Dominican convent at Mans, which is greatly
venerated for the virtue it possesses of curing fevers. St Helena has not
been so liberally provided for. Besides her body at Venice, she has but an
extra head in the Church of St Gereon at Cologne.(159) St Ursula beats her
hollow in this respect; for she has a whole body at St Jean d'Angely, and
a head into the bargain at Cologne, besides three separate limbs, and
various fragments at Mans, Tours, and Bergerat. The companions of this
saint are called _the eleven thousand virgins_, and although this is a
respectable number, yet it is still too small, considering that the
remains of these virgins are to be seen everywhere; for besides there
being about one hundred cart-loads of their bones at Cologne, there is
hardly a town where one or more churches have not some relics of these
numerous saints.(160)

If I was to enumerate all the minor saints I should enter a labyrinth
without possibility of egress. I shall, therefore, rest satisfied with
giving a few examples, leaving my readers to judge from these of the rest.
For instance, there are two churches at Poitiers, one attached to the
convent of Selle, and the other dedicated to the saint in question,
between which a great dispute has been going on as to the possession of
the real body of St Hilarion.

The lawsuit upon this point has been suspended for an indefinite time, and
meanwhile the idolaters worship two bodies of one and the same individual.

St Honoratus has a body at Arles, and another at the island of Lerins,
near Antibes.

St Giles has a body at Toulouse, and a second in a town bearing his name
in Languedoc.

I could quote an infinite number of similar cases. I think that the
exhibitors of these relics should at least have made some arrangement
amongst themselves the better to conceal their barefaced impostures.
Something of this sort was managed between the canons of Treves and those
of Liege about St Lambert's head. They compounded, for a sum of money, not
to show publicly the head in their possession, in order to avoid the
natural surprise of the public at the same relic being seen in two
different towns situated so near to each other. But, as I have already
remarked at the commencement of this treatise, the inventors of these
frauds never imagined any one could be found bold enough to speak out and
expose their deceptions.

It may be asked, how it came to pass that these manufacturers of relics,
having col