“Be to us, Lord, a place of defence against the enemy!” We are on a volcano—the volcano of popular passions; if the hand of God does not arrest them, what will become of us? Confidence! confidence! “Infidel France is abased and humiliated, and is not yet willing to repent; eucharistic France will pray, will arise, and increase in greatness!”[[57]]
O beloved soul gone hence before me, and who art myself! offer to God our prayers.
October 2.
Toul has surrendered, after a splendid resistance worthy of a better fate. The 29th—the looked-for 29th, the feast of the glorious Protector of France—has brought us another sorrow more: the capitulation of Strasbourg! O dear and beautiful cathedral, which I loved so well! “There is nothing left but ruins,” writes one of Berthe’s cousins. Why does the Lord delay to help us? Will not our other fortresses be also forced to give themselves up into the enemy’s hands? What will become of France? William is at Versailles; he lay down, booted and spurred, in the bed of the great king who so imperiously dictated laws to all Europe. Who will redeem us from all our humiliations?
Margaret and Lord William have apprehensions which will only too soon, alas! be verified. La Vendée is rising at the call of Cathelineau and of Stofflet—two illustrious names. Ah! who will merit for us that we shall be saved, when the public papers lavish outrage and abuse against everything that is holiest in the world—against the church of God, his priests, his pontiff, the glorious Pius IX.? Who shall restrain thine arm, O Lord! when scarcely a voice is raised to recall to conquered France that thou art the Salvation of the nations?
October 7.
The gentle Bishop of Geneva used to say: “Alas! we shall soon be in eternity, and then shall we see of how small account were the affairs of this world, and how little it mattered whether they were accomplished or not.” Adrien sends us long details. My soul is in anguish. O Kate! pray for us. I went yesterday with Margaret to the cemetery; we stayed there long. A splendid moonlight illumined the golden crosses surmounting the marble columns beneath which our doves repose. A feeling of profound peace took possession of my soul in the midst of this striking contrast—the calm and tranquillity of this field of death with the tumult and agitation of actual life in our poor France.
October 8.
The journals give accounts, only too faithful in their details, of the battle of Sedan, the catastrophe of Laon and of Strasbourg. It is horrible—this destruction, these savage attacks! Of how many valiant defenders are we not deprived, while the enemy’s forces are going to strengthen the army now besieging Paris! William is at St. Germain; he desires to be present at the bombardment of the brilliant capital which gave him so splendid a reception three years ago. To the shame of humanity, Europe remains unmoved in presence of our misfortunes. America sends an insignificant number of volunteers. O divine Justice! wilt thou not avenge us? Who shall tell the story of this sanguinary epic? Who shall recount this unheard-of intermingling of shameful cowardice and prodigies of courage, of base treason and sublime devotion, of reverses and successes equally impossible? Who shall tell posterity that the most loyal and generous of nations, the people which has been eager in its succors to every misfortune, has found no defender in the day of its calamities? And who shall make known to France that her success is a consequence of her repentance, that there is something greater than victory, more decisive and more powerful than the most formidable engines of war—the protection of Him who holds in his hands the destinies of nations? Deus, Deus, quid reliquisti nos?
October 10.