“Yes, so she was, and many others besides! Lazarus was in the boat, too, but when they were once on shore, every one went his own way: Magdalen went to Baume, and the two Maries and Sara remained with us. That was when a spring came out of the sand, by the favor of our Lord. When they built the church, they walled in the spring in the centre of it.”
“Faith, they would have done well to leave the spring outside the church!”
“Why so? is the water spoiled by it?”
“It’s only good on the fête-day.”
“After so many years! And there’s so little of it!”
“We ought to have asked the saints to make it pure and abundant. If we had all set about it with our prayers, they would have done it for us.”
“One miracle more or less!”
“The miracles, my dear, are only for strangers.”
“And that is just what we need, neighbor. If it wasn’t so, you see, strangers wouldn’t come any more—and without them what would the country live on? poor we! Where are our harvests? Where are our wheat and our grain, good people, tell me that? If it wasn’t for the saints, this would be a cursed country! One fête-day a year, and the pilgrims—God bless them!—fill our purses for us.”
“Miracle days are only too few and far between. We ought to have two fête-days a year!”