But I was weary; and when I had quieted my spirits with Elizabeth Seton’s memoirs⁠—a dull work⁠—the cold and the raving of the wind among the pines (for my room was on that side of the monastery which adjoins the woods) disposed me readily to slumber. I was wakened at black midnight, as it seemed, though it was really two in the morning, by the first stroke upon the bell. All the brothers were then hurrying to the chapel; the dead in life, at this untimely hour, were already beginning the uncomforted labours of their day. The dead in life⁠—there was a chill reflection. And the words of a French song came back into my memory, telling of the best of our mixed existence: