"
Leaving Lyons at four o'clock on the morning of the 22d, they journeyed
slowly towards Avignon, delayed by the condition of the roads covered by
an unusual fall of snow which was now melting under the breath of a warm
breeze from the south. On the way they pass "between the two hills a
telegraph making signals." This was, of course, a semaphore by means of
which visual signals were made.
Reaching Avignon on the night of the 23d, they went the next day, which
was Sunday, in search of a Protestant church, but none was to be found in
this ancient city of the Popes, so they followed a fine military band to
the church of St. Agricola and attended the services there, the band
participating and making most glorious music.
Morse, with his Puritan background and training, was not much edified by
the ritual of the Catholic Church, and, after describing it, he adds:--
"I looked around the church to ascertain what was the effect upon the
multitude assembled. The females, kneeling in their chairs, many with
their prayer-books reading during the whole ceremony, seemed part of the
time engaged in devotional exercises. Far be it from me to say there were
not some who were actually devout, hard as it is to conceive of such a
thing; but this I will say, that everything around them, instead of
aiding devotion, was calculated entirely to destroy it.
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