promising them four brothers for next All Saints Day, and indicating our conditions for taking over a school.

From the copy in AFM, 132.2, pp. 173-174.

This is a simple memorandum stuck into a notebook whose title page reads: Account book of the house of N.D. de lHermitage, for the produce and receipts for the year 1826. We can find no trace of the letter which the parish priests of Annecy must have written, neither in our archives nor those of that diocese. The interesting part of this text is the list of conditions required at that time for the opening of a school, and the fact that the Founder no longer shows the same scruples he had in 1822 when he sent the brothers to Bourg-Argental (cf. Life,
pp. 88-90), about opening schools even in the principal town of a department, like Annecy whose population at that time exceeded 11,500.

As for the date, which is totally lacking on the copy, it can be determined only in relation to the preceding copy, the letter to Fr. Barou (L. 7), and the following one, the letter to Fr. Cattet of 18th December 1828 (L. 11). We have no way of being more precise within that eighteen-month span. We have dated it 1828 simply to strike a midpoint between May 1827 and December 1828.

Letter to the parish priests of Annecy, Savoie

1º I answered the canon that we would be very pleased to open a house or two in your area, our only aim being to give glory to God and to increase the number of Marys children.

2º I answered that we could perhaps send four brothers to Annecy next All Saints.

3º That the Mother-house asks only that their travel expenses be covered, but it retains the right to transfer its subjects, wherever they may be, as the overall good of the society may require.

4º In every place, we ask for a roomy, healthy, and airy house; classrooms large enough for the number of children; a garden in which the brothers can work for recreation; two thousand francs for furnishings and one hundred francs per year for its upkeep.

5º We ask for 1600 francs per year for four brothers. In some places, we allow the town to charge the better-off parents something, to cover part of the expenses of the establishment.

I am also informing the authorities of Annecy that we want to have a free hand in assigning any subjects from your area who ask to join us, whether in Savoie itself or anywhere else in France.

Edition: Translation from: Lettres de Marcellin J. B. Champagnat (1789-1840) Fondateur de l?Institut des Frères Maristes, présentés par Frère Paul Sester,1985.

fonte: Daprès la minute AFM 132.2, pp. 173-174