‘And she will only sing the Laus Deo and the Kyrie Eleison,’ thought Othmar, ‘and no one will hear her except a few scores of sad-hearted, stupid women, who will succeed in making her as sad-hearted and as stupid as themselves!’
What she rendered was the sweetest of all the simple Noëls written by Roumanille, the song of the blind child who begs her mother to take her to see the Enfant Jésus in the church, and to whom the mother long replies, in chiding and hardness of heart: ‘What use, since thou canst not see?’ Saint-Saëns had set the naive and pathetic words to music which was penetrated with that esprit provençal which has in it ‘les pleurs du peuple et les fleurs du printemps;’ and the voice of the girl was pure, tender, and solemn, in unison with what she treated.
‘Je sais qu’au tombeau seul finit ma voie obscure;
Je sais encor
Que je ne verrai pas, divine créature,
Ta face d’or.
‘Mais qu’est-il besoin d’yeux pour adorer et croire?
Si mes yeux sont
A te voir impuissants, mes mains, ô Dieu de gloire,
Te toucheront!’