be.

You have been made to believe that all was darkness in Semur. M. le
Maire, it was not so. The darkness wrapped the walls as in a winding
sheet; but within, soon after you were gone, there arose a sweet and
wonderful light--a light that was neither of the sun nor of the moon;
and presently, after the ringing of the bells; the silence departed as
the darkness had departed. I began to hear, first a murmur, then the
sound of the going which I had felt without hearing it--then a faint
tinkle of voices--and at the last, as my mind grew attuned to these
wonders, the very words they said. If they spoke in our language or in
another, I cannot tell; but I understood. How long it was before the
sensation of their presence was aided by the happiness of hearing I know
not, nor do I know how the time has passed, or how long it is, whether
years or days, that I have been in Semur with those who are now there;
for the light did not vary--there was no night or day. All I know is
that suddenly, on awakening from a sleep (for the wonder was that I
could sleep, sometimes sitting on the Cathedral steps, sometimes in my
own house; where sometimes also I lingered and searched about for the
crusts that Leocadie had left), I found the whole world full of sound.
They sang going in bands about the streets; they talked to each other
as they went along every way. From the houses, all open, where everyone
could go who would, there came the soft chiming of those voices. And at
first every sound was full of gladness and hope. The song they sang
first was like this: 'Send us, send us to our father's house. Many are
our brethren, many and dear. They have forgotten, forgotten, forgotten!
But when we speak, then will they hear.' And the others answered: 'We
have come, we have come to the house of our fathers. Sweet are the
homes, the homes we were born in. As we remember, so will they remember.
When we speak, when we speak, they will hear.' Do not think that these