sent to school for five months, learning her catechism and a little reading and writing. In her twelfth year, having made her first communion, she entered the service of her great-aunt, who lived at Manage, near Bois d’Haine, in a certain degree of comfort. In this position she displayed great activity and devotion to her duties, giving herself up day and night to the service of her relative, who died in a year or two. She then entered the service of a respectable lady in Brussels, where she remained only seven months on account of an illness, the nature of which is not described; after this she obtained another place in Manage, where, as before, she left behind her the reputation of devoted courage, of patient toil, humble and quiet piety, and charity for the poor.

About the beginning of 1867, she became more feeble in health without being exactly ill or obliged to suspend her customary work. She lost appetite and color, suffered from severe neuralgic pains in the head, and her skin assumed the greenish-white hue that always indicates impoverishment of the blood. This had been aggravated by a severe attack of quinsy; and on several occasions, during the early part of April of this year, she spat blood, the source of which (whether from lungs or stomach) could not be decided.

For an entire month she now became constantly weaker, taking almost nothing during this time but water and the medicines prescribed for her. The exhaustion increased to such a degree that her death was thought imminent, and on the 15th of April the last sacraments were administered. She now suddenly improved, and so rapidly that, on the 21st of April, she was able to walk to Mass at the parish church, three-quarters of a mile distant. This

apparently remarkable cure was the first incident that attracted public notice to her case; crowds of people coming to see her as an object of curiosity.

This period may be viewed as her turning point from girlhood into a woman; and, at her then age of eighteen, she is described as being slightly below the middle height, with full face, very little color, a fine delicate skin, light hair, clear, soft blue eyes, a small mouth, and very white well-shaped teeth.

Her expression is intelligent and agreeable, and her general health is good, and free from any scrofulous or other constitutional taint. She has always worked hard, and exhibited considerable physical endurance. Mentally she is represented as unemotional, lacking in imagination, by no means bright, but of good, strong common sense, artless, straightforward, and devoid of enthusiasm. Her education is limited, although she has improved the elementary instruction received during her brief school term, speaking French with ease and some degree of purity, reading with difficulty, and writing very little, and incorrectly at that. Her moral character is honest, simple, transparent. Dr. Lefebvre and others, who questioned her about her ecstatic visions, repeatedly tried to test her sincerity, but never succeeded in making her contradict herself or tend in the least degree to exaggeration: nor could she ever be induced by her young friends to discuss her stigmata or visions, upon which she was equally reticent with her friends and her family. Of a naturally gay and happy disposition, she has shown in various circumstances much patience, determination, and courage. Amidst many domestic anxieties and troubles, often losing her rest day and night

during the illness of her relatives, and falsely accused by her mother (who seems to have been a person of difficult temper) of being the cause of all the family’s misfortunes, she remained invariably calm and cheerful. Another of her most striking traits was her charity for the poor; “poor herself, she loved to relieve the poor,” and many instances are narrated of her devotion to the sick and helpless during the cholera that raged at Bois d’Haine in 1866. From her infancy almost she was exceptionally devout, and her piety was always practical, and devoid of affectation and display. In her interior and religious life, as in her domestic duties, she was simple, earnest, and discreet.

A recollection of these details of her character and antecedents is necessary for the proper appreciation of the phenomena now to be described. These are of two distinct kinds, having no connection but their accidental association in the same individual; and that they may be more clearly understood, they will be considered separately, first the stigmata, then the ecstatic trances, and, thirdly, the nature of the evidence upon which the extraordinary facts rest.

I.—THE STIGMATA.

The first occurrence of the bleeding was noticed by Louise on Friday, the 24th of April, 1868, when she saw blood issuing from a spot on the left side of the chest. With her habitual reserve, she mentioned it to no one. The next day it recurred at the same spot; and she, then also observed blood on the top of each foot. She now confided it to her director, who, although thinking the circumstance extraordinary, reassured her and bade her keep the facts to herself. During the night