osen by
my Lord for himself."

After her journeys of devotion, in which she distributed immense alms,
she settled at Bethlehem with her daughter Eustochium, under the
direction of St. Jerom. The three first years she spent there in a poor
little house; but in the mean time she took care to have a hospital
built on the road to Jerusalem, as also a monastery for St. Jerom and
his monks, whom she maintained; besides three monasteries for women,
which properly made but one house, for all assembled in the same chapel
to perform together the divine service day and night; and on Sundays in
the church that was adjoining. At prime, tierce, sext, none, vespers,
complin, and the midnight office, they daily sung the whole psalter,
which every sister was obliged to know by heart. Their food was very
coarse and temperate, their fasts frequent and austere. All the sisters
worked with their hands, and made clothes for themselves and others. All
wore the same uniform poor habit, and used no linen except for the
wiping of their hands. No man was ever suffered to set a foot within
their doors. Paula governed them with a charity full of discretion,
animating them in the practice of every virtue by her own example and
instructions, being always the first, or among the first, in every duty;
sharing with her daughter Eustochium in all the drudgery and meanest
offices of the house, and appearing everywhere as the last of her
sisters. She severely reprimanded a studied neatness in dress, which she
called an uncleanness of the mind. If any one was found talkative, or
angry, she was separated from the rest, ordered to walk the last in
order, to pray at the outside of the door, and for some time to eat
alone. The holy abbess was so tender of the sick, that she sometimes
allowed them to eat flesh-meat, but would not admit of the same
indulgence in her own ailments, nor even allow herself a drop of wine in
the water she drank. She extended her love of poverty to her buildings
and churches, ordering them all to be built low, and without any thing
costly or magnificent; she said that money is better laid out on the
poor, who are the living members of Christ. She wept so bitterly for the
smallest faults, that others would have thought her guilty of grievous
crimes. Under an overflow of natural grief for the death of her
children, she made frequent signs of the cross on her mouth and breast
to overcome nature, and remained always perfectly resigned in h