rue, again, belong to 
 commercial families, and are very well off; the 
 former is rather heavy and not over bright in the 
 head, it is true, but some people are of opinion 
 that fools make the best wives — as to the latter, 
 her avarice is a guarantee for her economy ; she 
 would take care of your gains, and a thrifty 
 housewife causes the house to flourish. Ah ! I 
 had forgot to mention Eleonore Raymond ; she 
 is very rich indeed; but though a catholic 
 herself, has protestant relations, and that's an 
 objection. However, I have given you the 
 carte du pays ; you may now think of whom 
 you please, provided it be not of Catherine." 
 
 This abrupt and extraordinary warning, 
 though doubtless well meant, on the whole did 
 more harm than good ; for by the pleasure with 
 which my father listened to the mother's rhap-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 43 
 
 sodical encomiums of her daughter, he already 
 felt himself a lover, for who else but a lover can 
 understand a mother's praise of her child. But, 
 with a tact that was at that time rather the 
 instinct of nature than the growth of experience, 
 he was at no loss to discover how matters stood 
 in the family. He saw that the affection of 
 Madame Cadieres for her handsome, gentle 
 daughter, which partook of a sort of involuntary 
 respect for her imagined superiority, was mixed 
 with no small alloy of pride and ambition. To 
 make you fully understand how ambition could 
 be gratified in this circumstance, I must remind 
 you — or rather inform you, for you may chance 
 never to have heard of the influence of religion 
 among us previous to the revolution. 
 
 The different classes of society were then so 
 distinctly marked, that there was no possibility 
 of passing the boundary which divided the tiers 
 etat from the aristocracy. Wealth, talent, 
 beauty, genius, the gifts of fortune and of 
 nature, were alike inadequate to smooth away 
 the obstacles that lay between the unprivileged 
 and the privileged, however deficient the latter
 
 44 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 might be in equivalent merits. Now, as is usual 
 in such cases, the secondary classes had nothing 
 so much at heart as to pass the forbidden frontier, 
 and in proportion as they neared that point, 
 were they considered and looked up to by their 
 own society. Such was the power of the 
 priesthood, however, that what nothing else 
 could effect, religion could ; and before its 
 members all doors flew open, all artificial 
 barriers fell. Royalty itself was fain to humble 
 its head before the cowl, and the veil had 
 precedence of the coronet. Hence, perhaps, 
 the secret of many a misnamed religious calling, 
 the source of many a fervent devotion and of a 
 certain mania for saintship, a prevailing distem- 
 perature of mind at that epoch, which was a 
 convenient channel for female ambition. 
 
 My father perceived, without much diffi- 
 culty, that Madame Cadieres was silly, bigoted, 
 and very ambitious. To such a woman the 
 thought of giving the world a saint, and a 
 pretty one, — for ugly female eminences are 
 always at a discount, — would most naturally 
 present itself; and chance having met her half
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 45 
 
 way in the merits and disposition of her daugh- 
 ter, what more natural than that she should 
 hail the prospect with delight ? 
 
 That Catherine had wholly yielded up her 
 young soul to the feelings thus carefully instilled 
 into her was evident, and what might have been 
 expected. But my father began to suspect that 
 a warm imagination lay concealed beneath her 
 calm exterior, and he could not help thinking 
 that she was more calculated to bless a husband 
 and children with the sources of love lying as 
 yet unrevealed within her young bosom, than 
 for the frigidity of a monastic seclusion. He 
 approached the object of his meditations, and 
 timidly asked why she did not mingle in the 
 amusements of her friends. 
 
 " Because they do not amuse me," she re- 
 plied. " When the thoughts are often fixed 
 on grave subjects, it becomes difficult to bring 
 them to bear on lighter things." 
 
 Although the observation might have seemed 
 affected and odd in most girls of her age, 
 Catherine's manner was so simple and natural 
 that there was no possibility of misunderstand-
 
 46 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 ing her. Whatever she said came spontane 
 ously to her lips, and was the offspring of her 
 thoughts ; but those thoughts — her very nature 
 — had taken a forced and unnatural bent. 
 
 " I understand," said my father. " By re- 
 maining fixed too long on any one object, the 
 mind is apt, like the limbs, to lose its elasticity. 
 You are perfectly right, Mademoiselle Cathe- 
 rine ; but ought we not, in such a case, to apply 
 the same remedy we use for the body — a 
 change ?" 
 
 " Surely there is no need of remedy where 
 there is no evil," was Catherine's answer; and 
 my father dared not yet venture his real opinions 
 on so delicate a theme. 
 
 When the party again gathered together he 
 felt almost relieved from his former embarass- 
 mertt, so fast had his imagination familiarized 
 him with those whom Madame Cadieres had 
 so amply described to him ; but neither the 
 languishing, voluptuous beauty of Marie Lan- 
 gieres, whose long silken lashes fell over orbs 
 that glowed with passion ; nor the lustrous, 
 laughing eyes of the merry Mademoiselle Guyol,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 47 
 
 whose light step seemed scarcely to touch the 
 earth, and whose espieglerie lighted up an irregu- 
 lar, but very pretty face, nor any grace or charm 
 of any of them, could induce him to change 
 his former impression of Catherine Cadieres' 
 incomparable superiority ; in short, he was fast 
 yielding himself up to the all-delightful illusions 
 of a first love. 
 
 More than once he attempted to enter 
 into something like conversation with Made- 
 moiselle Raymond, next to whom he sat ; but 
 the frigid, disagreeable manner of that young 
 lady so totally discouraged him, that, although 
 he could perceive she was the most intimate of 
 Catherine's companions, he could not make up 
 his mind to win her good graces ; and, more- 
 over, doubted the possibility of the achieve- 
 ment. 
 
 The young men of the family came home 
 very late, but, the evening being inviting for 
 a walk, they accompanied my father back to 
 town. During that time he had an opportunity 
 of perceiving that they partook, in a great de- 
 gree, of their mother's poverty of intellect, and
 
 48 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 entered fully into her views and opinions with 
 regard to Catherine, whom they evidently fan- 
 cied must, one day, become the footstool of 
 their own promotion in the church, and cause 
 the elevation of the whole family. My father 
 listened with apparent acquiescence to all they. 
 advanced on this subject, but determined, in 
 his own mind, to carry off the prize if he could, 
 despite all the saintships in the world. 
 
 Now began, for him, the golden dreams 
 of youth, mingled with the realities of life. 
 Grounded in excellent studies, gifted with a 
 fine organ and natural eloquence, he soon made 
 way in his profession, whilst his good qualities 
 — intercourse with the world gaining for him a 
 sufficient ease of manner to set them off — 
 began to develop themselves, and in a very 
 short time he became a general favourite with 
 young and old. He was quoted as an example 
 to the sons, and looked upon as a very desirable 
 suitor for the daughters. But the parents were 
 not alone in discovering his merits; he was 
 not slow in perceiving that Madame Cadieres 
 had prophesied rightly, in assuring him that he
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 49 
 
 had no rejection to apprehend on the part of 
 their fair scions. Even the languid and proud 
 Marie Langieres grew more animated in his 
 presence, and the sprightly Marie Guyol more 
 pensive ; but his heart, from the first hour of 
 meeting, acknowledged no other sovereign but 
 Catherine. 
 
 Whether, after all, the mother triumphed 
 in Madame Cadieres' bosom, and she could not 
 remain insensible to the advantage of settling 
 her daughter so happily and comfortably as she 
 had an opportunity of doing with my father, 
 and therefore thought it a matter of conscience 
 to keep her doors open to him, or that she was 
 actuated merely by a feeling of kindness, he 
 could never discover; but her house became 
 a sort of second home, where all his leisure 
 hours were spent ; his place was marked at the 
 hospitable board, where a frank welcome ever 
 awaited him. 
 
 He was treated by Catherine with the 
 utmost cordiality ; and, though her manner 
 remained as calm and grave as ever, he could 
 not help fancying that he was daily gaining 
 
 VOL. I. d
 
 50 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 ground in her esteem, and that her preference 
 was insensibly ripening into a warmer feeling. 
 The bare possibility of such a thing sufficed to 
 gild every hour of his life with sunshine. How 
 often did he picture to himself the rapturous 
 joy with which he would clasp the dear girl 
 to his bosom, — his own, his Catherine, for life. 
 With what downcast eyes and blushing cheeks 
 would she still, even when a wife, receive him 
 on his return home ; and how he would teach 
 her lip to smile, and something sweeter still. 
 How quietly, but yet cheerfully, would she 
 fulfil the little home duties that make home 
 so comfortable — the only comfortable spot on 
 earth. How her meek virtues would clothe her 
 in a lasting beauty, that, like his love, would 
 grow with coming years. All the dreams of an 
 honourable love were his. He would sit gazing 
 on her in silence by the hour together, rapt 
 in thought, whilst a glowing, ardent admiration 
 filled his breast, equally inspired by the sun- 
 beam playing on his mistress' golden tresses, 
 the passing pallor of her cheek, or the soft mur- 
 mur of her voice. In short, love made him 
 a poet.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 51 
 
 Having no reason to conceal these sentiments, 
 they soon became pretty generally known, and 
 formed the topic of conversations it was sometimes 
 his chance to overhear. One autumnal evening, 
 as he was quietly reclining against one of the 
 prim, tall box hedge rows in Madame Cadieres' 
 garden, a few of her merry young guests hap- 
 pened to seat themselves on the other side of 
 the leafy barrier ; and, unconscious of his vi- 
 cinity, handled the subject with no great cere- 
 mony. 
 
 " As for me," said Marie Langieres, as if in 
 reply to something previously advanced, " I am 
 sure I do not see why the Cadieres should 
 refuse Monsieur Jules Chaudon. I am even 
 better connected than Catherine; my uncle is 
 a judge ; I might hope for a de, at least, before 
 my name, whenever I chose to change it, and 
 yet I don't know that I should have refused 
 him myself, had he proposed to me." 
 
 "Nor I," said Mademoiselle Guyol, "although 
 
 he is so grave, and likes so little the theatre. 
 
 However, if she should marry him, it is a comfort 
 
 to think that he will never take her to Paris, 
 
 d 2
 
 52 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 where it is my great ambition to reside, for any 
 srirl with tolerable looks is said to cut an un- 
 common figure there." 
 
 " For my part," exclaimed Mademoiselle 
 Reboul, " I had rather marry him than that old 
 Monsieur Renoir, whom my parents wish me to 
 wed, for all that he is so rich, and certainly, as 
 most people would think, the best match of 
 the two." 
 
 " Not I, "par ezemple" returned Mademoi- 
 selle la Rue, whose predilection for money 
 Madame Cadieres had touched upon in her 
 first conversation with my father ; "I wish Mon- 
 sieur Renoir would ask me, that's all ! Were he 
 fifty times as old and as ugly, I'd accept him at 
 the very first asking. ' If fortune be not hap- 
 piness, 'tis the better half of it,' says my grand- 
 mamma, and I believe her." 
 
 " That's dutiful," said Mademoiselle Guyol, 
 laughing ; " and now, young ladies, let's see if 
 we shall each of us be gratified in our dearest 
 wishes. Here is a daisy I pluck for Marie 
 Langieres ; I'll tear each leaf off with a yes or 
 a no, alternately, and we'll see with what word
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 53 
 
 the last will fall — that will be fate's decision. 
 Come, say, pretty daisy, — Shall Marie Lan- 
 gieres marry a chevalier, or a monsieur de, or 
 even an officer — she would so fain be a fine lady ? 
 Yes — no — yes — no. No! ha, ha, ha!" laughed 
 the merry girl ; " she'll marry an underwriter 
 after all, or an usher, or a schoolmaster, or, 
 perhaps, take the veil. Well — let's see ! now 
 it's my turn. — Shall I ever see Paris ? Again 
 the flower says — no. Shall Mademoiselle Re- 
 boul marry Renoir ? — no I Well, that's strange ! 
 And Marie de la Rue, shall she find a Croesus 
 for a suitor ? — no ! Well, that's odd ! Shall 
 any one of us marry at all, I wonder ?" But 
 the harmless flowret seemed unpropitious, for 
 again it determined — no ! " Well, that's stupid !" 
 said Mademoiselle Guyol, impatiently ; " I'll 
 know if Catherine will accept Monsieur Jules?'' 
 
 My father did not hear the conclusion of the 
 childish trick, for Catherine herself came up 
 the alley in which he sat, and he had not yet 
 sufficient courage to put the question to the 
 only true oracle, the sweet girl herself. 
 
 A short time after this, my father witnessed
 
 54 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 a strange incident, which I must not omit to 
 relate, for it bears upon the story. 
 
 It was a frequent amusement of the inhabi- 
 tants of Toulon to make excursions into its de- 
 lightful vicinities, on which occasions the old 
 axiom of the more the merrier seemed to be the 
 order of the day ; and, in the summer season, 
 gay caravans were constantly seen issuing from 
 the town gates. 
 
 Madame Cadieres had invited a large party to 
 accompany herself and her bevy of young com- 
 panions on a visit to a cave of celebrity in the 
 neighbourhood, that had served as a resting- 
 place to some saint or other, but ninety-two 
 and ninety-three have so sadly confused these 
 superstitious traditions, that I cannot precisely 
 inform you of the whereabouts, nor the exact 
 object, of their curiosity or devotion. I only 
 know it was to answer both ends, and that my 
 father was, as usual, invited to make one of the 
 party. 
 
 This place was at a considerable distance 
 from the town, to which it was agreed they 
 should return by moonlight, being too many —
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 55 
 
 for their servants accompanied them — to have 
 anything to fear from the unsettled state of the 
 roads. Gay was the little band, and none 
 gayer than my father. The warmer glow which 
 the sun of the south gives to man's spirits, as it 
 lends a richer hue to its flowers, a sweeter fra- 
 grance to its breezes, ripening all it lights upon 
 to a more finished existence, imparted to the 
 whole cavalcade a tone of hilarity, to which old 
 and young, master and man, yielded without 
 control, and all laughed in the face of smiling 
 nature around them. Even Catherine seemed, 
 to a certain degree, infected with the general 
 cheerfulness, though her enjoyment in no way 
 interfered with her usual repose of manner. 
 My father rode the whole day by her side un- 
 reproved by herself, and unmolested by others, 
 as though his right to that place of honour was 
 silently acknowledged by all. Catherine spoke 
 freely and feelingly on all subjects ; and though 
 not brilliantly witty, her frank and gentle 
 earnestness imparted to her conversation a 
 charm which rendered him perfectly insensible 
 to the gloomy silence maintained by her insepa-
 
 56 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 rablc friend, Mademoiselle Raymond, whose 
 joyless countenance and chilling aspect made 
 her like unto a shadow thrown across their path. 
 
 The merry devotees reached the aim of their 
 pilgrimage in safety, performed their somewhat 
 protracted devotions, and refreshed themselves 
 with a plentiful cold repast, the ingredients for 
 which had been brought from town, in large 
 baskets, wherewith a couple of strong mules 
 had been laden. 
 
 Up to this time every thing had been most 
 favourable ; but when their meal was finished, 
 and they prepared to return, the sky, which 
 had gradually assumed a threatening appear- 
 ance, poured forth a shower of rain as violent 
 as it was unexpected, forcing every one to cover. 
 The same tree sheltered my father and Made- 
 moiselle Cadieres, nor did either seem to feel 
 the circumstance an annoyance. 
 
 They all fancied the cloud would soon spend 
 its fury, and the weather clear again, such sud- 
 den and apparently causeless atmospherical 
 changes being very common in our climate ; 
 but instead of mending, matters grew worse
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 57 
 
 with every minute. The thunder growled, at 
 first indistinctly, and the lightning occasionally 
 illumined the lurid heavens with a faint flash ; 
 but soon the storm broke forth with unparalleled 
 might, and it was as much as my father could 
 do to prevent his fragile companion from being 
 dashed to the ground by the hurricane. 
 
 He was at first amazed, — then frightened at 
 the effect of the storm upon her nerves. As it 
 increased, she grew more silent and more pale, 
 seemed gradually to lose all consciousness of his 
 kind attentions, and even of his very presence, 
 and yielded herself up completely to her terror. 
 Remonstrances and encouragement were alike 
 disregarded ; he took her hand, but she tore it 
 impatiently from him. He then grasped her 
 by the arm to force, since he could not persuade, 
 her to leave the shelter of the tree, which bowed 
 to the wind in a manner to make him dread it 
 would snap, and crush them in its fall. 
 
 The rain was blinding. Large hail stones 
 
 were driven furiously into their faces ; he vainly 
 
 strove to conduct Catherine towards some 
 
 bushes that grew at a short distance, and which 
 
 D 3
 
 58 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 afforded, at least, protection from the wind. 
 Escaping his grasp, she uttered a few angry 
 expressions, in a sharp tone, such as he never 
 thought to have heard from her lips; and, 
 cowering down upon the field amid the rank 
 grass laid by the rain, panting breathless with 
 the excess of terror, she lay in dangerous 
 proximity to the tree. 
 
 Fortunately, however, the hurricane was not 
 of long duration, and the air soon became filled 
 with calls and shouts, as, one by one, the scat- 
 tered members of the party emerged from their 
 various places of refuge. The young ladies 
 looked all the lovelier for the unavoidable dis- 
 array of their costume, in spite of pale cheeks 
 and lank hair ; but the elder dames were greater 
 sufferers by this trivial mishap, and more con- 
 cerned for its consequences. They looked 
 disconsolately at the rain, which, although the 
 wind had ceased, continued to pelt them most 
 unmercifully, — then at their dripping clothes, 
 and at the lowering heavens, to which the dusk 
 of evening now began to impart an additional 
 obscurity, and finally called upon the aged
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 59 
 
 servant, who acted as guide, to join them in a 
 hasty consultation. 
 
 My father, all this time, stood near Made- 
 moiselle Cadieres, to whom he did not venture 
 again to speak. She still lay apparently insensible 
 in the wet grass, and he was much relieved by 
 the approach of Mademoiselle Raymond, who 
 stepped up to the prostrate Catherine, and ad- 
 dressed her in a decided manner. 
 
 "Rise, Catherine — for shame — why will you 
 ever remain a child ? Rise, I say ! Do you 
 not see that all is over? I hope these ladies 
 are not going to remain here all night, or ride 
 in their damp clothes ; you and I, at least, must 
 walk forward." 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond spoke rather with 
 an air of authority than affection, and my father 
 observed with surprise that it produced an al- 
 most instantaneous effect. Catherine rose at 
 her bidding, and walked on with the passive 
 obedience of a child, looking with reviving con- 
 fidence into her stern features. 
 
 " Ah !" thought my father, " hers is a weak 
 as well as a gentle spirit, and requires no less
 
 60 MAGIC AND ME8MERISM. 
 
 guidance than support — the most amiable of all 
 characters for a wife. Well, I am able to afford 
 her both." 
 
 " It is not easy to understand," said Madame 
 Cadieres, in an apologetic manner to the com- 
 pany fast gathering around, " how so gifted a 
 being as my Catherine, so superior to others of 
 the same age and sex, can be afraid of thunder, 
 and tremble at the wind. To be sure, I was 
 always a dreadful coward in these things, but 
 that's no reason why " 
 
 " It is the weakness of her nerves," said 
 Eleonore Raymond, somewhat sharply ; " they 
 are singularly irritable, though you will not 
 perceive it, and I advise you not to expose her 
 any longer to this cold shower-bath than you 
 can help." 
 
 Though the advice was ungraciously given, 
 its wisdom went directly home to the mother's 
 heart ; besides, it accounted favourably for a 
 weakness in her daughter's character which she 
 imagined to be a flaw, and she gratefully availed 
 herself of this opportunity of turning the atten- 
 tion of the listeners into another channel.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 61 
 
 It was promptly decided that they should 
 proceed on foot along a cross road leading to a 
 village well known to their guide, where they 
 hoped to find an inn of some sort or other. The 
 attendants were to bring up the rear with the 
 mules and baggage. 
 
 Again it fell to my father's lot to escort 
 Catherine and Eleonore. The latter gave him 
 little or no trouble; it was but seldom she 
 needed his assistance, and never his encourage- 
 ment. Not so his fairer companion; not a 
 step could she advance alone. As the gloom 
 deepened, she looked around in vague appre- 
 hension ; now fancying a bat was flying about 
 her head — now, that a toad leaped before her 
 in the pathway; then, that dark figures flitted 
 along behind the hedgerows; started at the 
 sound of her own voice, and feared to look 
 back, lest she might behold — she could not 
 herself say what. 
 
 For all these imaginary terrors Eleonore 
 every now and then reproved her friend in no 
 gentle tone; and my father perceived, with 
 displeasure, that her remonstrances had more
 
 62 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 weight with Catherine than his gentle persua- 
 sions. He could have wished Mademoiselle 
 Raymond at the other end of the world; but 
 still Catherine's trembling hand rested on his 
 arm. He could distinctly feel her heart beat 
 against it; she called on his name with soft 
 and timid accents, and he felt happy, as young 
 lovers only can feel, and wished it might be 
 permitted to walk on thus, hand in hand, 
 throughout all space and time. 
 
 " At last an inn was discovered. It was 
 crowded with wayfarers surprised by the storm ; 
 and all that the surly hostess would or could 
 do, was to allow this new influx of visitors to 
 dry themselves by the kitchen-fire, and to pass 
 the night in a large comfortless room, boasting 
 no beds, and very little furniture of any kind ; 
 along the walls of which she distributed heaps of 
 straw for their accommodation ; and, poor as this 
 was, they had reason to congratulate themselves 
 upon it ; for it was with the utmost difficulty 
 they obtained that no strangers should share 
 the apartment with them. 
 
 i\fter much scrambling and laughing on
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 63 
 
 the part of the juniors, and much grumbling on 
 that of the seniors, the disasters of the evening 
 were tolerably repaired; and all busied them- 
 selves in making preparations, as best they could, 
 for the enjoyment of rest, rendered doubly ne- 
 cessary by the exertions of the day. 
 
 Catherine, who had by this time completely 
 recovered her equanimity, provided, with the 
 most engaging solicitude, for her mother's com- 
 fort. A few cushions, taken from the mules by 
 her brothers, and arranged by her own careful 
 hand, and a coverlid borrowed from the hostess 
 (by a miracle clean and fresh), soon made the 
 old lady a tolerable couch. Madame Langieres 
 pillowed herself on her daughter's shoulder; 
 Mesdemoiselles la Rue and Reboul were equally 
 eager in displaying their filial affection ; whilst 
 Marie Guyol kept in exercise the gallantry of 
 the few young men who had neither mothers 
 nor sisters to claim their attention. 
 
 Eleonore Raymond stood pensively gazing 
 on the various movements of her young friends, 
 with an expression of sadness not habitual to 
 her austere countenance, and which softened
 
 64 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 its harsher lines. My father approached her, 
 and inquired if he could be of any service. 
 
 " No, I thank you," she replied, in a less 
 abrupt tone than usual. 
 
 " I thought you looked as if you missed 
 something," he said, apologetically. 
 
 " You were right," she answered. " When 
 I behold these happy children and parents thus 
 occupied, and anxious for one another, I miss 
 my own mother. " 
 
 Tears started to her eyes as she spoke, and 
 her voice trembled. For the first time, she 
 appeared to him not absolutely repulsive. She 
 is not pretty, thought he, but decidedly inter- 
 esting. He would have continued a conversa- 
 tion begun in a tone so congenial to his own 
 feelings, for he was the best of sons ; but Ma- 
 demoiselle Raymond suddenly turned her back 
 upon him, and moved off to another end of 
 the room, as if ashamed of her momentary 
 communicativeness. 
 
 " She has not a bad heart ; but what a surly, 
 uncongenial temper," thought my father. 
 
 " At last, every thing and every body was
 
 MAGIC AND .MESMERISM. 65 
 
 settled. Catherine, whose exhaustion had for 
 some time been visible, now lay stretched upon 
 a couch composed of cloaks and shawls thrown 
 upon the straw; and her brothers already be- 
 gan to nod in their chairs by her side. My 
 father, too, had taken his station at no great 
 distance, in a situation so shaded, that, while 
 no motion of Catherine's could escape him, she 
 could not easily become aware of his vicinity. 
 Even Eleonore Raymond, who sat at the table, 
 on which burned dimly a couple of villanous 
 tallow candles, with her head buried in her 
 hands, remained so still, that it was impossible 
 to say whether she slept or not. 
 
 That my father felt neither weary nor sleepy 
 I need perhaps scarcely tell you ; and yet 
 young men seldom now-a-days possess suffi- 
 cient freshness of feeling to know the luxury 
 of a real bona Jide passion — a pure, yet glowing 
 first love. I am sorry for them; for I think 
 them great losers by the change. Sentiment 
 has its epicurism as well as sensualit} 7 ; and I 
 consider him a pitiful wight indeed, who knows 
 too much of the latter ever to have tasted the
 
 66 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 sweets of the former. However, this is a digres- 
 sion, revenons a nos moutons. 
 
 It has often been said, and my father felt 
 on this occasion the full force of the observa- 
 tion, that nothing ripens intimacy faster than 
 a journey, or anything resembling it. Weeks, 
 months, of almost daily associations in the usual 
 routine of society, do not mature a budding- 
 affection, rub off the mutual diffidence, and 
 efface the doubts, which are its chief impedi- 
 ments, like a whole day spent together. It has 
 something of the familiarity of domestic habits ; 
 nor is it possible for the fair lady to maintain 
 herself within the strong ramparts of icy reserve, 
 when exposed to the incessant skirmishes of 
 polite attentions, needed kindnesses, and all the 
 chances that throw young people on such occa- 
 sions into each other's way. I see by your smile, 
 my young friend, that you think my comparisons 
 and sentiments as roccocos as myself; so I will 
 even on with my story. 
 
 For the first few hours, everything was 
 hushed in the large crowded chamber, and every 
 one slept, or seemed to sleep. Catherine was
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 67 
 
 wrapt in the peaceful slumbers of a child, from 
 which even the loud snorings of her brothers 
 were unequal to arouse her. To the young 
 lover's enamoured fancy she seemed more lovely 
 in this placid, gentle repose, than in her most 
 animated moments. But he loved as we of 
 Toulon and Marseilles love ; whether she spake 
 or was silent, laughing or sad, kind or other- 
 wise, her last mood ever seemed the most fasci- 
 nating, and herself more perfect with every 
 passing hour. 
 
 Midnight tolled from the neighbouring church 
 in thin, sharp accents, denoting, by the meagre 
 sound, how much it stood in need of fresh 
 bells. My father started at the chime, and 
 looked around. Mademoiselle Raymond was yet 
 in the same position ; Marie Guyol had drop- 
 ped asleep, in the midst of her frolics, like a 
 wearied Hebe ; and her admirers had glided to 
 a heap of straw not far off, doubtless with the 
 intention of never losing sight of their divinity, 
 where, nature having overcome them, they lay 
 in a state of the deepest oblivion. Scarcely 
 had the hour ceased to chime, when the moon,
 
 68 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 emerging from the cloud that had hitherto, 
 veiled her, shone forth in uncontrolled bril- 
 liancy, streaming full through the curtainless 
 •windows upon Catherine's reclining figure. My 
 father, dreading lest the light should disturb 
 her, was about to seek the means of excluding 
 it, when suddenly she rose to a sitting posture, 
 and stretched forth her hands anxiously. 
 
 " I must dress my hair," she said, in an 
 audible, though low voice ; " but I cannot find 
 my comb — 1 fear it is left behind." 
 
 He was surprised at the extraordinary de- 
 mand, and no less so when the elder brother 
 gently roused the younger, who immediately 
 produced the desired object. 
 
 " That's right," she said. " Now, bring me a 
 mirror. How can I braid my hair without one ? 
 Thank you. Now, take away this odious ker- 
 chief — so. Joseph, don't stand in my light." 
 
 My father was startled; for it was he, and 
 not her brother, who stood between her and 
 the light of the moon. He moved off, saying 
 to Joseph, as he did so — 
 
 "I am afraid my presence annoys Made- 
 moiselle Cadieres."
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 69 
 
 " Not the least in the world," was the reply. 
 " She is not even aware of it. If it interests 
 you to watch her just now, you may do so, pro- 
 vided you do not attempt to wake her." 
 
 " But she is no longer asleep." 
 
 " She is," answered Joseph, with a smile. 
 " Have you never before witnessed an instance 
 of somnambulism ? My poor sister has been 
 subject to this affliction since her childhood ; 
 it is, however, fast wearing off. But hush ! 
 she is about to speak." 
 
 (i Joseph, bring the light nearer." 
 
 He lighted a candle and placed it by her 
 with great precaution, and my father then per- 
 ceived that her eyes were completely closed. 
 One brother, at her desire, held the candle, the 
 other, the mirror, — then removing the silk ker- 
 chief, she carefully unbraided her tresses and 
 suffered them to flow in natural luxuriance 
 down her shoulders. 
 
 I have often heard it said by those who had 
 known her, that Catherine's hair was finer than 
 any they had ever seen. Of the purest, palest 
 gold colour, and of the softest, most silken 
 tissue, it fell in glittering showers about her, and
 
 70 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 literally veiled her person. The only touch of 
 vanity her friends and detractors had been able 
 to trace in Catherine, was in reference to this 
 beautiful ornament of nature. A menial hand 
 was never suffered to profane it, but she braided 
 and smoothed it herself with peculiar care ; 
 and, setting at nought the perverse taste of the 
 time, when ladies befrizzled and bespangled 
 themselves most unmercifully, she gathered 
 them up at the back of her head in a simple 
 Grecian knot, aware, doubtless, that this sim- 
 plicity displayed their beauty to the greatest 
 possible advantage, and would now and then pass 
 a sky-blue ribbon through them with a coquettish 
 and becoming grace. 
 
 Most men, besides admiring beauty in its 
 more broad and general acceptation, are devoted 
 to some separate, individual grace. Some praise 
 a small foot, others offer their homage at the 
 shrine of a snowy, well-formed hand, a third 
 fancies beauty rests in the eye ; my father had 
 always a caprice for fine hair, and this charm in 
 Mademoiselle Cadieres, although so strangely 
 exhibited, made no small impression on his 
 imagination.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 71 
 
 The light caught the long rich locks as she 
 carefully combed and separated them, and even 
 occasionally played on her closed eyelids without 
 discomposing her. At last she seemed satisfied, 
 and well she might be so, for the most expert 
 practitioner could not, with open eyes and in 
 full daylight, have achieved the work better. 
 She then rose to her feet and made towards the 
 window, feeling with her hands for a curtain. 
 
 "There's no shutting out the moon," she 
 said. " Well, it can't be helped. It is but for 
 one night, to-morrow I shall be home again." 
 
 " She must be awake," said my father, in a 
 whisper to Joseph, who watched his sister nar- 
 row ly, without, however, attempting to impede 
 her movements. " She speaks quite con- 
 nectedly." 
 
 " She is asleep, notwithstanding, and we must 
 be careful not to wake her, for that the physician 
 declares is the only danger." 
 
 Catherine walked, indeed, somewhat hesitat- 
 ingly, with outstretched hands, like ablind person, 
 or one groping in the dark, yet contriving with 
 singular nicety to avoid coming in contact with 
 any person or object that stood in her way, ad-
 
 72 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 dressing herself to Joseph alone, as if uncon- 
 scious of the presence of any other. 
 
 She next approached the table where Eleo- 
 nore sat, who, by a slight movement, betrayed 
 that she was either aroused by the circumstance, 
 or, what is more probable, had never slept at 
 all. Catherine took up the light; my father 
 sprang forward to snatch it from her uncertain 
 hold, but Mademoiselle Raymond interfered. 
 Gently pushing him back, she took the candle- 
 stick from Catherine's unresisting hand, saying, 
 with her wonted abruptness, — 
 
 " Go to your bed, Catherine ; night is the 
 time for sleep. Go and rest." 
 
 Catherine hung her head like a eluded child, 
 and moved slowly to her couch. She knelt by 
 its side and recited her evening prayer in a 
 sweet, though smothered voice. She never 
 omitted to cross herself at the appropriate 
 places, and even gently struck her breast at 
 certain words expressive of penitence and hu- 
 mility ; then laid herself down, and, in another 
 instant, seemed as calm and motionless as though 
 her sleep were unvexed even by dreams.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 73 
 
 My father had heard much and read more 
 about the singular abnormity called somnambu- 
 lism, but had never before witnessed this phe- 
 nomenon. Now that he, for the first time, 
 beheld its effects in a beloved object, he had 
 sufficient food for meditation until the early dawn 
 broke upon the uncomfortable party, and roused 
 them to fresh exertions. Joseph had warned him 
 that Catherine, in her waking hours, was totally 
 unconscious of having walked and talked during 
 sleep ; and that it was thought advisable by her 
 friends not to allude, in any manner, to the 
 circumstance. He therefore greeted her as if 
 nothing unusual had happened, and, after a 
 hasty meal, they mounted and rode homewards. 
 
 He would have resumed his place by Cathe- 
 rine's side, but perceived she had fallen to the 
 rear, and was engaged in an earnest conversa- 
 tion with Eleanor Raymond, of which, by the 
 direction of their glances, he could not but guess 
 he was the subject. 
 
