BOOKS.

A FRENCH CONVENT SCHOOL.* THE author tells us that her narrative relates facts, and only facts, drawn from her experience in a French convent school and later as a member of the Order which controlled the school. She has changed the names of the persons she describes, but nothing else. Her experience lasted five years. At the age

* The Truth about a Yummy 7 as Story of Five Years is a Paris Convent School. By Marion Ayesha. London : Chatto and Windtut. [ate:] of nineteen she was entered in the school as a pupil by a singularly heartless mother, who wished to have her off her hands, and hoped nothing more than that she would take the perpetual vows of_t.le Order and stay out of England for ever. At this school outside Paris " many royalties and members of the haute noblesse' of Europe have been educated." The author afterwards became in turn a lady boarder, a novice, and a professed novice of temporal (two years') vows. She entered the school as a Protestant and, of course, was received into the Roman Church when she became a novice. The title of the book, The Truth about a Nun- nery, probably by reminding one of the catch-penny titles of some scandalous chronicles, has a strong flavour, but there is really nothing scandalous about this book. At least there is nothing scandalous if the author tolls the truth. We assume that she does so, even though her habit of " keeping," as she says, " the comical side uppermost " is a dangerous selective process that may create a wholly false perspective. Moreover, the school described was never, wo should say, typical ; and another thing to remember is that French education in fashionable girls' schools has im- proved considerably since the period of which this book treats.. On the assumption of truthfulness, however, the only fault we have to find with a remarkably.-vivid story is that there are many errors of taste, the worst of which are distinctly offen- sive. We do not say this from the point of view of Roman Catholics, but from that of any one who values reverence and well-mannered restraint. The author says of her book : "The reader will not find in it weird stories of walled-up nuns, of starved prisoners covered with festering sores, or of slaughtered infants buried in the cellar. The Roman Catholic nun is painted only as what she often is—a conceited, ridiculously self-satisfied, but harmless and kindly old maid."

The school as the author presents it provides a model of a mistaken and unwholesome method. There was a system of espionage to prevent girls from carrying on such private conversations as innocent school girls may enjoy in friendship for one another without the least harm. The author's first experience of the ridiculous surveillance followed upon a very much supervised recreation on her first day. The girls, asking to be released from their games, were allowed to form groups of eight or ten and march round in a circle. Each group was watched by a novice, who bad not yet taken her temporary vows, and the conversation of the group bad to be general by rule. The novice eyed the girls " as if her salvation depended on it, pouncing on any two she caught holding private conversation. . . . No apartes,' mes enfants ! Join the general conversation." Pupils who distinguished themselves by their piety for three years were enrolled as members of the " Congregation des Enfants de Marie," and their duty was partly to listen to the conversation of other pupils and report disobedience to the nuns. As their advance ment in favour and authority depended on the frequency and value of their reports, it is obvious that their ddlations, to use the word which describes the similar yet reverse process of spying on Ultramontanes and Royalists in the Army, were not wanting in number or preciseness. The routine and the feed- ing of the pupils were Spartan enough, but all through het book the author writes with contempt of the attention which the nuns paid in private to their own meals. Some of them had become hypochrondriae, and tempted their jaded appetites with the most delicate and expensive repasts. As for the pupils, although their school lives were passed under a kind of "improved Borstal system," the author admits that these potted little Parisians "not only submitted to the convent rule with a good grace, but even loved their prison, loved it dearly; and wept bitter tears when the hour of parting ;arrived." One of the regular daily prayers, we note, was !for the Bourbons and against the President.

Among the most unwholesome products of an unwholesome ,

system was the habit most of the pupils had of raising some

'favourite nun to a position of spiritual perfection, reflecting on her virtues and her charm in a kind of mystical exaltation, and competing jealously with other pupils for her notice and favours. Very shortly after the author had joined the convent a girl asked her whom she intended to choose as her " toquade," and the author's answer contains her opinion of " toquades " as well as of the standard of convent education :—

"1 requested her to be more explicit. What did the word (toquade mean? For all I flattered myself that I spoke the

French language fluently, never had I encountered that particular word in any lexicon." Who is the nun you aro going to worship, to enshrine in your heart ? Whom will you choose as your soul's love, or 'toquade,' as we call them ? ' I looked to see whether she had a sunstroke; it was a sweltering day. Then I answered, as I pushed the straw hat further over her brow : 'Don't place your hat on the back of your head, Jacqueline. Your brain is not your strong point, and it needs protection. I'm not going to worship any nun ; why. should I ? I see nothing in any of them worth worshipping." Oh! ' she cried aghast; then added as an after- thought it because you are a heretic that you think nuns wicked?' Wicked! Those poor little old maids wicked !' I re- joined contemptuously. `No, indeed, I do not think them wicked, far from it. They are merely silly." Silly ! The Spouses of our Lord ! Oh, hush ! you speak sacrilege.' Then, recalling her onerous duties as member of the secret police force known as the 'Congregation des Enfants de Marie,' she questioned further : • In what way do you consider thorn silly P'

