II

M. MYRIEL BECOMES MONSEIGNEUR BIENVENU

THE bishop’s palace at D__ was contiguous to the hospital: the palace was a spacious and beautiful edifice, built of stone near the beginning of the last century by Monseigneur Henri Pujet, a doctor of theology of the Faculty of Paris, abbe of Simore, who was bishop of D__ in 1712. The palace was in truth a lordly dwelling: there was an air of grandeur about everything, the apartments of the bishop, the saloons, the chambers, the court of honour, which was very large, with arched walks after the antique Florentine style; and a garden planted with magnificent trees.

In the dining hall was a long, superb gallery, which was level with the ground, opening upon the garden; Monseigneur Henri Pujet had given a grand banquet on the 29th of July, 1714, to Monseigneur Charles Brulart de Genlis, archbishop, Prince d’Embrun, Antoine de Mesgrigny, capuchin, bishop of Grasse, Philippe de Vendome, grand-prior de France, the Abbe de Saint Honore de Lerins, Francois de Berton de Grillon, lord bishop of Vence, Cesar de Sabran de Forcalquier, lord bishop of Glandeve, and Jean Soanen, priest of the oratory, preacher in ordinary to the king, lord bishop of Senez; the portraits of these seven reverend personages decorated the hall, and this memorable date, July 29th, 1714, appeared in letters of gold on a white marble tablet.

The hospital was a low, narrow, one story building with a small garden.

Three days after the bishop’s advent he visited the hospital; when the visit was ended, he invited the director to oblige him by coming to the palace.

"Monsieur," he said to the director of the hospital, "how many patients have you?"

"Twenty-six monseigneur."

"That is as I counted them," said the bishop.

"The beds," continued the director, "are very much crowded."

"I noticed it."

"The wards are but small chambers, and are not easily ventilated."

"It seems so to me."

"And then, when the sun does shine, the garden is very small for the convalescents."

"That was what I was thinking."

"Of epidemics we have had typhus fever this year; two years ago we had military fever, sometimes one hundred patients, and we did not know what to do."

"That occurred to me."

"What can we do, monseigneur?" said the director; "we must be resigned."

This conversation took place in the dining gallery on the ground floor.

The bishop was silent a few moments: then he turned suddenly towards the director.

"Monsieur," he said, "how many beds do you think this hall alone would contain?"

"The dining hall of monseigneur!" exclaimed the director, stupefied.

The bishop ran his eyes over the hall, seemingly taking measure and making calculations.

"It will hold twenty beds," said he to himself; then raising his voice, he said:

"Listen, Monsieur Director, to what I have to say. There is evidently a mistake here. There are twenty-six of you in five or six small rooms: there are only three of us, and space for sixty. There is a mistake, I tell you. You may have my house and I have yours. Restore mine to me; you are at home."

Next day the twenty-six poor invalids were installed in the bishop’s palace, and the bishop was in the hospital.

M. Myriel had no property, his family having been impoverished by the revolution. His sister had a life estate of five hundred francs, which in the vicarage sufficed for her personal needs. M. Myriel received from the government as bishop a salary of fifteen thousand francs. The day on which he took up his residence in the hospital building, he resolved to appropriate this sum once for all to the following uses. We copy the schedule then written by him.

Schedule for the Regulation of my Household Expenses/p>

"For the little seminary, fifteen hundred livres.

Mission congregation, one hundred livres.

For the Lazaristes of Montdidier, one hundred livres.

Congregation of the Saint-Esprit, one hundred and fifty livres.

Seminary of foreign missions in Paris, two hundred livres.

Religious establishments in the Holy Land, one hundred livres.

Maternal charitable societies, three hundred livres.

For that of Arles, fifty livres.

For the amelioration of prisons, four hundred livres.

For the relief and deliverance of prisoners, five hundred livres.

For the liberation of fathers of families imprisoned for debt, one thousand livres.

Additions to the salaries of poor schoolmasters of the diocese, two thousand livres.

Public storehouse of Hautes-Alpes, one hundred livres.

Association of the ladies of D__ of Manosque and Sisteron for the gratuitous instruction of poor girls, fifteen hundred livres.

For the poor, six thousand livres.

My personal expenses, one thousand livres.

Total, fifteen thousand livres."