 "They are discussing your merits," said Ma- 
 demoiselle Guyol, in the free gay manner of 
 childhood which she had retained while woman- 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 74 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 hood and its graces were rapidly growing upon 
 her; "you never advocated a cause more 
 warmly than Mademoiselle Raymond does 
 yours at this moment, I can assure you." 
 
 Before he could frame a reply, she had urged 
 her horse forward and headed the cavalcade. 
 Her words, whether spoken in jest or earnest, 
 somewhat disconcerted him. He could not help 
 fancying they came nearer the mark, as to the 
 fact of his merits being under discussion, than 
 the speaker herself was aware of, though he 
 became nervous at the bare thought that Cathe- 
 rine might be prejudiced against him by the 
 harsh opinions which, in spite of Mademoiselle 
 Guyol's assertion, he doubted not her friend 
 entertained of him, as well as of all the world 
 besides. 
 
 The weather, though cloudy and uncertain 
 in the morning, cleared up in the course of the 
 day, and young and old recovered their spirits, 
 which had been damped by the mischance of 
 the previous night. But when my father again 
 joined Catherine, all his efforts to resume the 
 unembarrassed confidential tone of the eve
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 75 
 
 were unsuccessful ; long pauses intervened in 
 their conversation, which Eleonore, as usual, 
 took no trouble to fill up. But whether this 
 chilling restraint originated with himself or 
 Mademoiselle Cadieres, he was at a loss to 
 determine. This trifling check naturally ren- 
 dered their ride back to Toulon less agreeable 
 than their departure ; still my father, on the 
 whole, was sorry when it was over, and felt that 
 this excursion had rivetted his chains. 
 
 Matters remained for a few months in statu 
 quo. The intimacy continued, obviously en- 
 couraged by the mother, and anything but dis- 
 couraged, as he thought, by the daughter. His 
 parents, to whom he had openly declared his 
 feelings and intentions, approved highly of his 
 choice, and thus all things looked propitious. 
 He fancied, too, that Catherine's disposition 
 gradually became modified, by some unknown 
 cause or other, but which he did not fail, with 
 the sanguineness of youth, to attribute to his 
 own growing influence. She seemed every day 
 less of a saint and more of a woman. This 
 change, while it damped the ambitious hopes 
 E 2
 
 76 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 and disconcerted the personal views of her 
 friends, gratified him unspeakably. All parties 
 appeared to soften towards him; even her 
 brother's jealousy diminished, in exact ratio, 
 as the hopes they had built upon their sister 
 began to wane. 
 
 It was again spring. Catherine and her 
 mother had removed to their country house, 
 where my father continued to be an every day 
 visitor; and he determined, at last, to venture 
 on the grand question, whose answer was to fix 
 his future happiness or miseiy. But it would 
 be wearisome to relate, and incredible to believe, 
 how often he went to the house with the firm 
 resolution that that very evening should be the 
 last of suspense, and returned without even 
 having hinted at the subject nearest his heart. 
 Whenever he attempted to bring himself to the 
 point, his courage failed him. Uncertainty was 
 bliss compared to the misery a rejection would 
 inflict. 
 
 At last he took heart, and made his proposals 
 in due form to the mother. She was, evidently, 
 by no means taken by surprise ; her answer
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. ?~ 
 
 was fair and candid — it revealed her innermost 
 thoughts. 
 
 " It were my duty as a mother/' she said, " to 
 decide for my inexperienced daughter in so 
 grave a business, and most mothers in my con- 
 dition would, unhesitatingly, and gladly avail 
 themselves of such an offer as yours, so every 
 way satisfactory are your prospects, your con- 
 nexions, and especially your own qualities. 
 But my Catherine is so superior a being, that 
 what would be wisdom in the mothers of ordi- 
 nary daughters, would be folly in me. She is 
 the only authority to whom I can refer you in 
 such matters : if she accept you, no one can be 
 more willing than myself to call you son. However 
 different may once have been my hopes and views 
 for my daughter — whatever wishes I may still 
 entertain in my secret heart, — I do not feel jus- 
 tified in depriving her of the earthly advantages 
 that Providence may throw in her path ; besides, 
 if she do not reject you, it is a proof heaven 
 willed her not to be of the elect ; but if, as I 
 believe, she be one of the chosen, then are such 
 proposals as yours merely the test by which her
 
 78 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 virtue is tried. Speak to her yourself, Monsieur 
 Chaudon — I will not seek to influence her 
 either way — we must all abide by her decision." 
 
 He was received by Mademoiselle Cadieres 
 with the same kind smile that ever greeted him ; 
 but, somehow, it assumed a more sisterly ex- 
 pression than usual, in his disturbed fancy. 
 She listened to him throughout — and, though 
 awkward enough at first, he grew eloquent 
 with his subject — with a calm, grave attention, 
 and a collectedness of manner, that almost 
 damped his hopes. She blushed once or twice, 
 indeed, at the ardour of his expressions, but 
 never turned away her head, nor trembled, nor, 
 in short, shewed any of those symptoms of 
 embarrassment and fear, so reassuring to a 
 lover's doubts. 
 
 " And now," she said, in a firm though gentle 
 tone, " now that I have listened to all you have 
 to say, pray do the same by me, and do not 
 interrupt me. I have long guessed the prefer- 
 ence with which you honour me. Indeed, 
 Eleonore opened my eyes to it the day we rode 
 back from — " (she mentioned the very excur-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 79 
 
 sion, the incidents of which I have detailed 
 to you), "and I would then have renounced 
 your acquaintance, although a source of much 
 real pleasure, but for her advice, which I thought 
 wise, like everything she utters. i Do not 
 judge hastily, Catherine,' she said; 'you are 
 perfectly aware of Monsieur Jules' qualities ; 
 give yourself the time to be just to them, and to 
 know your own heart. Try it by every test in 
 your power before you consider it altogether 
 Heaven's — a mistake might cost you dear.' 
 She spoke at great length of my being mis- 
 led by vanity — delusions of all kinds — of the 
 necessity of giving my feelings fair play. I 
 yielded to the truth of her observations. I 
 thought you then, as I still do — and I feel a 
 pride in owning the fact — a man whom I could 
 love, because I esteem — to whom I could wil- 
 lingly, gladly, yield up my destiny." My father's 
 heart bounded with joy. " But," — Oh ! those 
 bats ; how they trifle with our best hopes in 
 life, and nip them in the bud, as a hoar frost 
 does the early spring blossoms ; — " but, though 
 I could have been content to wed you — could
 
 80 3JAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 have loved you — I did not, because I loved God 
 more, and wished to devote myself wholly to his 
 service. Interrupt me not, I entreat. I gave my- 
 self a fair trial — saw you every day — received 
 your attentions — courted, rather than avoided, 
 the opportunities of judging your merits — and 
 every day asked my own heart the question 
 you have put me to-day. The answer has 
 invariably been the same. I am not destined 
 for the calm joys and easy duties of a house- 
 wife ; my vocation speaks loudly in my bosom, 
 haunts me in my dreams, and points out to me 
 the path I must tread." 
 
 My father vehemently contradicted her as- 
 sertion, and blamed her desire for a conven- 
 tual life. 
 
 " You mistake," she said, with a quiet smile, 
 " I do not wish to take the veil. Nothing can 
 be further from my thoughts or desires. The 
 idle, dreamy existence of a nun, appears to me 
 the most insignificant and useless of any. My 
 sphere of action and of feeling must be en- 
 larged, not curtailed. No ! my mind is fixed 
 on other points. To take up, one day, the
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 81 
 
 pilgrim's staff, and turn my steps towards the 
 holy city, — such is my plan; — to reach it, 
 through many perils and troubles, and be blessed 
 by his Holiness, my hope. There, under the 
 shadow of his wing, will I dwell, — devote myself 
 and my fortune entirely to the service of the 
 unhappy — the suffering. All women can be 
 kind mothers, complacent wives — they but fulfil 
 nature's instinct ; but it is a noble mission for 
 a weak, timid woman, made strong by the spirit 
 of Christianity, to encounter, willingly, danger 
 under every shape — to bear privation and dis- 
 comfort — to renounce the deceptions and vain 
 joys of the world, that she may soothe, in their 
 excess of misery, the poor, the afflicted, the 
 abandoned ; smooth the pillow of infirm dotage, 
 guide the steps of the sightless, bring repent- 
 ance to the bosom of the wicked, and care for 
 those who have none to protect them. Oh ! it 
 is a holy mission, and one to which I burn to 
 devote myself. Seek not to interfere with my 
 vocation ; no temptation earth can offer could 
 induce me to renounce it." 
 
 My father listened with mixed feelings of 
 e 3
 
 82 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 consternation, pity, and admiration. The heart 
 of an angel seemed unveiling itself. He knew 
 she spoke not vain, calculated words — that they 
 welled from her inmost soul. But, beautiful as 
 he thought the aspirations of that soul, he 
 deemed her views visionary, and was convinced 
 that time would prove this even to herself. 
 Suspecting that, after all, she was more attached 
 to him than she was aware of, he did not 
 renounce his hopes at once, and frankly told 
 her so. 
 
 She smiled and sighed at the same time ; 
 but he obtained the permission to continue the 
 trial, with the result of which, she said, having 
 forewarned him — since he was willingly court- 
 ing error and disappointment — she would not 
 have to fear the reproaches of her conscience. 
 
 The words with which she closed the inter- 
 view were balm to the wounds she had inflicted ; 
 - — " If ever I should change my determination, 
 which is not likely, rest assured it will be in 
 your favour only." 
 
 After this explanation my father was very 
 unhappy, but not hopeless ; and continued his
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 83 
 
 visits to the house. Indeed, his footing there 
 seemed exactly the same as heretofore, and a 
 stranger to the circumstances of the case would 
 never have guessed but that he was an accepted, 
 not a rejected suitor. 
 
 Upon being informed of her daughter's 
 final decision, Madame Cadieres' feelings were 
 of a mixed kind. She was glad and sorrowful, 
 proud and humbled ; for, should Catherine 
 accomplish her destiny in obscurity, she, like 
 most mothers, would not have been best pleased 
 to see her daughter remain a spinster, whilst 
 she would have the mortification to behold the 
 fair scions of almost every other matron of her 
 set more or less advantageously settled. But 
 she was consoled by the reflection that my 
 father's love would, in all probability, outlive his 
 refusal, and that she could at any time secure 
 him if nothing better turned up. 
 
 My father, as I have said, suffered himself 
 by no means to be discouraged; he even be- 
 came, every day, more convinced that he was 
 gaining ground in Catherine's affections, — that 
 her childish adherence to early plans and fan-
 
 84 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 tastic notions was giving way to the voice of 
 nature and the force of truth. He was not the 
 only one to perceive that she was gradually de- 
 scending from those imaginary spheres wherein 
 her young imagination had been foolishly suf- 
 fered to wander; that the tone of her feelings 
 was growing more natural, and that her 
 thoughts were becoming more bent towards the 
 realities of life. Fools and the envious de- 
 plored the change; but all people of sense 
 rejoiced, especially the young men of the town, 
 for Catherine was blessed with a good inherit- 
 ance as well as with beauty and goodness. 
 
 It was very much the fashion with the 
 idle youths of the day— not being, as now, 
 allowed to dabble in politics ere they were 
 fledged — to make a great parade of gallantry. 
 It was one of their customs to elect, every now 
 and then, some fair idol of the hour, who was 
 adulated, talked over, and rhymed at, until she 
 either wedded or faded, when a new election 
 took place. Catherine, from earliest dawn of 
 womanhood, had been the standard belle of her 
 own society : but, at this epoch of her life, her
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 85 
 
 loveliness ripened into such fulness as to become 
 the theme of universal homage. Officers and 
 students, aspirants de marine and seminarists, 
 all agreed in electing her, with one voice, the 
 queen of beauty; and strove, with envious 
 emulation, to throw themselves in the way of 
 the young girl, who could not take a walk round 
 the ramparts, or look out of her window by the 
 merest chance, without encountering a host of 
 eager eyes, ready to drink in the most casual of 
 her glances. 
 
 My father was more distressed than flat- 
 tered by the general homage thus rendered 
 to the object of his affections ; for he dreaded 
 the appearance of competitors to the prize 
 which he was so eager to snatch to himself; 
 nor were his misgivings altogether without 
 foundation. 
 
 One young man, who had just arrived from 
 a northern province to join his regiment, quar- 
 tered for the time at Toulon, viewed Cathe- 
 rine with a deeper, purer admiration, than the 
 idle throng. He belonged to the privileged 
 classes; for he not only had a de before his
 
 86 MAGIC AND MES31ERISM. 
 
 name, but bore one of those made illustrious 
 in the annals of our country, by the deeds of 
 his forefathers. His fortune was not inferior 
 to his birth; yet he did not disdain, a few 
 months after his arrival, to depose all these 
 advantages at Mademoiselle Cadieres' feet, and 
 entreat her to share them with him. 
 
 Catherine unhesitatingly refused. To under- 
 stand fully the merit of this rejection, I must 
 again remind you of the state of society pre- 
 vious to the Revolution. The king in the fairy 
 tales, who wedded a shepherdess tending her 
 flock, scarcely conferred upon her a greater 
 honour, than did the gentleman of those days 
 upon a bourgeoise, in making her his spouse. 
 One must bear in mind the different position 
 of the gentilhommerie at that epoch, and how 
 inconceivably greater were its advantages, to 
 understand clearly that such a refusal was 
 actually a sacrifice. 
 
 In this case, too, the young lady could not 
 reasonably object to the person or mental qua- 
 lities of the lover. Youthful, tolerably good- 
 looking, thoroughly enamoured of her, he pos-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 87 
 
 sessed besides that high polish of manner, 
 which it is not prejudice to believe the pro- 
 perty of those only who have leisure to bestow 
 on its cultivation. 
 
 Still vanity and ambition left the heart un- 
 touched which love had failed to move ; and the 
 agonizing suspense my father endured whilst 
 the affair was on the tapis, gave way to the 
 most exuberant feelings of triumph when it was 
 decided. His rival, deeply galled at what he 
 conceived to be an insult, and yet too sincerely 
 attached to resent his disappointment by an 
 affectation of contemptuous indifference, ob- 
 tained leave of absence, and eventually an ex- 
 change of regiment ; so that he left the town 
 immediately, never to return. 
 
 Madame Cadieres' ambition, all devotee as she 
 was, had received a severe blow by Catherine's 
 determination. But when she pressed her on 
 this point, the answer was invariably the same 
 — " If you insist on my choosing a husband, 
 then let it be Monsieur Jules Chaudon:" and 
 there the matter rested; for, like most weak 
 mothers, Madame Cadieres found it impossible
 
 88 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 to take up the reins she had once suffered to 
 escape from her hands. 
 
 Gratified as my father was at this decision of 
 his mistress, so favourable to his own wishes, still 
 he felt daily more anxious about the issue of his 
 suit. His own ardent devotion, together with 
 that of the rejected officer, contributed to spread 
 the fame of Catherine's charms ; and he doubted 
 not but rivals would spring up from every quarter. 
 They soon indeed became numerous as black- 
 berries; but Mademoiselle Cadieres was as in- 
 exorable to her many lovers as ever was that 
 model of female truth and excellence, fair Pe- 
 nelope herself. Thus my father's fears again 
 gave way to brighter hopes. Her manner to 
 him continued the same as ever; still he fan- 
 cied he now and then could trace the semblance 
 of a blush on her countenance, when he ven- 
 tured to praise ; but her damask cheek was 
 habitually tinged with so soft a glow, that he 
 might easily have been mistaken. 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond, who, in spite of 
 her uncourteous, chilling demeanour, he could 
 not but think, was well disposed towards him,
 
 MAGIC AND 3IESMERISM. 89 
 
 since the kind advice she had once bestowed in 
 his favour, might perhaps best have informed 
 him of what he really had to expect; for she 
 possessed the whole of Catherine's confidence. 
 Indeed, though constantly surrounded by the 
 young ladies he had met on his first visit to 
 the house, Catherine's intimacy dated with 
 them but from the epoch of her first commu- 
 nion, having received their religious instruc- 
 tions at the same time, and from the same 
 person. With the Catholics, especially in the 
 narrow circles of provincial life, this often forms 
 a bond that lasts throughout existence ; at any 
 rate, is seldom broken during the first few years 
 that elapse after the event. But Eleonore Ray- 
 mond was a friend from the very cradle, as it 
 were, and one whom Catherine could love and 
 trust without reserve. They were constantly 
 with each other; and more serious in disposi- 
 tion, graver in manner, than their youthful 
 companions, often kept aloof and to themselves, 
 even in moments of the greatest apparent so- 
 ciability. 
 
 Although my father was fully aware of the
 
 90 MAGIC A.ND MESMERISM. 
 
 immense power of a female companion and 
 confidante in the furtherance of a love affair — 
 and it may be imagined that a certain degree 
 of intimacy had arisen between them from their 
 daily meetings for the space of a couple of 
 years — there was that about Mademoiselle 
 Raymond which checked all advance to fami- 
 liarity. Always with Catherine, she seemed 
 like the shadow-side of a bright picture, in 
 which objects are so indistinctly represented, 
 that the beholder can with difficulty discern 
 them. When spoken to, it was impossible to 
 decide whether she was affronted or pleased, 
 amused or wearied, when listening to the con- 
 versation of others. She was kind to Catherine 
 alone — communicative with no one else; to 
 every other individual, without exception, her 
 manner was cold to repulsion. 
 
 My father could not often overcome a cer- 
 tain disagreeable sensation, when addressing 
 her, even though convinced she had once acted 
 a friendly part towards him, and might do so 
 again. But, one evening, finding her alone in 
 the parlour, while the company were dispersed
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 91 
 
 in the garden, he summoned up sufficient reso- 
 lution to entreat her good offices with Cathe- 
 rine. Her answer was of a nature to preclude 
 all recurrence to the subject for the future. 
 
 " I never," she said, " would meddle or mar 
 in so grave an affair as the marriage of other 
 people. It is a trouble for which one seldom 
 reaps thanks, whether success attend the en- 
 deavour or the reverse. Parents are the only 
 lawful advisers in such cases." 
 
 " I am, then, totally without friendly assist- 
 ance," said my father, despondingly. 
 
 " Catherine herself is your best friend," said 
 Mademoiselle Raymond, with marked emphasis; 
 and turning away with her usual abruptness, 
 she left him to digest the meaning of her words 
 at his leisure. 
 
 The autumn of 1728 had just begun, and Tou- 
 lon was sadly at a loss for some novelty where- 
 with to while away the tedious hours of rainy 
 weather which they had for some time to endure. 
 Even the little coterie to which my father be- 
 longed was at a stand still ; for Monsieur Jules 
 Chaudon's long-protracted attachment to Made-
 
 92 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 moiselle Cadieres had grown to be so stale an 
 affair, that the intelligence of their marriage 
 would scarcely have elicited an exclamation, 
 when suddenly a new star appeared in their 
 hemisphere, and roused the inhabitants of our 
 good town from their momentary torpor. 
 
 Among the numerous beehives of cowls and 
 shaven crowns that Toulon possessed, it boasted 
 a seminary of Jesuits, and several establish- 
 ments belonging to the order of Mount Carmel. 
 The latter certainly had more partisans in the 
 town than the former ; and even the Lord Bishop 
 himself was supposed to favour them greatly. 
 The Carmelites had the best preachers, the 
 guidance of the most fashionable souls, and, 
 in short, carried it with a high hand over the 
 Jesuits. 
 
 For a lono; while were the latter forced to 
 bear this mortification — not without complaint 
 or murmur, it is true ; but still they were com- 
 pelled to yield the step to their rivals. That 
 this could not last for ever, that something must 
 be done, was certain ; but what that something 
 should be, it took some time to consider — as
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 93 
 
 much indeed as a few years, it would seem, 
 since my father had spent already a couple in 
 Toulon — before they thought of the expedient 
 which they finally fell upon. 
 
 They had — namely, in one of their commu- 
 nities at Aix — a preacher, who was singularly 
 distinguished by his eloquence and fiery zeal. 
 His reputation had spread far and wide over 
 the country, and his order considered him as 
 one of its most useful members. Such a person 
 only could be opposed to the barefooted Car- 
 melites with success. He would bear down 
 every thing before him at Toulon, as he had 
 done wherever he had appeared : the triumph of 
 the Jesuits, and the defeat of the Carmelites 
 would be complete. 
 
 This man was accordingly called to Toulon, 
 under the title of Rector of the Royal Semi- 
 nary of Chaplains to the Navy. He was ex- 
 pected with great anxiety by the rival parties, 
 and with intense curiosity by the whole town ; 
 for the Jesuits had artfully enough contrived that 
 many interesting rumours should be afloat re- 
 specting their new champion.
 
 94 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 The gossips of the place took up the subject 
 with avidity. The success of the new preacher 
 in the pulpit, his incredible zeal for the con- 
 version of erring souls, the mighty persuasions 
 by which he brought new votaries to the church, 
 his power over the hearts of men, or rather 
 women — for among them, it would appear, his 
 talents had been chiefly exercised — were the 
 theme of every conversation, from the highest 
 to the lowest circles. The Carmelites indeed 
 assumed a scornful, incredulous smile, as if very 
 well assured that all this great stir would turn 
 out much ado about nothing, whilst the Jesuits 
 looked as if about to celebrate a Te Deum for 
 victory. 
 
 At last, the news of the reverend father's 
 arrival was spread throughout the town. It was 
 announced that he would preach at the church 
 of the Jesuits on the ensuing Sunday ; and 
 until that hour of trial, he was carefully kept 
 from prying eyes, lest his novelty should wear 
 off. 
 
 The decisive Sunday at length arrived. 
 The moment the doors of the church were
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 95 
 
 thrown open, a rush was made by the expecting 
 multitude, as if they were going to a show, 
 instead of the decent, grave approach due to 
 the house of God. Everybody who was any- 
 body was there ; and among the rest, my 
 father, who was not without some curiosity 
 about the matter. 
 
 When John Baptiste Girard entered the 
 pulpit, all eyes were bent on him, with the anx- 
 ious curiosity with which spectators examine a 
 new actor, on whose merits they are about to 
 decide. 
 
 He was plain to ugliness, which my father 
 considered detrimental to an orator. Already 
 past fifty, his tall, gaunt, emaciated frame made 
 him look considerably older. His skin, sallow 
 and drawn like parchment, adhered tightly to 
 the frontal and cheek bones, giving to their ca- 
 vities beneath a remarkably ascetic appearance 
 — his pallor, contrasting with harsh, heavy un- 
 intellectual brows — his large mouth, and ears 
 that stuck to his head like two plates, formed 
 altogether one of the coarsest and most un- 
 gainly exteriors imaginable. His eye was the
 
 96 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 only redeeming point about the man — large, 
 dark, and fiery, it scanned the assembled crowd 
 with a glance of fierce assurance that seemed 
 the prologue to success, and was not devoid of a 
 sort of rude dignity. 
 
 His voice was at first husky, but cleared by 
 degrees, until it became loud and full, and, like 
 his glance, seemed to search every conscience 
 and descend into every heart. 
 
 He chose a simple text, and developed it 
 with singular perspicuity, avoiding to over- 
 burthen it with hyperbolical amplification. His 
 periods were well rounded, without exagge- 
 ration ; every sentence had a point — every word 
 a meaning; his comparisons were just, though 
 sufficiently flowery to be graceful ; his argument 
 was close and rapid ; — in short, my father said 
 he might have been a lawyer, and an uncom- 
 monly good one. 
 
 As a preacher that day, his success was 
 complete. The Carmelites were routed; and 
 the Jesuits looked that ineffably humble and 
 meek triumph of which women and monks 
 only have the secret.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM, 97 
 
 From that day the issue of the quarrel was 
 not dubious. Father Girard's celebrity daily 
 accrued, to the no small satisfaction of his order. 
 His eloquence and ambition took bolder flights 
 as he grew more at home in his new residence ; 
 and soon the town was filled with the account 
 of the proselytes he was making. 
 
 Gradually, the churches of the bare-footed 
 Carmelites were deserted, their preachers voted 
 tame, their confessors unsatisfactory, and the 
 tide of public favour was rapidly ebbing from 
 them. Father Girard understood, marvellously, 
 the art of warming the zeal of elderly ladies, 
 and making them denounce and renounce the 
 pleasures in which they could scarcely continue 
 to take a share ; but he had for some time no 
 opportunity of exercising his power over the 
 minds of the junior members of the community, 
 and this for a reason which I must explain. 
 
 Catherine was considered by all the young 
 girls of her age, or thereabouts, as their model 
 and guide in religious matters; and though 
 many were anxious to try the new confessor, 
 they dared not even so much as manifest their 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 98 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 desire openly, before it had received the sanction 
 of her example. But there reigned a great 
 curiosity among them to discover her opinion 
 upon the subject; for although resolved to 
 abide by it, they were naturally desirous that 
 her views should coincide with their own. 
 Though she had attended his sermons several 
 times, without ever dropping the slightest hint 
 about the matter in question, they did not think 
 fit to mention it until such time as she should 
 afford them a fair opening for so doing. They 
 felt confident that she would explain herself 
 one day or other, and awaited the moment in 
 silent but eager expectation. 
 
 In their anxiety concerning the all-absorb- 
 ing question, they forgot other topics that had 
 lately much engrossed them, such as the ap- 
 proaching nuptials of Marie Langieres and 
 Marie La Rue, which promised to be very 
 brilliant, the former being about to unite her- 
 self, with the only son of a fermier general, who 
 had just obtained a savonnette a vilain, as it was 
 called (a position among the aristocracy, by 
 means of the purchase of an estate, to which a
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 99 
 
 title was annexed — a term applied in derision 
 by the nobility, who meant thereby to insinuate 
 that the purchaser had acquired means whereby 
 to wash off his plebeianism) ; and Mademoiselle 
 La Rue was shortly to be led to the altar by 
 Monsieur Renoir, the Croesus of the province. 
 Thus the taste of the one for grandeur and the 
 other for wealth was in a fair way to be gratified. 
 Mademoiselle Guyol's flirtations and inconse- 
 quences with her admirers among the officers 
 had also been much discussed, as well as the 
 obstinate refusals of all proposals by Eleonore 
 Raymond, whose wealth tempted many families 
 to seek her alliance. All these interesting: sub- 
 jects were swallowed up for the moment by the 
 new interest excited by Father Girard. 
 
 Several weeks elapsed before the desired 
 explanation took place. At last, Mademoiselle 
 Cadieres formally invited all her young friends 
 to a species of conclave, on which occasion it 
 was understood she would explicitly announce 
 her opinion on the much-mooted point. A 
 collation was, as usual, to soften the fatigue 
 of so grave a debate. All the young ladies of 
 f2
 
 100 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 her coterie joyfully accepted the invitation, 
 which included no gentlemen, except Cathe- 
 rine's brothers, and my father, whom she treated 
 with the same confidence as though he in reality 
 made part of her family. 
 
 The sitting amused him not a little at the 
 time, ignorant as he was of the influence it 
 would have upon his own fate and that of all 
 present. How little did any of those there 
 reunited, revelling in their youth and their 
 prospects, laughing rather to ease their heart of 
 its fulness of joy than at the objects that raised 
 that laughter — how little did they dream they 
 were nearing, with careless, dancing steps, the 
 abyss that was about to engulf them. 
 
 Catherine sat, in childish state, in a purple 
 velvet chair of antique shape, that had been 
 brought down from the lumber-room for the 
 purpose of giving the meeting a more imposing 
 effect. On her right, on a plain tabouret, sat 
 the languishing Marie Langieres, who already 
 spoke confidently of soon having a tabouret 
 a la cour ; and next to her was placed Made- 
 moiselle La Rue, who remarked on the oc-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 101 
 
 casion, that once in her new home, such vile 
 things as these mesquins settees should never be 
 seen. On Catherine's left was Mademoiselle 
 Raymond, and next to her my father. The 
 two brothers stood behind their sister's chair, as 
 gentlemen of honour ; and opposite to her sat 
 the piquante Marie Guyol, whose pretty head 
 passed that of all the rest by one good half, so 
 that, as she herself observed, she might easily 
 have been mistaken for the president. 
 
 The girlish fancy that had inspired these 
 arrangements was a happy augury in my father's 
 eyes; the more Catherine's character would 
 lose of its loftiness and austerity, the more 
 likely and near seemed the realization of his 
 hopes. When silence was established, and all 
 were willing to listen, Catherine began : — 
 
 " I know, my dear friends," she said, rt that 
 you have long tacitly awaited my decision 
 upon a grave and important point — namely, 
 whether it be best to adhere to the Carmelite 
 priests, who have hitherto guided and en- 
 lightened our consciences, or choose a new 
 director in the person of the celebrated Father
 
 102 MAGIC AND MES3IERIS3I. 
 
 Girard, of the Jesuits. I feel flattered by your 
 reliance on me, but would not misuse it by 
 seeking to influence you in a matter where con- 
 science alone can decide. But I owe it to my- 
 self, as well as to you, to lay before you the real 
 cause of the line of conduct I myself am about 
 to pursue, which might otherwise be imputed 
 to motives furthest from my heart. It is not 
 Father Girard's brilliant eloquence that has 
 touched me, nor am I dazzled by his great 
 reputation ; for I should have resisted both these 
 impulses, as being too worldly to induce me to 
 resign my soul into the keeping of a stranger. 
 No ! it is the will of Heaven. You all re- 
 member St. John's Day, when Father Girard 
 preached at the church of the Carmelites. The 
 service being over, I was about to depart, when, 
 crossing the porch, I happened to meet him, and 
 caught his eye, as I had often done before, 
 resting upon me. At the same instant, an 
 angel form appeared visibly to me, pointing 
 towards him, and a voice distinctly murmured 
 in my ear — ( This is the man who is to lead 
 thee unto Heaven.' I well nigh fainted with
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 103 
 
 surprise, and can well imagine yours in listening 
 to this extraordinary fact. Yet, when we re- 
 member how of yore the will of God was re- 
 vealed in visions to his chosen, we may wonder, 
 but may not doubt. His voice bids me seek 
 Father Girard, to whom, alone, the mission of 
 my salvation is given. I follow not, therefore, 
 my own blind, erring judgment, which might 
 deceive, but the guidance of Providence, which 
 I obey with joyful confidence. But you, who 
 have not received such direct warnings from 
 above, should weigh the matter gravely in 
 your own minds, and submit it to another course 
 of reasoning, before you follow my example, if 
 indeed you wish to do so." 
 
 The whole party was, as you may conceive, 
 amazed at this communication, which evidently 
 was new, even to Eleonore, who looked the 
 extreme of displeasure while listening to it. 
 My father, too, felt pained by an announcement, 
 which exhibited the object of his affection in a 
 less favourable light than that in which he had 
 hitherto regarded her. He and Eleonore tes- 
 tified their disapprobation by a cold silence,
 
 104 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 whilst Catherine's eye — lighted up with the 
 secret triumph of a devotee, who fancies her- 
 self singled out by Heaven as an object of 
 especial predilection — sought in vain for sympathy 
 in their grave countenances. But the rest of 
 the party expressed their admiration of the 
 secret ways of Providence, and obviously at- 
 tached the most ridiculous importance to this, as 
 my father then thought it, fantastic communi- 
 cation. 
 
 He could, at the time, scarcely listen to 
 Catherine with common patience ; but fre- 
 quently in after times did he remember the de- 
 tails of her recital with much interest, for they 
 afforded him the first clue to the unravelling of 
 a succession of mysteries, upon which for years 
 his reason could throw no light. 
 
 The general curiosity being sated, the suffrage 
 was loud in favour of Father Girard, who was 
 henceforth to direct all the tender consciences 
 there present. For although not favoured, like 
 Mademoiselle Cadieres, with an especial call, 
 they conceived that she had merely been the 
 chosen vehicle whereby Providence deigned to
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 105 
 
 make manifest its will unto them. Catherine 
 was too much carried away by the elation of 
 her spirits at the moment to notice the reserve 
 and silence of Eleonore, which was evidently 
 intended as a reproof. As to my father, he was 
 merely angry with the fuss made about what he 
 conceived at best but an extraordinary halluci- 
 nation, which he thought it unpardonable in 
 Catherine to bring thus forward. For the rest, 
 he cared but little who was the director of her 
 conscience : Girard was old and ugly, and, in 
 his opinion, would do quite as well as another. 
 When, however, at last, Mademoiselle Ray- 
 mond's opinion was thought of and solicited, he 
 perceived she viewed the matter in another 
 light. 
 
 " I am sorry to say," she answered, " I differ 
 from you all — most especially from Catherine — 
 but opinion is personal, and we are all at 
 liberty to think as we please. We have been 
 trained from childhood by the worthy Father 
 Alexis of the Carmelites — what we know of 
 our religion we owe to his care. Hitherto he 
 has had the sole management of our consciences, 
 f 3
 
 106 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 and we are not worse than oar neighbours. 
 Why should we, suddenly, turn ungrateful for 
 the many benefits which we have so often 
 acknowledged, and pain our good, kind, old 
 confessor ? This, I regret to say, seems, to me 
 at least, a mere love of change, caprice, 
 imitation. I, for one, am quite certain of having 
 no part or parcel in Catherine's vision, and I 
 am not likely to be visited by one myself. I 
 shall not, therefore, attend Father Girard either 
 at the confessional or even at mass, though I 
 allow him to be an excellent preacher." 
 
