St. Vincent's Hospital—Routine of a Sister.

During the spring of 1891, the Province of the Sisters of Charity of Providence of the Pacific Northwest was divided, and by an order from the head Mother House at Montreal, the sisters were to remain in the provinces where they were when the division went into effect. I was ordered to report to the Mother House at Vancouver, Washington. This was in March, 1891. On my way to Vancouver from Spokane, I had to pass through Portland, Oregon, and while there the order went into effect, and the sister superior of St. Vincent's Hospital claimed me as a subject of the Oregon Province.

I was at St. Vincent's Hospital about a month, when I was transferred to Astoria, Oregon, to St. Mary's Hospital, where I practiced on typhoid patients and became more efficient in laundry work, for a little over a year.

In June, 1892, I was missioned to St. Mary's Hospital, New Westminster, B. C. My duties in this hospital were practically the same as in the other hospitals I had worked in.

It was while I was at this hospital that I was sent on my principal begging expedition. On July fourth, 1892, Sister Ethelbert and myself were commissioned to go north to the logging camps on the islands in the Gulf of Georgia (near Alaska) to secure contributions in the name of Charity for the Roman Catholic Church and to sell tickets for ten dollars each, which would entitle the holder to care in St. Mary's Hospital, New Westminter, B. C., for a specified time.

The hardship and terrors of this trip are indescribable. Crossing the stormy straights in small canoes, camping out at night in the wildest woods, our lives were endangered many times. Arriving at the camps at all hours of the night, tired, wet, cold and hungry; being lifted into bunks by the men when we were so cold, in fact nearly frozen, that we could hardly move; being carried on the backs of the men across muddy and wet places where the water was too shallow for the canoe, or boat, to land. Oh, yes, in the convent we were taught to be so modest—modesty to the very extreme, but it is all right, in the Roman Catholic Church, to send sisters to such places as this, where, as some of the men told me, they had not seen a woman for from three to eight years. It was all right in the Roman Catholic Church because we were getting the money for the fat living of the priests and to enrich the coffers of the Pope of Rome. Believe me, dear reader, no benefit do the sisters ever get from the hardships and indignities imposed upon them on a trip of this nature.

At one camp we visited, the men refused to keep us over night, so the men who had rowed us all day, began to row us to the next camp. About ten o'clock in the night, a storm arose, and we had to land, as it was too rough to go farther. The shore space was very limited, as there were huge mountains on one side and the breakers on the other. Dry wood was very scarce so the fire we had was little better than none at all. There were four of us—two sisters and two men—and all the covering we had was one double blanket, with the rough, rocky shore for a bed. About two o'clock in the morning, the storm subsided and we embarked again and continued our journey, arriving at the next camp about four o'clock. Two of the workmen very kindly gave us their bunk, but because of the cold there was very little sleep. When we arose, the Chinese cook took us to the kitchen and had us warm our feet in the large oven. He was a very good and kind sympathetic friend for he looked so sorry for us and said, "You have hard time."

Since I had to go begging, I was very pleased to have Sister Ethelbert for a companion because I knew that she was not a trouble-maker, but a truly good and sisterly person. I had hungered and longed for many years to be with some sister that I could talk with on some other than the written religious subjects and I was sure that this was the opportunity. I tried to talk to her, and she would smile at me, and she tried to talk to me, and I would smile at her. It was very apparent that our vocabulary was very limited and simple, when it came to talking on outside subjects. It was not till some years later that I realized why this condition existed. It was from the long silence and suppression, of not only speech, but our very thoughts, having been in bondage so long.

We were away from St. Mary's Hospital just three weeks and brought back a little over eleven hundred dollars in checks and cash. Is it any wonder that Rome can build such magnificent institutions?

As a result of the exposure and hardships on this trip I contracted sickness from which I did not completely recover during the remainder of my convent life. And oh, if I could only explain what it means to be a sick sister! I was not receiving the proper care, so I wrote to my Mother House, located in Portland, Oregon, pleading that something might be done for me. I waited for three weeks for an answer, but received none. I wrote to my Superior again, and told her that if the community could not give me the care I needed, I would write to my father and ask him to see that I received medical assistance. This was a very bold thing for a sister to do, but I was certainly very sick and little did I care what the community would do to me.

