CHAPTER V.
MONSEIGNEUR'S CASSOCKS LAST TOO LONG.
M. Myriel's domestic life was full of the same thoughts as his publiclife. To any one who could inspect it closely, the voluntary poverty inwhich the Bishop lived would have been a solemn and charming spectacle.Like all old men, and like most thinkers, he slept little, but thatshort sleep was deep. In the morning he remained in contemplation foran hour, and then read mass either at the cathedral or in his house.Mass over, he breakfasted on rye bread dipped in the milk of his owncows. Then he set to work.
A bishop is a very busy man. He must daily receive the secretary to thebishopric, who is generally a canon, and almost every day his grandvicars. He has congregations to control, permissions to grant, a wholeecclesiastical library to examine, in the shape of diocesan catechisms,books of hours, etc.; mandates to write, sermons to authorize, cur?sand mayors to reconcile, a clerical correspondence, an administrativecorrespondence, on one side the State, on the other the Holy See; ina word, a thousand tasks. The time which these thousand tasks, hisoffices, and his breviary left him, he gave first to the needy, thesick, and the afflicted; the time which the afflicted, the sick, andthe needy left him he gave to work. Sometimes he hoed in his garden, atothers he read and wrote. He had only one name for both sorts of labor,he called them gardening. "The mind is a garden," he would say.
Toward mid-day, when the weather was fine, he went out and walked inthe country or the town, frequently entering the cottages. He could beseen walking alone in deep thought, looking down, leaning on his longcane, dressed in his violet wadded and warm great coat, with his violetstockings thrust into clumsy shoes, and wearing his flat hat, througheach corner of which were passed three golden acorns as tassels. Itwas a festival wherever he appeared, it seemed as if his passing hadsomething warming and luminous about it; old men and children came tothe door to greet the Bishop as they did the sun. He blessed them andthey blessed him, and his house was pointed out to anybody who was inwant of anything. Now and then he stopped, spoke to the little boysand girls, and smiled on their mothers. He visited the poor so long ashe had any money; when he had none he visited the rich. As he made hiscassocks last a long time, and he did not wish the fact to be noticed,he never went into town save in his wadded violet coat. This was rathertiresome in summer.
On returning home he dined. The dinner resembled the breakfast. Athalf-past eight in the evening he supped with his sister, MadameMagloire standing behind them and waiting on them. Nothing could bemore frugal than this meal; but if the Bishop had a cur? to supper,Madame Magloire would take advantage of it to serve Monseigneur withsome excellent fish from the lake, or famous game from the mountain.Every cur? was the excuse for a good meal, and the Bishop held histongue. On other occasions his repast only consisted of vegetablesboiled in water and soup made with oil. Hence it was said in the town:"When the Bishop does not fare like a cur? he fares like a trappist."
After supper he conversed for half an hour with Mlle. Baptistine andMadame Magloire; then he returned to his room and began writing again,either on loose leaves or on the margin of some folio. He was wellread, and a bit of a _savant_, and has left five or six curious MSS.on theological subjects, among others a dissertation on the verse fromGenesis, "In the beginning the Spirit of God moved upon the face of thewaters." He compared this verse with three texts,--the Arabic, whichsays, "The winds of God breathed;" Flavius Josephus, who said, "A windfrom on high fell upon the earth;" and lastly the Chaldaic of Onkelos,"A wind coming from God breathed on the face of the waters." In anotherdissertation he examines the works of Hugo, Bishop of Ptolema?s,great-grand-uncle of him who writes this book, and he proves that tothis bishop must be attributed the various opuscules published in thelast century under the pseudonym of Barleycourt. At times, in the midstof his reading, no matter what book he held in his hands, he wouldsuddenly fall into a deep meditation, from which he only emerged towrite a few lines on the pages of the book. These lines have frequentlyno connection with the book that contains them. We have before us anote written by him on the margin of a quarto entitled, "Correspondenceof Lord Germain with Generals Clinton and Cornwallis, and the Admiralsof the American Station. Versailles, Prin?ot; and Paris, Pissot, Quaides Augustins." Here is the note.
"O thou who art! Ecclesiastes calls you Omnipotence; the Maccabees callyou Creator; the Epistle to the Ephesians calls you Liberty; Baruchcalls you Immensity; the Psalms call you Wisdom and Truth; St. Johncalls you Light; the Book of Kings calls you Lord; Exodus calls youProvidence; Leviticus, Holiness; Esdras, Justice; Creation calls youGod; man calls you the Father; but Solomon calls you Mercy, and that isthe fairest of all your names."
About nine o'clock the two females withdrew and went up to theirbed-rooms on the first floor, leaving him alone till morning on theground floor. Here it is necessary that we should give an exact idea ofthe Bishop's residence.