 A murmur of disapprobation went round the 
 circle, and the words heretic — heretical relations, 
 more than once reached my father's ear, to whose 
 memory they recalled what Madame Cadieres 
 had told him of Mademoiselle Raymond's 
 situation and parentage. 
 
 He was deeply impressed with the good 
 sense of her remarks, and the clearness with 
 which they were delivered ; but they had evi- 
 dently given offence, for the others did not 
 again address her, and even Catherine's manner 
 was cooler than usual until the party broke up.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 107 
 
 His road led past the house of Elconore's 
 guardian, and for the first time since their 
 acquaintance he accompanied her to the door. 
 Although not alone, they walked somewhat in 
 advance together, and could exchange some 
 few sentences unheard. He turned to account 
 this opportunity of sifting her feelings more 
 closely concerning that evening's proceeding, 
 and to his surprise she threw off, in great 
 measure, the frigidity from which he had not 
 yet seen her depart. 
 
 " I am much grieved," she said, " by what I 
 have just heard ; and by the manner in which 
 Catherine has announced her intention, I know 
 it will be in vain for me to attempt to dissuade 
 her." 
 
 My father begged her to explain herself 
 further, for he could see no harm in this 
 caprice de confesseur, independently of the pain 
 the change might inflict on the worthy man 
 who had hitherto officiated in that capacity. 
 Her answer struck him forcibly. 
 
 " I could not well convey my real opinion, 
 or rather, I should say, develop it completely,
 
 108 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 before so many biassed persons as were there 
 to-night," she said, " because the mere fact of 
 my poor mother, whom I do not remember, 
 and her relations, whom I have never seen, 
 having been protestants, is enough to create a 
 strong prejudice against me; but you, I am 
 sure, are not so bigoted, and will not misun- 
 derstand me if I tell you that I object to Father 
 Girard as a confessor for Catherine on account 
 of his zeal. The good fathers who have until 
 now guided us, used all their efforts to maintain 
 my poor friend within the bounds of real piety, 
 and prevent her imagination from taking too 
 wild a flight. They thought of her happiness 
 and their duty only, and were not, like this 
 idol of the day, struggling for notoriety. I 
 hear that of him which convinces me he will 
 be but too glad to have such a disciple, and 
 will make of her an instrument for the ad- 
 vancement of his own vainglory and ambition. 
 But I am afraid," she added, hesitatingly, " you 
 will think it very bold in one so young, so in- 
 experienced, to advance such opinions." 
 
 Being reassured on this point, she continued.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 109 
 
 " Next to the danger of over-exciting a 
 young person so predisposed to religious enthu- 
 siasm as Catherine is, there will be another and 
 very serious evil attendant upon this. There 
 will arise among these young ladies an emula- 
 tion of holiness, a struggle to get furthest in the 
 esteem and good graces of their teacher, who 
 will know how to turn this rivalship to the 
 advantage of his reputation. His disciples will 
 no longer consider religion a duty, but desecrate 
 it into an occupation — an amusement to fill up 
 the void that must at times be felt in such a 
 quiet life as ours. The loftier feeling of religion 
 will be lost, in the hearts of many, amid its 
 grimaces." 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond had reached home 
 before my father could utter a reply; he would 
 have been puzzled, indeed, how to frame one — 
 and he felt grateful for the circumstance that 
 released him from the necessity of so doing. 
 He required time to think over all she had said, 
 and to reflect on the strong masculine good 
 sense she had that evening evinced. " If she 
 has not many of the graces of her sex," thought
 
 110 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 he, (l she has some of the qualities of ours — she 
 is sincere, clear-headed, and plain-spoken. The 
 very woman one would select for a friend." 
 
 From that hour dated a total revulsion of 
 feeling in favour of Mademoiselle Raymond. 
 When once a woman has honoured a man with 
 any portion of her confidence, however slight, 
 and finds that he respects it, from that time 
 forth he is no longer indifferent to her, and it is 
 his own fault if he do not improve the opening 
 thus afforded him. The evil spell that had 
 kept so long asunder two beings formed to 
 understand and appreciate each other was now 
 broken; and henceforth, whenever they met, 
 Eleonore and my father spoke freely and kindly 
 to each other. 
 
 The change which Eleonore had foretold, 
 took place more rapidly than either she or my 
 father expected, and extended even to the fami- 
 lies and friends of the young ladies. Through 
 its tender offshoots the wily Jesuit was regene- 
 rating the whole of the Toulonaise society, or 
 rather filling it with reports of his own fame. 
 
 None dreamed of noticing my father's growing
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. Ill 
 
 intimacy with Eleonore, so wrapt were they in 
 their new confessor. They talked of nothing 
 among themselves but his humility, his austerity, 
 his surpassing love of God, the severity with 
 which he scanned the consciences of others, the 
 hopes, the fears he knew so well how to 
 awaken; even Catherine's brothers could join 
 in these discourses, from which my father and 
 Eleonore only were excluded, knowing nothing 
 of the subject. It is incredible in how short a 
 time this want of sympathy estranged them 
 from her who had but lately prized them so 
 highly, and how much it threw in the back- 
 ground those who had hitherto played principal 
 parts in that limited circle. 
 
 What is stranger yet, is the deep pain this 
 circumstance caused my father, independently 
 of his attachment to Catherine. To understand 
 fully his feelings on this occasion, we must have 
 felt ourselves ousted out of our intimacies and 
 habits by a total stranger, who comes across us, 
 and everywhere fills our place. Eleonore bore 
 the growing coolness of her friend, and the 
 glances of suspicion and dislike cast askance at
 
 112 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 her by the others, with a stoical indifference, 
 which my father thought did more credit to her 
 nerves than her heart. 
 
 A change had, indeed, come over everybody. 
 Marie Langieres seemed, like Pygmalion's 
 statue, to have become animated under the 
 hands of Father Girard — and Mademoiselle 
 Guyol to forget her smiles and to learn the use 
 of frowns, for the advantage and better teaching 
 of the young aristocratic officers of the garrison, 
 whose nighty homage she had but lately re- 
 ceived with so much pleasure. Even Made- 
 moiselle La Rue forgot her ruling passion, and 
 spoke of the blessing of poverty, which gives a 
 meek spirit. As to the approaching nuptials of 
 some of the young ladies, it seemed that, by a 
 tacit understanding, a subject so full of levity 
 and worldliness was altogether to be eschewed. 
 They walked as though they dreaded the con- 
 tact of anything so material as earth, even with 
 the soles of their feet; and their eyes sought 
 the ground as if to avoid the subjects of scandal 
 with which the air around must be filled. Con- 
 fession, communion, and penance, employed all
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 113 
 
 their days — holy converse with each other their 
 evenings — and melancholy meditations their 
 nights. The great reform that the rector had 
 wrought in these lovely young pupils soon 
 became known, and his power in reclaiming and 
 purifying souls was the theme of every tongue. 
 
 The Jesuits deemed their triumph complete ; 
 but the Carmelites bided their time with that 
 quiet, untiring patience of which men of the 
 world cannot even form a conception; for it 
 requires the leisure of the cell or the solitary 
 closet to admit of the constant recurrence of 
 the same idea, and the tension of the mind on 
 one and the same point for any length of time. 
 Hence the patient, enduring resentment which 
 from time to time has been known to actuate 
 monks and prisoners — in short, all those 
 doomed to inactive, incomplete existences. 
 
 But of all the alterations produced by Father 
 Girard's arrival, none was so evident as that 
 wrought in Mademoiselle Cadieres. Every 
 time my father beheld her — and his opportuni- 
 ties for so doing were gradually curtailed — he 
 found her less like herself — the heroine of his
 
 114 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 first dream of love ; and yet, rapid as was the 
 process of the change he was watching with 
 such poignant regret, many months elapsed 
 before it was complete ; and he was compelled 
 to confess to his own heart the sad truth that 
 Catherine was, indeed, a new, but not an im- 
 proved being. 
 
 Her manner was strange and fantastic. 
 Whenever the subject mentioned before her 
 had no reference to religion, she either sat ab- 
 stracted, with folded hands and uplifted eyes, 
 the image of pious meditation, or testified, by 
 fretful tones, her impatience of the topic. In- 
 stead, however, of listening with lively interest 
 — as might naturally enough have been con- 
 cluded — when religious discourse was intro- 
 duced, she was restless and dissatisfied until 
 she had the lead in the conversation. Then 
 she would break out in the most flighty rhap- 
 sodies about visions and martyrdoms, saints and 
 devils, temptations and submissions ; in short, 
 her language was mystic and her ideas con- 
 fused. She assumed a loftiness, a triumph in 
 look, word, and action, that seemed plainly to
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 115 
 
 intimate her consciousness of angel wings fast 
 growing and spreading around her, shortly to 
 waft her to the world of fleecy clouds above, 
 which alone now filled her mind waking or 
 sleeping. Her feet scarcely touched the earth 
 when she walked; a painter must have been 
 struck with the light buoyancy of her figure 
 when in motion, so dreamy was its grace, and 
 he might have borrowed inspiration from the 
 heaven-wrapt expression of her countenance. 
 
 But how much soever a painter — especially 
 one who had an altar-piece on hand — might 
 have been delighted by a glimpse of the fair 
 devotee, in spite of the poetic grace this new 
 mood imparted to her loveliness, my father 
 remarked, with deep sorrow, that it invaded 
 every corner of her heart. Eleonore had pro- 
 phesied but too truly on every point. Not 
 only had the religious feelmgs of Mademoiselle 
 Cadieres ripened into enthusiasm, — always dan- 
 gerous in the young and the imaginative, and 
 most destructive to his own hopes and wishes, — 
 but, what grieved him yet more, the beautiful 
 purity and simplicity of her character was
 
 116 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 obviously undermined. Vanity had, indeed, 
 mingled with, and stained, every thought, every 
 feeling. 
 
 He might still have worshipped the saint, 
 even whilst renouncing all earthly commune 
 with her, and enshrined her within the niche 
 of remembrance as some vision of a better 
 world ; but there was in Catherine's sanctity 
 a spiritual pride, a mixture of Saint Theresa's 
 raptures, in their wild sincerity, with a desire 
 to unveil the mysteries of her heart to the 
 world, that it might be amazed and worship, 
 which, in itself, was sufficient to destroy the 
 illusion in one so clear-sighted as my father. 
 
 Perhaps he would have been more blind, had 
 his own feelings not been wounded, and his 
 pride hurt, by the growing and marked coolness 
 of Catherine, which extended even to her 
 once beloved Eleonore. She delighted now in 
 the society of none but those who, like herself 
 were under Father Girard's direction. The 
 intimacy of these young ladies, but lately dif- 
 fering so much from each other in temper, 
 taste, and prospects, was — to borrow their own
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 117 
 
 quaint, exaggerated style of expression — a bond 
 of union ; they were but as one in submission 
 and love to Heaven and Father Girard, and 
 through him, and with him, of Heaven's elect. 
 It was, indeed, clear enough to the meanest 
 comprehension, that he was the corner-stone of 
 this alliance ; for they met, as it seemed, merely 
 for the pleasure of talking of him, and spent 
 all their powers of figurative language in the 
 ever -renewed struggle of outstripping one 
 another in the most fulsome and extravagant 
 adulation of his sanctity. 
 
 If their evenings were thus devoted to kind 
 reminiscences of him who had so far succeeded 
 in insinuating himself into their good graces, 
 their days were no less so to his society ; and the 
 time he could consecrate to them within the pre- 
 cincts of the church not sufficing to the necessities 
 of their consciences, towards the close of the year 
 he began to attend some of them at their homes. 
 Mademoiselle Cadieres was not yet of the 
 number thus honoured — a circumstance which 
 appeared to mortify her not a little, although 
 her poor friend Mademoiselle Langieres' state of
 
 118 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 health, — so delicate as to cause the delay of 
 her marriage, — might well justify the preference 
 which, at this epoch, the reverend father testified 
 in her favour. 
 
 My father's visits at the Cadieres' were now 
 so evidently barely tolerated, not desired, by 
 any member of the family, that it required all 
 the fortitude of a lover to persevere in them. 
 But what would he not have borne, rather than 
 be altogether banished from his mistress's pre- 
 sence? Whilst all were thus occupied with 
 one object, and he was overlooked, if not for- 
 gotten, his only comfort was the society of 
 Mademoiselle Raymond. With her, at least, 
 he could talk of Catherine, abuse Father Gi- 
 rard, and dwell on his grievances, confident 
 in the luxury of a sympathizing listener — for a 
 change had also come over Eleonore, no less 
 advantageous to her, than that of Catherine was 
 the reverse. Her sternness and coldness had 
 gradually melted in their growing intimacy. 
 She proved herself a true friend in his afflic- 
 tion, cheering him to look forward with hope 
 to the future, infusing consolation for the pre-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 119 
 
 sent, palliating his mistress's folly, and, above 
 all, patiently repeating to him every particular 
 she could collect respecting her actual state of 
 mind, and the every-day occurrences of her life; 
 for she continued to love Catherine, — no longer, 
 indeed, for the affection she met with in return ; 
 not for the qualities her friend had gained or 
 lost ; but because where she had once placed her 
 affection she could not withdraw it : she could 
 overlook and forget everything but the fact that 
 they had once been friends, though she plainly 
 saw the time fast approaching, when, without 
 any fault of hers, that friendship would be 
 broken. 
 
 As my father discovered, one by one, the 
 sterling qualities of Eleonore's mind, his eye 
 learned to rest with complacency on her features, 
 which he sometimes wondered how he could 
 ever have thought so very plain. The evenings 
 he could no longer devote to Catherine might 
 have hung heavy on his hands, and the sudden 
 rupture of the bond of habit have added an 
 additional pang to those he already endured, 
 had not this fresh interest in life soothed, in
 
 120 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 some degree, the loss of the first and greatest 
 his existence had yet known. 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond's store of consolation, 
 however, diminished rapidly. Her bulletin of 
 Catherine's state of feelings grew every day 
 more alarming, so far, at least, as regarded my 
 father's chance of happiness, and — as both he 
 and Eleonore conceived it — of her own. 
 
 Her situation was, indeed, such as to warrant 
 some anxiety on the part of her friends. Father 
 Girard, forbidding all books but those which he 
 chose to denominate holy, had substituted for 
 light, moral essays, the dangerous romances of 
 the catholic religion. The imagination of poor 
 Catherine was fast ripening at the fires of Saint 
 Theresa's ecstasies of divine love, and Saint 
 Anthony's temptations in the desert — both 
 which, to the reflective mind, must appear but 
 the self-deceits of poor, erring mortals, who had 
 lost their path in life in seeking that to heaven. 
 Her mind, naturally weak, yielding, and affec- 
 tionate, requiring, to maintain its equilibrium, 
 a calm, serene state, was, by this constant effer- 
 vescence of thought, wearied beyond its power,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 121 
 
 and in danger of being destroyed altogether. 
 Already her health began to suffer from this 
 feverish excitement: her nights were restless, 
 or visited by the most appalling visions; and 
 her mother, so obtuse in the ordinary matters 
 of life, soon became painfully sensible, by the 
 state of her daughter's nerves, of the necessity 
 of medical assistance, and earnestly consulted 
 Father Girard on the subject. But the rector, 
 who saw, or pretended to see, in the altered 
 state, sinking frame, and disturbed slumbers of 
 his young penitent, nothing but the workings 
 of the Divine Spirit, strongly opposed the inter- 
 vention of an earthly power, proposed his own 
 aid, — a measure joyfully accepted, — and, finally, 
 established himself as a constant visitor at the 
 house of the Cadieres. 
 
 This step was decisive as to my father's foot- 
 ing in the family. The mother gave the final 
 blow to his still lingering hopes, which, she said, 
 Catherine herself would long since have done, 
 but for her innate dislike to wound the feelings 
 of another. It became incumbent on her, how- 
 ever, to speak, since Monsieur Chaudon ap- 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 122 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 peared so very insensible to the eloquence of 
 silence. She observed that, as Catherine was 
 decided never to marry, she felt it unjust to 
 herself as well as to him to continue to en- 
 courage attentions which could be of no use 
 to either party, and certainly gave no pleasure 
 to the receiver ; in short, maidenly modesty in 
 the daughter, and maternal prudence in the 
 mother, alike moved them to forbid his appear- 
 ance at their house for the future. 
 
 My father received his sentence of banish- 
 ment in the deepest silence, suffered no shadow 
 in his countenance to betray the inward pain, 
 but permitted Madame Cadieres, woman fashion, 
 to turn the dagger in the wound without 
 wincing. 
 
 " I really do not know, Monsieur Jules, on 
 whom you can now turn your eyes for a wife," 
 continued the loquacious lady ; " and yet it is 
 time a handsome young man like you, and one 
 of such promise, with such good prospects, 
 should think seriously of the matter. You 
 suffered Marie Langieres to slip through your 
 fingers. It is true, poor thing, she has no
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 123 
 
 health, and is obliged to put off her marriage 
 until, people say, her bridegroom has sworn 
 that if she makes him wait much longer, he will 
 cut the matter short by wedding another — 
 youth is so vain and impatient ! Then there's 
 Mademoiselle La Rue, who has just broken off 
 her marriage, and she did but what was right 
 and proper. Fancy that impious Monsieur 
 Renoir insisting on her giving up Father 
 Girard, and taking another confessor ! Shock- 
 ing, was it not ? — quite her duty to stand firm. 
 I would have proposed her to you, but then I 
 know that, like my Catherine, whom she 
 apes in all things, she objects to marriage 
 altogether." 
 
 Madame Cadieres, during the course of her 
 address, occasionally paused artfully in the vain 
 hope of hearing her auditor burst forth in some 
 assurances, that no female could be thought of 
 after her incomparable daughter ; but he would 
 not gratify so far the feminine and maternal 
 vanity that induced her thus heartlessly to probe 
 the bleeding wound. 
 
 " Well, then," she continued, with a look of 
 G 2
 
 124 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 evident disappointment, " there's Marie Guyol, 
 now she has turned off the officers that used to 
 swarm around her like so many troublesome 
 mosquitoes, — she might do very well. She has 
 no money, it is true — is, or rather was, a little 
 lightheaded, but Father Girard has put lead 
 enough in it by this time, I warrant you. He 
 would put some in an air balloon, and cause an 
 opera-dancer to repent, I verily believe. She 
 is a pretty girl, Marie Guyol !" Still my father 
 maintained his perverse silence. " There re- 
 mains, it is true, that half-pagan, half-heretic, 
 Mademoiselle Raymond," she continued, with a 
 frown, — " she has plenty of money to make one 
 forget her uncomeliness ; but ah ! what can 
 efface the uncomeliness of the heart that comes 
 not unto God ?" 
 
 " I thought Mademoiselle Raymond gave full 
 satisfaction to the directors of her conscience ?" 
 
 " The Fathers Carmelite ! Lukewarm drowsy 
 set, as they are — Catherine's soul languished 
 beneath their care, like a flower in the shade. 
 No warming up — no elevating — they understood 
 nothing, felt and saw nothing — they would
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 125 
 
 rather have turned away my Catherine from the 
 glorious path she is about to tread, than, like 
 Father Girard, borne her onward in it with a 
 mighty hand." 
 
 " I have no doubt," said my father, with a 
 bitterness he could not check, " that Made- 
 moiselle Cadieres will shortly stand forth as a 
 candidate for the honours of the calendar !" 
 
 " And you for the hand of Mademoiselle 
 Raymond, I doubt as little," answered Madame 
 Cadieres, with ill suppressed choler. 
 
 My father looked full in the lady's face, and 
 bowed. 
 
 This was too much for the mother's patience. 
 She had expected — nay, secretly delighted in 
 the idea of having to encounter a lover's ravings, 
 and, to her amazement, had to deal with a com- 
 posed, collected man, who did not put himself 
 at her mercy for one single instant. It is sur- 
 prising how much women participate, in their 
 dealings with men, in the feline propensity of 
 experiencing pleasure in inflicting a pang. I 
 mean, of course, in love matters, for in all others 
 I have ever known them compassionate and
 
 126 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 kind ; but this instinct of their nature is so 
 strong, that it dies but with them. The mother 
 still indulges in it by means of her daughter. 
 Yet, after all, it is but the promptings of an in- 
 nocent vanity. 
 
 Madame Cadieres was sadly hurt on this oc- 
 casion, for she had not discernment enough to 
 see beneath the surface. When my father took 
 leave, he uttered none but ordinary phrases, — 
 thanked her for past kindnesses, and for having 
 endured his society so long, — wished all happi- 
 ness, for the future, to herself and her fair 
 daughter, — was very sorry to have troubled her 
 with a love that had no merit but its sincerity, 
 and bowed himself out of the room with all the 
 grace he could assume. 
 
 Prepared as he was for this conclusion to the 
 early romance of his life, it caused him a shock, 
 and an exquisitely painful one. Not only had 
 he to lament the loss of a hope, too fondly 
 cherished, but also to regret ever having suffered 
 himself to be drawn into illusions, that evidently 
 never had the slightest foundation in reality. 
 The preference, the something more than 
 sisterly affection, he once imagined that Cathe-
 
 MAGIC AND MES3IERISM. 127 
 
 rine manifested in his favour in spite of her 
 own will, existed but in his fancy — Catherine 
 had not felt, could never feel for him. The 
 cold manner of his expulsion from the house — 
 a trial in itself, of which she must have been 
 conscious — not even softened by a word, a look, 
 a token of kindness or regret, certainly war- 
 ranted the supposition. My father owned to 
 me, that the first hours of his return home were 
 spent in unmitigated anguish, but having paid 
 this tribute to the weakness of his heart, he 
 struggled manfully against that morbidness of 
 feeling, which is so apt, in extreme youth, to 
 enervate its best powers, when it has to en- 
 counter disappointment. 
 
 One part of Madame Cadieres' conversation 
 had wounded him more than the rest, and seemed 
 to him particularly characteristic of that lady's 
 utter want of refinement and feeling. It was 
 her allusion to his union with Mademoiselle 
 Raymond. He was yet too young to know, 
 that those who are strangers to our own feel- 
 ings, — and who can read the human heart aright 
 but he who bade it beat ? — are apt to jump at 
 conclusions, which the natural course of events
 
 128 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 render probable — nay, almost unavoidable, but 
 which, at the moment they are broached, seem 
 to us, from our peculiar state of mind, at the 
 very antipodes of possibility, and we are in- 
 dignant at being foretold that, which it pleases 
 us not to think about ; but the experience of 
 riper years teaches us not only to bear this 
 handling of our finer feelings, but even to in- 
 flict it on ourselves. We have so often fancied 
 our sorrows eternal, and yet forgotten them, 
 that we willingly anticipate and permit others 
 to suggest to us those consolations which are 
 within our reach, and of which we arc not sorry, 
 in due time, to avail ourselves. For it is 
 another and no less approved truism, that en- 
 durance in woe is a luxury only sought and 
 yielded to by the extremely young in feeling ; 
 those whose hearts passion or the world has 
 tried, recoil from pain as from an old enemy, 
 whose might they have too cruelly experienced 
 to be willing to face again. Hence the callous- 
 ness of age. But I am again at my old trick 
 of steering wide of my subject. 
 
 Although offended at what he conceived to
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 129 
 
 be a gross insinuation under the circumstances, 
 my father was not childish enough to give up an 
 intimacy which suited him, merely to prove the 
 falsehood of the lady's suggestion, the more 
 especially that he cared but little what she 
 thought, and was but too painfully convinced that 
 Catherine never gave herself the trouble of 
 thinking about it all, or indeed anything else 
 concerning him. On the other hand, he was 
 not disposed to do anything whatsoever out of 
 pique, or to make a silly parade of an indiffer- 
 ence he did not feel; he therefore remained 
 on precisely the same footing with Eleonore as 
 before. 
 
 I am afraid I have made use of a great many 
 words to explain a fact, which but a few would 
 have sufficed to establish — namely, that there 
 was in my father's character a manliness which 
 even at this early period of his life displayed 
 itself in every point of his conduct. He bore his 
 sorrow well — denied it to none, but obtruded it 
 on no one ; he felt no resentment against Cathe- 
 rine or her family, for his sound understanding 
 told him he had no reason to feel any. They 
 g 3
 
 130 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 had never deluded him with false hopes — their 
 conduct had been strictly honourable, from first 
 to last; but, at the same time that he acquitted 
 them of injustice towards himself, he gave up, at 
 once and for ever, all idea of possessing Cathe- 
 rine, plainly perceiving that they were not suited 
 for each other, and that happiness, even should 
 unforeseen circumstances prove eventually fa- 
 vourable to its completion, could never attend 
 their union. 
 
 From this time forth my father devoted the 
 energies of his mind to the career he had em- 
 braced, and all his leisure hours to Mademoiselle 
 Raymond, whose strong mind could fully under- 
 stand and cope with his, although she had not 
 disrobed it of those gentle sympathies which 
 make the society of women, especially under 
 affliction, so attractive. She also was soon given 
 to understand by Catherine, that her friendship 
 was one of those earthly pleasures which it was 
 incumbent upon her to resign, as interfering 
 too much with her religious duties. Had 
 Eleonore followed the same course with her- 
 self—nay, if even at that late hour, for Cathe- 
 rine's sake, she would put her conscience under
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 131 
 
 the guidance of Father Girard, then indeed they 
 might remain to each other what they had ever 
 been ; otherwise, it would be a great trial, but 
 one that God would give her strength to bear, 
 they must not meet again. In short, she sacri- 
 ficed Eleonore without much scruple ; but it is 
 fair to state, that the latter renounced her most 
 unhesitatingly, rather than enlist herself among 
 the Jesuit's fanatical worshippers. 
 
 " This rupture between us may, perhaps, 
 hereafter conduce to Catherine's benefit," said 
 Mademoiselle Raymond, when communicating 
 this new caprice to my father. " She will one 
 day come back to me, when I may even turn 
 this breach to account in making conditions, 
 perhaps, in your favour." 
 
 " Not in mine," he replied. " I have ceased 
 to hope, and even to wish anything connected 
 with Mademoiselle Cadieres. Her happiness 
 is, and ever will remain, a subject of deep 
 interest to me; and should it at any time lie 
 in my power to serve her, I shall not neglect 
 the opportunity : love, such as I have felt, may 
 be overcome, but never forgotten." 
 
 " She bade me tell you she would remember
 
 132 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 you in her prayers," said Mademoiselle Ray- 
 mond ; " and I still persevere in believing that, 
 but for Father Girard, she would ultimately 
 have yielded to your wishes." 
 
 " It is better thus," said my father — and what 
 he said he thought — " far better thus, at least 
 for myself, if not for her." 
 
 He inquired then, with some curiosity, what 
 spell could possibly have been exercised over 
 the female imagination, by one whose austere 
 bearing, and still more austere language, seemed 
 but little calculated to make amends for his un- 
 gainliness of person ; and by what means so ill- 
 endowed an individual as Father Girard had 
 contrived to revolutionize the whole existence of 
 those who had been drawn within his circle. 
 
 His very austerity, she said, was, to many 
 women, a charm. Their weakness required a 
 stay, which his severity afforded ; their self- 
 love was flattered by the importance which he 
 attached to every trifle connected with his peni- 
 tents ; . there was a species of voluptuousness in 
 this petty sinning, constant reproof, performance 
 of daily penances, and the necessity of satis-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 133 
 
 tying his exalted notions of righteousness. It 
 was a perpetual excitement, which chased away 
 all languor from the mind, and kept it in un- 
 wearied exercise. The divine love, in short, 
 as taught by Father Girard, had in some sort 
 the advantage of an earthly one. It kept its 
 votaries awake. 
 
 One of his fair penitents, however, already 
 began to find all this flurry a bore rather than 
 a pleasure. This was Marie Langieres. Her 
 inclination, indeed, for the rector — enthusiasm, 
 her torpid temperament prevented her feeling 
 for any one — had been on the wane at an early 
 epoch of their acquaintance ; for her very nature 
 revolted against the excitement that fascinated 
 others, and which had acted so perniciously on 
 her health, as to cause the breaking off of the 
 brilliant marriage she had been on the eve of 
 accomplishing ; nor could she help entertaining 
 some resentment against Father Girard — the 
 author, as she conceived it, of her disappoint* 
 ment. Something of this sentiment had already 
 transpired before Eleonore, who determined to 
 avail herself of it, in order to be the better au
 
 134 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 courant as to what was passing among the 
 Jesuit's votaries. 
 
 About this time, my father and Mademoiselle 
 Cadieres began to excite much of the public 
 attention, and that in a manner the most flat- 
 tering to the views of both. He, young as he 
 was, had so distinguished himself by arduous 
 study and close attention to his profession, that 
 he was entrusted with a cause of some note 
 and difficulty. The brilliant style in which he 
 won it, and that when opposed to one of the 
 shrewdest and ablest lawyers of the time, made 
 a great sensation. The powers of his mind now 
 ripened and developed themselves under the 
 sunny influence of public approbation and ap- 
 plause ; and it soon became evident, that his pro- 
 gress in the honourable profession to which he 
 belonged would be attended with no ordinary 
 success. His parents were proud of the uni- 
 versal praise he elicited. Eleonore warmly con- 
 gratulated him; but where was the sympathy 
 of her at whose feet he would have laid his 
 budding laurels ? All engrossed with self, as he 
 had but too much reason to know.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 135 
 
 Her sanctity was now as much the theme of 
 conversation as her beauty had lately been, and 
 her sayings and doings scarcely occupied the 
 public less than those of Father Girard himself; 
 nay, as Mademoiselle Raymond had foreseen, 
 they even added lustre to his celebrity. The 
 singular fact of her confessing and taking the 
 sacrament daily was obviously, the people said, 
 a proof of a spirit peculiarly holy, whose spi- 
 ritual necessities were different from those of 
 less gifted mortals, or the priest would not 
 grant such out of the way privileges. 
 
 Her visions, too, and celestial colloquies, were 
 much talked of — all crowded the Jesuits' church 
 to obtain a glimpse of this beautiful and holy 
 maid; and Father Girard's reputation spread 
 like a mighty shadow, veiling completely the 
 radiance of Mount Carmel — at least, in Tou- 
 lon. 
 
 Now that they were full blown, the Jesuits 
 wore not their laurels meekly. Under their 
 rector's guidance, saints and angels were trained 
 for the use of heaven, and the edification of the 
 world. Surely, few communities could boast so
 
 136 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 many. Eleonore had been right in predicting 
 that Catherine would become the mere instru- 
 ment of party spirit and personal vanity. What 
 mattered it to the Jesuits in general, or to Father 
 Girard in particular, that her future prospects 
 were blasted by the errors of her judgment, at 
 the very period of woman's life when she has 
 to decide for its weal or its woe ? What mat- 
 tered it that her health gave way under the 
 weight of emotions she had not the strength 
 to bear ? What was she in the eyes of an am- 
 bitious priest, when weighed in the balance 
 with the furtherance of his own private views 
 of elevation ? 
 
 " We shall live to see Father Girard a car- 
 dinal, and Catherine a canonized saint; and 
 saints are never calendared until after death," 
 said Eleonore one day to my father, who an- 
 swered but by a sigh. 
 
 Thus had they each entered on a separate 
 path of life who, a few short months before, 
 it was but natural to suppose were destined to 
 end their days together. 
 
 There was now no pause in my father's
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 237 
 
 career. Not willing, like many young men, 
 vain of a day's applause, to rest after his first 
 success, he progressed steadfastly upwards — ■ 
 mounting, step by step, the weary ascent; 
 never pausing to take breath, nor turning 
 round to admire the prospect, but keeping his 
 final aim, and nothing but that, in view, he 
 slowly but unerringly neared the goal of for- 
 tune. Poor Catherine, too, held on her course ; 
 from visions she passed to miracles, and grew 
 with every day more sick, and more saintly, 
 drawing towards her all the praise the town 
 could spare from Father Girard. 
 
 Though not her equals in sanctity or in repu- 
 tation, nor such favourites of Heaven or Heaven's 
 interpreter at Toulon, as Father Girard styled 
 himself, the health of his other disciples grew 
 every day more precarious. This was more par- 
 ticularly the case with Marie Langieres. Roused 
 from the natural sloth of her disposition, it was 
 not to a pleasing animation, but to a state of 
 nervous irritability, so strong as to render it 
 impossible to behold her without dreading its 
 consequences upon her reason, which, Eleonore
 
 138 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 thought, was already tottering on its throne. 
 This belief she grounded on a circumstance, 
 certainly of a nature calculated to suggest it: 
 her former disinclination to her confessor had 
 ripened into a most vehement antipathy; no 
 expression of vituperation seemed of sufficient 
 force to gratify this apparently insane hatred — 
 for she could assign no motive for it, and yet 
 she could not live out of his presence. So irre- 
 sistible indeed had this feeling become, that 
 when he could not come to her, she sought 
 him out, wherever he might happen to be at 
 the time. She strove neither to conceal nor 
 palliate this glaring contradiction — inexplicable, 
 indeed, except by the adoption of Eleonore's 
 supposition. 
 