When the Mother Superior received this letter, I was immediately recalled to the Mother House by telegram. I arrived at the Mother House, St. Vincent's Hospital, Portland, on the seventh day of July, 1893.

I received fairly good care for a short time; then I was handed a picture of our suffering Lord, and told by the Mother Provincial, Sister Mary Theresa, to practice resignation and make novenas to this miraculous picture for help. (Novena means nine days' prayer.)

For years I was not sick enough to be confined to my bed, although I should have been there many times when I was drudging away, working for the Church of Rome. A sick sister need not look for any care until she is about ready to pass to the Great Beyond. The climax of my sickness came many years later when I had to submit to an operation.

During the first eight months I was at St. Vincent's Hospital, I had very little use of my left hand and arm. I thought it was partial paralysis. A very prominent physician of the hospital staff, whose name I purposely withhold, diagnosed my case and gave it a technical name, which my unintelligible mind could not comprehend. But in my presence he told Sister Mary Bonsecours, who was my officer and who had received orders to see what the doctor could do for me, that I would never be any better. Nevertheless, he prescribed for me which improved my condition to a certain extent.

In this condition I assisted in the caring of patients, doing the best I could, experimenting, as it were, and learning a little here and there at the expense of the suffering sick. We had no instructors or books on nursing until after I had been there about three years, when we were furnished one book, a manual of nursing, and whenever a sister was lucky enough to get it she would keep it until some other sister would have a chance to "swipe" it. A sister once "swiped" it from me, and it took me eight months to get a chance to "swipe" it back. Also, about this time we were allowed to attend certain lectures given by the staff doctors. One of the "certain" lectures we were not allowed to attend were those given on maternity, and yet the sisters were held responsible for any errors in caring for cases of this nature. To sum it all up in short, we were instructed to pray that God would bless us and our work and that nothing wrong would happen to the patients.

During the first six years of my experience at St. Vincent's Hospital and after I had recovered sufficiently from my sickness, I was sent to St. Mary's Hospital, Astoria, Oregon, off and on, for short periods to assist in the work there.

In 1895 the new magnificent, six-story brick St. Vincent's Hospital was finished, and we took charge in September of that year.

Here I had charge of ten rooms, and had the serving of two meals daily to the entire floor, which meant about fifty patients, and the only assistance I had was one girl who was neither sister nor nurse, but very good and kind to me. Besides these duties, I had to take my turn in the laundry, do sewing, and above all else, attend to the numberless religious obligations.

In order that you might realize of what these numberless religious obligations consisted, I will here give a program of the daily routine which I had to follow throughout my Sisterhood career:

In addition to these, the following must be observed:

Every hour of the day when the clock strikes, each sister must rise to her feet and say, "Let us remember that we are in the holy presence of God. Blessed be the hours of the birth, death and resurrection of our Lord, Jesus Christ. O my God, I give thee my heart, grant me the grace to pass this hour, and the rest of this day in thy holy love and without offending thee," and one "Hail, Mary."

An hour each week must be spent in the chapel in honor of the Blessed Sacrament.

From fifteen to thirty minutes every Friday evening after evening prayer for the exercise called the "culp," in some orders called "chapter." This exercise consists of each sister kneeling before the superior, and all the other sisters charges her with every mean, contemptible, petty wrong, usually a breach of some rule of the order, which they have remarked in her during the past week. Then the "culprit" so charged acknowledges some of these faults, adds a few more herself, and, kissing the floor, asks a penance of the superior. The superior has the authority to impose any of the accustomed penances.

One Sunday of each month is called "retreat day," which means additional prayer and devotion, that the sister may be fortified spiritually for the next month. During this day there are three meditations in addition to the regular daily routine. Each sister must present herself to the superior to tell her spiritual advancement and the difficulties she has had in the work. Sometimes all the sisters do not have the time to appear before the superior on this day, but she must do so the first opportunity she has during the week, and then it is generally a reprimand for not being there sooner. This retreat day is ended with a long Te Deum, which means a canticle of thanksgiving.

