were compelled to return to the
simple nudity of the days of innocence when taking exercise in
the conventual gardens, and even at their devotions in the
chapel. The novice Madeleine, on one occasion, was reprimanded
for concealing her bosom with the altar-cloth at communion. She
was originally of a pure and artless mind; and only gradually and
stealthily she was corrupted by the pious arguments of her
priest. This man, Picart by name--one of that extensive class the
'tristes obsc[oe]ni,' of whom the Angelos and Tartuffes[126] are
representatives--succeeded to the vacant office of directing
confessor to the nuns of Louviers; and at once embraced the
opportunities of the confessional. Without repeating all the
disgusting scenes that followed, as given by Michelet, it is only
necessary to add that the miserable nun became the mistress and
helpless creature of her seducer. 'He employed her as a magical
charm to gain over the rest of the nuns. A holy wafer steeped in
Madeleine's blood and buried in the garden would be sure to
disturb their senses and their minds. This was the very year in
which Urban Grandier was burned. Throughout France men spoke of
nothing but the devils of Loudun.... Madeleine fancied herself
bewitched and knocked about by devils; followed about by a lewd
cat with eyes of fire. By degrees other nuns caught the disorder,
which showed itself in odd supernatural jerks and writhings.'

[125] It is but one instance of innumerable amours within
the secret penetralia of the privileged conventual
establishments. In the dark recesses of these vestal
institutions on a gigantic scale, where publicity, that sole
security, was never known, what vices or even crimes could
not be safely perpetrated? Luther, who proved in the most
practical way his contempt for the sanctity of monastic vows
by eloping with a nun, assures us, among other scandals
attaching to convent life, of the fact that when a fish-pond
adjoining one of these establishments in Rome was drained
off, six thousand infant skulls were exposed to view. A
story which may be fact or fiction. But while fully
admitting the probability of invention and exaggeration in
the relations of enemies, and the fact that undue prejudice
is likely to somewhat exaggerate the probable evils of the
mysterious and unknown, how could it be otherwise than that
during fourteen centuries many crimes should have been
committed in those silen