Letter from Mrs. Martin CF 70
To Mrs Guerin
October 1, 1871.
I learn with sorrow that you are still in bed and that you suffer from a mortal boredom, which no one understands better than me, since I cannot bear to be two days in bed, so how much I admire your patience! You tell me, however, that I have courage, it's true that I don't listen to myself, but if I saw myself several months inactive, I don't know what would become of me. I do not believe that the good Lord would allow such a calamity for me, it would be beyond my strength; so you see, my dear sister, that I have not so much courage as you suppose.
I remember that when my youngest child was born, I was still going about my business at half past nine in the evening, taking care of Céline, whom I put to sleep singing; and little Mélanie-Thérèse was there before eleven o'clock. I said to myself: “How lucky I am! But I haven't always had it and many times I would have preferred to be afflicted like you are and keep my little girl.
I had said to God: “You know very well that I don't have time to be sick. I was answered beyond all hope, and I gloried a little. So the good Lord seemed to answer me: “Since you don't have time to be sick, will you perhaps have time to be in a lot of pain? And I was not spared, I assure you!
You see, in this world, it's like that, you have to carry your cross one way or the other. We say to God: "I don't want that one." Often we are answered, but often also for our misfortune. It is better to take what happens to us patiently, there is always joy alongside sorrow, that is what will happen for you, my dear sister.
The children are going back to the Visitation next Thursday, but to my great regret, my Léonie is not going back, because she would not be in a condition to follow the others and we do not currently have a teacher to give her private lessons; moreover, my sister's health is so fragile, in winter, that the Mother Superior wants to spare her the fatigue of following this child.
Céline is very strong, she talks like a magpie, she is charming and witty. She knows her uncle and aunt well, as well as little Jeanne, she knows how to name them by showing their portraits. She learns whatever she wants; her sisters have only to sing a little song four or five times, we hear Céline repeat it in the same tone, but as soon as she notices that we are listening to it, she stops.