 Upon hearing these evil tidings, my father 
 became seriously alarmed about Catherine ; he 
 was not, however, without some hope that she 
 too might experience a portion of that young 
 lady's feelings of repulsion for Father Girard, a 
 sentiment which he would have hailed with de- 
 light, as the first step towards a more happy 
 and healthy tone of mind. He therefore en-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 139 
 
 treated Eleonore to forgive and forget the 
 unkind and unjust treatment she had met with 
 on the part of her friend, and endeavour to see 
 her at this crisis, when the renewal of their 
 former intimacy might prove so useful to poor 
 Catherine, and sympathy for her failing health 
 afford so natural a pretext for making up the 
 breach between them which had now subsisted 
 for more than a year. 
 
 Eleonore shared my father's feelings ; for her 
 interest in the poor recluse was still, like his 
 love, glowing beneath the embers. She, there- 
 fore, willingly promised to comply with his 
 request. 
 
 " And what message am I to bear from you ?" 
 said she, with a smile. 
 
 i( None !" was my father's prompt and decided 
 answer. " To me she can never be anything 
 more than a cherished remembrance of the past. 
 When once rudely awakened from his dream, 
 the slumberer can seldom resume it ; so is it 
 with that of love. I have been aroused from 
 my sweet dream, and I would not, if I could,
 
 140 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 Eleonore's account of her visit to Catherine 
 astonished and perplexed my father not a little 
 at the time. He could not understand or fathom, 
 any more than Eleonore herself, the pheno- 
 menon she described ; nor was it until Mesmer 
 had revived the science of animal magnetism 
 among the studious, and revealed it to the idle 
 vulgar, that my father fancied he had at last 
 obtained the key to the mysteries which, for so 
 many years, baffled his ingenuity. That I have 
 adopted his view of the subject is but natural, 
 considering by whom the tale was told, and the 
 manner in which it was represented to me at an 
 age when impressions are most easily received 
 and retained. The bent of my mind, too, — 
 the systems and studies I afterwards adopted, 
 confirmed me, at a later period, in the opinion 
 thus early formed. It is for you, unbiassed as 
 you are by all such circumstances, to account 
 for the strange facts I am now about to relate, 
 if you can, in another and a more satisfactory 
 manner. 
 
 Eleonore found less trouble in gaining admit- 
 tance to Catheriue than she had expected,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 141 
 
 every one being from home at the time of her 
 visit except Mademoiselle Cadieres, whom ill 
 health kept confined, not only to the house, but 
 to her room. Upon hearing she was alone, 
 Eleonore unhesitatingly took her way to the 
 well-known little chamber where they had spent 
 so many happy hours together. 
 
 Catherine was reclining, listlessly, on a couch, 
 her head propped up by a deep crimson cushion, 
 which, by its harsh contrast, caused the paleness 
 of her features to be more apparent. At the 
 slight noise caused by Eleonore's entrance she 
 started up in nervous alarm, and on perceiving 
 who was the intruder on her solitude, she be- 
 came yet more agitated. Uncertainty, hesi- 
 tation, a sort of reluctant shame, seemed to 
 overwhelm her ; but when Eleonore approached 
 with open arms, she threw herself into them, 
 and sobbed aloud on her bosom. Mademoiselle 
 Raymond gently led her back to the couch, sat 
 by her side, and still retaining her hand in 
 hers, with the other stroked down her hair with 
 a soothing fondness. Her manner was im- 
 pressed with an eloquence that needed no
 
 142 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 words ; Catherine evidently felt and understood 
 it, for when she could control the vehemence 
 of her first emotion, she said, in a tone of 
 gentle reproach — 
 
 " Oh ! Eleonore, why did you leave me for 
 so long, or ever ?" 
 
 " One word of recal would, long ere this, 
 have brought me to your side," said Eleonore. 
 " Why did you not speak it sooner ?" 
 
 " Oh ! but you know not, you cannot know 
 how wretched, how miserable I have been — we 
 have all been — how unhappy I now am — you 
 have come too late, Eleonore !" 
 
 " Hush, Catherine ! Do not as usual fly 
 into extremes, errors may be repented of and 
 repaired, Father Girard dismissed, and Jules 
 Chaudon recalled. Open your heart to me, 
 Catherine, without reserve ; I am still, as ever, 
 disposed to do you what service I may." 
 
 " I have not deserved this, Eleonore," said 
 Catherine, again throwing herself on her friend's 
 neck, and indulging in an excess of feeling, 
 which, as such exhibitions were most foreign 
 and uncongenial to Mademoiselle Raymond's
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 143 
 
 nature, at once surprised and embarrassed her. 
 She attributed this lively display of sorrow, in 
 one of Catherine's susceptible temperament, to 
 remorse for having severed herself from those 
 whom she truly loved, under the passing influ- 
 ence of an utter stranger, and began to ad- 
 minister consolations on that head, by assuring 
 her that she had grieved, but not alienated, 
 their affections ; but her kind words seemed 
 rather to irritate than soothe the still weeping 
 Catherine. 
 
 u Oh ! it is not that !" she impatiently ex- 
 claimed — " not that which torments me — not of 
 that I would speak ! Had I but followed your 
 advice from the first, and never come near that 
 man, or that you had never left me !" 
 
 " It was not my choice," gently remonstrated 
 Eleonore ; " you must not forget that. But 
 why recur to the past, which is every way so 
 painful, since you are again the same dear 
 Catherine as ever, and see things as you were 
 wont to do ? It only requires a little self- 
 exertion to throw off your new habits of 
 thought and feelings, and to resume your 
 former ones. Leave Father Girard !"
 
 144 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " Speak not of it," was the hurried reply. 
 " It is impossible, or I had long since thrown him 
 off. But I cannot. No ! anything but that /" 
 
 " So says Marie Langieres, and yet she hates 
 him." 
 
 " Yes ; it is the same with us all, more or 
 less. Eleonore, he is a terrible man. You don't 
 know his power ; you do not dream of it — you 
 who never were exposed to its influence. If 
 you were always there by my side — with your 
 hand on my burning head, and with those calm, 
 penetrating eyes fixed on mine, as now, — always 
 thus, then perhaps I might free myself from 
 him, from every thrall !" 
 
 " My poor Catherine, your mind wanders !" 
 exclaimed her friend, for a moment thrown off 
 her guard ; then, reassuming as naturally as she 
 could the cold severe tone she had always found 
 from experience to soothe best any casual 
 irritation in her friend, she said : — " Come 
 Catherine — you must exert your reason, and not 
 give way in this childish manner — you know I 
 cannot abide it. Come, tell me, as rationally as 
 you can, all about Father Girard and yourself, 
 from beginning to end."
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 145 
 
 " I will obey you/' said Catherine in a calmer 
 tone, whilst a sudden and striking change came 
 over her features, which had assumed a more 
 languid expression as Eleonore's manner softened. 
 u Suffer your hand to rest on my brow, as you 
 did before, nothing clears my ideas better — so — 
 that's right — my other hand in yours. Oh • 
 had you never left me, Eleonore, it had perhaps 
 fared better with me. I see you are impatient 
 that I should proceed, and yet I scarcely know 
 how to do so ; all is confusion in my brain — dis- 
 cord in my heart. Sometimes I think Father 
 Girard the best, the most holy of men, and 
 myself a wretch to doubt him ; at other times, 
 I see in him but the vilest and worst of mankind. 
 It has ever been thus with me, since I first 
 knew him. I have lost all power of discrimi- 
 nation — I had almost said of thought ; but, no, 
 that is my misfortune ; I still think, and that, too, 
 differently from him ; but this is only when he is 
 away. When he is present, I am his slave — 
 enthralled by his will, even when it is most 
 opposed to mine. I sometimes cannot help 
 fancying that he has bound me by some power- 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 146 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 ful, unhallowed spell, which I vainly struggle to 
 break, — at others, I again believe him sent to me 
 by Heaven, on a special mission of grace ; and 
 my sufferings, whether in body or mind, a most 
 signal favour. Then I accuse myself of faint- 
 heartedness in not being able to bear up against 
 them, and weep over my own frailty of purpose, 
 and the weakness that makes me rebel against 
 the will of Heaven and unworthy of the trials 
 which are awarded me." 
 
 " But of what trials are you speaking ?" 
 inquired Eleonore, with some curiosity. " Do 
 you mean the regret you feel, at having per- 
 mitted a comparative stranger to exercise an 
 undue influence over your mind, and cause an 
 estrangement between you and those who most 
 cherished you ? That, indeed, has been a trial 
 to others as well as to you !" 
 
 " That, it is true, has cost me many a sleep- 
 less night — many a tearful day," said Catherine. 
 " The struggle between the impulses of my 
 heart and what I conceived to be a duty was a 
 severe one. He bade me discard you from my 
 thoughts, but this I could not do, and when left
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 147 
 
 to myself, loved you as much as ever. Thus 
 has it been with almost every object of former 
 affection or preference— nay, even with every 
 matter of opinion — until all my notions of right 
 and wrong are confused — and sometimes I feel 
 exalted in my own opinion and the next instant 
 humbled to the very dust ; for he has taught 
 me the holiness of self-abasement — the necessity 
 of sinning in order to repent — of yielding in 
 all things to the will of Heaven, blindly, 
 darkly, with the heart, not with the under- 
 standing." 
 
 " And he, I suppose," said Eleonore, with a 
 flashing eye and contracted brow — " he is the 
 oracle of that will ?" 
 
 " Not he alone, he merely expounds it — it is 
 revealed to me in visions, in ecstasies, and the 
 palpable signs of these supernatural communions 
 remain with me !" 
 
 " The palpable signs ? — I don't understand 
 you !" said the amazed listener. 
 
 " Yes, I can shew them to you as I have to my 
 mother and brothers. Look here !" and, removing 
 the hair that clustered over her brow and neck, 
 H 2
 
 148 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 she exposed to view some rather severe and but 
 recently healed wounds. 
 
 Eleonore was mute with surprise. 
 
 " Yes," continued Catherine, "these are the 
 inflictions, with which the devils are permitted 
 to visit me, during my trances ; but do not 
 look so shocked, there is more fear than pain 
 attending them — my soul alone is conscious at 
 such times, my body lies in a state of torpor 
 that deadens feeling. 
 
 " This is passing strange,*'' said Mademoiselle 
 Raymond as she closely examined the marks 
 thus subjected to her observation. " These are 
 but too real, and cannot well have been self- 
 inflicted, even in the worst fit of 1 — of " 
 
 " Insanity, you would say," added Catherine, 
 with a mournful smile ; " I am not insane — but, 
 oh ! I often dread becoming so !" 
 
 " Do these fits — these trances, come over you 
 by day or by night ?" 
 
 " Both ; they sometimes rouse me from my 
 sleep, but, strange to say, it is but to another 
 sort of slumber — a numbness steals over my 
 frame whilst my mind wakens to activity."
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 149 
 
 "You describe but the state of dreaming, 
 which is common to all," remarked Eleonore. 
 
 " Ay," resumed her companion ; " but dreams 
 do not extend to the waking moments. This 
 phenomenon overtakes me when I least expect 
 it — whilst talking or walking — even at meals." 
 
 u I have read of people being drugged into a 
 forced sleep," said Eleonore, thoughtfully. 
 
 " But Father Girard gives me nothing, nor is 
 he always present at such times. When he is, 
 my slumber is more peaceful, and I feel more 
 tranquil on waking. In his absence, the fits are 
 torture, and on their leaving me I am totally ex- 
 hausted." 
 
 "If you do not attribute these accidents to 
 Father Girard, how do you account for them 
 unto yourself and others," demanded Eleonore, 
 who was desirous to sift the matter to the 
 bottom, and to probe her friend's feelings to the 
 uttermost, before venturing on advice, or even 
 on conclusions. 
 
 " Why, I have already told you, I sometimes 
 fancy he has charmed me ; but am more often 
 inclined to think myself, like Saint Theresa, one
 
 150 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 of those elected to suffer and to love, and unto 
 whom mysteries are revealed in visions — through 
 whom and upon whom miracles are wrought." 
 
 " This is a most extraordinary delusion," ob- 
 served Eleonore, carried away by the feeling of 
 the moment beyond the reserve which it was 
 her desire to maintain until the close of the 
 conference. 
 
 " It is, perhaps, natural you should think so, 
 to whom nothing has been revealed," said her 
 friend, with a slight shade of hauteur. " But 
 from earliest childhood I was unlike others, 
 and I believe destined to higher things : and I 
 cannot but believe that Father Girard has been 
 especially appointed to guide me in the path 
 which I should tread/' 
 
 " Fatal error !" burst involuntarily from Eleo- 
 nore's lips. " And bethink you, Catherine, if it 
 be an error, it may cost you dear " 
 
 " If it be an error ! ay, indeed, Eleonore ! 
 the thought were madness — but no ! it cannot 
 be — I will not believe it. Listen to facts : I 
 know nothing else will have any weight with 
 you ; but surely to them you must yield belief,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 151 
 
 even whilst they, perhaps, exceed your compre- 
 hension. Led away by your views and opinions, 
 and those of my ordinary associates, I was 
 beginning to yield to them in all things ; my 
 yearnings after higher things gradually di- 
 minished — my fervour of piety was cooling, and 
 my soul became more alive to earthly objects." 
 As she spoke these words, a slight flush crim- 
 soned her cheek. " At this juncture, Father 
 Girard appeared on the scene. You cannot 
 but remember the mysterious circumstance that 
 first attracted me more particularly towards 
 him?" 
 
 A mournful expression pervaded the features 
 of Eleonore, but she carefully abstained from 
 breaking the thread of her friend's narrative. 
 
 "As you well know, until that moment," 
 continued Catherine, " strange to say, his elo- 
 quence, the theme of the world's praise, was 
 quite thrown away upon me — I did not always 
 understand it ; and when I did, his sentiments 
 failed to strike me as particularly beautiful ; at 
 any rate, that had no effect upon me ; nor had, 
 I am ashamed to confess, his extraordinary de-
 
 152 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 votion. On the contrary, an unnameable, un- 
 accountable feeling of repulsion at times pos- 
 sessed me, which I could with difficulty control. 
 Well, this was again counteracted by his alter- 
 nate severity and praise. Thus, even whilst 
 secretly disliking him personally, I derived 
 great benefit from his spiritual guidance. It is 
 remarkable that Marie Langieres, Anne Guyol, 
 and all his penitents, have felt exactly like me 
 in this respect. The bright side of my ex- 
 istence— I may even call it its glorious sunshine — 
 was the hope I entertained of treading in the 
 footsteps of the blessed virgins who adorn our 
 church. He taught me to believe myself called 
 to the same path as that of my holy patroness, 
 sweet St. Catherine of Sienna. All the bright 
 dreams of my childhood came back to my heart 
 with renewed freshness. I was like one sud- 
 denly transported to the summit of a high 
 mountain, whence the eye could bathe itself in 
 the blue of the heavens, the green of the valleys, 
 the radiance of die setting sun. I looked be- 
 yond the very heavens, and I was proud and 
 very happy. My mother and brothers also
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 153 
 
 encouraged me in my new vocation, to the 
 utmost of their power. They already saw the 
 halo of canonization encircling my brow ; but 
 we were all too vainglorious — I especially. In 
 vain did Father Girard warn me of the dangers 
 of this self-exaltation ; nothing could damp my 
 glowing ardour; the warning was overlooked, 
 but the punishment was not long in overtaking 
 the fault. One day — I had already been a 
 whole year under his care — he breathed gently 
 on my brow, and looked full into my eyes as he 
 did so. From that hour I have been his slave. 
 He often repeated this form, and each time it 
 drew the chain tighter that bound me to him, 
 until I had no will but his. I could neither 
 act nor feel as I pleased, nor even think. Thus 
 I became, if I may so express it, estranged 
 from my own self. Oh ! — but you cannot un- 
 derstand me — indeed, how should you, I cannot 
 myself, — this perpetual struggle between my 
 own will and that of another, gliding into my 
 very being, was the dark side of that period of 
 my existence. At last, you and Chaudon were 
 excluded from our house ; and since then, how 
 h 3
 
 154 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 ever great have been my mental sufferings in 
 consequence of that event, Father Girard at 
 least has no longer tormented me on the sub- 
 ject. I had already had many visions of a 
 mystic and holy character, all of a nature to 
 natter my inordinate vanity ; but now came one 
 predicted by Father Girard, in which I was 
 told I should be possessed for more than a year 
 by evil spirits, to whom the power of torment- 
 ing me should be given, in order that a soul in 
 much pain should be freed from purgatory. 
 From that time, my trances have changed their 
 heavenly form — foul fiends have haunted me 
 under every shape, and burnt wounds into my 
 flesh, which, upon waking, I still found there. 
 Father Girard told me this was necessary to my 
 soul's weal and to the perfection of my charac- 
 ter, as well as implicit blind obedience to him 
 in all things. All this have I undergone ; but 
 I have suffered in body and mind enough to 
 win the crown of martyrdom ; my health is, 
 indeed, so impaired, that I could no longer 
 either confess or take the communion, if it 
 were not that Father Girard attends me daily
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 155 
 
 at home, as he has done his other penitents 
 when indisposed." 
 
 " But," said Eleonore, " is it not a profanation 
 to perform such sacred duties daily ? You can- 
 not always be in a suitable frame of mind." 
 
 " I cannot explain all that," answered Cathe- 
 rine, looking embarrassed, "but Father Girard 
 does, and very clearly, too." 
 
 " Then, I am to understand," said Eleonore, 
 " that you are as convinced as himself of the 
 merit — the necessity of this abuse of things 
 most sacred. Unbosom yourself to me, dear 
 girl, without restraint." 
 
 " And so I do, Eleonore, you have there 
 probed the sore to the quick. I should agree 
 with you were I to follow my own weak and 
 wicked thoughts: but Father Girard must 
 know best. He has also forbidden me prayer ; 
 saying, that it is not an efficient means of 
 binding myself to God — that has cost me the 
 severest pang of all. But since I have fallen 
 into the power of the spirits of darkness, I can 
 no longer pray, even when I feel most the 
 necessity for so doing. There is a moral
 
 156 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 impossibility, a clog on my thoughts, a seal on 
 my lips, which all the warm impulses of my 
 heart, and even the force of habit, are inade- 
 quate to vanquish. This is one of my greatest 
 torments, which I am sure you, who knew me 
 when the outpourings of my spirit flowed as 
 freely from my lips as water from its source, 
 will be well able to imagine." 
 
 " There may be a remedy to all this," said 
 Eleonore, thoughtfully. " Have you thought 
 of none?" 
 
 " Exorcism might afford a relief to my soul, 
 and a physician to my enfeebled frame ; but it 
 is for my own future weal and glory that all 
 this should be unflinchingly borne. How high 
 the price at which both are bought, none shall 
 ever know but myself. Oh ! Eleonore, con- 
 ceive, if you can, what are my feelings ; when, 
 in spite of all that he can say, I sometimes 
 doubt if my path is a right one — dread that I 
 am altogether misguided — that Father Girard is 
 the only evil spirit which torments me ! When 
 that idea crosses my brain, I am for hours the 
 prey to despairing regrets and the bitterest
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 157 
 
 remorse. Then he comes and talks me over, 
 or barely looks at me — for he reads my thoughts 
 at a glance — and I repent my miserable guilty 
 doubts, so that my soul is ever dark and trou- 
 bled as the most tempestuous night." 
 
 " It was once clear as a summer morning," 
 said Eleonore, spiritedly, " why should not the 
 mists that obscure it clear up again ? If you 
 would but trust in my advice, as you once did, 
 perhaps all might yet be well." 
 
 " How ? What would you advise ?" said 
 Catherine, looking up into her friend's face, 
 with renovated hope lighting up her wasted 
 features, as a ray of autumn's paly sun is often 
 seen to play on a sickly flower. 
 
 Eleonore paused in doubt how to proceed. 
 Should she discuss the character of the director 
 with his half-enlightened proselyte, and endea- 
 vour to convince her of the absurdity and 
 villany of which she believed her the victim ? 
 or had she better trace out a plan for the future, 
 without attempting to throw too much light 
 upon the past ? A two-fold reason induced her 
 to determine upon adopting the latter measure.
 
 158 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 Iii the first place, she could come to no clear 
 understanding of the means and ultimate plans 
 of the Jesuit; and, secondly, the little light that 
 glimmered forth from the darkness was not of a 
 nature calculated to suit the capacity of her 
 friend; for Eleonore, tenderly as she was 
 attached to Catherine, was perfectly aware of 
 her own great superiority in intellect. 
 
 " Well, Catherine, if you really wish for 
 advice, listen to mine, which I am willing to 
 support by every means in my power. I have 
 friends in Paris, I shall go and visit them ; you, 
 under pretence of seeking to benefit your 
 health by change of scene, will accompany me. 
 Father Girard cannot pursue you thither ; and 
 you will there find more consoling and gentle 
 guides, that will soon quiet your alarmed and 
 disturbed conscience. Other objects, too, will 
 divert your mind from its present painful ten- 
 sion. Nerve yourself but with the courage 
 necessary to break your present fetters, and 
 time and I will contrive to smoothe your way 
 before you." 
 
 " Never — never !" answered Mademoiselle
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 159 
 
 Cadieres, despondingly ; u you cannot do that, 
 Eleonore ; no one can. Is Monsieur Chaudon 
 going to Paris ?" she demanded, with a sudden 
 revulsion of feeling. " Has he put you up to 
 counsel this ? You are silent, Eleonore ; you 
 fear, perhaps, I shall dislike the measure on 
 that account ; but it is a mistake, I assure you. 
 Pray tell me, does he wish to see me, too ?" 
 
 " I will be quite frank with you, Catherine, 
 as I always am when aught is demanded of me. 
 Jules Chaudon has loved you with a love such 
 as it is seldom woman's lot to inspire — so deep, 
 pure, and sincere." She paused, and fancied her 
 friend breathed an audible sigh. "His is a 
 noble heart," she continued, " and a gift which 
 I fancy few would have rejected as carelessly as 
 you did. He suffered much ; a thousand times 
 more than he would have cared to avow to any 
 living creature." 
 
 The subdued, timid, almost deferential ex- 
 pression that had pervaded the manner and look 
 of Catherine up to this point of the conversa- 
 tion, suddenly gave way to one of another 
 character; she seemed not unlike a startled
 
 160 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 courser, unrestrained by bit and bridle, about 
 to spring forward on his mad career. Eleonore's 
 self-possession wavered before the wildness of 
 her gaze, and she could not repress an excla 
 mation of alarm. 
 
 " Oh, yes ; you think me insane, and are 
 more than half afraid of me," said Catherine, 
 with a strange irritability ; " but I care not what 
 you think !" 
 
 " But, dearest Catherine, why fly out thus at 
 me for a thought I have never expressed." 
 
 " Oh ! because I saw you think it." 
 
 This answer somewhat startled Mademoiselle 
 Raymond, who was not pleased- that Catherine, 
 contrary to her wont, possessed sufficient dis- 
 cernment to read her unspoken thoughts ; 
 justly displeased, too, with the acerbity of her 
 manner, she involuntarily assumed a sterner 
 air. 
 
 " I have then been mistaken," she said, coolly, 
 drawing herself up to her full height, as she rose 
 from the couch. " I was induced, by the first 
 glow of your welcome, to believe that it was 
 sincere, and that your feelings were unchanged,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 161 
 
 at least towards me. I see my error ; for had 
 it been so, you could have declined my advice 
 without rudeness or scorn. I perceive you 
 neither know your own mind, nor can appre- 
 ciate mine ; so I had better leave you, until it 
 is your pleasure to recal me." 
 
 " Do not part thus, dear, dear Eleonore," ex- 
 claimed Catherine, tenderly, throwing her arms 
 around her ; i( I will do and say whatever you 
 please. Do not look thus angrily at me, I im- 
 plore you ; your love is all that remains to me 
 of the happy past — do not withdraw that which 
 youhave but so lately restored to me." 
 
 " If this be your wish, Catherine, then try to 
 be more consistent in your conduct." 
 
 "I cannot; it is not my fault. I am very 
 sorry, and very, very ill, Eleonore, — far more 
 so than you or any one else can imagine ;" and 
 again the poor girl hid her pale face in the 
 bosom of her friend, and gave vent to her agita- 
 tion in a succession of hysterical sobs. 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond, in spite of her usual 
 clearness and rapidity of judgment, was com- 
 pletely at fault, at this moment, what to say or
 
 162 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 do, or even to think. A few hours of undis- 
 turbed meditation were necessary to enable her 
 to collect herself, and to decide upon the course 
 of conduct which it would be most advisable to 
 pursue. One thing she felt intuitively — namely, 
 that the least appearance of hesitation or un- 
 certainty on her part, or any appeal to Ca- 
 therine in her present odd, unsettled frame of 
 mind, was so much ground lost in her esteem, 
 and, in consequence, a forfeiture of that influ- 
 ence over the unhappy girl, of which she had 
 once possessed so large a share, and which had 
 now become so all-important to the welfare, 
 at least, of one of them. That she might keep 
 all her advantages, therefore, and gain time to 
 reinforce her position, she decided on leaving 
 the house for the present. 
 
 " Well, Catherine," she said, gently extricat- 
 ing herself from the embrace of her weeping 
 companion, " I will exact nothing of you 
 just now, but what I believe you both able and 
 willing to perform. Do not tell Father Girard 
 of my visit, and let me know when you are 
 most likely to be alone, that I may come again
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 163 
 
 to you ; but mind, — do not tell him of this 
 meeting, or he will do his utmost to prevent its 
 repetition." 
 
 " You are right — quite right," said Made- 
 moiselle Cadieres. <( Yes, if I can, I will keep 
 this visit from him. Come at this hour when- 
 ever you please ; I am then always alone, and 
 perhaps you may ultimately do something for 
 me. 
 
 " I hope so," said Eleonore. " If you are at 
 all docile and manageable, I am sure I shall 
 prove the most able of physicians. But, for 
 to-day, adieu." 
 
 When Mademoiselle Raymond had leisure to 
 think over what she had just heard, she was 
 not more successful in arriving at a clear, dis- 
 passionate view of her friend's case, than during 
 their interview. The most rational, nay, the 
 only solution she could find to this problem, 
 was the admission of a fact, the bare surmise of 
 which was pain, — namely, that her poor friend's 
 intellects were deranged. This idea she could 
 not bear to dwell upon ; and remembered, with 
 pleasure, many symptoms of rationality and col-
 
 164 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 lectedness which tended to combat this opinion ; 
 yet there were but too many nighty assertions 
 she had no other means of explaining. 
 
 My father was deeply moved by Mademoiselle 
 Raymond's communication ; but hesitated in 
 coinciding with her concerning Catherine's state 
 of mind, 
 
 " The constant super-excitement of the brain 
 under which she has laboured for the last two 
 years, is, it is true, well calculated to produce 
 this result," said he ; " but if really afflicted by 
 this infirmity, I suspect Father Girard has 
 hurried it on by some foul practice or other, 
 which may one day be brought to light. Far 
 from having the real interest of his church at 
 heart, I believe him to be one of those men 
 who, actuated merely by personal motives and 
 ambition, would not scruple to employ means 
 to obtain their ends, before which even fanati- 
 cism would recoil. We must, however, sift this 
 matter thoroughly before passing judgment." 
 
 But when he came to ponder over this sub- 
 ject in the silence of his own closet, he was to 
 the full as embarrassed as Mademoiselle Ray-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 165 
 
 mond, in tracing out the machinations of which, 
 he doubted not, Father Girard had been guilty. 
 He could, indeed, find no clue to them what- 
 ever, except by adopting Catherine's own ver- 
 sion of the affair, and disgracing his reason by 
 admitting the truth of all those tales of enchant- 
 ment and sorcery which the enlightenment of 
 his day already began to class among popular 
 errors. 
 
 He pored over the pages of Cornelius Agrippa, 
 and other writers on the same mystic subjects, 
 without being able either satisfactorily to refute, 
 or unscrupulously to admit, the truth of the 
 strange doctrines they contain. 
 
 He found that they described, as a means 
 of enchanting, or, in other words, mastering the 
 passions and affections of indifferent persons, 
 the very acts to which Mademoiselle Cadieres 
 alluded when speaking of her confessor — breath- 
 ing upon the brow, and steadfastly gazing into 
 the eyes of the person upon whom it is designed 
 to operate, whilst the fixity of thought was 
 declared a necessary accompaniment to the fixity 
 of gaze recommended. This proceeding was
 
 166 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 averred to be infallible ; and, could my father 
 but have relied on this exposition, not only 
 might the incoherences of poor Catherine — the 
 singular description she had given of the state 
 of her soul under Father Girard's direction, 
 in some measure, be accounted for, but also his 
 mysterious power over his other penitents, as 
 well as the moral changes and contradictions 
 which each had exhibited in turn. 
 
 You will wonder, perhaps, that he did not 
 laugh at what, in the days of the great philoso- 
 phers then about to dawn on France, — the 
 harbingers of the storm that was to shake her 
 to her very foundation, and root up, for a time 
 at least, all her ancient and respectable uses, 
 together with her abuses, — would have been 
 termed old women's stories. But in his youth 
 sorcery was yet accredited among the mass ; 
 and though consigned to ridicule by a few of 
 the bolder spirits of the day, the fancy of the 
 many, even in the better classes, still clung to 
 the traditional delusion. 
 
 My father, whose mind was yet fresh from 
 Nature's mint, ready to receive every impression, 
 hovered for some time between the fluctuating
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 167 
 
 prejudices of his epoch ; but eventually his own 
 reason told him, that to deny the secrets of 
 nature, or to despise them and her all pervading 
 power, betrayed rather a deficiency of ability in 
 unbelievers to read her mysteries aright, than 
 it argued that her dominion was limited. In 
 short, what Cornelius Agrippa terms magic, and 
 Mesmer animal magnetism, that much discussed 
 and not yet thoroughly understood agency, 
 flitted across his imagination, until facts on the 
 one hand, and Mesmer's eloquence on the other, 
 clearly proved it in after times to his under- 
 standing. 
 
 It is worthy of remark, indeed, that in the 
 exposition of practical magnetism, Mesmer's 
 directions tally so completely with some of the 
 fantastic assertions of the talented secretary of 
 Charles V., in his occult philosophy, that on 
 these points, at least, it may be said they have 
 treated one and the same subject. And it is a 
 no less remarkable fact, that every detail which 
 has transpired concerning Father Girard and 
 his penitents can be referred to that system, 
 and, in my opinion, to nothing else. 
 
 You may adduce, and with truth, that by
 
 168 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 playing upon the mind — especially in youth — 
 exalting and debasing it by turns, it is easy, 
 without the assistance of any extraneous agency, 
 to affect the reason, if not actually to destroy 
 its equilibrium. You may further urge, and 
 with equal truth, that so complete is the power 
 which he who wields skilfully the dangerous 
 weapon called enthusiasm may obtain over his 
 miserable victims, it remains no difficult task to 
 sway, not only their judgment, but their feelings 
 also. It is, indeed, the knowledge of numerous 
 cases handed down to us in history, and even 
 still of daily occurrence, in which fanaticism con- 
 ducts to crime — to madness — even to death, 
 that has caused me sometimes to hesitate in 
 my conclusions. 
 
 Had this, however, been the Jesuit's real 
 hold on Mademoiselle Cadieres, it is not likely 
 that she would have struggled so painfully with 
 the influence he exercised over her; she would 
 rather have yielded cheerfully and wholly to it. 
 But it is averred by the most experienced 
 writers on the subject of magnetism, that the 
 operator has an unlimited power over the
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 169 
 
 patient, obtained by the concentration of his 
 own thoughts, and their transfusion into the 
 mind of the person subjected to this process, 
 either by means of manipulation, which supposes 
 consent in the party concerned ; or by the mere 
 attraction of gaze, and sympathy with surround- 
 ing objects submitted to the ordeal of magne- 
 tism by the one party, and unconsciously much 
 used by the other ; which does not imply con- 
 nivance. This was the case with Mademoiselle 
 Cadieres and all the worthy Father's penitents, 
 who yielded to, or rather suffered by an artifice 
 whose very nature and existence was totally 
 unknown to them. 
 
 When once affinity is established between the 
 master and the patient — or victim, as the case 
 may be — that strange psychological phenomenon 
 takes place, of which I have often read in works 
 on magnetism, but which I have never witnessed, 
 or even heard of in real life, except in the case 
 of Mademoiselle Cadieres — I mean that state of 
 high exaltation of the nerves, which permits 
 spirit to commune with spirit without the grosser 
 intervention of the organs of speech, — when 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 170 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 the half-formed thought is met by a correspond- 
 ing thought, and the unspoken, unspeakable 
 feelings are, at once, conveyed to a heart that 
 throbs,— that must throb with sympathy ;— a 
 communion so full of harmony that, when we 
 first contemplate its nature, we are excusable in 
 believing it to belong to spheres and to beings 
 of a higher order than ourselves, and the little 
 world that contains us ; — but when we bethink 
 ourselves of the further consequences of this 
 latitude, and perceive that the will of man, the 
 noblest, holiest of his attributes, is also to be 
 enchained by the same mysterious link between 
 a stronger and a weaker mind, while both are 
 yet clothed within their frail human tenements, 
 liable to be shaken and riven by human passion, 
 we shudder and turn away from the picture of 
 mental degradation which this subject may 
 offer to our view. 
 
