and celebrated letter
called "Epitaph of Paula," in which he exhausts the hyperboles of
praise. The features of a rare character and the proofs of an
extraordinary affection may be discerned within the extravagances of
this eloquent panegyric. The tombs of Jerome and Paula are still to
be seen side by side in the monastery at Bethlehem. Saint Clara of
Assisi, on account of her high rank, great wealth, and extreme
loveliness, had many offers of marriage, many temptations to enter
into the gayeties and luxuries of the world. But she preferred the
thorny path of mortification and the crown of celestial beatitude.
The melting pathos of the preaching of Saint Francis, with the
penetrative charm of his spirit, drew her to throw herself at his
feet and supplicate his guidance. He approved her desire to devote
herself wholly to the religious life in seclusion; and, when she had
made her escape by night from the proud castle, clad in her festal
garments, and with a palm-branch in her hand, he and his poor
brotherhood met her at the chapel-door, with lighted tapers and hymns
of praise, and led her to the altar. Francis cut off her long golden
hair, and threw his own penitential habit over her. She became his
disciple, daughter, and friend, never wavering, though exposed to
dangers and trials of the severest character. Under his direction,
she formed the famous order of Franciscan nuns, afterwards named from
her the Poor Clares.

These nuns, clad in gowns of gray wool, knotted girdles, white coifs
and black veils, engaged in touching works of humility and charity,
have been seen in many nations now for seven centuries, keeping alive
the example of their foundress. When the body of Saint Francis, on
its way to burial, was borne by the church of San Damiano, where
Clara and her nuns dwelt, she came forth with them weeping, saluted
the remains of her friend, and kissed his hands and his garments. The
memory of the relation of these sainted friends is perpetuated in
many pictures of the Madonna, wherein Clara is portrayed on one side
of the throne of the Virgin, and Francis on the other, both
barefooted, and wearing the gray tunic and knotted cord emblematic of
poverty. Perhaps the most fervent and interesting of all the
friendships between director and devotee, of which the documents have
been published, is that of Saint Francis of Sales and Madame de
Chantal. Full materials for studying this relation are furnished in
the letters t