door, but the sacristan was lighting the candles for Benediction, so
I went up to the bronze screen, the Cancello, that divides the public
part from the part occupied by the Sisters, and knelt on the nearest
step.
After a while the church-bell rang overhead, and then (the congregation
having gathered in the meantime) the nuns came in by way of a corridor
which seemed to issue out of the darkness from under a figure of the
Virgin and Child.
They were all in white, snow-white from head to foot, with a glimmer of
blue scapular beneath their outer garment, and they wore long thick
veils which entirely concealed their features when they entered but were
raised when they reached their seats and faced the altar.
Familiar as I was with similar scenes this one moved me as I had never
before been moved--the silent white figures, with hands clasped on their
breasts, coming in one by one with noiseless and unhurried footsteps,
like a line of wraiths from another world.
But a still deeper emotion was to come to me.
As the last of the nuns entered, the Superior as I knew she would be, I
recognised her instantly. It was my own Reverend Mother herself; and
when, after kneeling to the altar, she came down to her seat nearest to
the screen, immediately in front of the place where I knelt, I knew by
the tremor of the clasped hands which held the rosary, that she had seen
and recognised me.
I trembled and my heart thumped against my breast.
Then the priest entered and the Litany began. It was sung throughout.
Almost the whole of the service was sung. Never had Benediction seemed
so beautiful, so pathetic, so appealing, so irresistible.
By the time the _Tantum ergo_ had been reached and the sweet female
voices, over the soft swell of the organ, were rising to the vaulted
roof in sorrowful reparation for the sins of all sinners in the world
who did not pray for themselves, the religious life was calling to me as
it had never called before.
"Come away from the world," it seemed to say.
Notka biograficzna
Sir Thomas Henry Hall Caine CH, KBE (May 14, 1853August 31, 1931), usually known as Hall Caine, was a British author. He is best known as a novelist and playwright of the late Victorian and the Edwardian eras. In his time he was exceedingly popular and at the peak of his success his novels outsold those of his contemporaries. Many of his novels were also made into films. His novels were primarily romantic in nature, involving the love triangle, but they did also address some of the more serious political and social issues of the day.
Harold MacGrath (September 4, 1871 - October 30, 1932) was a bestselling American novelist, short story writer, and screenwriter. Also known occasionally as Harold McGrath, he was born in Syracuse, New York. As a young man, he worked as a reporter and columnist on the Syracuse Herald newspaper until the late 1890s when he published his first novel, a romance titled Arms and the Woman. According to the New York Times, his next book, The Puppet Crown, was the No.7 bestselling book in the United States for all of 1901. From that point on, MacGrath never looked back, writing novels for the mass market about love, adventure, mystery, spies, and the like at an average rate of more than one a year. He would have three more of his books that were among the top ten bestselling books of the year. At the same time, he penned a number of short stories for major American magazines such as The Saturday Evening Post, Ladies Home Journal, and Red Book magazine. Several of MacGraths novels were seriali
Mabel Collins (9 September 1851 - 31 March 1927) was a theosophist and author of over 46 books. She was born in St Peter Port, Guernsey.