 The antagonists of Mesmer have advanced a 
 fact, which, if true— as it seems likely enough to 
 be — would bear me out in my supposition of 
 his science being applicable to this particular 
 case. They assert that magnetism is highly
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 171 
 
 prejudicial to the health, and, by over exciting, 
 is apt to cause the most serious derangements of 
 the nervous system, — that the senses are fre- 
 quently brought to a state betwixt waking and 
 sleeping, which can hardly be said to be either 
 and yet partakes of both, — that this unnatural 
 condition, in which the intellect is constantly 
 struggling betwixt its perceptions of the real and 
 the unreal, is most dangerous alike to mind and 
 body, and that magnetism can produce other 
 consequences as fatal to the sufferer as the con- 
 vulsions which are its usual accompaniment. 
 
 All this, I feel, must seem very obscure to 
 those who, like you, have not dipped much into 
 this theory. We see, however, by daily expe- 
 rience, how miserable are good and innocent 
 young females — and they are the persons in 
 point — when forced into the companionship of 
 the bad and the reckless of our sex. That such 
 trials have often affected their reason is a fact 
 proved beyond dispute, by the fate of many who 
 have been induced to marry notorious rakes. 
 We may suppose, therefore, a close affinity of 
 spirits, such as is said to be produced by mag- 
 i 2
 
 172 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 netism between persons of unequal morality, 
 in which the weaker party has been compelled, 
 in spite of its purity, to adopt the loose senti- 
 ments and principles of the stronger and more 
 dissolute, to be a thraldom past the human 
 powers of endurance. I see, by your incredu- 
 lous smile, you believe rather in the possibility 
 of corrupting human purity, than of forcing its 
 barriers; well — I think differently. But then, 
 I am a confirmed believer in this mysterious 
 agency, whose nature is, I own, startling enough 
 at the first glance. 
 
 Having given you a faint outline of the 
 pretensions of this doctrine, in order to enable 
 you to understand in Avhat manner I apply it 
 to this particular case, I will return to my story. 
 
 When Mademoiselle Raymond next called 
 upon Catherine, she was no longer alone. 
 Father Girard was closeted with her; and 
 Mademoiselle Cadieres' confidential maid de- 
 livered her the somewhat ungracious message, 
 that she was entreated not to come again to 
 the house, as her friend could in no case see 
 her. This was a relapse which Eleonore had
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 173 
 
 not expected to take place so soon ; but as she 
 saw that, for a time at least, nothing more was 
 to be done in the matter, she departed. 
 
 Some weeks more elapsed, during which little 
 transpired at large of what passed at the Ca- 
 dieres', beyond the fact of Father Girard's daily 
 — nay, hourly — presence there, and the rapid 
 progress of his fair penitent in sanctity. The 
 chapter of miracles was freely broached by him- 
 self and her brothers ; the curiosity of the public 
 was strongly excited ; and even the bishop, the 
 worthiest soul alive, dropped a few hints, that 
 proved he began to feel a growing interest in 
 the subject. The Carmelites still shook their 
 heads ominously, and shrugged their shoulders 
 at the bare mention of these things with an 
 affected contempt, which could not veil their 
 real mortification. The Jesuits' triumph was 
 complete, radiant; and they bore the palm 
 over all competitors at Toulon without dis- 
 pute. 
 
 Such was the state of affairs, when, all of a 
 sudden, the news was spread about the town 
 that Mademoiselle Cadieres was about to em-
 
 174 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 brace the veil. Various reasons were assigned 
 for this step, and diverse convents named, of 
 which one would be selected by the young 
 saint to become the theatre of her future glory. 
 Mademoiselle Raymond was, however, informed 
 by Marie Langieres, whom she still continued 
 occasionally to visit, that Father Girard had 
 appointed the convent of St. Clare of Ollioules 
 as the future residence of Catherine, whom she 
 described as most unwilling to enter it. She 
 declared, also, that Madame Cadieres, though 
 fully sharing the reluctance of her daughter, 
 was, like herself, unable to resist the imperative 
 monk, who would suffer no contradiction. 
 
 u She loathes the very idea of a convent," said 
 Marie Langieres, in conclusion, " and is growing 
 daily less religious, I fancy. But what then? 
 If that horrid man wills it, of course she must 
 take the veil." 
 
 These words roused Eleonore's attention. 
 She found, upon a closer investigation, that all 
 the peculiarities she had remarked in Cathe- 
 rine's discourses, as betraying an incipient in- 
 sanity, were developed almost to a greater de-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 175 
 
 gree in Marie Langieres : the same depression 
 of spirits and faded appearance, the same in- 
 ward struggle between opposing emotions, — the 
 natural impulses counteracted and controlled 
 by an unaccountable, inexplicable inner thral- 
 dom. She would talk in the same breath on 
 the same subject, now in her own person, and 
 with the feelings that might be supposed natural 
 to her ; and again, with an altered tone, would 
 utter sentiments unbecoming her sex and her 
 years, which must have been farthest removed 
 from her sphere of thought. 
 
 The similitude which Eleonore found between 
 Catherine and Marie forced themselves upon her 
 notice in Father Girard's other penitents, when 
 accident brought her near them; and they so 
 puzzled and confounded her reason, that she 
 gradually yielded to Catherine's suggestion — 
 namely, that they were all suffering under 
 some powerful spell which Father Girard had 
 cast upon them. 
 
 My father, as I have already explained to 
 you, had not sufficiently made up his own mind 
 on this subject to be enabled to enlighten an-
 
 176 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 other; and indeed, as all personal interest in 
 the affair was fast subsiding in his heart, he 
 soon discovered that he had enough to think of 
 in other quarters, and had no time to waste in 
 fruitless brooding. 
 
 Not so with Mademoiselle Raymond. How- 
 ever superior in intelligence to the mass of young 
 women of her age, especially at an epoch when 
 the education of women was very deficient, still 
 the monotony of her pursuits left her ample lei- 
 sure for the development of her feminine curi- 
 osity ; and this was a subject to excite it to the 
 uttermost. 
 
 " If," said my father to her often recurring 
 remarks on this subject — " if you think there is 
 a chance of your being able to move Mademoi- 
 selle Cadieres from her purpose, I would advise 
 you, by all means, to attempt seeing her before 
 she sets off for the convent. Once there, she 
 will find it perhaps impossible to return to the 
 world, even should she desire it." 
 
 " Could you contrive to speak to her," urged 
 Eleonore. 
 
 Her eyes were keenly fixed on his counte-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 177 
 
 nance. The colour mounted to his very brow, 
 as he felt conscious of the gaze ; but he returned 
 it, and it was Mademoiselle Raymond's turn to 
 blush. 
 
 " If I thought any earthly exertion of mine 
 could save Mademoiselle Cadieres," he said, " I 
 would not spare myself, be assured of that ; but 
 I am convinced, that any interposition on my 
 part would but hurry on Catherine to her fate. 
 If I could unravel the mystery, and prove but 
 half the villany I suspect in Father Girard, I 
 would avenge her ; but I must not forget, that 
 I have no right whatever to interfere with the 
 concerns of that young lady, when even that of 
 friendship has been withdrawn from me; and 
 my position as a rejected suitor should make 
 me doubly reserved in all my proceedings." 
 
 " But will you quietly sit by and see Cathe- 
 rine take the veil ?" 
 
 " You must have too much sense, my good 
 young lady," was the answer, accompanied by 
 an arch smile, " not to see that had I even the 
 right, I can no longer have any reason for 
 opposing such a measure. After all, if the 
 i 3
 
 178 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 family Cadieres prefer their Tartuffe to all 
 else in the world, who may gainsay them ? But 
 you know very well the opinions I must perforce 
 entertain on this subject : I cannot understand 
 why you should insist on making me repeat 
 them so often." 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond's tell-tale cheek might 
 have enlightened him as to her drift, and Ma- 
 dame Cadieres' prophecy, which, when spoken 
 two years back, had so grievously displeased 
 him, now flitted across his mind, but this time 
 certainly without causing any disagreeable 
 emotion. 
 
 That Eleonore was not too deeply hurt at 
 his being so resigned on the chapter of Cathe- 
 rine's retiring altogether from the world, was 
 evident from her manner growing even more 
 free and unreserved under the influence of his 
 answer. 
 
 The footing on which they stood together 
 was peculiar, as indeed, Mademoiselle Ray- 
 mond's whole bearing and character was reputed 
 to be. Circumstances allowed her, on many 
 points, a greater latitude than other young 
 women of her age are ordinarily permitted in
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 179 
 
 our country, more especially with regard to the 
 choosing the society that best suited her; for 
 her guardians were but distantly connected 
 with her, and took little or no interest in her 
 welfare. An impoverished elderly gentlewoman 
 had been imposed upon her by way of a duenna; 
 but, beyond this necessary restriction, no control 
 whatever was laid upon her actions. Though 
 nominally residing under the roof of her guar- 
 dians, she kept a separate establishment, and 
 received in her salon when and whom she 
 pleased. 
 
 The liberty that fell thus early to her lot, 
 might have been misused by many, so inex- 
 perienced as herself; but Eleonore, guarded 
 by a powerful understanding, and the conscious- 
 ness that her wealth, rather than her looks, 
 would be generally considered her chief at- 
 traction, had steeled herself in an impenetrable 
 armour of coldness and suspicion, that had stood 
 proof against many a well-directed arrow. 
 
 Up to her acquaintance with my father, her 
 salon, as well as her heart, had been closed 
 against every intruder ; and when he was at 
 last admitted into that sanctum sanctorum, it
 
 180 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 still remained inaccessible to others, to the no 
 small mortification of all the speculative sons 
 and parents in our good city. Great, therefore, 
 was the outcry against what was almost deemed 
 an impropriety — their marriage was spoken of 
 as a certainty ; then, as neither party took the 
 trouble to notice the many hints thrown out 
 before them on this subject, and as weeks grew 
 to months and the thing remained in statu 
 quo, and Mademoiselle Raymond refused offer 
 after offer, and yet solemnly pledged her word, 
 in so doing, that she was under no pre -engage- 
 ment, people set down this intimacy as one of 
 the bizarreries of the heiress, and turned to the 
 discussion of some newer topic. 
 
 My father, as I have said, had accepted Eleo- 
 nore's friendship as a substitute for Catherine's 
 love, without much reflection; but, independently 
 of the gratitude he owed her who had softened the 
 sharpness of his first disappointment, he soon 
 discovered in her qualities calculated to fix his 
 esteem. 
 
 The uprightness and candour which she dis- 
 played on every occasion, even the most trivial, — 
 her fair and dispassionate judgment even in
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 181 
 
 those things that concerned her most, — the 
 generosity of heart that overlooked the foibles of 
 others,, which her own keenness of intellect 
 rendered so glaring, — the firmness of her cha- 
 racter and principles, that kept her in everything 
 and at all times true to herself and to others — 
 these sterling qualities, so rarely found in the 
 opposite sex, that we may fairly term them 
 masculine, made her, at once, an object of his 
 respect and admiration. Nor was she devoid 
 of those feminine inspirations, which teach even 
 the most guileless of womankind how to in- 
 gratiate themselves with those whom they are 
 desirous of pleasing. Habit, too, often recon- 
 ciles men to the very plainest exteriors ; and 
 my father had long since discovered that Made- 
 moiselle Raymond, whose figure and eyes were 
 really fine, did not belong, absolutely, to that 
 category — her society had become indispensable 
 to him. Her superiority to all the women it 
 had ever been his fortune to meet with, was by 
 this time an established fact in his own mind ; 
 and had he been forced to forego her intimacy 
 and renounce her friendship, the pain would 
 have been scarcely less, though perhaps of
 
 182 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 another character, than that which he felt when 
 separated from Catherine. In short, though he 
 would doubtless have written better verses in 
 favour of the latter, he would much rather have 
 chosen the former for the companion of his life, 
 now that he had a fair opportunity of comparing 
 their real merits. 
 
 But, although the progress of this attachment 
 was so gradual on his part, that it was almost 
 imperceptible to himself, Mademoiselle Ray- 
 mond's preference for him had dated from the 
 beginning of their acquaintance. It was, pro- 
 bably, the struggle she constantly maintained 
 against her own heart, when she perceived that 
 her friend's beauty had cast her into shade, 
 that caused her usual reserve to deepen into 
 ungraciousness and gloom. Too generous to 
 resent his choice, and too modest not to ac- 
 quiesce in its justice, she suffered no feeling of 
 mortification or envy to dim the purity of her 
 long established friendship with Catherine. She 
 was careful not to permit the slightest trace of 
 her weakness to become evident, well knowing 
 that Catherine would not have encouraged any 
 attentions likely to distress her, and she was
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 183 
 
 too proud to owe anything to pity. Thus had 
 she sedulously avoided showing my father any 
 more attention than what the most frigid 
 courtesy exacted, and it was this line of con- 
 duct — the principle which influenced it remain- 
 ing concealed from him — that had so long 
 blinded him to her rare and high merits. 
 
 From the moment the fact became public of 
 Catherine being about to leave Toulon, Eleo- 
 nore was constantly on the look out to procure 
 a final interview; but the vigilance of Father 
 Girard even exceeded her own, and frustrated 
 all her efforts. To her great surprise, now that 
 a powerful motive had made her keep a kind of 
 watch over Madame Cadieres' house, she per- 
 ceived that the confessor scarcely ever left it, 
 nay, even the apartment of his penitent — that 
 he penetrated into the latter at all hours, and 
 sometimes banished her nearest relations from 
 the chamber, whilst he remained alone with its 
 fair tenant. This displeased to the full as much 
 as it surprised Eleonore; nor could she view 
 with patience the degrading, imbecile humility 
 with which the Dominican and the Abbe, 
 Catherine's two brothers, greeted or took leave
 
 184 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 of, or indeed even approached the haughty 
 Jesuit. 
 
 She was also struck with the alteration that 
 had taken place in his whole person and manner. 
 The latter had grown abrupt and presumptuous 
 — the former more repulsive than ever. A 
 restless, fiery look, that seemed at once to dread 
 and yet defy opposition, gleamed from beneath 
 his shaggy eyebrows, whilst the hollow of his 
 cheeks and corpse-like pallor had even increased, 
 although those who remembered him on his 
 first arrival at Toulon might have deemed the 
 thing impossible. 
 
 Most of Mademoiselle Raymond's remarks 
 were made from a house opposite to that of 
 Madame Cadieres, to which she had contrived 
 to obtain admission, at first for the express pur- 
 pose of laying in wait for a favourable opportu- 
 nity of executing her project of speaking with 
 Catherine previous to her departure; but she 
 soon became aware what an ample field was 
 thus afforded for general observation. In any 
 other case her innate delicacy of mind, and 
 indeed, her perfect indifference to the concerns 
 of strangers, would have made her shrink from
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 185 
 
 such a mode of gratifying her curiosity ; but 
 she conceived that her love for Catherine gave 
 her a right to inquire more closely into actions 
 which, but for the baneful influence of a stran- 
 ger, rising suddenly like a cloud between them, 
 and which she trusted might yet in time be 
 blown away, would have been laid bare to her 
 like her own. 
 
 She could often catch a glimpse of Madame 
 Cadieres, bathed in tears; a circumstance that 
 convinced her how painful was the sacrifice she 
 was about to make in suffering her daughter's 
 departure. But Catherine was so completely 
 confined to her room, which had no other look- 
 out but upon the yard, that she could form no 
 idea of her real feelings. That Father Girard 
 wielded the sceptre of domestic power with a 
 most tyrannical sway was obvious from a series 
 of trivial occurrences that came within her 
 notice ; and her dislike to, and distrust of the 
 man, amounted to disgust as she perceived how 
 unscrupulously he took the most open and 
 unfair advantage of the weak, almost sottish, 
 infatuation of the Cadieres. 
 
 Finding all her endeavours to obtain speech
 
 186 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 of her friend vain, she had recourse to letters, 
 with no better success. She soon, indeed, 
 became convinced that none ever reached their 
 destination ; and, finally, she had the mortifica- 
 tion of seeing her friend safely deposited in a 
 travelling carriage by the side of Anne Guyol, 
 and another of Father Girard's most devoted 
 adherents, by that worthy personage himself. 
 The mode of departure at that time partook 
 but little of the hurry of our present habits, 
 nor were leave takings as unceremonious then 
 as now; so that Mademoiselle Raymond had 
 time to reach the carriage before, in spite of the 
 Jesuit's impatience, the ponderous vehicle had 
 yet been put in motion. Eleonore's bare head 
 and careless attire denoted the eagerness of the 
 moment ; and no sooner had the Father's angry 
 exclamation drawn Catherine's eyes towards 
 her than she seemed conscious of her friend's 
 devotion, and grateful for the feeling. 
 
 " Thank you, Eleonore, thank you, dearest ! 
 I will pray for you," murmured she, in scarcely 
 audible accents. 
 
 " Catherine, do not leave us," said Eleonore,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 187 
 
 fixing her penetrating eye on the young girl, 
 who had already assumed a semi-religious habit. 
 " You cannot really desire to do so!" 
 
 Catherine cast a timid, pleading glance at 
 Father Girard, which tears soon obscured, 
 coursing each other rapidly down her pale 
 cheeks. 
 
 Father Girard crushed the mute appeal by a 
 single threatening look, which seemed at once 
 to terrify, not only the frail object on whom it 
 fell, but even the weeping mother, who had 
 looked up, as Eleonore was speaking, with 
 something like an expression of hope depicted 
 on her sunken countenance. The Priest turned 
 sharply on Mademoiselle Raymond, and dart- 
 ing at her one of those withering glances which 
 so well sustained the thunders of his eloquence 
 in the pulpit, and produced such triumphant 
 effects on his female adherents, he stood in 
 haughty expectation of the result; but, in 
 this instance, it fell short of its customary 
 effect. Eleonore returned the look with one 
 of undisguised contempt; and the Jesuit quailed 
 before the firm, steady gaze he encountered in
 
 188 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 the large, dark, severely expressive eyes of 
 Mademoiselle Raymond. 
 
 " Leave us, Mademoiselle," he said, in a tone 
 of ill-suppressed rage ; " leave this holy maiden, 
 whom you never approach but with the attempt 
 to lead her astray from a path of light which 
 you have not the grace to follow. Go, I say,'' 
 he continued, raising his voice in the nervous 
 impatience of the moment, above the pitch of 
 decorum, and grasping, at the same time, the 
 arm of the young lady in no gentle or reserved 
 manner. " Go ! impious heretic — or — " and 
 he compressed the arm he held in a rude, rough 
 manner, equally unbecoming his habit, and the 
 sex of her whom he addressed. 
 
 " You forget yourself," said Mademoiselle 
 Raymond, coolly drawing herself up, and seek- 
 ing, by a slight gesture, to release herself from 
 the bold grasp of the Jesuit, but instantly ceas- 
 ing the effort upon discovering that it would 
 not avail her. 
 
 " It is not I, it is you ! — you !" An excess 
 of resentment, for which there appeared scarcely 
 sufficient cause, seemed about to transport
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 189 
 
 the Monk beyond the bounds of decency. In 
 vain did the Cadieres, mother and sons, and the 
 young girls in the carriage exhort him to be 
 pacified; it was evident that rage was fast 
 mastering his reason, when Eleonore, bending 
 her tall form towards him, whispered a few 
 words in his ear. 
 
 No spell spoken by necromancer ever pro- 
 duced a more magical effect. A hue still more 
 ghastly than usual overspread his countenance, 
 — his trembling hand released the frail arm it had 
 grasped as though no longer able to retain it, — 
 his knees knocked against each other, — his eyes 
 rolled wildly in his head, — the most abject 
 terror was depicted in every feature. Had 
 Eleonore stabbed him, the change could not 
 have been more sudden, or more striking. It 
 was so much so that Madame Cadieres ex- 
 claimed — 
 
 " Good God ! what has happened to the 
 reverend Father? — what has she done to 
 him?" 
 
 " Nothing, assuredly, madame," said Eleo- 
 nore. " But what is he doing to you ? Rob-
 
 190 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 bing you of your daughter, and yet you know 
 not how to resist !" 
 
 An embarrassing pause ensued, to which 
 Mademoiselle Guyol put an end by ordering 
 the coachman, somewhat fiercely, to drive off. 
 Father Girard seemed to breathe anew as the 
 wheels began slowly to revolve, and the coach- 
 man's whip cracked cheerily in the air. Ma- 
 dame Cadieres re-entered the house abruptly, 
 as if unwilling to mark the progress of the 
 vehicle that was bearing from her what she held 
 dearest on earth. The Jesuit, without speak- 
 ing another word, hastily darted up the street, 
 following the carriage with rapid strides, whilst 
 the brothers remained rooted to the spot. 
 Eleonore's keen eye caught the figure of Cathe- 
 rine, at the next turning, as, leaning with her 
 whole body out of the carriage window, she 
 stretched forth her arms towards her — the next 
 instant she was out of sight. Whether the 
 movement had been an adieu, or an appeal, 
 was a point which it troubled much Mademoi- 
 selle Raymond to decide. Luckily, for all 
 parties, the early hour at which this scene took
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 191 
 
 place precluded the possibility of its getting 
 bruited about. This was especially fortunate 
 for Eleonore ; for, bigoted as were the times 
 and the people, had the report once gained 
 ground that she had insulted a member of the 
 church, and so holy a man, too, as Father 
 Girard was considered to be, it might have 
 blighted her fair fame. She recounted, how- 
 ever, the affair to my father, down to the smallest 
 detail. His answer was : — 
 
 " The Tartuffe will never forgive you, and I 
 am afraid you have braved his anger to little or 
 no purpose. I, too, have taken my informa- 
 tions, and we have little to fear for Catherine. 
 I understand that the nunnery of St. Clare 
 belongs to a mild order, and boasts, besides a 
 very sensible and high-born abbess, many sisters 
 of distinction. Should she not feel disposed 
 to take the veil, no one there will exert any 
 undue authority, or even persuasion, to induce 
 her to that step ; and, should she really perform 
 the vows, she has every chance of happiness that 
 such an existence can afford. At all events, there 
 she will be delivered from that odious director's
 
 192 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 presence and control ; he will hardly dare to 
 follow her to the sisterhood — if, indeed, he could 
 quit Toulon. He believes, however, his object 
 attained ; her person and fortune are secured to 
 the church, and he will now turn his thoughts 
 to some other victim, perhaps Marie Langieres." 
 
 w God grant you may be right," said Made- 
 moiselle Raymond ; but she looked very much 
 as if she could not bring herself to share his 
 opinion. 
 
 Catherine's departure, and the manner of it, 
 had put an end to all Eleonore's hopes of a 
 reconciliation. That unfortunate being would, 
 probably, now, for the rest of her life, be dead 
 to them and to the world, as completely as 
 though the grave had closed upon her; and, 
 having mourned this easy to be foreseen event 
 long before it actually took place, both my 
 father and Mademoiselle Raymond felt them- 
 selves very much at liberty to think of each 
 other, — the only other object of interest that 
 stood in their way being withdrawn from them. 
 
 I will cut a long story short — or one that 
 might be spun out into such — nor detail to you
 
 -MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 193 
 
 by what rapid gradations my father became 
 aware of the real nature of his attachment to 
 Eleonore — that she alone could render him 
 truly happy. Neither will I dwell on the man- 
 ner in which he communicated this discovery, 
 nor on that in which it was received. Made- 
 moiselle Raymond was free from all even the 
 slightest shadow of coquetry, and probably 
 would have been thought, upon the whole, too 
 deficient in that respect by a vulgar-minded 
 man ; but my father was as superior to the 
 generality of his sex as she was to hers, and was 
 able to appreciate her every qualit}^. The frank, 
 candid admission she at once made of the state 
 of her feelings, even previous to the existence 
 of his own love for her, was received by him 
 with delight and gratitude. He wondered, in 
 his soul, how he could ever have preferred the 
 rose to the pearl — Catherine to Eleonore ; but, 
 as he expressed it in after life, one was the 
 romance, the other the reality of love. It is 
 right and proper that youth should have its 
 dreams, and manhood its happiness. The first 
 choice of the heart depends so much on cir- 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 194 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 cumstances, and on the imagination, and every 
 man's tastes and opinions alter so much with 
 time and experience, that the object of his 
 boyish passion would seldom, if obtained, con- 
 duce to the happiness of his after years. 
 
 My father's proposal came at a most fortunate 
 and critical moment for poor Eleonore. In a 
 very short time her minority would cease ; her 
 guardians had determined on leaving Toulon, 
 and had she wished to remain there, she would 
 have found it no easy matter to procure a home. 
 
 I will not tell you of all the tittle-tattle of 
 the town, when this news was made public by 
 the parties whom it most concerned. After 
 having loudly predicted it nearly three years 
 before it had any basis on truth, they would not 
 credit it, even from the lips of the future couple. 
 It was not until the parents of Monsieur Chau- 
 don came from Marseilles, in great haste, to 
 attend the fianqailles of the young people, that 
 at last the thing was believed ; and then, again, 
 it gave rise to as much jealousy and animadver- 
 sion, to as many heart-burnings and calumnies, 
 as though such an event had been a flagrant act
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 195 
 
 of injustice committed against all the marriage- 
 ables of the good city. 
 
 Now that the beauty and the heiress — Cathe- 
 rine and Eleonore — were both disposed of, it was 
 but reasonable to expect they would be forgotten. 
 So far as regards Eleonore this was indeed the 
 case. You must not suppose, however, that her 
 marriage had actually taken place. Matrimony, 
 like every other thing, was treated then with 
 far more importance than it is at present ; and 
 the Jianqailles, or betrothals — a ceremony sel- 
 dom, if ever, observed now in France — was in 
 full use at that epoch. It generally preceded 
 the marriage by many months, but bound the 
 parties almost irrevocably to the performance 
 of that engagement. 
 
 But Mademoiselle Cadieres did not subside 
 into forgetfulness. On the contrary, never had 
 she been so much talked of as since her arrival 
 at Ollioules. Father Girard having requested 
 her admission to this convent in no very humble 
 terms — for he had announced his protegee as 
 one whose peculiar holiness would shed a fresh 
 lustre on the establishment, and in whom he 
 k2
 
 196 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 himself took a special interest, on account of 
 the extraordinary graces with which she was 
 gifted — and being, moreover, personally known 
 to the superior, — she was received with singular 
 honours; and all the strange, unusual condi- 
 tions he made in her behalf were acquiesced in 
 without demur. 
 
 But his after proceedings, and her own, at- 
 tached a still greater importance to Catherine, 
 and brought her before the public in a far more 
 glaring manner than heretofore. Abandoning 
 almost entirely his concerns at his seminary, more 
 to the satisfaction of his superiors than to the 
 edification of his other penitents, the whole of 
 Father Girard's time was taken up with jour- 
 neys to and from Ollioules; and the soul of 
 Catherine occupied his attention so exclusively 
 as to cause much jealousy and discontent among 
 those whom it had long been his habit, and was 
 now more than ever his duty, to attend to ; for 
 they all seemed to live but in his presence. 
 
 Marie Langieres, Madame la Rue, and her 
 daughter, were loudest in their complaints on 
 this occasion, and stood forth the representa- 
 tives, as it were, of the malecontents.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 197 
 
 Among these, neither last nor least were the 
 Cadieres; nor were they slow in making their 
 uneasiness known. Serious rumours now began 
 to circulate about miracles having been wrought 
 upon Catherine, visibly and palpably impress- 
 ing her with the sign manual of special elec- 
 tion; and they soon became not only univer- 
 sally discussed, but credited in every circle, 
 drawing the attention of the clergy and the 
 great, in a marked manner, towards the con- 
 vent. The nearer she approached the culmi- 
 nating point at which they had long desired to 
 see her, the greater became the mortification 
 of her relations at having the saint of Ollioules, 
 as she was now called, removed beyond their 
 sphere, her glory profiting utter strangers rather 
 than themselves. This was certainly the first 
 consideration that roused the indignation of her 
 brothers, who, if they were not brought into 
 notice by her means, had but little advance- 
 ment to hope for in their profession. 
 
 The mother, doubtless, was influenced by 
 tenderer and less interested motives. Her great 
 source of anxiety, that which really pressed 
 heavily on her mind, was the state of her
 
 198 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 daughter's health, which seemed materially im- 
 paired since the last few months. She re- 
 proached herself constantly with having yielded 
 to Father Girard's persuasions in delaying to 
 call in medical aid, whilst she had yet an op- 
 portunity of so doing. She felt, moreover, se- 
 verely the loss of her idol — for Catherine might 
 be called such in the fullest sense of the word ; 
 and her confidence in, and reverence for, Father 
 Girard, began to diminish from the moment she 
 no longer beheld in him the promoter of, but 
 rather the bar to, the realization of those plans 
 and ambitious desires which she had cherished 
 in her bosom for years. But Father Girard was 
 not probably very desirous of sharing the glory 
 redounding upon him for having made a saint 
 with any one else, not even with the Dominican 
 or the Abbe, whose interest in their sister was 
 thus completely neutralized. 
 
 At Ollioules, as at Toulon, Catherine had 
 trances, ecstasies, and fits of a character that 
 almost bordered on epilepsy. At other times, 
 she seemed to walk, talk, and exist, like one in 
 a perpetual dream. The miracles spoken of had
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 199 
 
 indeed wrought visibly on her person. She 
 received the communion, and confessed almost 
 daily with Father Girard ; and the fame of her 
 sanctity spread far and wide over the country, 
 so that priests and laics, grandees and beggars, 
 devotees of all classes, ages, and sexes, were daily 
 entreating admittance to this new saint, of whom 
 the strange fact is recorded, that she could read 
 the thoughts, and guess the ailings or troubles, of 
 those who approached her, before they had even 
 spoken them. 
 
 Miraculous cures and heaven-inspired advice 
 was soon reported to have emanated from her, 
 and curiosity attracted even those to see the 
 lovely saint of Ollioules whom credulity did not 
 bring to her shrine. 
 
 The bishop several times meditated a per- 
 sonal visit to her, which Father Girard was 
 careful to prevent, in order to keep her humble, 
 as he said ; but he could not prevent the grand 
 vicar, and other dignitaries of the church from 
 doing her that honour. It seemed, indeed, from 
 the Jesuit's account, that his chief difficulty in 
 guiding his young votary's soul aright consisted in
 
 200 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 combatting her growing pride in her own sur- 
 passing sanctity, and the privileges it drew down 
 upon her from heaven. 
 
 My father was much pained at the growing 
 honours of Mademoiselle Cadieres. A convic- 
 tion he could no longer repel induced him to 
 believe they were due to imposture alone ; and 
 that Catherine herself — his but so lately beloved 
 Catherine — was the chief impostor. It was most 
 reluctantly that he admitted this truth even unto 
 himself; but his reason spoke loud enough to 
 silence the pleadings of his heart. These mi- 
 racles and wondrous signs from above — this gift 
 of prophecy in one so simple-minded and little 
 enlightened — this power of penetrating into the 
 secrets of consciences, reading the darkest mys- 
 teries of the human heart — of diving with equal 
 skill into the past and future — seemed to him, 
 not, as to the superstitious and illiterate vulgar, a 
 voice from Heaven speaking to the amazed mul- 
 titude through the lips of an innocent and fa- 
 voured agent, but rather the well- played comedy 
 of an artful priest, performed by a no less cun- 
 ning stager. When he reflected how pure and
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 20 i 
 
 spotless was her mind at the epoch of his first 
 introduction to her, and then thought of her 
 actual position, so young, and brought up in 
 such reserve and obscurity, and yet exhibiting 
 herself in so glaring a manner to public notice, 
 displaying acting so consummate as to deceive 
 and blind men of the strictest honour, and of 
 no mean capacities, he shuddered at the moral 
 depravity which so much perseverance and bold- 
 ness in falsehood betrayed. 
 
 These feelings of disgust weighed heavily on 
 his spirits ; and although he permitted them to 
 be apparent to no one else, he frankly commu- 
 nicated them to Eleonore. Her answer was, 
 as usual, calculated to dispel the clouds from 
 his brow. 
 
 " You are kind enough to say you have some 
 confidence in my judgment," she said 3 "allow 
 me, then, like so many others, to perform a pil- 
 grimage to Ollioules ; I shall then be better able 
 to tell you how much of all these reports that 
 affect you so painfully is founded in truth ; for 
 exaggeration has doubtless laid on its colours 
 with no sparing brush. I shall, also, I doubt 
 k3
 
 202 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 not, be able to detect how far Catherine is her- 
 self the dupe of her own imagination. I will, 
 at all events, be a careful observer of all that I 
 may be permitted to see, and will report every- 
 thing most faithfully, even in its minutest de- 
 tails. May I go to Ollioules ?" 
 
