subdued but gradually louder and more confident, reached even him. “It shows God’s judgment is not as man’s,” Father Païssy heard suddenly. The first to give utterance to this sentiment was a layman, an elderly official from the town, known to be a man of great piety. But he only repeated aloud what the monks had long been whispering. They had long before formulated this damning conclusion, and the worst of it was that a sort of triumphant satisfaction at that conclusion became more and more apparent every moment. Soon they began to lay aside even external decorum and almost seemed to feel they had a sort of right to discard it.
“And for what reason can this have happened,” some of the monks said, at first with a show of regret; “he had a small frame and his flesh was dried up on his bones, what was there to decay?”
“It must be a sign from heaven,” others hastened to add, and their opinion was adopted at once without protest. For it was pointed out, too, that if the decomposition had been natural, as in the case of every dead sinner, it would have been apparent later, after a lapse of at least twenty-four