M. Myriel made no alteration in this plan during the time he held the see of D__; he called it, as will be seen, the regulation of his household expenses .

Mademoiselle Baptistine accepted this arrangement with entire submission; M. Myriel was to her at once her brother and her bishop, her companion by ties of blood and her superior by ecclesiastical authority. She loved and venerated him unaffectedly; when he spoke, she listened; when he acted, she gave him her co-operation. Madame Magloire, however, their servant, grumbled a little. The bishop, as will be seen, had reserved but a thousand francs; this added to the income of Mademoiselle Baptistine, gave them a yearly independence of fifteen hundred francs, upon which the three old people subsisted.

Thanks, however, to the rigid economy of Madame Magloire, and the excellent management of Mademoiselle Baptistine, whenever a curate came to D__, the bishop found means to extend to him his hospitality.

About three months after the installation, the bishop said one day, "With all this I am very much cramped." "I think so too," said Madame Magloire: "Monseigneur has not even asked for the sum due him by the department for his carriage expenses in town, and in his circuits in the diocese. It was formerly the custom with all bishops."

"Yes!" said the bishop; "you are right, Madame Magloire."

He made his application.

Some time afterwards the conseil-general took his claim into consideration and voted him an annual stipend of three thousand francs under this head: "Allowance to the bishop for carriage expenses, and travelling expenses for pastoral visits."

The bourgeoisie of the town were much excited on the subject, and in regard to it a senator of the empire, formerly a member of the Council of Five Hundred, an advocate of the Eighteenth Brumaire, now provided with a rich senatorial seat near D__, wrote to M. Bigot de Preameneu, Minister of Public Worship, a fault-finding, confidential epistle, from which we make the following extract:-

"Carriage expenses! What can he want of it in a town of less than 4000 inhabitants? Expenses of pastoral visits! And what good do they do, in the first place; and then, how is it possible to travel by post in this mountain region? There are no roads; he can go only on horseback. Even the bridge over the Durance at Chateau-Arnoux is scarcely passable for oxcarts. These priests are always so; avaricious and miserly. This one played the good apostle at the outset: now he acts like the rest; he must have a carriage and post-chaise. He must have luxury like the old bishops. Bah! this whole priesthood! Monsieur le Comte, things will never be better till the emperor delivers us from these macaroni priests. Down with the pope! (Matters were getting embroiled with Rome.) As for me, I am for Caesar alone," etc., etc., etc.

This application, on the other hand, pleased Madame Magloire exceedingly. "Good," said she to Mademoiselle Baptistine; "Monseigneur began with others, but he has found at last that he must end by taking care of himself. He has arranged all his charities, and so now here are three thousand francs for us."

The same evening the bishop wrote and gave to his sister a note couched in these terms:

Carriage and Travelling Expenses/p>

"For beef broth for the hospital, fifteen hundred livres.

For the Aix Maternal Charity Association, two hundred and fifty livres.

For the Draguignan Maternal Charity Association, two hundred and fifty livres.

For Foundlings, five hundred livres.

For Orphans, five hundred livres.

Total, three thousand livres."

Such was the budget of M. Myriel.

In regard to the official perquisites, marriage licenses, dispensations, private baptisms, and preaching, consecrations of churches or chapels, marriages, etc., the bishop gathered them from the wealthy with as much exactness as he dispensed them to the poor.

In a short time donations of money began to come in; those who had and those who had not, knocked at the bishop’s door; some came to receive alms and others to bestow them, and in less than a year he had become the treasurer of all the benevolent, and the dispenser to all the needy. Large sums passed through his hands; nevertheless he changed in no wise his mode of life, nor added the least luxury to his simple fare.

On the contrary, as there is always more misery among the lower classes than there is humanity in the higher, everything was given away, so to speak, before it was received, like water on thirsty soil; it was well that money came to him, for he never kept any; and besides he robbed himself. It being the custom that all bishops should put their baptismal names at the head of their orders and pastoral letters, the poor people of the district had chosen by a sort of affectionate instinct, from among the names of the bishop, that which was expressive to them, and they always called him Monseigneur Bienvenu. We shall follow their example and shall call him thus; besides, this pleased him. "I like this name," said he; "Bienvenu counterbalances Monseigneur."

We do not claim that the portrait which we present here is a true one; we say only that it resembles him.