It was wine; what a boon! but the leper stretched out his arm and emptied the jug at one draught.
Then he said: "I am cold!" Julian ignited a bundle of ferns that lay in the middle of the hut.

The leper approached the fire and, resting on his heels, began to warm himself; his whole frame shook and he was failing visibly; his eyes grew dull, his sores began to break, and in a faint voice he whispered: "Thy bed!" Julian helped him gently to it, and even laid the sail of his boat over him to keep him warm.
The leper tossed and moaned.

The corners of his mouth were drawn up over his teeth; an accelerated death-rattle shook his chest and with each one of his aspirations, his stomach touched his spine.
At last, he closed his eyes.
"I feel as if ice were in my bones! Lay thyself beside me!" he commanded.

Julian took off his garments; and then, as naked as on the day he was born, he got into the bed; against his thigh he could feel the skin of the leper, and it was colder than a serpent and as rough as a file.
He tried to encourage the leper, but he only whispered: "Oh! I am about to die! Come closer to me and warm me! Not with thy hands! No! with thy whole body." So Julian stretched himself out upon the leper, lay on him, lips to lips, chest to chest.
Then the leper clasped him close and presently his eyes shone like stars; his hair lengthened into sunbeams; the breath of his nostrils had the scent of roses; a cloud of incense rose from the hearth, and the waters began to murmur harmoniously; an abundance of bliss, a superhuman joy, filled the soul of the swooning Julian, while he who clasped him to his breast grew and grew until his head and his feet touched the opposite walls of the cabin.

The roof flew up in the air, disclosing the heavens, and Julian ascended into infinity face to face with our Lord Jesus Christ, who bore him straight to heaven.
And this is the story of Saint Julian the Hospitaller, as it is given on the stained-glass window of a church in my birthplace.
A SIMPLE SOUL.