All our labour, in this, however, proved unavailing; for we were unable to get the woman to appear in court.
At length it was found impossible to induce the magistrates to do any thing in the case; and arrangements were made for my return to New York. While in the ferry-boat, crossing from Montreal to Laprairie, I happened to be standing near two little girls, when I overheard, the following conversation.
"I had gone to spend a week or two; but I heard that Antichrist was in the city, and was afraid to be there. So I am going right home. I would not be in Montreal while Antichrist is there. He has come to destroy the Catholic religion." I felt quite happy when I found myself once more safe in New York; and it has only been since my return from Montreal, and the conviction I had there formed, that it was in vain for me to attempt to get a fair investigation into the Hotel Dieu Nunnery, that I seriously thought of publishing a book. Under some disadvantages this volume has been prepared, and unfortunately its publication has been delayed to a season when it will be difficult to transmit it promptly to all parts of the country. I am sure, however, that in spite of all, no material errors will be found in it uncorrected, though many, very many, facts and circumstances might have been added which would have proved interesting. Indeed I am persuaded, from the experience I have already had, that past scenes, before forgotten, will continue to return to my memory, the longer I dwell upon my convent life, and that many of these will tend to confirm, explain, or illustrate some of the statements now before the public.
But before I close this volume, I must be indulged in saying a word of myself. The narrative through which the reader has now passed, he must not close and lay aside as if it were a fiction; neither would I wish him to forget the subject of it as one worthy only to excite surprise and wonder for a moment.
It is desired that the author of this volume may be regarded, not as a voluntary participator in the very guilty transactions which are described; but receive sympathy for the trials which she has endured, and the peculiar situation in which her past experience, and escape from the power of the Superior of the Hotel Dieu Nunnery, at Montreal, and the snares of the Roman priests in Canada, have left her.