The Project Gutenberg Historic Court Memoirs

tevrault.-The Head in t

tism of the Monst

on of the Royal Ab

ow all the geographical details of important places, asked me of the form and

e founder, for some inexplicable whim, united in one d

of Benedictine Monks is only second,-a fact which surprises greatly strangers and visitors. Both in the monastery and the

l an immense expanse of land. Carts drawn by bullocks, big mules, or superb horses are ceaselessly exporting the products of the fields,

remote periods of early civilisation, which saw the great proprietors delighting in their natal

is she who admits postulants, who fixes the dates of ordinations, pronounces interdictions, graces, and penances. They render her an account of their ad

nedictine Fathers to you

ked me,

they are to these monks, would have looked askance at the innovation. The Fathers never go in there. They are to be seen at the abbey church, where they sing a

a wooden theatre, which forms a terrace, and from this elevation th

e is ignorant of it. I am going to tell you of it, for it is extremely curious; it is not as it is r

, night and day, what we call, in hunter's parlance, 'big game.' Having won the victory over a monstrous boar, he cut off the head himself, and this quivering and bleeding mask he went to offer to his la

e body, but above had the horrible head of a wild boar! Imagine what cries, what grief, what despair! The c

o the monastery where your sister rules. He laid down his closed packet in the c

greatest secrecy; it drank and lapped after the manner of its kind. As it grew up it walked on its feet, and that without the least imperfection; it could sit down, go on its knees, and even make a courtesy. But it never articulated any distinct

good mother proceeded there, and the monks, after some hesitation, confessed what had become of it. She wished to see it; they showed it her. At its aspect she felt the s

ed a considerable sum to the Benedictines of Fontevrault

a family of great property, resolved to procure it as a wife for his nephew. He sounded

as recognised her. There are many as ugly as she is to be seen who still find husbands. I will put a pretty mask on her, and the

d in Honorinde, who, not daring to noise abroad this e

ht. She did not know how to sit at table, and would only eat out of a trough. She needed neit

s did not proceed fast enough for his impatience, he killed his companion, Benedicte,

uilt a convent, to which her immense property was given, where she retired herself as a si

th such eclat. You must have remarked the boar's head, perfectly imitated in sculpture, in the dome; that mask is the