It was one ceaseless bother to buy, mostly in French; but one damsel, confident of success assailed us in whining English, running up and down before her wares, and seizing different objects in quick succession, while continuing to praise their beauty and cheapness.  Every shop or stall we passed—­and there were a good many—­had an inmate more or less importunate, but as what they had to say was very similar, it can be all embodied in the following

“CRY OF THE LOURDES SHOPKEEPERS.”

This way, if you please, miss; and madame, this way;
Kind sir, pause a moment, and see. 
Oh! tell me, I beg, what’s your pleasure to-day? 
Pray enter—­the entrance is free.

Some candles?  I’ve nice ones at half a franc each,
Or thirty centimes, if you will. 
Some tins, each with lids fitted tight as a leech,
For you, with blest water to fill.

And look at these beads, only forty centimes,
All carved, and most beautif’ly neat. 
I’ve “charms” that will give you the sweetest of dreams,
And benitiers lovely and sweet.

A cross of pure ivory.  Photographs too. 
—­No good?—­You want nothing to-day?—­
Alas! what on earth must poor shopkeepers do? 
Oh, kindly buy something, I pray!

One candle?  You must have one candle to burn
When into the grotto you tread. 
Not one?  Not a little one?  Onward you turn! 
Bah! may miseries light on your head!!

As soon as the shops were passed, and even before, women besieged us with packets of candles, and it was with great difficulty we made them understand the word No!  Then, leaving the Hotels de la Grotte and Latapie on the right, and the “Panorama” on the opposite side, we wound down towards the river and the grotto.

To us, it would be hard to conceive anything more pitiable or repulsive than the scene which met our gaze as we passed at the base of the church and came in full view of the grotto.  An irregular opening in the dull grey stone going back only a few feet, with the moisture oozing over it here and there, and the ivy and weeds adding picturesqueness to what would otherwise be commonplace; in an elevated niche on the right, a figure of the Virgin in white robes and blue sash; in front, on the left, a covered marble cistern, with taps; and innumerable crutches and candles, were all the unsuperstitious eye could see.  But to those poor wretches gathered round in prayer, influenced by the “light-headed” dreams of a poor swineherd, the spot was the holiest of holy ground.  The abject reverence of their attitudes, the stand of flaming and guttering candles, the worship and kissing of the rough wet stones, the pious drinking of the cistern’s water as they came away—­a few pausing to buy some “blest” token of their visit at the adjacent shop—­and the solemn silence that reigned over all, were the chief features that made the scene one from which we were only too glad to turn away.  Taking the zigzag