The English word "hospice" originated in the Middle Ages. At the time, it referred to places where pilgrims could rest, as well as shelters established by the Church to care for the sick and those with no one to look after them. It later gradually became a "hospital" that provided care for terminally ill patients to ease their suffering.
Unlike efficient hospitals that provided rehabilitation services, nearly everyone who came to a hospice had an incurable disease. The emphasis was on spiritual concerns—how to calmly accept and face death.
Death was part of life, though not everyone saw it that way. Everyone had to face that day. For all sorts of reasons, many people could not arrange a dignified funeral for themselves, especially those sleeping on the streets. Women and young children were sent to convents, and some never came out for the rest of their lives. Coco Chanel's mother died when she was eleven. Her father sent his two sons to farming families and all three daughters to convents. Being sent to a convent did not necessarily mean becoming a nun, but at least there, they had food, clothing, and shelter from the wind and rain.
Modern hospices had the beggars they took in tend to green belts and pull weeds, but much earlier, when the plague was still raging, their duty had been to dig pits. Of course, they did not always encounter such extreme circumstances. Usually, they also dug graves for all kinds of funerals.
Simplon Road could not be completed by military engineers alone. With Saint-Domingue in such turmoil, restoring slavery was out of the question. Lamborghini had been born into a noble family that was not wealthy. He attended a school run by the Church, which usually admitted boys of lower status.
He believed a