THE VENERABLE DON BOSCO
then he added, 'I recommend to you my Congregation'.
"The Cardinal encouraged him, speaking of submission to the holy Will of God, and reminding him of all the labour he had undergone for His greater glory. Don Bosco with tears in his eyes, answered: 'I have done what I could; may the holy Will of God be accomplished in me.'
'Few,' observed the Cardinal, 'are able to say that when they come to the end of their life.'
"Don Bosco exclaimed: 'I have lived in troublous times…… but the authority of the Holy See…… I have just commissioned Msgr. Cagliero to tell the Holy Father that the Salesians are to be a bulwark to the authority of the Pope, wherever their labours may call them.'"
The diary of Don Bosco's last illness, under the date January 7, 1888, reads thus:
"This evening, with the doctors' permission we began to give Don Bosco some food. Before taking it he uncovered his head and prayed, evidently affected. The bystanders feared that the food might prove hurtful to him, but he bore it very well. Afterwards with unusual liveliness he began to ask a thousand questions. He inquired after news from Rome, about the Pope and his Sacerdotal Jubilee; then he asked for information about the Oratory and wished to speak with some of the brothers. He never felt so well.
"Toward six o'clock he sent to Father Lemoyne the following message: 'How do you account for
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