With the aid of God, and of the Prince, she entered.
She departed at the end of six or eight months, alleging as a reason, that there was no shade in the garden.
The nuns were delighted.
Although very old, she still played the harp, and did it very well.
When she went away she left her mark in her cell.
Madame de Genlis was superstitious and a Latinist.
These two words furnish a tolerably good profile of her.
A few years ago, there were still to be seen, pasted in the inside of a little cupboard in her cell in which she locked up her silverware and her jewels, these five lines in Latin, written with her own hand in red ink on yellow paper, and which, in her opinion, possessed the property of frightening away robbers:--
Imparibus meritis pendent tria corpora ramis:[15]
Dismas et Gesmas, media est divina potestas;
Alta petit Dismas, infelix, infima, Gesmas;
Nos et res nostras conservet summa potestas.
Hos versus dicas, ne tu furto tua perdas.
[15] On the boughs hang three bodies of unequal merits: Dismas and Gesmas, between is the divine power.°思°兔°網°
Dismas seeks the heights, Gesmas, unhappy man, the lowest regions; the highest power will preserve us and our effects.
If you repeat this verse, you will not lose your things by theft.