In the height of the Reign of Terror, my grandmother, then a young girl, was living in the Faubourg Saint-Germain. There was a void around her and her mother; their friends, their relatives, the head of the family himself, had left France. Mansions were left desolate or else were invaded by new owners. They themselves had abandoned their rich dwellings for a plain lodging-house, where they lived waiting for better times, carefully hiding their names, which might have compromised them in those days. The churches, diverted from their purpose, were used as shops or manufactories. All outward practice of religion had ceased.

Nevertheless back of a sabot-maker's shop in the Rue Saint-Dominique, an old priest who had taken up his father's humble trade, used to gather some of the faithful together for prayer; but precaution had to be observed, for the hunt was close, and the humble temple was exactly next door to the dwelling of one of the members of the revolutionary government, who was an implacable enemy of religion.

It was then a cold December night; midnight Mass was being celebrated in honor of the festival of Christmas. The shop was carefully closed, while the incense was smoking in the little room back of it. A huge chest of drawers on which a clean, white cloth had been spread, served as altar. The priestly ornaments had been taken from their hiding-place, and the little assembly, composed of women and a few men, was in pious recollection, when a knock at the door, like that of the faithful, attracted attention.

One of the worshippers opened the door; a man hesitatingly entered. The face was one to which all were unaccustomed in that place. To some, alas! it was a face too well known; it was that of the man who had in the public councils shown himself so bitter against gatherings of the faithful, and whose presence, for that reason, was more than ever to be dreaded at such a moment.

Nevertheless the majesty of the sacrifice was not disturbed, but fear had seized on all the attendants; did not each of them have reason to fear for himself, for his family, and for the good old pastor, in even greater danger than his flock?

With severe, but calm, cold air, the member of the convention remained standing until the end of Mass and communion, and the farther the ceremony progressed, the more agitated were all hearts in the expectation of an event which could not but too well be foreseen.

When all was over, in fact, when the lights were hardly extinguished, the congregation cautiously slipped out one by one; then the stranger approached the priest who had recognized him, but who remained stoically calm. "Citizen priest," he said, "I have something to say to thee."

"Speak, my brother; how can I be of service to you?"

"It's a favor I must ask of thee, and I feel how ridiculous I am. The red is coming up into my face and I daren't say any more."

"My bearing and my ministry nevertheless are not of the kind to disturb you, and if any feeling of piety leads you to me—"

"Eh? That's exactly what it isn't. I don't know anything about religion; I don't want to know anything about it; I belong to those who have helped to destroy yours; but, for my misfortune, I have a daughter—"

"I don't see any misfortune in that," the priest interrupted.

"Wait, citizen, thou shalt see. We people, men of principles, we are the victims of our children; inflexible towards all in the maintenance of the ideas which we have formed for ourselves, we hesitate and we became children before the prayers and the tears of our children. I have then a daughter whom I have reared to be an honest woman and a true citizeness. I thought I had formed her to my image, and here I was grossly deceived.

"A solemn moment is approaching for her. With the new year, she marries a good young fellow, whom I myself selected for her husband. Everything was going right; the two children loved each other,—at least I thought so,—and everything was ready for the ceremony at the commune, when, this evening, my daughter threw herself at my feet, begging me to postpone her marriage.

"Surprised at first, I lifted her to her feet.

"'What! you don't love your intended?' I asked her.

"'Yes, father,' she replied, 'but I don't want to get married yet.'

"Pressed with questions on this strange caprice, she finally confessed her girlish idea. She wanted to wait, hoping that a day would come when she could get married, and have her union blessed in the church. My first burst of anger having passed, I cannot tell you all the fine reasons she gave me to obtain from me a thing so contrary to my rule of conduct. The marriage of her dead mother had been performed in the church; her memory required that pious action; she would not think herself married if it was not at the foot of the altar; she would prefer to remain single the rest of her days.

"She said so much, mingling her entreaties and tears with it all, that she vanquished me. She even showed me the retreat which a few days ago I would not have discovered with impunity to you all. I have come to seek thee out, and now I ask thee: Thou hast before thee thy persecutor: wilt thou bless according to thy rite, the marriage of his daughter?"

The worthy priest replied:—

"My ministry knows neither rancor nor exclusion; I am glad, besides, for what you ask of me; only one thing grieves me, and that is that the father should be hostile to his daughter's design."

"Thou mistakest: I understand all sentiments. That of a girl who wants to be married as her mother was, seems to me to be deserving of respect, and just now, I saw, there is something touching which I cannot explain in your ceremonies, and it has made me better understand her thought."

A few days later the same back shop contained a few intimate and conciliating friends who were attending a wedding. We need not say that from that day, whether through change of principles or through gratitude, the member of the revolutionary government was secretly the protector of the little church which could live on in peace, unknown to its persecutors.