yawned ; 'how can I tell ? To begin with, the education even in the first division is most elementary. All the classes are religious lessons more or less disguised. Madame Johan de la Pocono's method of teaching history is most absurd. Fancy calling that infamous Alexander VI. a saint ? Fancy wanting to make us believe that Saint Bartholomew was God's Judgment, and perfectly in accordance with the teaching of the Gospel ! Then; I continued, ' in a school of eighty only eight learn a foreign language. No one studies Latin, Algebra, Euclid, Italian, Political Economy, or Universal History and Literature in their more advanced form. You waste your days gabbling prayers you do not understand, carrying banners and statues round the garden, singing canticles and performing all sorts of silly, empty Ceremonies, while no time is loft for serious study."

A little latter the author gives a further example of the duties of the Enfants de Marie :— " I bad just asked for permission to fetch a pocket-handkerchief. She looked round, then shook her head. You see that I have no ehitd of Mary disponible at the present moment,' she replied.

You must wait.' i

But surely, ma mere, a girl of my ago is capable of fetching a pocket-handkerchief, without getting iuto mischief. Let me go alone." Certainly not ; the idea! Ali, here comes Lili. Lili, will you be so kind as to accompany Miriam to her cubicle ? ' Lili, the youngest Enfant do Marie of that year and one of the best-behaved pupils in the school, as also the meanest, most underhand, treacherous little sneak of any school— past, present, or future—tossed her head, and, with a ludicrous mien of grave importance, beckoned me to follow her. 'Had she not better hold my hand ? ' I queried. But the sarcasm fell flat, and I was led away—a young woman nearing twenty—guarded and supervised by a child of fifteen, who followed me to my cubicle and held the curtain up to watch me while I searched my drawer for a handkerchief."

Some of the practices of the nuns were equivocal and casuistical, yet their spiritual self-satisfaction as " the brides of the Lord" and as " a holocaust for the sins of the world " enabled them apparently to go on their way with quite easy consciences. The author tells, for example, how on a certain feast day, particularly sacred to the school, the pupils were reminded that it was the custom to give their special dinner

to the poor, contenting themselves with ordinary fare. " Am I to understand," asked the head of the convent, " that you all desire to give your feast-day dinner to God's holy poor ? " A hesitating but general assent was given by the school. The pupils had paid for this special dinner, and the anther was amused on discovering later that the £40 collected by the head girl was pocketed by the nuns themselves. Having taken the vow of poverty the nuns could, with at all events legal propriety, style themselves "God's holy poor." The silliest practice was the traditional practical joke of collecting money from those

who wished to see St. Pierre miraculously revealed. When the curtain behind which St. Pierre was to present himself

was drawn back the spectators saw " cinq pierces" arranged on a table. Perhaps the best instance of the spiritual arrogance of the nuns which the author gives is the incident of the death of a pupil named Linda. The school was not informed of her death, although she was buried in Paris, whereas about the same time there was much pomp and

ceremony at the funeral of a nun belonging to the convent.

The author asked one of the nuns the reason for this difference, and suggested that humble lay women had as good a chance of salvation as the nuns themselves :— "'.Assuredly,' she returned 'that is, if they die in the holy Roman faith, otherwise there can be no se.' lvation for them. Linda belonged, to a good Irish Catholic family, and I am hopeful that Heaven s gates will open to admit her when her purgatory is over.' The same heaven in which your consecrated virgins spend your eternity ? " The same, aye—yet with what a• difference. Wo virgins will follow the Lamb wheresoever Ho goes. Tho place of honour near. the, Trinity's Throne will be ours by right absolute ;. while you seculars, who moat of you will owe to our penances and. prayers your admittance inside the sacred portals, will stand far below, probably forming a court of honour to those among us, to whom you more especially owe your salvation. At this moment Mere Emmanuel du Coeur Pere() rests in the very centre of the burning ocean of Our Saviour's divine love, while Linda, even if our prayers have already raised her out of purgatory, stands far, far below." I don't believe it,' I tartly retorted. 'Nor can you be quite sure. For all you know, Linda may be nearer to the Beatific Vision than More Emmanuel, and dearer to her Creator.'" It may be wondered why a pupil who formed such opinions.

of the nuns as are expressed here allowed herself to be con- verted to Roman Catholicism and to take temporary vows

Her explanation is that she was too much alone in the world to know what else to do. Life outside a nun's vows was a sealed book to her. Having taken her vows she was sent to teach at a convent in Nicaragua, but was dismissed, certainly not through want of ability—as this book will testify—but because her mother ceased to pay £100 a year on her behalf.

Convinced that her money and not herself was required the author separated herself from the Order.