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Show LOURDESOfMDOkllfM Grand Procession Pious Pilgrims Wrapped Wrap-ped in Devotional Ecstacy Pyramids of Faith Gruesome Memorials of Human Hu-man Suffering The Scala Santa Leads Beautiful Heights What Is Seen There Falls of Montmorency Water Makes a Leap of 275 Feet, Causing the Bridal Veil natural Steps. (Special Cor. Intermuntaiii Catholic) The morning I arrived at St. Ann's the church was celebrating the festival cornmrniorating the. "Beheading of St. .!"hn the Baptist." This was the forenoon of the i'.Hh uf August, and a. I. reached the floor of the great church. 1 ttud nido with uncovered head to make way for a procession just emerging. Led by a richly vestmentcd deacon bearing aloft a g"ld plaited crucifix, the emblem, of man's redemption; and supported on either sid" by soutaned and surpliced acolites. a solemn procession pro-cession of priests in embroidered vestment.- slowly passed out the basilica door. Under a canopy of yellow silk the officiating priest carried tUe blessel sacrament, followed by another bearing the relic of St. Ann, and an orderly throng of devout worshipers worship-ers iu a seemingly endless line. Slowly and reverently rever-ently the procession passed through the marvel-ously marvel-ously beautiful garden singing a hymn of praise to God. The vast multitude, not hi the procession, were on their knees, bareheaded and bowing low in adoration to our Divine Lord and in reverence ami respect for the mother of the Blessed Virgin. Three sides of the floral square were a breathing and adoring mass of pilgrims, devotion ra-luithiii- from every face and unswerving faith visible in attitude and expression. It is a revelation to the Protestant Protes-tant spectator and a relisious tonic to the Catholic Catho-lic from afar. 1 The procession re-enters the church and 'the . .f ' Christ bearing priest leaves tin? devout multitude in the aisles and pews of the sacred building, passes through the gates 'of the sanctuary and plone ascends as-cends the steps of e beautiful marble altar. While the sacrificial pri- is depositing ih Blessed Sacrament Sac-rament in the tabernacle the soft and almost plain- tive notes from the organ float upon the sacred air, the sweetly blended voices of the choir mingle with the music of the instrument, the great' congregation congrega-tion is wrapt in devotional ecstasy, the gorgeously vestmeued and gray-haired pripst pauses for an instant in-stant on the elevated plane of the altar, looks down upon the devout mass of living souls and slowly descends to the level of the sanctuary- A time of solemn silence ensues, the voices from the choir are stilled, but the subdued music from aloft steals through, have, chancel and chapel, when as if by concerted Signal, the worshipers leave tho pews and, advancing to the sanctuary rails, kis reverently the precious reliquary of St. "Ann presented pre-sented to their lips by one of the priests. The holy sacrifice was offered up before I entered the basilica and now, after this act of reverence to the reli? of the Saint, the peoule leave the sacred building; and all is over for the morning. PYRAMIDS OF FAITIL xnd now what of the church itself? Tt is archi-tecturaly archi-tecturaly a striking structure, massively built, of ancient limestone and of proportions large enough to scat and accommodate a great multitude. It i a monument worthy of the ages of faith, and unless un-less an earthquake overturns it or the earth fall from beneath it, is destined to endure for all time But to me, familiar with the great cathedrals of the world, the hundreds of crutches, mechanical reliefs, braces, spectacles and articles of unknown use for deformed human beings, built up into pyramids pyra-mids twenty feet high, gave to the church a singular singu-lar and pathetic distinction. These gruesome me- morials of human sorrow and human suffering wem abandoned and contributed to the pyramidal collections col-lections when the afflicted were cured arid needed them no more. These miraculous cures are authenticated, au-thenticated, and, in a register preserved in tho sacristy, the names of the privileged are entered their places of residence given, the date of the miraculous visitation stated and other particulars written down. This is not the place to enter into a disquisition on the power of imagination, psychic influence or even the direct or indirect action of the supernatural super-natural in effecting wonderful transformations or cures of chronic diseases. For myself, after what I have seen at Lourdes, La Sallette and St. Ann de Beaupre, I am satisfied that 90 per cent of the cured are subjects of supernatural intervention. But let us pass on. THE "SCALA SAXTA." The Basilica and sacred shrine are of course the religious magnets which attract annually to this quiet little village on the St. Lawrence thousands thou-sands of devout pilgrims and restless tourists. Yet . there are here other cozy and devout spots of interest in-terest having a beauty and a fsoination oi their own. For instance, on the slope of the little mount overlooking the basilica are the Scala Santa, or Holy Stairway, a very close imitation of the stairway stair-way preserved in the magnificent church of St. John of Latern. Rome, and said to be the original origi-nal stups ascended by our Divine Lord when he entered the hall of Pilate and was asked by the Roman governor, "What is truth ?' A plenary indulgence in-dulgence is obtained by those who, in the state of grace, ascend these steps on their knees. There is a private stairway by which one may' reach the (Continued on Page 5.) t 1 LOURDES OF THE DOMINION (Continued from Page 1.) summit or landing of the seala santa where a group of exquisitely chisseled statuary and five figured windows of soft tones and beautiful designs appeal to one's artistic sense. Higher still, on the plane of the hill, and overlooking a panorama of scenic wonders are a chapel, convent and college and beyond them, near the highway, a colossal cross marking the boundary of the parish to the ' east. On the public roads in the rural districts of the province of Quebec one passes these great crosses every six or seven miles, many of them are crucifixes, as in Belgium, and to which the poet. Thomas Hood, so reverently refers in his merciless "Ode to Ray WTilson." FALLS OF MONTMORENCY. Returning from St. Ann's, visitors leave the cars near Montmorency Falls, a splendid view of which is obtained from the bridge crossing the Montmorency river. Here the water makes a sheer leap over the lip of the falls of 275 feet, falling in a beautiful white, wide ribbon of water called the "Bridel Veil." An inclined railway carries the visitor to the top of the cliff, and a short walk j brings him past the Duke of Kent's famed hostel- I ry, in which the ancient and the modern are so fittingly commingled to the (jdge of the falls. From the projecting bridge, frrm the stairways and from the opposite cliff so strangely stratified, excellent views may be had of the tumbling, foamy water. In the immediate neighborhood of the falls there is a park of liberal dimensions with excellent drives and bridle paths, fine groves of lordly oaks and maples, handsomely laid out flower beds, a zoo- , logical garden and places of amusement and refreshment, re-freshment, j A half hour's walk across the country and the visitor comes to the "natural steps," a series of remarkable re-markable shelving stairs, produced by the erosion of water acting for untold time on the stratified shale peculiar to the place. But here as elsewhere the covetousness of man is marring the beauty of nature, for a large dam is now being built across the river which in the course of a few weeks will cause this natural phenomenon .to be wholly submerged. sub-merged. But, while we linger in this enchanting, region, the long shadows cast by the sinking sun are reaching far across the valley and the river; already the red lights marking the channel of traffic traf-fic are visible at the buoys and we must away. We reluctantly turn aside from this scene of waterfall water-fall ami beautiful landscapes and descend to the electric road below. As twilight deepens with the shades of approaching night the train returns along the Beauport short, recrosses the St. Charles river, through Lower Town and into the St. Jean street denot. HUBERT LARKIN. Quebec, Sept. 1, 1907. |