Father Ignatius had many doubts, and much
secret compunction of conscience; but, like a wise chief, he
endeavoured to turn the sad event to some account, in the impending
warfare of faith. Changing his battery, he whispered in the ears of a
few of his oldest parishioners, that he had been deceived in the state
of Middleton's mind, which he was now compelled to believe was
completely stranded on the quicksands of heresy. He began to show his
relics again, and was even heard to allude once more to the delicate
and nearly forgotten subject of modern miracles. In consequence of
these demonstrations, on the part of the venerable priest, it came to
be whispered among the faithful, and finally it was adopted, as part
of the parish creed, that Inez had been translated to heaven.
Don Augustin had all the feelings of a father, but they were smothered
in the lassitude of a Creole. Like his spiritual governor, he began to
think that they had been wrong in consigning one so pure, so young, so
lovely, and above all so pious, to the arms of a heretic: and he was
fain to believe that the calamity, which had befallen his age, was a
judgment on his presumption and want of adherence to established
forms.
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