The nuns of the Petit-Picpus had made a vault under their grand altar for the burial of their community. “The Government,” as they say, does not permit this vault to receive coffins so they leave the convent when they die. This is an affliction to them, and causes them consternation as an infraction of the rules.
They had obtained a mediocre consolation at best—permission to be interred at a special hour and in a special corner in the ancient Vaugirard cemetery, which was made of land which had formerly belonged to their community.
On Fridays the nuns hear high mass, vespers, and all the offices, as on Sunday. They scrupulously observe in addition all the little festivals unknown to people of the world, of which the Church of France was so prodigal in the olden days, and of which it is still prodigal in Spain and Italy. Their stations in the chapel are interminable. As for the number and duration of their prayers we can convey no better idea of them than by quoting the ingenuous remark of one of them: “The prayers of the postulants are frightful, the prayers of the novices are still worse, and the prayers of the professed nuns are still worse.”
Once a week the chapter assembles: the prioress presides; the vocal mothers assist. Each sister kneels in turn on the stones, and confesses aloud, in the presence of all, the faults and sins which she has committed during the week. The vocal mothers consult after each confession and inflict the penance aloud.
Besides this confession in a loud tone, for which all faults in the least serious are reserved, they have for their venial offences what they call the coulpe . To make one’s coulpe means to prostrate one’s self flat on one’s face during the office in front of the prioress until the latter, who is never called anything but “our mother,” notifies the culprit by a slight tap of her foot against the wood of her stall that she can rise. The coulpe or