find out if the prioress were ruling well, and if the services were
properly performed, and if the finances were in good order, and if
discipline were maintained; and if any nun had a complaint, then was the
time to make it.

And the nuns were full of complaints. A modern schoolgirl would go pale
with horror over their capacity for tale-bearing. If one nun had boxed
her sister's ears, if another had cut church, if another were too much
given to entertaining friends, if another went out without a licence, if
another had run away with a wandering fluteplayer, the bishop was sure
to hear about it; that is, unless the whole convent were in a disorderly
state, and the nuns had made a compact to wink at each other's
peccadilloes; and not to betray them to the bishop, which occasionally
happened. And if the prioress were at all unpopular he was quite certain
to hear all about her. 'She fares splendidly in her own room and never
invites us,' says one nun; 'She has favourites,' says another, 'and
when she makes corrections she passes lightly over those whom she likes,
and speedily punishes those whom she dislikes'; 'She is a fearful
scold,' says a third; 'She dresses more like a secular person than a
nun, and wears rings and necklaces,' says a fourth; 'She goes
out riding to see her friends far too often,' says a fifth;
'She-is-a-very-bad-business-woman-and-she-has-let-the-house-get-into-
debt-and-the-church-is-falling about-our-ears-and-we-don't-get-enough-
food-and-she-hasn't-given-us-any-clothes-for-two-years-and-she-has-sold-
woods-and farms-without-your-licence-and-she-has-pawned-our-best-set-of
spoons; and no wonder, when she never consults us in any business as she
ought to do.' They go on like that for pages, and the bishop must often
have wanted to put his fingers in his ears and shout to them to stop;
especially as the prioress had probably spent half an hour, for her
part, in telling him how disobedient and ill-tempered, and thoroughly