 The approbation she sought was not with- 
 held ; and Eleonore, always prompt in following 
 up an idea, was that very day on the road to 
 St. Clare's. Many, and of various kinds, were 
 the wayfarers she fell in with — all bound to the 
 same goal as herself. She addressed several 
 females, who evidently belonged to the lowest 
 class, and discovered that their trust in the new 
 saint of Ollioules was illimited; and as they 
 seemed sufficiently burthened by misery and 
 illness already, Eleonore thought it a cruelty to 
 seek to lessen the comfort which their strange 
 delusion aiforded them. They recounted to her 
 the most incredible facts that had occurred to 
 some of their friends and relations through the 
 intervention of the Holy Virgin of St. Clare's, 
 as they called Catherine. The stories they re- 
 cited, in spite of her utmost efforts to repress
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 203 
 
 the rising smile, brought it more than once to 
 her lips, and once even forced a laugh, the real 
 cause of which she had some trouble in con- 
 cealing from her simple interlocutor, whose se- 
 verest indignation would doubtless have been 
 roused by her avowed incredulity. The obvious 
 interest, however, with which she listened to 
 their lengthened tales of distress and sickness, 
 ingratiated her with them too much to allow of 
 their suspecting her real sentiments. 
 
 When, however, she was at last ushered along 
 with the others into the convent parlour to await 
 Catherine's appearance, she was surprised, on 
 examining those who surrounded her, to per- 
 ceive that many were of a standing in life not 
 only far superior to her own, but some even 
 apparently of the most exalted station. 
 
 These clustered together at one end of the 
 long dark chamber, whilst the poorer devotees 
 grouped themselves at the opposite extremity, 
 thus leaving Eleonore, in solitary dignity, the 
 sole possessor of the centre immediately facing 
 the grate. This circumstance might have inti- 
 midated some young women ; but Eleonore Ray-*
 
 204 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 mond was ever above the trivial occurrences of 
 life that so often disturb less well-strung nerves ; 
 and she sat quietly surveying the scene, uncon- 
 scious perhaps of the effect her calm demeanour, 
 and the depth of intelligence reflected in her 
 lustrous eyes, w r as calculated to produce on the 
 beholders. Having been for some time the sub- 
 ject of much scrutiny, especially from the aris- 
 tocratic end of the room, she was not surprised 
 when a young lady detached herself from the 
 group, and took a seat beside her. 
 
 " You are of Toulon, madam, I presume T* 
 said the stranger, in tones, the slight hauteur of 
 which was almost veiled by their sweetness, and 
 whose accent was decidedly Parisian. 
 
 Eleonore guessed the rank of her interlocutor 
 at a glance ; and though certainly not in the 
 habit of conversing with, or even of seeing 
 marquises out of their glass coaches, she was 
 far from being overwhelmed by the condescen- 
 sion of the pretty sprig of aristocracy who ho- 
 noured her thus far. 
 
 " I am," was the reply, conveyed in Ma j 
 demoiselle Raymond's most ungracious man- 
 ner.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 205 
 
 The lady was evidently shocked at the want 
 of respect, even of courtesy, to which she had 
 exposed herself, and was about to turn away in 
 disgust; but a second thought seemed to pre- 
 vail with her ; for, pushing aside the profusion 
 of curls and laces that obscured her features, 
 she exhibited them in full to Mademoiselle 
 Raymond, whose gaze, in spite of herself, was 
 rivetted by their exquisite loveliness, although 
 time, and the fatigue of an agitated life, had 
 already somewhat dimmed their brightness. 
 The impertinence of a slightly turned up, but 
 most delicately formed nose, was fully amended 
 by the gentle smile that played on her ripe and 
 pouting lips. There lay a world of love in her 
 deep hazel eyes, fringed with darker lashes; 
 and the grace of courts, and the assurance of 
 fashion, rather than that of rank, was revealed 
 in her careless attitude. 
 
 " Then," she said, " you must know some- 
 thing of this — this " she paused a moment, 
 
 as if embarrassed to find the fitting expression 
 — " this young person," she continued, remark- 
 ing the sardonic smile that lighted up for a 
 moment the gravity of the Toulonese lady.
 
 206 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " I do," was the blunt answer ; " we have 
 been friends from earliest childhood." 
 
 " Really ! — oh ! charming ! Then, you can 
 tell us all about her. Come, come," she cried 
 out, in a gleeful tone to her companion — " come, 
 we have what we want." 
 
 u I do not understand," said Eleonore, laugh- 
 ing, * what you want ; but if it is me, or any in- 
 formation I am able to afford, how can you make 
 sure of securing either. 1 ' 
 
 The handsome and animated Parisian lady 
 turned her soft eyes upon her with a stare 
 expressive of anything but pleasure, and already 
 her lips opened, doubtless, to utter some 
 ungracious reply, which would certainly not 
 have furthered her views with the person she 
 addressed, when another came forward, whose 
 countenance, though scarcely less beautiful than 
 that of the former speaker, was more touched by 
 time, and evidently had ever been of a thought- 
 ful cast. 
 
 " Ah ! come, my dear Madam, to my assist- 
 ance," said the repulsed fair one, " if you would 
 while away time, and procure some light on
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 207 
 
 the important subject that has lured us so 
 far." 
 
 " Yes," was the answer, " but above all, I 
 must remind you, tetefolle, that we are to keep 
 our incognito, or you will infallibly betray us. 
 Down with that veil." 
 
 " Oh ! it is merely some Toulonese rotuviere? 
 was the whispered reply, which Eleonore's quick 
 ear caught, nevertheless, most distinctly. 
 
 " Never mind — we must deal cautiously by 
 her, or she may guess who we are," said the 
 other, in a tone scarcely less low ; " and if it 
 were to gain wind that we have been here this 
 day, it would cover us with ridicule. To have 
 come so far, and incognito, for such folly — and 
 I a philosopher too — it is too bad ! — " And the 
 lady laughed and coloured at the same time. 
 
 " No fear for the incognito, if your wit does 
 not betray us, fair Canoness — " 
 
 " Or your beauty, thoughtless one !" said the 
 graver lady. 
 
 Not a word of this colloquy was lost upon the 
 unnoticed listener ; and when the elder turned 
 to address her, she already knew they were of
 
 208 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 high distinction in the capital — the one an 
 acknowledged wit, the other a beauty ; but her 
 utter ignorance of Paris and the exalted sphere 
 in which such orbs were accustomed to move, 
 prevented these discoveries from being of any 
 service to her with regard to satisfying her 
 awakening curiosity. A Canoness and a Phi- 
 losopher were two qualities which, united in one 
 and the same person, might have sufficed to 
 betray a name but too well known to the public, 
 had Eleonore been less provincial; but, as it 
 was, the ladies were perfectly safe from discovery, 
 so far as she was concerned. 
 
 " Being of this neighbourhood, to which we 
 are perfect strangers," said she, whom Eleonore 
 had heard complimented on her talents, in a 
 natural and simple manner, which, in proportion 
 as it was freer from courtly graces and minau- 
 deries than that of the other, was more congenial 
 to the person she addressed, " perhaps you will 
 be kind enough to inform us if there be any 
 truth in the extraordinary things that are re- 
 ported concerning this new marvel of Provence. 
 Is she so beautiful, so gifted, and, above all, so 
 trustworthy, as people say ? ? '
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 209 
 
 The deep, thoughtful blue eyes of the lady 
 were fixed 011 Mademoiselle Raymond's, with 
 an expression that said, as plainly as words 
 could have spoken it, she felt confident of 
 obtaining a satisfactory answer to her question. 
 Eleonore rose with that involuntary feeling of 
 respect which the mere presentiment of talent in 
 others awakens in those who are conscious of 
 possessing some share of it themselves ; and she 
 unhesitatingly replied : — 
 
 " The young lady you have come to see out 
 of mere curiosity has been most lovely and ex- 
 cellent, and was once truth itself. What she 
 may have become during the few months we 
 have not met I can scarcely determine until I 
 have again seen her; and it is that purpose 
 which has drawn me here to-day." 
 
 " I understand," said the stranger, with a deep 
 sigh — " she has been during that time in this 
 convent ; and sincerity is not always the lesson 
 best taught in cloisters." 
 
 During the full hour that intervened previous 
 to Catherine's appearance, there ensued between 
 the two courtly friends and Eleonore an ani- 
 mated colloquy, in which the latter was un-
 
 210 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 consciously drawn out by the extraordinary con- 
 versational powers of the elder lady, who joined 
 to much depth of thought a gentle earnestness 
 of manner that pleased Mademoiselle Raymond, 
 and made her overlook at the moment, though 
 it afterwards came back to her memory most 
 distinctly, a few startling paradoxes, bold views 
 of religion, and flighty ones of morality, which 
 were calculated to amaze a mind like hers, firm 
 in womanly strength of principle, but which 
 soared not beyond the limits assigned to her sex 
 by education and society. The other lady tes- 
 tified, now by her wearied looks and yawns, and 
 now by a few sparkling phrases, shining through 
 the discourse like the facets of a diamond, and 
 bringing a smile even to Mademoiselle Ray- 
 mond's grave lips, that her wit, more brilliant 
 than solid, was of that light order which distils 
 just as much essence from the flower of all 
 things as it can conveniently retail to a crowd 
 of admirers, that has no time to be charmed too 
 long ; whereas the honey the other had gathered, 
 whether of a good or bad quality, was evidently 
 extracted for her own use, the world only
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 211 
 
 deriving advantage from the overflow of its 
 abundance. But if this trio was sufficiently 
 concentred in itself to wait with patience for 
 the appearance of the saint, not so the poorer 
 votaries, whose hopes began to cool at the 
 chill of their reception; and their murmurs 
 were growing very loud indeed, when they were 
 silenced by the sound of many steps behind the 
 grate : then ensued much shuffling of feet — 
 the dragging of some heavy piece of furniture 
 was distinctly heard, and another awful pause of 
 suspense followed. 
 
 " I wonder they did not prepare their comedy 
 beforehand," said the wit, in a whisper to 
 Eleonore. 
 
 " The worst of convents is, they are so very 
 unpoetical in the country," said the Beauty. 
 "A dark, dingy parlour, with a few high-backed, 
 hard-stuffed, villanous oak chairs, a rusty grate, 
 behind which hangs a dirty black curtain of 
 moth-eaten wool — it is quite chilling. If ever I 
 made my retreat, it should be, like the Duchesse 
 de la Valliere, into a Parisian sisterhood, where 
 the Lady Abbess was a princess of the blood 
 at the very least."
 
 212 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " Princess Adelaide's, perhaps," murmured 
 the other. 
 
 " Perhaps," was the answer ; but it was ac- 
 companied with a deep sigh, which shewed the 
 heart was not quite so light as the gay roving 
 glance would have bespoken it. 
 
 The heavy, dark curtain, so scornfully de- 
 scribed by the fair advocate of the capital, after 
 sundry jerks and tugs, was withdrawn ; and a 
 novice appeared behind the grate, seated in 
 state in an antediluvian arm-chair, from the 
 old hard-stuffed arms of which the brass knobs 
 appeared ready to drop with age. Beside her 
 was a prie Dieu, to match with two miserable- 
 looking thin tapers burning before it; and a 
 flaming heart, surmounted by doves wrapt in a 
 chaste embrace, cut delicately out of paper by 
 the cunning hand of some of the sisterhood, 
 and resembling the lace-like tracery one finds 
 on some of our bonbons boxes, stood out in 
 relief on a dark-coloured missal placed upon it. 
 On either hand of the novice a few nuns had 
 grouped themselves, self-importance and idle 
 curiosity being strongly stamped upon their 
 features.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 213 
 
 These mesquine details were taken in at a 
 glance by the trio, who stood yet aloof from the 
 grate, and raised a smile, that shewed how 
 unfavourable to the effect intended are the toy- 
 like resources of the catholic faith when ad- 
 dressed to cultivated intellects, or even to such 
 as have been ripened by the mere influence of 
 elegant habits and the refinements attendant 
 upon wealth and rank. 
 
 The poorer class, of course, were more edified 
 with this little display, however simple; but 
 Catherine herself occupied most their attention, 
 and they drew nigh to where she sat with an 
 expression of holy confidence, ennobling in itself 
 the object to which it was addressed. 
 
 The few persons there present that belonged 
 to the higher order of society grouped them- 
 selves in the background, as their inferiors 
 crowded on the first ranks, but occasionally 
 caught glimpses of the young saint through the 
 waving motions of her votaries. 
 
 Catherine, far from looking pale or dejected 
 as when last Eleonore beheld her, had a colour 
 in her cheeks so bright and transparent as to
 
 214 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 contrast with the waxy whiteness of her brow 
 and hands in a manner that almost betrayed the 
 hand of art rather than that of nature ; and the 
 lustre of her eye and the delicacy of her 
 features were heightened beyond the degree 
 that is agreeable by this lovely but unnatural 
 tint. The novice's veil shrouded her slight 
 figure, and lent additional dignity to the perfect 
 oval of her physiognomy; but it was not the 
 well-known lineaments, nor even the unusual 
 colouring, that startled Eleonore — it was the 
 expression pervading that once familial* counte- 
 nance, and making it as strange to her eye as 
 though it had never rested on it before. 
 
 There was a radiance on the brow, a light in 
 the eye, a suavity in the smile hovering round 
 the half-unclosed lips, the very impress of hea- 
 ven itself seeming to surround her lovely head 
 with a halo of refulgent light, invisible to mortal 
 eye, except by the reflection it cast upon her 
 irradiated countenance. 
 
 " She's a saint — one has only to look on her 
 to say so !" exclaimed one of the common 
 women, in ecstasy.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 215 
 
 " Ay, the glory is round her, 'tis plain," 
 said another. 
 
 " She looks like one in a dream," said the 
 beauty to Eleonore — " was she always thus ?" 
 
 But Eleonore's whole soul was in her eyes, 
 and there was echo in her breast but for the 
 words her friend might speak. The concentra- 
 tion of her faculties was too evident for her 
 courtly companion to insist on claiming an 
 attention which was evidently rivetted else- 
 where ; and the profoundest silence reigned in 
 this strange and heterogeneous assembly. 
 
 u If," said one of the nuns, coming forward, 
 " you would anything of this holy maiden, 
 good people, she who would hold converse with 
 her must give her hand through the grate." 
 And the nun opened a little wicket for the 
 purpose. 
 
 A woman, in circumstances apparently above 
 those by whom she was surrounded, advanced 
 hastily, and said, in a voice half choked with 
 sobs — 
 
 "I am not come for myself — but they say 
 you are a holy maid, and can read the secrets
 
 216 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 of nature as well as those of afflicted hearts. 
 Here is a lock of my daughter's hair. Oh tell 
 me — tell me, in the Virgin's name ! something 
 about her, sweet lady !" 
 
 Catherine looked earnestly at the lock of 
 soft, dark hair which had been placed by the 
 sobbing mother in her hand, put it on her 
 heart, and kept it there some time, when she 
 said, in low but distinct tones, as audible as if 
 they had been spoken in the ear of each person 
 in the room — 
 
 " I see your daughter ; she is very young — 
 almost a child — and very beautiful." 
 
 u She is but fifteen," murmured the grieved 
 parent. 
 
 " She lies on her snowy bed, all decked out 
 in white. The marriage wreath binds her dark 
 locks, and the small gold ring glitters on the 
 third finger of her left hand. But the lights for 
 the dead are burning at her head and at her 
 feet; people in mourning are kneeling around 
 her; a young man is weeping; — yes, she is 
 dead — I see the seal of death upon her brow !" 
 
 " No, no, — not dead !" exclaimed the wo-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 217 
 
 man, putting forth her hand and clasping, in 
 the anguish of the moment, that of the young 
 novice, who in turn held it tightly imprisoned 
 within the grasp of her own slender, delicate 
 fingers. 
 
 " Woman ! woman ! — why should you doubt 
 that the hand of God has withdrawn what it 
 had given ? But though your lips move in 
 prayer, and speak of submission, your heart 
 murmurs and rebels against his will. It is all 
 of no avail ! The physician has spoken it — the 
 priest has read the prayers for the dead over 
 her — friends have wept her loss ! What more 
 would you know ?" 
 
 " Ay, but it must be a trance — a lethargy !" 
 said the mother, impetuously, the despair at her 
 heart drying up the tears at their source. 
 " But fifteen, and so fair ! — my only darling ! — ■ 
 so happy, too ! The priest had but just spoken 
 the blessing — the husband pressed his lips to 
 hers for the first time — all her little ailings had 
 ceased — she looked as bright and smiling as the 
 angels — and as she turned from the altar, felt 
 into my arms — dead! — no, no! impossible! — it 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 218 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 is false, I tell you ! and so I would tell the 
 angels were they to come on earth and tell me 
 so ! It cannot be — they laid her on her bridal 
 bed, in her wedding-clothes ; but it is now six 
 days ago, and yet no trace of death has come to 
 mark her for his prey. Her hand is not yet 
 cold — her face is pale, but not discoloured. 
 Oh, sweet Saint of Ollioules ! say the priest 
 and the doctor are wrong — that she is but in 
 a swoon ! — oh, say so, and I will worship you 
 evermore !" 
 
 Catherine again looked intently at the lock 
 of hair which the mother had given her, pressed 
 it to her bosom, and after a somewhat protracted 
 pause, replied — 
 
 " No, you must no longer resist the orders of 
 the physician, nor refuse the dead the peaceful 
 grave. Let flowers spring up from the bed of 
 sod where must rest your innocent child. Her 
 sleep is that of eternity — her heart is broken." 
 
 " Broken !" shrieked the mother, " broken ! 
 Oh, no ! — the lark that sang at her window was 
 not gayer than she." 
 
 " The fibres of that heart were too weak to
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 219 
 
 resist its throbs of happiness," murmured Cathe- 
 rine, gazing intently on the curl. " She is 
 well — she is happy now — all her little ailings, 
 the beatings of that fitful heart are over — she 
 is dead, I tell you. Woman, bow your head in 
 submission to the Divine decree." 
 
 But the mother was alike insensible to re- 
 proof or sympathy, — she had fainted. The 
 poor women who surrounded her, manifested 
 the greatest attention and feeling, but were 
 evidently more awe-stricken than encouraged 
 by the scene that had reduced her to this 
 state. 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond, for the first time 
 since the appearance of Catherine, cast her eyes 
 on the mysterious strangers. All trace of mer- 
 riment or affectation had vanished from the 
 dimpled and capricious countenance of the 
 younger, and tears stood in the eyes of the elder 
 as she gazed sorrowfully on the prostrate form 
 of the bereaved mother. 
 
 The nuns took the lock of hair from the 
 novice's passive hand, and, closing around her, 
 for a moment effectually veiled her from sight. 
 l2
 
 220 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 Then, after a short consultation as it appeared, 
 one of them again came forward and announced 
 that those who had any more demands to make 
 of the novice should hasten, as she would not 
 be much longer able to reply to them. 
 
 The humbler votaries seemed now far less 
 anxious than previously to draw near the Saint 
 of St. Clare's, and after some hesitation, observed 
 that, as their betters were waiting, they would 
 retire for that day. This design they soon 
 put into execution, bearing the still insensible 
 woman in their arms, whom, with the sudden 
 and warm impulse of southern natures, they 
 were now more intent upon reviving and con- 
 soling than concerned about the business that 
 had brought them thither. The few ladies who 
 were there, lingered not long behind, but, seem- 
 ingly too painfully affected with what they had 
 just witnessed to have the courage to expose 
 themselves to anything of the kind, left the 
 parlour with looks and gestures sufficiently in- 
 dicative of their deep conviction of the super- 
 natural agency visible in Catherine. 
 
 As they were moving away, the strangers,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 221 
 
 who still stood at Eleonore's elbow, spoke in 
 low hurried tones that gradually became audi- 
 ble, discussing the propriety of remaining yet 
 awhile, or of following the example set by 
 others. 
 
 " After having come so far," said the graver 
 lady, who was the first to recover her composure, 
 " it were absurd to depart thus unsatisfactorily. 
 To have made all this fuss, and yet to lack the 
 courage to face the matter out ! Nay, if you 
 go, I stay ; and see, we are not alone," and her 
 glance plainly intimated that Mademoiselle 
 Raymond was the presence alluded to. 
 
 "May be, but I like not the aspect the thing 
 has taken," answered the other, tremulously. 
 " At a distance, it looked a very amusing 
 plaisanterie, but it is a very different matter 
 now. I tell you, I do not feel nerve to go 
 through it." 
 
 " Nonsense, my dear !" urged the other, with 
 reviving spirits — " it is, I assure you, but a well 
 got up comedy ; it is easy for this pretended 
 marvel of the place to gain intelligence of what 
 has been passing so immediately in her vicinity ;
 
 222 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 the trick is a stale one, and ought not to be 
 palmed off with success upon a person who 
 knows so much of the world as you do." 
 
 " But really I " began the other, hesi- 
 tatingly. 
 
 " You must, ma toute belle, allow yourself to 
 be persuaded — overruled even, if you please — 
 by me, in this affair. Let us advance bravely, 
 hand in hand, and you will soon see that, to 
 unexpected visitors, of whose identities and 
 history she must be wholly ignorant, her 
 answers will be altogether of another nature. 
 She will get embarrassed, speak nonsense, or 
 take refuge in an obstinate silence ; and after 
 what you have this morning seen, it will, per- 
 haps, be a soothing conviction to your mind 
 that she is nothing but an impostor." 
 
 " Truly, if I could bring myself to believe 
 so — " but before the timid beauty had time to 
 finish her sentence, her companion had taken 
 her by the hand, and with gentle violence 
 brought her close to the grate. 
 
 Eleonore, who had not lost a syllable of the 
 foregoing dialogue, although it was spoken in
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 223 
 
 loo low a voice to have reached the ears of the 
 nuns or novice, followed them closely ; taking 
 care, however, to conceal herself behind the tall 
 form of the elder of the two friends, for the 
 other was rather diminutive in stature — that she 
 might avoid, if possible, withdrawing Cathe- 
 rine's attention from those whose object it was 
 to attract it. 
 
 Her curiosity was excited to the uttermost 
 by the scene about to take place ; for, like the 
 lady who had suggested the idea, she thought 
 it very likely that Catherine had heard in her 
 retreat of an event which at that time created 
 some sensation at Toulon. A pretty young girl, 
 namely, had fallen dead at the foot of the altar, 
 where she had but just pronounced vows that 
 were to bind her on earth — a bond broken 
 asunder at the very moment it was formed ; — 
 and yet there was nothing in the handsome 
 bridegroom to excite the suspicion of his having 
 called down upon himself such a catastrophe by 
 any dark deed of his own. The wild over- 
 whelming grief of the mother, — her reluctance 
 and that of her friends to believe in her de-
 
 224 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 cease, — their formal opposition to the burial 
 taking place according to custom and police 
 regulations — all this was a matter of notoriety, 
 and caused much discussion among the public, 
 who began to shew manifest alarm lest the 
 ceremony of interment should be, in some 
 cases, too promptly performed ; a possibility to 
 which the rumours excited by this event gave 
 some colour. What Eleonorc had just wit- 
 nessed, therefore, was not conclusive evidence 
 of her friend's veracity. She might still be 
 acting a part, though Mademoiselle Raymond 
 was forced to acknowledge that in that case she 
 had proved a most consummate actress. 
 
 " We have been informed you can divine as 
 well the mysteries of the future as declare those 
 of the past," said the bolder of the two ladies to 
 Catherine, with a somewhat incredulous smile. 
 " We would have a proof of the latter talent, that 
 we may repose more trust in the former." 
 
 The nuns were, at first, struck dumb, with 
 this irreverent mode of addressing their saint ; 
 then suddenly gave vent to their reprobation in 
 terms of anything but placid reproof. To their
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 225 
 
 vehement objurgations the offender replied in 
 the most winning and honeyed phrases, evi- 
 dently anxious to make up for her mistake, and 
 succeeded after a time, though not without 
 difficulty, in laying the storm she had raised. 
 The softened sisters withdrew from before their 
 idol, to whose person they had momentarily 
 formed an impenetrable barrier; peace was 
 restored, and the lady prepared herself to ad- 
 dress Catherine in more appropriate terms. 
 
 " It is not to gratify idle curiosity, or to 
 dissipate an hour of languor, that we open our 
 gates to the followers of folly or mundane 
 vanities. Our motives for departing from the 
 strictness of our rules are of a graver, higher 
 nature," said one of the nuns, who seemed, 
 both in manner and rank, above the rest, and 
 who was addressed as the mistress of the novices. 
 " It is that the grace and light which it has 
 pleased God to bestow upon this humble maiden, 
 and which exalt her above her years and station, 
 may, peradventure, recal an erring soul from its 
 career of mortal sin, and turn it to repentance ; 
 or," she added, with a severe look and marked 
 L 3
 
 226 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 emphasis — "or to confound, perchance, shame- 
 less scepticism, that would seek, in the brightness 
 of the sun itself, a proof of the darkness which 
 it advocates." 
 
 The reproach cut deep into the soul of the 
 younger lady, who devoutly crossed herself; 
 but the elder cast an inquiring glance on the 
 nun, in whom the freemasonry of education and 
 manner had at once revealed to her practised 
 eye an equal. Nor was she mistaken. Madame 
 de L'Escot, the mistress of the novices at the 
 convent of St. Clare, of Ollioules, was a lady 
 by birth as well as breeding. The result of this 
 discovery was a slight bow of acquiescence in 
 the stranger ; who now, turning to Catherine, 
 and extending her left hand through the wicket, 
 whilst with the right she still tightly grasped 
 her companion, as if afraid that she would break 
 away, and leave her alone and unassisted to get 
 out of the dilemma in which she had placed 
 herself, said, in a grave, submissive tone — 
 
 " You behold two women, who would wil- 
 lingly atone by the future for many an error in 
 the past, if they but knew how ; they are come
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 227 
 
 to claim assistance of your holier spirit, that 
 you may point out to them by what means such 
 errors may best be expiated, and how they may 
 deserve that their remaining days should know 
 nothing of the storms that agitated their youth." 
 
 Madame de L'Escot placed the ungloved 
 hand of the stranger, on which a wedding ring 
 stood conspicuous amidst many an accompany- 
 ing gem, into that of Catherine, who had re- 
 lapsed into a sort of reverie, apparently wholly 
 unconscious of what was passing around her. 
 She seemed transported in thought to some far 
 distant world, whose bright tints were reflected 
 in her deep, radiant gaze. 
 
 She started as she felt the contact of the small, 
 delicate palm of the stranger with her own, 
 and appeared gradually recalled by the touch 
 to a sense of her situation. She stared for a 
 few seconds rather wildly at this new inter- 
 locutor, then heaved a deep sigh, as renewed 
 activity of thought beamed from her bright 
 eyes. When the visitor had ceased speaking, 
 she answered, in the same calm, clear, low, yet 
 searching tone as before —
 
 228 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " Yours has been a stormy youth, lady. 
 Your besetting sin was pride ; it is humbled, 
 not broken. Ambition was your idol; to it 
 you have sacrificed duty and honour — for it, 
 stilled alike the voice of your heart and that of 
 your conscience — you broke the vows that bound 
 you to heaven, the tie that bound you to earth 
 — you forgot your convent, and later, your child, 
 in the guilty pursuit of a guilty aim. Yes, you 
 have known the court well, and its hollowness 
 and deceit. It makes me suffer to think of 
 such things — to behold them is pain, very great 
 pain. You have known power, too, but that 
 dream is over now ; pleasure, pomp, and power, 
 are alike left behind in the rapid flight of time. 
 Born to obscurity, fate has elevated you on its 
 pinions for a time, to fling you back into your 
 native element. Your son, inheriting your gifts, 
 and, perchance, some of the errors of your 
 judgment, will rise on this hemisphere, a brilliant 
 star, but will deny you in his hour of triumph, 
 as you have denied him in his helplessness. 
 You rejected a mother's care — a mother's joys 
 will never be yours. But the past may yet be
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 229 
 
 atoned ; — to the world by your talents, to heaven 
 by sincere contrition " 
 
 "Enough — enough !" said the lady, haughtily, 
 tearing her hand from the novice. " It is now 
 your turn, madam," addressing her companion. 
 
 The latter stood as if rooted to the spot by 
 some irresistible power. As her friend fell 
 back, she involuntarily extended her hand to 
 the saint, who seized, and kept it in hers for a 
 few moments without speaking, then gazed 
 intently at it for a few more, as if willing to 
 read, in the almost imperceptible lines of the 
 rosy palm, the secrets of the heart whose throbs 
 were almost audible. 
 
 "It is fair to look upon, and yet there is 
 blood on that hand,'' she said. The lady gasped 
 for breath and closed her eyes, whilst a slight, 
 but visible shudder passed over her frame. 
 " Yes, there is blood — it sickens me to look 
 at it. ; ' 
 
 " I have not spilled any," murmured the fair 
 penitent. " Oh ! if you know aught, you surely 
 know that." 
 
 " Not you, — but it was spilt through you ;
 
 230 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 your smiles were his destruction. Had he looked 
 less often into your bright eyes, never knelt 
 at your feet — had he not been surprised there 
 by a jealous, a princely lover — his doom had 
 never been sealed. Yes, that is what weighs 
 heaviest on your heart. All your manifold sins 
 — your broken vows — your adulterous amours — 
 your shame — your hours of dalliance and of 
 guilt, are all light, forgotten offences, compared 
 with that one fatal consequence of your levity. 
 He loved you with all the devotion of a reck- 
 less, an erring, but a truthful heart; and you 
 accepted the homage that was to prove his ruin, 
 thoughtlessly — carelessly ; but he was hand- 
 some, young, high-born ; you loved him too. His 
 portion was the rack and the wheel — his noble 
 blood was spilt as though it had been that of 
 the meanest boor that ever crawled. Yes, he 
 loved you well — your name was on his dying 
 lips ; and yet your head rested again on his 
 princely rival's bosom; you heard him call a 
 cowardly revenge, justice ; you drank in his 
 cup, sat in his halls, wreathed gay flowers in 
 your locks for his banquets, and the pale spectre
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 231 
 
 of the dead never rose to your mind — the 
 thought of your guilt never caused you to turn 
 pale at the sight of the ruby wine, or to sicken 
 at the touch of that hand which had signed his 
 doom. He looks at us even now — there — so 
 pale and yet so noble in aspect — his fair hair 
 clotted with blood — he beckons to you " 
 
 " Where ! where ! " wildly shrieked the lady. 
 " De Homes, unhappy de Homes, why torment 
 me? It was the regent — the regent's insane 
 jealousy — and not my love, that caused your 
 death!" 
 
 " This is too much ! — you forget yourself, 
 Madame de Paraberes!" said the elder lady, 
 authoritatively, tearing the trembling, agonized 
 female from the grate, and leading her forcibly 
 away. 
 
 " Oh ! Madame de Tencin, you have killed 
 me," said she, in a broken murmur, as her com- 
 panion dragged her from the parlour. 
 
 All stood amazed and paralysed at this 
 sudden, unlooked for revelation. 
 
 The errors of both these celebrated mistresses 
 of the Regent had been too flagrant to have
 
 232 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 escaped the knowledge even of such recluses 
 as the virgins of Ollioules. The literary fame of 
 Madame cle Tencin had indeed survived, in the 
 world of Paris, the renown of her beauty and 
 her intrigues ; but nought could mitigate their 
 heinousness in the eyes of the nuns, though 
 swallowed up, for the moment, in the deep 
 interest created by the supposed heroine of the 
 tragical event just alluded to — the death of the 
 young Count de Homes — which was yet fresh 
 in every mind. 
 
 Although all creditable historians have agreed 
 in charging him with the offence for which he 
 suffered, yet there were many at the time, espe- 
 cially among the privileged classes to which he 
 belonged, who were inclined to doubt both the 
 justice of his sentence and the Regent's motives 
 for enforcing it with a relentless purpose so 
 much at variance with his usual easiness of 
 temper. The dissolute habits of the Prince 
 naturally led the suspicious to couple this un- 
 wonted severity with some portion of the scan- 
 dalous chronicle of his life ; and they asserted 
 that jealousy of the Count's success with one of
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 233 
 
 the very few objects of his gallantry for whom 
 he ever professed, or felt, a real passion, the 
 lovely Marquise Dc Parabercs, was the real 
 cause of his secret rage against De Homes, 
 which a chance accident, by involving the 
 Count in a mysterious and criminal affair, had 
 favoured. Others there were, who affirmed 
 that the desire to oblige law, and protect his 
 system, was the only reason for this act of in- 
 clemency. 
 
 However slight the foundation for such 
 rumours may have hcen, and however obvious 
 the motives of those who brought them into 
 circulation, still none can read the sad fate of 
 this ill-starred young nobleman without feeling 
 some surprise, perhaps even suspicion, at such 
 unwonted, and in some details almost malig- 
 nant severity, as the Regent displayed, in a case 
 where so many attenuating circumstances might 
 have pleaded in favour of the culprit. His 
 extreme youth, his illustrious origin, his more 
 than doubtful sanity of mind, his quality of 
 foreigner — the mean condition and lost character 
 of his accusers — all these were so many facilities
 
 234 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 afforded to the Prince's mercy. But vainly did 
 the highest in the realm humble the pride they 
 almost invariably opposed to the Regent on 
 every possible occasion, to petition the youth's 
 life, or at least a commutation of the sentence 
 into inflicting death in a more humane manner. 
 Vainly did they implore that his blood, which 
 claimed affinity to that of the Regent himself, 
 should not be disgraced by a peine infdmante — 
 the voice of petition and that of mercy were 
 alike disregarded; and at the early age of nine- 
 teen, the handsomest youth of the day perished 
 like the lowest and worst of malefactors. 
 