An explanation of some of the daily exercises will no doubt be of interest to most of my readers.

The morning meal is eaten in silence, except on Feast days or unusual occasions. During the noon and evening meal some sister is appointed to read, generally from the "Lives of the Saints" or "Roman Martyrology," narrations very repulsive and revolting to nature. In this manner we mortify the senses. If we wish something passed while we are eating, we make signs for it. Ten minutes is about the time spent in consuming the gout defying food supplied us. There is a dish-pan with about two quarts of warm water in it on the table, and the first sister finished eating has this pan passed to her and she washes her dishes, dries them and places them in her private drawer in the table at her place. From six to ten sisters wash their own dishes in this same water, and no difference if some of these sisters are diseased, as I have seen them, they would be wasting time to make a change of water, and that would be a breach of the vow of poverty. In all my thirty-one years of convent life, I never had a chair with a back to it more than a dozen times in the refectory (as the dining-room is called). It was either benches or stools.

The following will show the spirit in which a sister should receive her food, given at my spiritual instruction during retreat:

MEALS.

"Attention and devotion in saying the prayers before and after meals, eyes modestly cast down, a deep sense of my own misery, a pure intention in this animal exercise. Never to pick or choose of what comes to table. If anything is disagreeable, to thank God for having given me an opportunity of mortification."

According to rule, we are allowed two hours' recreation each day, which, in reality, are about the busiest two hours of the day. Oh, no, Rome does not give her sisters any two hours' real recreation, or rest, during her long hours of labor. Such work as preparing fruit for canning or vegetables for cooking, folding clothes that are often very damp, picking over unsanitary gauze, tearing rags for carpet, picking over feathers from old pillows, and other undesirable work is done during these two hours; and then they say the sisters have plenty of recreation and rest.

At three o'clock every afternoon the sister must repair to some private place for profound prostration. That is, she must kneel and bend forward and say: "Jesus Christ became obedient unto death, even unto the death of the cross. Son of God, dying upon the cross for the salvation of souls, we adore thee; eternal Father, we offer Thee this, thy divine Son; accept, we beseech thee, His merits in behalf of the suffering souls in purgatory, for the conversion of all poor sinners, and of all in their agony." In addition to this prayer, she must say the "Hail! Mary" and the "Our Father" three times each, or remain kneeling the time it would take to say them and meditate on the prayer said. Then, this exercise is completed by kissing the floor.

Three times each day, five minutes is spent in examining our conscience. We write in a little book provided for that purpose, our faults and imperfections. Before going to confession we are supposed to look over this book and in this manner we forget nothing the priest should know.

A bell called the "regulation bell" calls us to each and every one of these "holy" exercises, and no matter what the sister is doing when this bell rings, even if a patient is sorely in need of her care, she must stop and go to her religious duties. If she is late to any of them, it means punishment, either by reprimand or penance, or maybe both. My readers can draw their own conclusions as to the care a patient gets from a sister-nurse, when these religious duties comes before the duties of nursing.

One of the great inconveniences and discomforts of a sister-nurse is the clothes which she is compelled to wear. The garb which I wore for thirty-one years weighed about fifteen pounds, and there is no change of weight in this "holy habit" for cold or warm weather. Our petticoats and stockings are the only garments that are changed in weight for the different temperatures. We are allowed two garbs at a time, but a sister wears one nearly all the time until it is worn out. All the cleaning these garbs get is a little brushing with soap and water, and when it gets discolored, it is dyed to its original color. One of these garbs I had for twelve years, and when I discarded it, there was only a small piece of the original left. Think of the cleanliness and sanitation of these poor girls, wearing such clothes, perspiring over the sick, and from cooking and doing laundry work, and even being under the rule of asking permission to take a bath. Over all this when we cared for the sick, we tied a large white apron, slipped on a pair of white sleeves, and then the patients would say, "How sanitary these sisters were." Poor, deluded public; poor, secluded girls; they are not to blame, they do the very best they can under the gag-rule of Rome. Is it any wonder to you that the average sister dies between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-five years, when they are compelled to live in this manner and endure the terrible practices I have mentioned in this chapter?