This excellent lady was a Protestant, and it was the first time in my life that I met a Protestant whose piety seemed so enlightened and sincere. I could not help admiring her.
When she had most sincerely thanked and blessed me for the service I had done her, she asked if I would have any objection to pray with her, and to aid her in thanking God for the favor he had just shown her. I told her, I should be happy in uniting with her to bless the Lord for his mercies. Upon this, she gave me a Bible, magnificently bound, and we read each in turn a verse slowly, and on our knees, the sublime Psalm 103: “Bless the Lord, O my soul,” etc.
As I was about to take leave of her, she offered me a purse containing one hundred dollars in gold, which I refused, telling her that I would rather lose my two hands than receive a cent for what I had done.
“You are,” she said, “surrounded with poor people. Give them this that I offer to the Lord as a feeble testimony of my gratitude, and be assured that as long as I live I will pray God to pour his most abounding favors upon you.”
In leaving that house I could not hide from myself that my soul had been embalmed with the true perfume of piety that I had never seen in my own church.
Before the day closed, I had given back to their rightful owners the effects left in my hands, whose value amounted to more than $7,000, and had my receipts in good form.
I am glad to say here, that the persons, most of whom were Protestants, to whom I made these restitutions, were perfectly honorable, and that not a single one of them ever said anything to compromise me in this matter, nor was I ever troubled on this subject.
I thought it my duty to give my venerable friend, the Grand Vicar Demars, a detailed account of what had just happened. He heard me with the deepest interest, and could not retain his tears when I related the touching scene of my separation from my two new friends, that night, one of the darkest—which, nevertheless, has remained one of the brightest of my life.
My story ended, he said, “I am, indeed, very old, but I must confess that never did I hear anything so strange and so beautiful as this story. I repeat, however, that your mother must have given you a brain harder than diamond and nerves more solid than brass, not to have been afraid during this very singular adventure in the night.”
After the fatigues and incidents of the last twenty-four hours, I was in great need of rest, but it was impossible for me to sleep a single instant during the night which followed. For the first time, I stood face to face with that Protestantism which my Church had taught me to hate and fight with all the energy that heaven had bestowed on me, and when that faith had been, by the hand of Almighty God, placed in the scale against my own religion, it appeared as a heap of pure gold opposite a pile of rotten rags. In spite of myself, I could hear incessantly the cries of grief of that penitent thief: “Lord, have mercy on me, so great a sinner!”