 The general outline of this sad story was, as 
 I have said, but too well known to admit of 
 what had just passed not being fully understood 
 by all present ; and there ensued at its close a 
 pause of surprise and indignation, during which 
 the unfortunate woman who had so powerfully 
 excited the latter feeling in the bosoms of the 
 quiet sisterhood, was shoved by her friend, more 
 dead than alive, into the chaise that had brought 
 them to the convent door. 
 
 It was the rattle of its wheels that first re-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 235 
 
 called the wandering thoughts of those in the 
 parlour. Catherine had fallen back into the 
 arm-chair, apparently in a state of total exhaus- 
 tion. It seemed as if an enchanter's wand had 
 passed over her frame, dispelling at one touch 
 the magic beauty he had lent, so complete and 
 remarkable was the change. There she lay, 
 ghastly pale, with closed eyes and lips apart, 
 the veil flung back from her emaciated features, 
 from which all expression had fled except one 
 of intense fatigue. 
 
 " Her fit is coming on," murmured one of the 
 nuns to the mistress of the novices ; " we must 
 remove her." 
 
 The little candles were blown out ; after a 
 few violent tugs, the curtain was again hermeti- 
 cally drawn to ; the shuffling of feet was heard, 
 the rolling away of the heavy chair, with its 
 half insensible burthen ; then that of the prie 
 Dieu; a banging of many doors ensued, and the 
 scene was over. 
 
 The terrified Eleonore still stood rooted 
 before the grate, unable to determine if what 
 she had just assisted to was the representation
 
 236 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 of an excellently got up, exquisitely played 
 comedy, that only wanted a little better setting 
 off in the way of decoration to be perfect, or if 
 it were a strange awful mystery of nature 
 which she had for the first time beheld. How 
 long she might yet have remained thus absorbed 
 and unmindful of time or place, it is impossible 
 to say ; for a light, though firm grasp was laid 
 on her arm — she started, looked up in surprise, 
 and my father stood before her. 
 
 " I have been present almost since the very 
 first moment," he said, "though you did not see 
 me, lost as I was in the shadow of the entrance 
 door. I have seen and heard everything ; so 
 trouble not yourself to relate what it were pain 
 to describe, nor attempt to explain what hardly 
 admits of explanation. I am not ashamed to 
 confess it, it was a womanish curiosity that 
 brought me here ; but I am glad of the impulse, 
 let its cause be what it may, since it has brought 
 me to you at the right moment." 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond indeed had cause to 
 rejoice at his timely presence. Her nerves, 
 strong as they naturally were, had been un-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 237 
 
 usually shaken, and she needed an arm on 
 which to lean, a gentle and sympathising but 
 firmer mind than her own to lead her by 
 degrees, if not thoroughly to understand in all 
 its details, or to obliterate the general impres- 
 sion of that morning's proceeding, at least to 
 calm the agitation it had excited, and to regu- 
 late the ideas it had engendered. 
 
 As to my father, puzzled and perplexed, he 
 once more turned over many a dusty volume, 
 that only perplexed and puzzled him the more, 
 then ceasing from his unfruitful labour, volun- 
 tarily, though not without a strong effort, he 
 dismissed the subject altogether from his mind, 
 and trusted to the future to throw more light 
 upon it than his reason, torture it as he would, 
 could well afford at the present moment. 
 
 I may as well here mention that when, at a 
 later period, Mademoiselle Raymond had occa- 
 sion to visit Paris, and the ladies De Tencin 
 and De Parabere were pointed out to her notice, 
 she had no difficulty, though meeting them in a 
 calmer, lighter scene, in recognising in them 
 the strangers of the parlour at St. Clare's ; and
 
 238 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 when, at a still later period, D'Alembert, the 
 former's natural son, shone conspicuous in the 
 bright but baneful constellation that for a time 
 illumined the horizon of French literature, 
 when his name was pronounced along with 
 those of Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot, and the 
 rest, that name recalled, involuntarily, to all 
 who had been present at the scene we have 
 described, Catherine's allusions concerning him. 
 Nor was the fact thought less remarkable that 
 when at last, at the request of the physicians 
 and desire of the authorities, the body of the 
 young girl whose sudden decease had caused 
 such general sensation, was submitted to au- 
 topsy, it was discovered that the cause, though 
 totally unsuspected, was very natural. The 
 heart had burst ; which, as the poor child had 
 been for the last few years subject to constant 
 and violent palpitations, and was otherwise of a 
 very delicate constitution, was not a matter of 
 marvel to the faculty. 
 
 The events which led to the sketch I have so 
 rapidly traced, took, however, many months in 
 developing themselves; and some time had
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 239 
 
 since elapsed when Mademoiselle Raymond, 
 who was now busily engaged in the arrange * 
 ments necessary for her approaching nuptials, 
 was one day startled out of her usual com- 
 posure by the sudden appearance of Madame 
 Cadieres, who had never been in the habit of 
 visiting her, even when her daughter's intimacy 
 with Eleonore was at its height. The laces she 
 had just taken up dropped from her hand, and 
 surprise kept her mute ; but her visitor was at 
 no loss to explain herself, as indeed a powerful 
 sentiment or desire seldom leaves room for 
 embarrassment. 
 
 " I feel," she said, " you must think it very 
 odd of me to come to you in my difficulties, 
 whom I so unscrupulously offended in my time 
 of happiness. But do not forget I did so only at 
 the bidding of another, not from any personal 
 disinclination, and that that other has deceived 
 me. I now know you to have been our real 
 friend throughout." 
 
 Had Mademoiselle Raymond consulted her 
 feelings only, she would have frankly confessed 
 how very immaterial she considered what Ma-
 
 240 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 dame Cadieres thought or had ever thought of 
 her ; but the recollection of the daughter soft- 
 ened her towards the mother, to whose folly 
 she could not but remember that she owed her 
 own felicity ; and she said, in a gentle tone — 
 
 " And so I could wish ever to remain. But, 
 pray, is there anything in my power by which I 
 can testify my friendship at this moment ?" 
 
 " Oh, yes — many things," replied the old 
 lady, accepting a proffered seat. " You see, I 
 am sadly afraid I have been altogether mis- 
 taken in Father Girard, although not in my 
 daughter, as you must now admit." 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond not choosing to fill 
 up the pause which Madame Cadieres here 
 made for an answer, the latter continued — 
 
 " Yes, there will be a Saint Catherine of 
 Toulon, as there is one of Genoa and of Sienna — 
 as for that, heresy itself cannot deny it, although 
 I have heard it denies saints altogether. How- 
 ever; that signifies nothing — mine cannot be 
 talked away ; but I will candidly own you were 
 right in thinking Father Girard selfish and 
 overbearing. My son, the Dominican, and
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 241 
 
 even the ecclesiastic, have come to the same 
 conclusion." 
 
 " And is it merely to impart this discovery 
 that you have done me the honour of this 
 visit ?" said Mademoiselle Raymond, whose 
 patience was ebbing fast. 
 
 " Oh, no — not exactly," said the expansive 
 matron — " I came to ask your advice, your 
 assistance, on a very difficult point for a mother 
 to decide about. I have just received a letter 
 from Catherine." 
 
 " Have you it by you ?" said Mademoiselle 
 Raymond, with reviving interest — " what does 
 it contain ?" 
 
 " Why, you must know that neither I nor my 
 poor girl ever liked the idea of her going into a 
 convent. She always declared herself loudly 
 against the plan. No, no ! Catherine was des- 
 tined to be a saint, but not a nun. Father 
 Girard, however, insisted in spite of all her 
 tears and protestations — he also wrung a forced 
 consent from me. His taking her to Ollioules, 
 and that, too, when she was very ill, and needed 
 nothing so much as a mother's care " 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 242 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " You might, you ought to have prevented 
 this ; but perhaps it may not be too late," said 
 Mademoiselle Raymond, endeavouring to cut 
 short the wearisome repetition of facts with 
 which she was well acquainted, and which had 
 ceased to be of paramount interest to her. " I 
 hope Catherine is no worse. Have you seen 
 her lately ?" 
 
 " Not very recently ; but when I last saw 
 her, I thought my heart would break only to 
 look upon her. She is so changed — she looks 
 as if she had just risen from her grave." 
 
 Madame Cadieres put her kerchief to her 
 eyes, and Eleonore did not feel wearied by the 
 sight of this natural sorrow, nor at the mode in 
 which it was expressed, but pressed her visitor's 
 hand in sympathizing kindness. 
 
 " Well, Father Girard's power being at an 
 end with Catherine, it will be easy to put a 
 stop to all this," she said. " Exert yourself but 
 a very little, and you will recover her." 
 
 " There's the difficulty ; the poor child is 
 completely in his hands — she can't withdraw 
 herself from him, but wants us to do it ; she
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 243 
 
 needs our assistance, she says, to counteract her 
 own passive obedience — her blind submission 
 to his will, — in short, to take her from the 
 convent." 
 
 " Then, if she has so decided a will of her 
 own, why does she not express it to her di- 
 rector? — perhaps he might be prevailed upon 
 to yield to it." 
 
 " There lies the mistake : she has begged 
 and entreated him on her knees to let her 
 return to me ; she has sobbed at his feet — 
 besought him by all he holds sacred; but he 
 will not hear of it, and punishes her severely 
 for what he terms her disobedience to the will 
 of God. But as the abbess, who is a lady of 
 great discernment and kindness, has found out 
 that Catherine has no vocation for a monastic 
 life, and does not, under such circumstances, 
 approve of her embracing it, he speaks of 
 removing her to a severer order, that of the 
 Carmelites of Premole, where she will be so 
 cut off from all communication with the w r orld, 
 that she had as well be entombed alive. Indeed, 
 I am sure she will not survive her noviciate." 
 m 2
 
 244 MAGIC AND MESMERISM, 
 
 " What can be his motive for this strange 
 insistance?" said Eleonore, thoughtfully, en- 
 deavouring in her own mind to find a clue 
 to the seemingly aimless labyrinth of the Je- 
 suit's system of persecution. 
 
 " He says it is to humble my poor Cathe- 
 rine's pride ; but, if you but saw her, she 
 already looks more dead than alive. The con- 
 vent kills her by inches, and yet the order 
 of St. Claire is very mild. What will she not 
 have to suffer if forced into one of a more 
 austere description ! I cannot bring myself to 
 think of it." 
 
 " But after all, my dear madam, what can 
 Catherine object to so much in a convent life ? — 
 she dislikes marriage." Mademoiselle Ray- 
 mond blushed deeply as she spoke. 
 
 " Yes ; and some people, doubtless, think 
 themselves lucky that she does.'' 
 
 Eleonore forbore from answering the taunt 
 with one in the same bad taste, for which the 
 efforts of Madame Cadieres, at one time, to 
 obtain her hand and fortune for one of her sons, 
 might have afforded her an ample opportunity ;
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 245 
 
 but, as I before have had occasion to say, she was 
 superior, if not to all the weaknesses of her sex, 
 at least to those that take their rise in narrow- 
 ness of mind or badness of the heart. Her 
 spirit was as noble as her feelings were ge- 
 nerous. She could utter a reproach, but never 
 a sarcasm — she could blame, but never turn 
 any one into ridicule. I fear there are not 
 many like her, or we should sec the world 
 abounding with better brought-up families. 
 But this is again a digression — forgive it me, I 
 entreat, I have cause to dwell on this subject 
 with pleasure. 
 
 Madame Cadieres was utterly unable to un- 
 derstand such sentiments, and accordingly, 
 without paying any attention to the delicacy of 
 the young lady's silence, she added, in the tone 
 of one deeply affronted — 
 
 " But although Catherine does not like the 
 notion of matrimony, as you say, she loves her 
 home and her mother." 
 
 " She is happy in possessing either," said 
 Mademoiselle Raymond, with a sigh. 
 
 " Besides," continued the mother, in eager
 
 246 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 vindication of her child, " you should remem- 
 ber that the life she leads is not an easy one for 
 a sick girl, accustomed to all the indulgences of 
 home. To be roused in the depth of night 
 from sound, refreshing sleep, to attend mid- 
 night prayers — to kneel on the cold marble — 
 and, above all, to abstain from meat all the 
 year round — are physical sufferings which ordi- 
 nary beings, such as you and I, can easily com- 
 prehend. But to these are added moral strug- 
 gles, of which we can have no notion. The 
 latter of course come from Heaven, and can't 
 be helped ; but it is my duty to spare her those 
 unnecessary trials which can be of little use in 
 elevating such a soul as hers, but must bring 
 her body to premature decay. I am proud and 
 happy to see the palm of the saint in Cathe- 
 rine's hand, but I have not the courage to see 
 her wear the crown of martyrdom." 
 
 " Nor I, could I but see in what manner it 
 were possible to extricate one who will not be 
 extricated !" 
 
 " That is just the point on which I came to 
 consult Having fully explained my motives
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 247 
 
 for withdrawing her from St. Clare's — for should 
 she once enter on her noviciate at Salette, I 
 doubt if we could ever get her back again, — I 
 implore you to point out to me by what means 
 I can effect my purpose, and to aid me in so 
 doing. I am but a simple woman myself, and 
 my sons are but inexperienced youths, rendered 
 more than usually cautious and timid by their 
 profession. It would never do for them, you 
 know, to put themselves in too marked an op- 
 position to Father Girard." 
 
 " Well, really, deeply grieved as I feel for 
 your daughter, since neither you nor your sons 
 are willing to exert your lawful authority, I 
 scarcely know what advice to give." 
 
 " I did not exactly expect you would," said 
 Madame Cadieres, at last coming to the point ; 
 " but you have one at your disposal who can, 
 and, at your bidding, probably will give the 
 best of advice — perhaps even aid us ; and you, 
 I am sure, for Catherine's sake, will not refuse 
 to bid him." 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond stared at her visitor 
 in undisguised astonishment.
 
 248 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " But, my dear madam, if it is Monsieur 
 Chaudon's advice you require^ why not ask it, 
 personally, of him ? You know him, and must 
 be convinced of his kind feelings towards you 
 and yours." 
 
 " That is what I could not feel sure of; and as 
 he has experienced so much disappointment at 
 our hands, of course we feel delicate in asking 
 any service of him." 
 
 a But, surely, not now, when his being in a 
 state of consolation is officially announced," 
 answered Eleonore, laughing. " It is, at the 
 best, an exaggeration of delicacy. Go to him ; 
 I can assure you of a kind welcome." 
 
 " Oh, I have no doubt. Still, he might resent 
 the past ; my sons, and even I, were obliged to 
 treat him with great distance ; well, you know 
 it all, and so " 
 
 " I see that you totally misconceive the whole 
 affair, my dear madam," said Mademoiselle 
 Raymond ; " but if you will follow my advice — 
 though, it seems, after all, it is not for that you 
 came here — you will sit quiet for a few minutes 
 longer, when Monsieur Chaudon, whom I ex-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 249 
 
 pect every instant, will be able to satisfy all 
 your doubts." 
 
 This was said with a malicious smile, and 
 produced, instantaneously, the desired effect. 
 Madame Cadieres rose and took her leave ; but 
 in so doing she thrust a sadly crumpled note 
 into Eleonore's hand, saying — 
 
 " This is from Catherine. Oh ! do not 
 abandon us !" 
 
 Eleonore willingly forgot the silly, vain wo- 
 man, the moment the mother spoke in Madame 
 Cadieres. She promised her assistance, and 
 her promises were sacred as oaths. 
 
 The letter contained but these words : — 
 
 " If you do not withdraw me hence, my 
 
 mother, I perish ! 
 
 " Catherine." 
 
 On reading these few words, Mademoiselle 
 Raymond's emotion was great; but, of course, 
 its first impulses were controlled by the wise 
 hand that in future was to guide her destiny. 
 It was agreed that both her future husband and 
 herself should go to Ollioules, and try to gain 
 M 3
 
 250 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 admittance to the saint. They had even fixed 
 the day for this joint visit, when a sudden fit 
 of sickness interfered with Mademoiselle Ray- 
 mond's wishes, and my father went alone. 
 
 After some demur — for, at first, he was not 
 willing to let Catherine know who sought an 
 interview with her, apprehensive of a refusal — 
 he gave in his name, which proved the real 
 sesame to the parlour grate of St. Clare's ; 
 where, in the habit of a novice of that order, 
 Catherine awaited him. 
 
 Had he not been prepared to meet her, he 
 could never have recognised, in the colourless, 
 worn, emaciated being who now stood before 
 him, with pendant arms, half open lips, and a 
 wan brow, from which all intelligence had 
 faded, the object of his early adoration. 
 
 Her vestments hung loosely round her 
 shrunken person, that no longer exhibited the 
 graceful outlines of ripening womanhood which 
 had once distinguished it. They were, too, 
 donned with a negligence contrasting much 
 with the scrupulous neatness of attire which 
 she was wont to display ; but the change that
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 251 
 
 most startled him was the careless arrangement 
 of her beautiful hair. This object of her former 
 pride and delight, as well as of his own admira- 
 tion, was now thrust under the novice's veil, 
 from beneath which a few locks struggled for- 
 ward, unrepressed and untrained, whose paly 
 gold glittered no longer. 
 
 " Her mother is right — she is dying," was the 
 thought that involuntarily suggested itself to 
 his mind, as he gazed on this wreck of human 
 loveliness. The next was, " She must be saved, 
 cost what it may," and compassion, deep and 
 ardent, was now the predominant feeling with 
 which he regarded the wretched being before 
 him. All unpleasant recollections of the past 
 vanishing at once from his mind, he approached 
 her no longer as a lover, but in a character that 
 partook little less of devotion in one whose soul 
 was so highly toned — that of a friend. 
 
 " I am here, partly at Eleonore's request," he 
 said, "who is too ill to come herself, and 
 partly at your mother's. I hope you will 
 receive me as you would them." 
 
 This prelude eliciting no answer, he con-
 
 252 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 tinned, with the familiarity of past times, that 
 all awkwardness might be removed on her part, 
 should she feel any in addressing him for the 
 first time since she had so unkindly dismissed 
 him. 
 
 " Arc you sorry to see me, Catherine ?" he 
 said, gently, looking steadfastly at her as he 
 spoke, — for he remembered Eleonorc's asser- 
 tion, that this was the most effectual means she 
 had discovered of securing her attention. 
 
 The novice turned her e} r es languidly from 
 his fixed gaze, and answered in a low, toneless 
 voice, that struck painfully on his ear, like the 
 harbinger of approaching decay. 
 
 " Oh, no ! why should I ? — I am never glad 
 or sorry at anything now/' 
 
 "But you would be glad to leave the con- 
 vent, I presume ? At least, I have been told as 
 much." 
 
 " Yes, if Father Girard will allow me ; but 
 he won't — he never will." She uttered these 
 words despondingly, and suffered her head to 
 fall on her breast, 
 
 " Exert vour own will but for a moment, and
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 253 
 
 you arc free," urged my father. " Your mother 
 is ready to receive you back to her arms, so 
 arc your brothers, so is Elconore, — all who have 
 ever known and loved you ; and here am I, 
 with fall authority, to claim you in their name, 
 if you will but allow me to do so." 
 
 "You! — you want to take mc away from 
 here ! This is very, very kind, and more than I 
 deserve at your hands," — she blushed slightly 
 as she made this allusion to the past, — " but it 
 cannot avail me. You had better not put your- 
 self forward in this matter ; don't thwart him — 
 he will not bear to be thwarted." 
 
 " That is spoken more like your former self, 
 dear Catherine, though not in the same tones. 
 You seem very feeble ; you must really return 
 home, were it only for your health's sake. As 
 for me, I neither seek to offend, nor yet dread 
 to do so, in a fair cause, any breathing mortal; 
 monk or soldier are alike to me in that respect. 
 Besides, why should this redoubted Jesuit wish 
 to immure you here, or any where else ?" 
 
 " Because he wishes my speedy death now 
 he has ceased to like me ; that is why he wishes
 
 254 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 me to go to Saletta. He may cheat others with 
 fair words, but from me he cannot hide his 
 thoughts." 
 
 " I dare say you know him thoroughly," said 
 my father, delighted at seeing the soulless 
 apathy, which, at first sight, had seemed to him 
 to have usurped in her the place of every faculty, 
 gradually giving way, as something more of life 
 and human interest lighted up her eye. It was 
 to him as if the mists of night were slowly 
 rolling away from before a well known prospect. 
 He rejoiced in the change, slight as it was, and 
 was pleased to ascribe it to the beneficial effects 
 of his presence ; but her voice had still the same 
 monotonous, husky, powerless sound that so 
 painfully grated on his ear, on which still hung 
 the soft, silvery tones that had once charmed 
 him. 
 
 " But, knowing him and his purposes well," 
 he continued, " why not defeat them ?" 
 
 " I may not," muttered the novice, with a 
 slight shudder. 
 
 "Then why write to your mother to take 
 you away ?"
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 255 
 
 " I don't know," was the disconsolate answer. 
 
 " This is more like moody madness than 
 sober sense. She must be roused from this," 
 thought my father ; " but first I will try her." 
 
 " If Father Girard be persuaded to let you 
 go, — if he give his free consent, what then ?" 
 
 " Then — then I should be saved !" exclaimed 
 Catherine, with some vivacity. " But, no ; he 
 never will consent 1" 
 
 " He must have strange reasons for this 
 insistance, Catherine." 
 
 " Of course he has. It would never do if 
 the world at large were to learn that he is a 
 magician — a sorcerer — and has bewitched me ! 
 But the lady abbess and all this community 
 know it, and do not approve of my vocation, 
 nor of him, — that is why I am to be withdrawn 
 hence." 
 
 " Catherine, give me your hand through the 
 grate in sign of renewed amity ; do not hesitate, 
 mine is pledged to Eleonore ; there, that's right. 
 Now, look at me, and answer me succinctly and 
 frankly, as though I were Father Girard, and 
 do not trifle with me. You know I bear no 
 trifling."
 
 256 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 Although well aware how powerful are the 
 rays of the human eye on all those to whom 
 reason is denied, cither in our own species, or 
 even in the most wild of the animal creation, 
 my father had recourse to the means recom- 
 mended by Eleonore to command both Cathe- 
 rine's attention and goodwill, without much 
 trusting in their efficacy. Severity, indeed, he 
 believed to be operative, to a certain extent, 
 over all weak intellects, even when not actually 
 disordered; but never had he so strong an 
 evidence of that doctrine's truth as in this 
 instance, which, he frankly owned to me, made 
 him fully understand the nature of animal mag- 
 netism, though, at the time, he vainly struggled 
 to class it under any received denomination, 
 or define its boundaries. 
 
 The manner of the young girl underwent a 
 marked change, at the same time that her whole 
 person assumed an air of passive obedience ; 
 an animated expression instantly pervaded her 
 features, nor did she attempt to withdraw her 
 hand from the firm grasp that held it. 
 
 "Yes," she said, as if in communion with her
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 257 
 
 own thought rather than with reference to the 
 subject under discussion — " yes, you mean it 
 well by her and by me. Oh, no ! you are not 
 like Father Girard ! Your hand cools, it does 
 not burn." 
 
 " Well, then, let yours rest in it, and answer 
 freely and frankly — Do you love Father Girard ?" 
 
 "Oh, no, no!" almost shrieked Catherine. 
 " Ours is a bond of hatred, not of love. He 
 has bewitched me, I tell you — that is our only 
 tie. But, do not mention this. It maddens 
 me to think of it !" 
 
 " I must insist," continued my father, authori- 
 tatively, "painful as the interrogatory may be 
 to both. In what way has the spell you com- 
 plain of worked ?" 
 
 " You see me after months of absence, and 
 you ask ?" said Catherine, reproachfully. " Is 
 there anything left of what I once possessed ? 
 Youth, beauty, happiness — he has wrenched 
 everything from me ! His words have mocked 
 my ears, his thoughts bewildered my brain, 
 his wickedness seared my heart. From the first 
 hour his unhallowed breath warmed my brow,
 
 258 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 fever has throbbed in my pulses, madness burnt 
 my brain, remorse gnawed into my heart. My 
 nights have known no rest, my days no joy, 
 my conscience no peace. My life has been but 
 a protracted torture, and you ask me in what 
 manner the spell has worked ?" 
 
 My father was startled at this sudden display 
 of vehemence, and though prepared for some 
 such ebullition by Eleonore's account of her 
 own observations, still this strange exhibition 
 of feeling aroused his deepest interest. 
 
 " You have suffered much !" he mechanically 
 exclaimed, still retaining within his the passive 
 hand which Catherine thought not of with- 
 drawing. 
 
 " Much !" she repeated, with a bitterness of 
 accent that seemed, for a moment, to restore 
 some tone to her voice. " Much ! — more, a 
 thousand times more, than you, or any human 
 being who has not been in that fiend's power, 
 can guess ! Oh ! but, 'were I to speak for hours, 
 I never could tell all I have suffered. My 
 whole existence is wrecked in this world, and, 
 perhaps, in the next ! All I loved he bade me
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 259 
 
 hate ; and I hated and loved the same objects 
 at the same time, until the furious struggles of 
 these contending passions threatened to break 
 the fibres of my heart, too weak to contain 
 them. Yes, I could have loved you, — I did 
 love you. I was on the eve of giving up my 
 imagined vocation to the loud dictates of my 
 heart, when he came, like a thunderbolt, to 
 blight every honest feeling — every happy pros- 
 pect! But I loved you even when my lips 
 denied it — even when they pronounced the 
 doom of our eternal separation — of my own 
 misery !" 
 
 She looked full into the face of him whom 
 she thus frankly addressed, and scarcely did the 
 faintest blush tinge her sallow cheek, so intense 
 was the concentration of her feelings upon her- 
 self, whilst she lay the secrets of her heart bare 
 to the analysis of another. 
 
 A man of ordinary and superficial mind 
 would, on this occasion, either have felt a per- 
 fect indifference on hearing that he had been 
 the object of a sentiment in one whom he no 
 longer cared for, and, perhaps, considering the
 
 260 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 circumstances, have felt a mean triumph in it ; 
 or, admitting that he was influenced by more 
 gentle and gentlemanly feelings, some weakness 
 might have come over him, and the past become 
 blended with the present. Not so my father. 
 His character was as firm as it was noble. The 
 latter quality, indeed, rarely exists where the 
 former is missing. That which had been, was, 
 in his mind, irrevocably separated from what 
 was. Constitutionally free from the infirmity 
 of melancholy brooding, he never looked back- 
 wards in life, but ever cheerily forward. When 
 he heard, therefore, this confirmation of a fact 
 long since suspected by him, he was grieved 
 for Catherine's sake, but not for his own, for his 
 affections were now unreservedly in the posses- 
 sion of Eleonore ; nor was he depraved enough 
 to misunderstand the words of the wretched 
 inmate of St. Clare's, as they welled from the 
 depth of uncontrollable feeling. 
 
 As he paused to consider in what manner he 
 should avoid uttering anything consistent with 
 the truth without offending the young girl, she 
 continued, with increasing warmth : —
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 261 
 
 " Oh ! you cannot fancy such an existence as 
 mine has been. I could not love — I could not 
 pray — that was worse than all beside. I thought 
 blasphemies, even whilst the world called me 
 holy. My soul is lost ! lost for ever — that fiend 
 has possessed himself of it!" and suddenly 
 tearing her fingers from my father's grasp, she 
 wrung her hands in the very wildness of 
 despair. 
 
 " Brighter days" — began my father. 
 
 " Never — never !" she exclaimed. " You 
 know not — I am lost, irretrievably lost, in this 
 world as in the next — he has robbed me of 
 everything — my faith and my hope — even of 
 innocence !" 
 
 "Nay, Catherine, you speak wildly; your 
 innocence who could taint ?" 
 
 She covered her face with both her hands, 
 and the tears forced their way through her 
 slender fingers. 
 
 " What can this mean, Catherine ? I must— 
 I insist on knowing." 
 
 " Yes," said the poor girl, slowly withdrawing 
 her hands, and exhibiting on her wan cheeks
 
 262 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 two hectic spots — " yes — I know what I say — I 
 am disgraced — he has robbed me of everything 
 — home and friends — my God and my early 
 love — he has left me nothing — nothing — not 
 even a woman's honour." 
 
 My father was speechless with amazement. 
 Much as he had pondered on Father Girard's 
 character, and the possible motives of his 
 strange conduct towards Catherine, this leading 
 one had never struck him; and when Made- 
 moiselle Raymond recited how she had caused 
 the Jesuit to tremble at the mere epithet, 
 " seducer," which she breathed in his ear on the 
 morning of Catherine's departure for Ollioules, 
 he had not suspected the full meaning which 
 both the young lady and the priest attached to 
 the word. He fancied, indeed, she meant to 
 reproach him with seducing a young girl from 
 her home and friends, inducing her to adopt a 
 course of life diametrically opposed to her real 
 inclinations and their wishes; but the coarser, 
 broader acceptation of the word he had deemed 
 inapplicable in reference to Catherine, had not 
 even Father Girard's disgusting appearance
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 263 
 
 been a sufficient warrant against such a sup- 
 position. 
 
 Mademoiselle Raymond's feminine tact had 
 dived into the secret sooner ; but, on perceiving 
 how unconscious was every one else but herself 
 she had deemed it best to confine her suspicions 
 to her own bosom. 
 
 Even now, when my father heard the fact 
 admitted by the unfortunate victim of abomin- 
 able arts, he could not credit his own senses. 
 That her director had driven her mad was the 
 inference he drew from her whole behaviour 
 and manner. As this thought presented itself 
 to his mind, he gazed on her with unmitigated 
 pity ; and as the ravages of disease forced them- 
 selves upon his notice, as he viewed thus, at 
 one glance, the havoc that the hypocrite's tam- 
 pering with so fine a spirit had produced, he 
 felt every nerve thrill through him with rage, 
 the fiercer because he knew how impossible it 
 was to procure redress, and visit with deserved 
 punishment the Jesuit's villany. As he con- 
 tinued his interrogatories, and Catherine, 
 swayed as usual by the more or less firmness of
 
 264 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 those with whom she came in contact, answered 
 the questions he put with almost childlike 
 frankness, the whole web of iniquity was laid 
 bare to his scrutiny. Father Girard's aim, he 
 now plainly saw, was to elevate himself in his 
 order by means of his votaries and proselytes ; 
 but his ambition, though strong, was not the 
 master passion of his soul. His baser, grosser 
 instincts came athwart it, and neutralized his 
 other well-ordered plans for bettering himself. 
 This had been more glaringly the case with 
 Catherine Cadieres ; whose peculiarities of 
 mind had presented him with a glorious oppor- 
 tunity of satisfying his ambition, had not her 
 beauty too fatally tempted him from the pursuit 
 of his primary object. He would, however, 
 have succeeded in blending the glory of pro- 
 selytism with the indulgence of his cynical 
 libertinism, had not Catherine's violent remorse, 
 and the moody melancholy that preyed on her 
 health, together with the general attention she 
 excited, agitated him with the fear that his foul 
 secret might be discovered. 
 
 This, then, was the reason why he insisted on
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 265 
 
 her removal to St. Clare's, where he hoped all 
 chance of discovery would be buried with her 
 beneath her nun's veil. The resistance, how- 
 ever, which Catherine and her friends opposed 
 to his wishes on this point, both incensed and 
 embarrassed him ; but he was determined to 
 overcome every difficulty ; for his profane and 
 licentious passion drew him still towards his 
 wretched victim, by a spell as powerful as any 
 that he himself could raise. 
 
 But, either fear getting the better of his 
 inclination — as a marked change in the lady 
 abbess's manner warned him that her suspicions 
 were roused, or, as usual with depraved beings, 
 the very violence of his passion wearing it 
 out, he finally saw less of its object; and, at 
 last, formed the project of removing her alto- 
 gether from any communication either with 
 himself or others — hence his diabolical deter- 
 mination to bury her wrongs and her sorrows in 
 the living tomb of a Carthusian cell. 
 
 What a mass of vices — what a tale of mis- 
 fortune did the few words he elicited from 
 Catherine's lips reveal to her companion ! He 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 266 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 could have wept over her as a father over a 
 favourite child ; and he felt it would have been 
 a pleasure, at that moment, to crush the vile 
 Jesuit, like a venemous reptile under his heel. 
 
 But his was a profession that teaches self- 
 control better, and tames the passions earlier, 
 than perhaps any other. His warm and gene- 
 rous nature had not, indeed, become chilled, 
 but merely guided by the habits of self-posses- 
 sion it imposes. He dared not trust himself to 
 speak, lest he should utter aught that he might 
 repent of; but his flashing eye and quivering 
 lip betrayed the secret struggle within, and his 
 sympathy with the victim more than words 
 could have conveyed. When he felt conscious 
 of having sufficiently mastered his first indig- 
 nant emotion, he gave vent to the grief that 
 filled his heart, for the ruin of one whose wel- 
 fare, in spite of his alienated affection, he yet 
 held so dear, and whose overwhelming wretched- 
 ness — whose very loss, made her still dearer. 
 
