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One might take exception to the word "undisciplined" Puvis was one of the most calculating painters that ever used a brush, and one of the most cerebral. His favourite aphorism was: "Beauty is character." His figures have been called immobile, his palette impoverished; the unfair sex abused his lean, lanky female creatures, and finally he was named a painter for Lent for fast-days.

Father Bartholomew, neither eating, drinking, nor smoking, till the sun should set for this was one of his fast-days was heartily pleased with his guest's good cheer, and smiled with the large benevolence which a lean face expresses with more decision than a plump and jolly one.

If one wished to eat meat on fast-days, marry within prohibited degrees of relationship, or indulge in forbidden pleasures, he could do it without offence by rendering certain satisfactions before or after, which satisfactions could mostly be made by payments of money.

See, therefore, how anxious the Church is for the good of its children, when it makes its bishops, priests, and religious pray daily for all the faithful, and send up in one voice the same prayer to the throne of God. *392 Q. How should we keep the holy days of obligation? A. We should keep the holy days of obligation as we should keep the Sunday. 393 Q. What do you mean by fast-days?

In Lent, and on Fast-days, I have eaten very good Soups abroad, that were made without any Flesh. And as that is not very common in England, I thought it convenient to bring over the Receipts with me, that we may know how to make the best of every thing about a Farm. To make Fish-Gravy for Soups.

Here the procession was met by the priest, precentors, and choir, who conducted the brotherhood to the parish church. After hearing mass the company adjourned to the house of the Green Wolf, where a simple repast, such as is required by the church on fast-days, was served up to them. Then they danced before the door till it was time to light the bonfire.

I read, for instance, in Calamy's Life of John Howe that on the public Fast-days, it was Howe's common way to begin about nine in the morning and to continue reading, preaching, and praying till about four in the afternoon.

His closet was crowded with relics, rosaries, etc., but there he passed generally eight hours of the twenty-four upon his knees in prayer and meditation. He often inflicted on himself mortifications, observed fast-days, and kept his vows with religious strictness.

The congregation emerged austerely from the church, shaking their heads solemnly over the minister's remarks, and their feet carried them into the tent. There was no mirth, no unseemly revelry, but there was a great deal of hard drinking. Eventually the tents were done away with, but not until the services on the fast-days were shortened.

The officers who guarded them took away their chessmen and cards because some of them were named kings and queens, and all the books with coats of arms on them; they refused to get ointment for a gathering on Madame Elisabeth's arm; they, would not allow her to make a herb-tea which she thought would strengthen her niece; they declined to supply fish or eggs on fast-days or during Lent, bringing only coarse fat meat, and brutally replying to all remonstances, "None but fools believe in that stuff nowadays."