taken by the plague, and with difficulty dragged
himself in to Ravensburg. For three months he lay ill, and death came
very close. As its unearthly glow irradiated the world around him,
reversing its light and shade, the visions of the nunnery recurred. He
vowed that if his life were still his to give, it should be given to
God's service; and on recovering he entered Ottobeuren.

In his noviciate year he was under the guidance of a kind and
sympathetic novice-master, who allowed him to study quietly in his
cell to his heart's content; and during this period he composed what
he calls an epitome or breviary of Plato. Its precise character he
does not specify, but its second title suggests that it may have been
a collection of extracts from Plato: not from the Greek, for he had
little acquaintance with that yet, but presumably from such of Plato's
works as had been translated into Latin. On Ascension Day, 1504, which
appears from other indications to mean 15 August, he made his
profession, and in September 1505 he went to Augsburg to be ordained
as sub-deacon. Writing to a friend to give such news as he had
gathered on this outing, he tells a story to convict himself of hasty
judgement. During the ordination service he noticed that one of the
candidates, a bold-eyed fellow who had been at several universities,
and had been Rector at Siena, let his gaze wander over the ladies who
had come to see the ceremony, instead of keeping it fixed on the
altar. Ellenbog censured him in his mind, but later he noticed that as
the man kneeled before the bishop with folded hands to receive
unction, his eyes were filled with tears of repentance--others perhaps
would have called it merely emotion.

On his way back to Ottobeuren, Ellenbog arrived at a village, where he
had counted on a night's rest, only to find it crowded with a
wedding-party; the followers of the bridegroom, who were escorting him
to the marriage on the morrow, a Sunday. It was with great difficulty
that he found shelter, in the house of a cobbler, who let him sleep
with his family in the straw; but it was so uncomfortable that before
dawn he crept out and started on his way under the moon. In the half
light he missed the road and found himself at the bride's castle;
where he learnt that her sister was just dead and the wedding
postponed. As he passed in that evening through the abbey-gate, there
was thankfulness in his heart that he was back out of the world and
its pet