 " My poor Catherine !" he exclaimed, clothing 
 his sympathy in the words of tenderness with 
 an almost feminine intuition of compassion —
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 267 
 
 "Dear, unhappy Catherine, redress for such 
 wrongs as yours is impossible. The revenge it 
 might afford us upon" — the mere allusion to 
 the wretch caused a gulping sensation at his 
 throat which he paused to repress — " would be 
 barren, productive of evil to others, perhaps, 
 but chiefly to ourselves — yourself, I mean, my 
 poor Catherine. The world, in such cases, 
 stamps with infamy the brow of the innocent 
 victim more than that of the cowardly aggressor. 
 An attempt at redress must be attended with 
 publicity ; and the public ought never, with 
 your free will or that of those who love you, to 
 be made a participator in a secret which would 
 blast your name for ever. Innocent you still 
 are and must ever appear to the thoughtful ; but 
 to the unreflecting multitude ! Oh, Catherine ! 
 Catherine ! that you should have been the vic- 
 tim ! I had as soon believed the brightest star 
 of heaven would have fallen !" 
 
 Catherine listened with a half- bewildered air, 
 
 but when she beheld large drops of moisture 
 
 glitter on his dark lashes, which, after a vain 
 
 struggle to repress, he was obliged to dash away 
 
 N 2
 
 268 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 repeatedly with his hand, her look became still 
 more strange. 
 
 " You have loved me well," she said ; " your 
 advice must be the best ; but you must not be 
 so sad, or my heart will break. If I could only 
 get home again, I should then, at least, sink 
 quietly into my grave." 
 
 " You shall return home. I promise it," said 
 my father; and his words seemed to convey 
 assurance to the poor sufferer. 
 
 " But," continued he, " surely you can afford 
 me consolation on some points. Make my mind 
 easier on the past and the future, by confessing 
 yourself the involuntary agent of a fraud, not 
 a participator in it, — a pretended saint, in short. 
 Say so, my dear girl; for your sake as well 
 as mine, say so." 
 
 The tone of my father had become gentle 
 and imploring as he tried to coax Catherine 
 into a conviction, which he conceived an indis- 
 pensable preliminary to any steps he might 
 think fit to take on her behalf. But, to his 
 great surprise, his manner produced exactly the 
 contrary result to that which he was desirous of 
 effecting.
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 269 
 
 " I am not obliged to think like other people," 
 answered Catherine, the permanent irritability 
 of her shattered nerves being in nothing more 
 obvious than in the fitfulness of her mood ; it 
 seemed to vary with every tone and turn of her 
 interlocutor. " I may be a saint, or a sinner, 
 or both, for aught that others may wish me to 
 be. I scarcely know myself what I am; it 
 is not likely, therefore, I should be able or 
 willing to tell even you." 
 
 " Catherine, I hoped to have listened to 
 kinder language, the expression of gentler feel- 
 ings on your part. I am sure, if the most 
 devoted, the most brotherly sentiments can 
 deserve such, I may claim as a right some return 
 of friendship." 
 
 " Doubtless, you are very good ; and if my 
 poor head were not so confused, if my pulses 
 did not throb so, I am certain I should be and 
 should say all you desire ; but, I do not know 
 how it is, I cannot fix my thoughts. The 
 pleasure I had in first seeing you is ebbing 
 fast. Perhaps," she added, with a slight degree 
 of embarrassment and perturbation, " perhaps 
 you had better go."
 
 270 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 To be thus coolly discarded after having met 
 with so warm a reception, and especially after 
 having been made the depositary of her sad 
 secret, appeared to my father a conclusive 
 evidence of insanity in the poor girl, and a 
 momentary doubt of the truth of all she had so 
 lately narrated flashed across his mind. 
 
 * I were worse than an idiot," he thought, 
 " to take offence at her inconsiderate, uncon- 
 nected conduct, — and most unfeeling as well as 
 unreasonable." Reassuming, therefore, the se- 
 vere aspect, which the knowledge gleaned from 
 that morning's experience pointed out as most 
 calculated to gain his end, he said coldly — 
 
 " I shall depart, Catherine, when I feel in- 
 clined to do so, but certainly not before I have 
 obtained from you a promise " 
 
 " Go — go !" she exclaimed in a low, hurried 
 tone, interrupting him, as it appeared, without 
 even being aware that he spoke. " I feel 
 nervous, uneasy — I am sure something is wrong. 
 Oh, now I have it! He is at the convent 
 gate. Leave me, I entreat, or he will visit 
 upon me your presence here ; if you have any
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 271 
 
 affection left for me, oh ! do not let him meet 
 you." 
 
 As she spoke thus strangely, a marked change 
 came over her. She stood before the grate that 
 divided the convent parlour in equal parts, 
 and which she had approached so near as almost 
 to touch it, with the appearance of being trans- 
 fixed to the spot. Her limbs gradually stiffened, 
 and her eyes became fixed on the opposite wall 
 with a deep, intense gaze, as if watching the 
 movements of some visible object beyond it ; 
 her lips were parted, and her attitude was one 
 of the most rigid and strained attention. 
 
 After a pause of some minutes, during which 
 not a muscle relaxed from its tension, she said, 
 in a husky, guttural voice : — 
 
 " I see him — he is passing the portal — he 
 has answered the portress's greeting — his hands 
 are meekly folded on his breast. He crosses 
 the yard with rapid strides that cause his long 
 black robe to hang more negligently than ever, 
 — his flat cap is pressed deep over his brows — 
 its points seem like the horns of Satan. But," 
 she exclaimed, looking directly at my father,
 
 272 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " why do you thus remain rooted to the spot ? 
 Go ! perhaps you may yet have time to evade 
 him by gliding for a few moments along the 
 cloisters until he is passed. But no !" she con- 
 tinued, after another slight pause, "it is too 
 late, — his foot is on the stairs, — in two minutes 
 he will be here !" 
 
 Surprise kept my father mute. The solitary 
 parlour window la}' outside the grate at the 
 other end of the room, and, though of favour- 
 able dimensions, it would have been impossible 
 for Catherine to glance through it, even had 
 she looked in that direction ; but her eyes had 
 fallen, as I have said, on the opposite wall, with 
 an intensity of gaze as if desirous of question- 
 ing the dark, oaken panels with which it was 
 adorned. The singularity of her manner absorbed 
 him, at first, too much to admit of any inter- 
 ruption on his part ; but, when he had re- 
 covered from his astonishment, he was about to 
 tax her for yielding to so strange an hallucina- 
 tion, when a heavy step was heard outside the 
 parlour — then, a hand was laid on the lock — it 
 turned, and Father Girard entered the room,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 273 
 
 with a perturbation of spirit which he could 
 scarcely conceal beneath the veil — and thin 
 enough it was — of common decency. His 
 countenance, moulded by Nature into a most 
 scowling aspect, looked absolutely savage with 
 scarce contained rage. His step, as he entered 
 the parlour, was even more haughty than usual ; 
 he walked up at once to the grate, behind which 
 stood his victim, trembling in every limb, con- 
 templating him with a fixed and mournful 
 gaze, as the poor bird must gaze at the snake 
 that is said to fascinate ere it destroys. 
 
 " How is this ?" exclaimed Father Girard, in 
 a loud, peremptory voice — " I had forbidden 
 you to receive any more visits, even from your 
 nearest and dearest, and I find a man with you. 
 Catherine — Catherine ! are you, then, decided 
 to forfeit the last particle of my good- will ?" 
 
 " It was not I who wished — who asked — " 
 faltered the poor, overawed creature, as she 
 clung to the grate for support; and her lids 
 drooped heavily on her moist orbs, and her 
 head fell back on her shoulder, as if her senses 
 were about to leave her. 
 n 3
 
 274 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 " But," resumed the monk, in his hoarse 
 tones, that fell on the tympanum like the eroak 
 of a disturbed crow — "but you consented to 
 speak to him. It is lucky I was on my road 
 hither, else " 
 
 " Else what, Sir Jesuit ?" said my father, in- 
 terposing his person between the confessor and 
 his fair, stricken penitent — " Else what ? It is 
 I rather who ought to say — ' Go hence,' and you 
 to obey. It is my respect for her alone that 
 shields you. Take a timely warning — meddle 
 not again with her, or anything concerning her, 
 or 
 
 " Leave us — leave us this instant !" almost 
 screamed the priest, in the excess of his rage. 
 " Depart, and let us never meet again on earth, 
 who never can meet in heaven !" 
 
 " Beware, canting hypocrite, what words you 
 speak, and, from this hour forth, what deeds 
 you do ! There is a place on earth where we 
 should have met, face to face, but for her sake ! 
 Now, you know me her avowed protector, be- 
 ware of foul dealings, for a brother's eye is 
 upon her I"
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 275 
 
 " Impious, unchristian man, avaunt thee! 
 Satan speaks his wickedness from your lips — 
 leave me, and this dear child; and think not 
 your idle threats can terrify me. I bear no 
 sword by my side to avenge my honour as a 
 man; but you insult your faith in aggressing 
 its minister, and it is my turn to say — beware ! 
 We have thunderbolts wherewith to strike the 
 unbeliever and the scorner." 
 
 " Your eloquence is lost on me, and your 
 villany known, and may, perhaps, one day be 
 avenged. I go now, not at your bidding, proud 
 priest, but because I care not to stay any 
 longer." 
 
 As he spoke, my father came close up to the 
 Jesuit, and gazed full in the malignant, fierce, 
 dark eyes, that gleamed like those of a tiger at 
 bay, from beneath his shaggy eyebrows. " But, 
 if we meet again," he said, in the deep, clear, 
 slowly accentuated tones of suppressed but in- 
 tense wrath — " if we meet again, it shall be 
 your fault, not mine ; and then, though neither 
 of us may use the sword, yet will it be a struggle 
 of life and death between us— a struggle to
 
 276 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 which, as I live, I will bring all the energy, 
 every capability with which God has gifted me, 
 to blast, to ruin, to kill you, as ruthlessly as you 
 have blasted, ruined, and killed kef. But one 
 step further, one little act of injustice and op- 
 pression more, and then we meet." 
 
 With these words my father turned away, 
 and strode hastily out of the apartment, with- 
 out casting a single glance behind at the faint- 
 ing form of his once beloved Catherine, as, 
 releasing her hold of the iron bars that sup- 
 ported her, she sank heavily on the floor; nor 
 did he mark the terrified, quivering Jesuit, who, 
 lost in his fears, was not even aware of his com- 
 panion's situation. 
 
 My father felt that the ecclesiastical arm 
 alone was long enough to overtake the priest— 
 its grasp alone strong enough to compel him : 
 the only influence, indeed, that could be brought 
 to bear, in order to save Catherine, since the 
 inertia and timidity of her natural friends and 
 protectors would paralyse the effects of their 
 sympathy. But how to implicate himself in 
 this affair, without injury to Catherine in any
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 277 
 
 way, he scarcely knew. Chance, however — as 
 so often happens, at the very moment when an 
 affair seems most complicated to our puzzled 
 brains, and we in vain endeavour to find the 
 right way out of it — served him very satisfac- 
 torily at the present crisis. 
 
 A family council was to be held at one of 
 the aristocratic mansions of the town that very 
 evening, where, as matters of interest were to 
 be deliberated upon, and contending claims dis- 
 cussed in private, previous to their being de- 
 bated in public, most of the parties brought 
 with them their legal advisers, among whom 
 was my father. As he never allowed private 
 feelings to interfere with the duties of his avo- 
 cation, on his return from Ollioules his first 
 care was to prepare immediately for the even- 
 ing's task. This he did, not only by bestowing 
 upon his toilet the necessary degree of atten- 
 tion, but by forcibly banishing from his mind 
 every thought unconnected with the interests 
 he was about to espouse. 
 
 Always scrupulously punctual, it was often 
 the young lawyer's fate to find himself the first
 
 278 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 at his rendezvous of business, especially when 
 he had to do with patrician clients. It was so 
 on this occasion. When he had denied through 
 the double row of expecting footmen who stood 
 ranged along the anteroom awaiting the guests, 
 and was formally ushered by the valet whose 
 duty it was to announce, into the grand saloon, 
 brilliantly lighted up, as if for grand reception, 
 he found himself the solitary tenant of its splen- 
 dours. Its many candelabras revealed without 
 dispelling the gloom of its rich crimson hang- 
 ings. The light of the tapers fell cold and un- 
 friendly on the white polished surface of the 
 marble consoles and tables that stood between 
 the tall windows, glittered on the gilding of their 
 bases, and played mysteriously in the depths of 
 the mirrors that overhung them. The stiff- 
 backed sofas and chairs, ranged in awful preci- 
 sion against the walls, sombre and rich, looked, 
 to his unaccustomed eye, like so many Spanish 
 dons awaiting for the king's presence. In short, 
 the cold magnificence of an apartment furnished 
 a la Louis XIV., and of dimensions of the most 
 lofty description, not much relieved from the
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 279 
 
 drilling sensation of solitude that pervaded it by 
 a few tables in the centre, ostentatiously covered 
 with paper, pens, and ink, and surrounded 
 with not very elegant, dark, leather chairs — 
 especially and exclusively set apart for the men 
 of business — all that offered itself to the eye 
 was not of a nature to exhilarate his spirits. 
 He mechanically approached the immense 
 chimney, under whose mantel-piece, tall as he 
 was, he could stand with ease. Although no- 
 minally autumn, summer yet lingered in this 
 favoured clime ; the hearth was fireless and 
 obscure, and he was almost concealed within 
 its shade. 
 
 He was not long left to his solitude, however, 
 nor the meditation which it might have inspired. 
 A tall dignified figure slowly advanced from one 
 of the doors leading to the inner apartments, in 
 which my father had no difficulty in recognising 
 the Bishop of Toulon. He soon remembered, 
 as he gazed on the mild benevolent countenance 
 of the venerable prelate, that he was nearly .re- 
 lated to the nobleman to whom the house be- 
 longed, and ceased to wonder at his presence.
 
 280 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 The old man looked wistfully round, as if 
 seeking some one whom he expected to meet 
 there; and as my father stepped respectfully 
 forward to greet him, he became aware that he, 
 and no other, was the individual of whom the 
 Bishop was in quest. In a few brief, simple 
 words, but full of apostolic eloquence, in which 
 he sought to bring over my father to the views 
 of peace, for the establishment of which he had 
 forced his own presence and counsel on the 
 conflicting parties, he communicated the object 
 that had induced him to precede the others. 
 
 He succeeded, perhaps, all the better in his 
 Christian mission, that my father was extremely 
 averse to the meaner parts of his profession, 
 which often consist in fanning into a devastating 
 flame the passions of men — sometimes even of 
 those between whom nature and duty should 
 form an indissoluble bond. Far from considering 
 the worthy Prelate's interference in any way 
 disadvantageous to himself, he entered eagerly 
 into his views ; and promised to open them to 
 his colleagues, in a manner that should prepare 
 them to support, or at least prevent their
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 281 
 
 opposing, the amicable arrangements which it 
 was the Bishop's wish to promote. 
 
 The Prelate mingled in his conversation a 
 few paternal remarks, and eulogiums on my 
 father's conduct and talents, with the grace 
 peculiar to the sphere in which he habitually 
 moved, and with the sincerity of a kind 
 heart. 
 
 The young lawyer was much flattered by 
 this proof of his dawning reputation. - He had 
 scarcely dared to hope that his merits should 
 be acknowledged in circles where the names of 
 the obscure of other classes seldom penetrate, 
 and where, consequently, to be known at all 
 argues no small degree of notoriety. By the 
 way, it is worthy of remark that those young 
 men who so loudly proclaim their carelessness 
 of praise, their indifference to public opinion, 
 and think thereby to stamp themselves with the 
 seal of superiority, seldom, if ever, rise above 
 the most vulgar mediocrity. It is only he who 
 has an aim in view, who urges forward in the 
 lists of life, and meets bravely the shock of com- 
 petition — he only who values the laurel wreath
 
 282 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 that can ever hope to win, or deserve to wear it. 
 The poet — the painter — the hero — all need the 
 spur of some such ennobling influence to charm 
 or dazzle the world. Oftener, too, does this 
 unnatural affectation of disdain in the young 
 arise from the consciousness of utter nullity and 
 want of those powers which enable the more 
 favoured to gain applause, than from any real 
 insensibility to its value. The heart that beats 
 with joy at merited distinction is the only one 
 worthy of receiving it. 
 
 My father's heart was elated at that instant 
 with a justifiable pride, but still he forgot not 
 those who had an interest in it, even in his 
 hour of triumph. Availing himself of the 
 moment when the Bishop, having obtained his 
 aim, and apparently exhausted every topic of 
 conversation, was evidently meditating a retreat, 
 he arrested his attention by introducing at once 
 the subject uppermost in his thoughts. 
 
 " I have this day heard," he began, " that 
 Toulon is about to lose one of its palms of 
 glory, and yield it up to Saletta. It is said, 
 too, in a secret manner; but I can scarcely
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 283 
 
 believe that any one would dare to transplant 
 any sprig out of your lordship's garden without 
 your special permission.' ' 
 
 " I do not understand you," mildly answered 
 the Prelate — " pray explain, if indeed it be a 
 matter that may concern me," he added, ner- 
 vously ; " for if it be relating to some young 
 person or other whose vocation parents are anxi- 
 ous to promote, I love not, except the case be 
 urgent, to interfere with the privileges and 
 rights of the heads of families in my diocese. 
 Still, it is my duty to interpose my authority in 
 cases of too flagrant an abuse of these privileges ; 
 but this requires caution — great caution. Such 
 dealings are extremely delicate — admit of much 
 misrepresentation, — in fact, Monsieur Chaudon, 
 unless the matter be very imperative, it had 
 better be submitted to my grand vicar." 
 
 My father having permitted the flow of words 
 to subside, in which the great and those high 
 in office are apt to indulge, in order, probably, 
 to avoid hearing certain addresses from their 
 inferiors, which, for divers reasons, they may be 
 willing to escape, and having listened to them
 
 284 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 with the respect due to the rank of the speaker, 
 he replied, with apparent carelessness — 
 
 " Oh no — this is no case of domestic tyranny 
 — it is referable merely to the Saint of Olli- 
 oules, whom Father Girard, it appears, wishes 
 to remove to the community of Carthusians at 
 Saletta, that she may, as he says, shine else- 
 where, having edified enough at St. Clare's 
 and Toulon." 
 
 All the nonchalance of the grand seigneur 
 gave way at once in the Bishop, before the 
 roused and instinctive feelings of the priest. 
 
 M How is this ? — the Saint of Ollioules to be 
 snatched by the Carthusians of Saletta from our 
 dear sisters of St. Clare's ! You must be mis- 
 taken, Monsieur Chaudon — this cannot be !" 
 
 " I have heard it this day from the novice's 
 own lips, and yet, when I heard, too, that your 
 lordship's sanction to so important a measure 
 had neither been obtained nor even solicited, I 
 unhesitatingly declared my disbelief in the 
 power of any member of the clergy to effect it." 
 
 " Your clear and quick insight, young sir, 
 does your judgment credit," answered the
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 285 
 
 Bishop, warmly. " We bear meekly, we trust, 
 our honours and dignity — wield, also, our apos- 
 tolical sceptre mildly, and with due reserve in 
 all things, whenever we can in conscience do 
 so ; but for the sake of ourselves, of our succes- 
 sors, and, above all, for that of the church, we 
 may not permit that dignity to be slighted, 
 that power to be braved, nor that sceptre to be 
 put aside." 
 
 " I dared to believe so," modestly put in my 
 father, "and even to predict that you would 
 not think it meet to permit any other diocese to 
 appropriate the glories of your own ; for, I 
 argued, the high dignitaries of the church have 
 to consult policy as well as all other rulers; 
 and such a step would be an error, as tending 
 to displease our many excellent religious com- 
 munities, the boast of this town, who all con- 
 ceive they have a greater right to a native 
 celebrity than those of other territories — but I 
 am afraid I weary your lordship." 
 
 " Nay, proceed, young man — proceed," im- 
 patiently urged the Bishop, now evidently 
 deeply interested in the conversation, and ap-
 
 286 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 prehensive lest the arrival of the expected 
 guests should put an end to their colloquy. 
 " Your lucid views are peculiarly agreeable to 
 me — they perfectly coincide with my own." 
 
 My father, whose artful pause had only been 
 made that he might ascertain, to a certain 
 degree, the impression produced by his words, 
 now continued, with increased assurance — 
 
 " I also urged that the town, as well as the 
 clergy would expect their beloved lord to pre- 
 serve to them their young countrywoman, in 
 whom they take so much pride." 
 
 " Of course," said the venerable Bishop — " of 
 course, sound policy and duty, and the care of 
 my own dignity, alike require my interference 
 in this affair — require, I may say, an instanta- 
 neous, resolute interference ; unless, indeed," 
 he added, " the Saint of Ollioules herself has 
 been guided in this, as in former resolves, by a 
 heavenly voice, which to disobey were sinful 
 even in the highest and most mighty of this 
 earth." 
 
 My father perceived, by these words, the 
 shoal on which he might strike in his endea-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 287 
 
 vours to guide into the channel of his wishes 
 the gentle, but irresolute, timid, malleable spirit 
 of the Bishop, whose mental abilities were not of 
 the highest order, though his heart was most 
 excellent. Every instant was now of the ut- 
 most importance — he might never again com- 
 mand so favourable an opportunity even of 
 addressing, far less of influencing the high 
 personage before him ; and he, too, began to 
 feel nervously alive to every sound that seemed 
 to announce an intruder, and to tremble lest he 
 should not have time to utter all he was desirous 
 of grafting on his listener's mind. 
 
 " It is far from being the desire of Mademoi- 
 selle Cadieres to exile herself from her native 
 town," he replied, " and to carry her fame into 
 other and strange communities ; but Father 
 Girard is a bold man — a very bold man. I 
 suppose he presumes on his reputation as a 
 preacher of eminence, and believes that it 
 emancipates him from all ordinary restrictions 
 and the respect due to his superiors. At any 
 rate, I think — and so, I am sure, will all Toulon 
 — that he is very presumptuous in thus acting
 
 288 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 upon his own authority in a case of so much 
 delicacy, when our good town is honoured with 
 the presence of a lord bishop." 
 
 " Oh ! but he shall be taught, and Toulon 
 shall see, that none can brave with impunity 
 their lawful superiors," replied the Bishop, with 
 dignity. " Providence has placed me at the 
 head of the flock, and I were a bad shepherd if 
 I suffered the sheep to be stolen from me in the 
 dead of night, as it were. I thank you, my 
 young sir — heartily do I thank you, for your 
 timely warning. It would not have been 
 seemly in me to have learnt this too late, and 
 might have involved me in great difficulties 
 with our neighbours of Saletta; but — " the 
 prelate slightly hesitated ; then, resuming the 
 air of calm dignity habitual to him, which, in 
 the uncommon animation of the moment, had 
 been somewhat ruffled, he continued — " of 
 course, the latter part of our conversation and 
 its subject will remain strictly private for a time 
 — perhaps only for this evening ; I must impose 
 secrecy on you, and " 
 
 What more he might have added was in-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 289 
 
 terrupted by the arrival of my father's col- 
 leagues ; his reply to the last words of the pre- 
 late was therefore conveyed in a mute but low 
 obeisance, which was acknowledged by his 
 lordship with a most affable nod as he retired 
 from the apartment ; nor did he reappear until 
 the valet of the chambers announced the arrival 
 of the expected parties, who awaited nothing 
 but his presence to open the evening's debate. 
 
 The worthy prelate was received by all pre- 
 sent, however hostile their feelings towards 
 each other, with the deepest reverence ; the 
 doors were then closed, and the business of the 
 evening began in earnest 
 
 The difficulties that opposed the bishop's 
 pacific mission were not small, for bitterness 
 of feeling was at its height, and many of the 
 profession gave advice the most contrary to his 
 desires ; nor would he, perhaps, in spite of the 
 high veneration in which he was held, have 
 succeeded, had it not been for the eloquent 
 manner in which my father laid his views and 
 wishes before the assembly, not failing to point 
 out adroitly to each, individually, how a fair 
 
 vol. i. o
 
 290 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 accommodation would best further the personal 
 views of each ; so well did he perform this self- 
 imposed task, that his success was complete. 
 
 All the preliminaries to a fair compromise 
 were then settled; and the delighted bishop 
 reaped the grateful thanks of the soothed as- 
 sembly before the deliberations of the evening 
 closed, which, considering the habits of those 
 days, had been, indeed, protracted to a very 
 late hour. It was midnight when my father 
 was summoned to the door of the good bishop's 
 coach to receive his acknowledgments for the 
 able manner in which he had supported his 
 measures during the last few hours, hinting, at 
 the same time, that his services should not be 
 forgotten, any more than his timely warning 
 about the saint of Ollioules. My father re- 
 turned home, too agitated by all that had passed 
 in the course of the day to court even the sem- 
 blance of repose ; but, pacing the narrow limits 
 of his bachelor's apartment with hasty strides, 
 he, according to his wont, resolutely endea- 
 voured to class and arrange the chaos of 
 thoughts and emotions that filled his breast,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 291 
 
 and to test them by the calm light of his 
 reason. 
 
 He was still very young, although five years 
 had elapsed since his arrival at Toulon, his first 
 entrance into life ; and his mind, though equal 
 to the effort, had need of all its powers to regu- 
 late itself with the hot blood of youth yet 
 dancing through his veins. 
 
 It was impossible for one whose heart's first 
 and purest offering had been made at the shrine 
 of Catherine's virtue and beauty, to behold the 
 idol thus broken into fragments, — the shrine 
 desecrated, — the blossoms of his early love torn, 
 leaf by leaf, and scattered to the winds, with- 
 out feelings of the most vehement indignation 
 against the author of so much evil. 
 
 He felt even more than a brother's sorrow for 
 Catherine's fate, — more than a brother's humilia- 
 tion in her shame ; and his anger, whenever his 
 thoughts reverted to the infamous agent of her 
 ruin, partook somewhat of the violence which 
 generally marks the emotions of us children of 
 the south. 
 
 To calm the more bitter feelings, to soothe
 
 292 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 the sadder ones, could not, he felt, be the result 
 of a single night of meditation, although it 
 afforded sufficient leisure to trace out, both for 
 himself and the unfortunate object of his solici- 
 tude, the line of conduct most advisable to 
 pursue with regard to Father Girard, and to the 
 rest of the world. 
 
 There is, perhaps, no better composing draught 
 to administer to the human passions, when 
 excited, than a well-weighed, firmly-embraced, 
 formal resolution, on any point whatever. This 
 is, for most people, of all difficulties, the greatest, 
 for the very simple reason that weak minds are 
 more abundant in this world than strong ones ; 
 as my father's, however, belonged most de- 
 cidedly to the latter order, he did not experience 
 any such embarrassment ; and, in pursuance of 
 the measures he had resolved upon, the very 
 first rays of the sun escorted him to the house 
 of Madame Cadieres, where he was soon 
 closeted in earnest conference with Catherine's 
 brothers. 
 
 A couple of hours later, the Dominican was 
 on his way to the Carmelite convent, where he,
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 293 
 
 too, claimed and obtained a long interview with 
 Father Alexis, the former confessor and director 
 of Mademoiselle Cadieres; and not long after, 
 Father Alexis was seen on his road to the 
 episcopal palace, where, in his turn, a pro- 
 tracted audience was granted him. 
 
 For the rest of the day great animation 
 seemed to prevail within its usually quiet walls. 
 Members of the divers religious orders were to 
 be seen gliding in and out of the gateway, with 
 visible traces of agitation on their ordinarily 
 impassible countenances. The lights burned 
 late in the good old Bishop's chamber, and the 
 Grand Vicar, who shared, with a few more 
 privileged councillors, the honours of his table, 
 left him not before, the evening meal being 
 concluded, the Bishop retired for the night. 
 
 Whilst the train he had laid was thus slowly 
 taking fire, my father kept himself aloof from 
 it, and was, to all appearance, a careless, unin- 
 terested observer ; but Eleonore, with whom he 
 spent the better portion of the day, knew better 
 than to suspect him of indifference as to its 
 results. 
 
 o 2
 
 294 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 Nor were they backward in manifesting them- 
 selves. At twelve o'clock precisely, next day, 
 the Grand Vicar was seen, accompanied by two 
 other of the most confidential satellites of the 
 Bishop, all three seated, in great pomp, in the 
 Grand Vicar's phaeton, exhibiting, in their 
 whole air and manner, an increase of dignity, 
 that seemed to proclaim the importance of the 
 mission on which they were bound. 
 
 Many idlers stood still, gazing after them, 
 as they rattled over the roughly-paved streets, 
 and here and there a casement was flung open 
 at the sound, and a curious female head thrust 
 out. In the streets through which they had to 
 pass in order to gain the Marseilles gate, there 
 were, however, a few houses whose occupants 
 denoted a greater interest in their proceedings, 
 and who evidently were no strangers to them. 
 At the first floor of the one might be seen my 
 father and his affianced bride, joyfully watching 
 the progress of the clerical vehicle, although its 
 tenants did not appear aware of the circum- 
 stance. But shortly afterwards, as they en- 
 countered the watchful glances of Madame
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 295 
 
 Cadieres and her sons, who were also orna- 
 menting the front windows of their small dwell- 
 ing with their rubicund faces, they interchanged 
 mysterious nods and smiles. Heartfelt happi- 
 ness beamed from every face — there was an air 
 of rejoicing and festivity throughout the estab- 
 lishment, proclaiming the celebration of some 
 gladsome event, such as a marriage, a christen- 
 ing, or the return of a very dear and long-absent 
 friend. The most savoury perfumes escaped 
 the kitchen, as the females of that department 
 opened its window to obtain a glimpse of the 
 phaeton. Flowers everywhere met the eye in 
 wreaths and bouquets ; and Clara, Mademoiselle 
 Cadieres' own maid, had departed for once, and 
 that without reproof, from her usual soberness 
 of habiliment. The little white dog, too, that 
 had once belonged to Catherine, was decked 
 out with most coquettish pink knots and bows, 
 shewing off to advantage the carefully preserved 
 snowiness of his coat. 
 
 As the reverend fathers drove past the Col- 
 lege of the Jesuits, they examined its long, im- 
 posing front in vain for any trace of the atten-
 
 296 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 tion which thej seemed to imagine their passage 
 must excite ; nor did their investigating glances 
 detect any emotion of curiosity or surprise in 
 the visage of the well-trained porter, whose 
 brow was as dark and chilling as his habit. 
 
 Not such, however, was the appearance of 
 the Carmelite convent. Heads were to be seen 
 in every quarter, and anxious eyes peering from 
 beneath every cowl, at the very first glimpse 
 of the Grand Vicar's well-known equipage. 
 The reverend fathers within and those without 
 exchanged glances of intelligence, which were 
 soon converted, by the former at least, when the 
 latter were out of sight, into looks of the most 
 uncontrollable triumph ; for if the Jesuits, un- 
 conscious of the cloud that was lowering so 
 near over their heads, had paid little or no 
 attention to the all-important fact that the Grand 
 Vicar was on his road to Ollioules in company 
 with the Prior of the Carmelites, — whose zeal 
 for his order was as notorious as the talents 
 which enabled him to display it to advantage, — 
 the Carmelites were better instructed as to the 
 impending storm, and enjoyed already in antici-
 
 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 297 
 
 pation the victory they were about to achieve 
 over their proud rivals, though little guessing 
 how complete — how immeasurable it was des- 
 tined to be. 
 
 The next day explained satisfactorily the 
 movements of the preceding one. It was now 
 publicly reported that the Grand Vicar had 
 proceeded to Ollioules to claim Mademoiselle 
 Cadieres in the Bishop's name ; that she had 
 been most willingly delivered into his hands by 
 the Lady Abbess herself, who, contrary to 
 expectation, seemed anything but mortified at 
 the loss ; that, in short, Catherine was restored 
 to her home and her friends, and the Bishop 
 had issued forth his interdiction against Father 
 Girard, to prohibit him from attending her any 
 more in the light of confessor, and had ap- 
 pointed Father Nicholas, the distinguished Car- 
 melite I have already alluded to, in his place. 
 
 This intelligence sounded like the trumpet of 
 judgment in the ears of the Jesuit; like the 
 bells of a Te Deum in those of my father and 
 Eleonore ; resolving, however, that his own 
 participation in this event should remain per-
 
 298 MAGIC AND MESMERISM. 
 
 fectly unknown — perhaps, indeed, it was already 
 forgotten, or still unsuspected, by those whose 
 more active interference had been but the mere 
 result of his adroit instigations — my father 
 formed a determination to resume his visits at 
 the house, which he felt certain none would 
 now forbid. All motive, indeed, for refusing 
 him admittance had long ceased to exist ; and 
 it was a matter of moment to poor Catherine 
 that some wise hand should now re-unite and 
 guide the broken threads of her destiny. 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 T. C. Savill, Printer, 107, St. Martin's Lane, Charing Cross.
 
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