3 The abbey of Fontevrault, near Saumur, Maine-et-Loire, was
founded in 1100 by Robert d'Arbrissel, and comprised two
conventual establishments, one for men and the other for
women. Prior to his death, d'Arbrissel abdicated his
authority in favour of Petronilla de Chemillé, and from her
time forward monks and nuns alike were always under the sway
of an abbess--this being the only instance of the kind in
the history of the Roman Catholic Church. Fourteen of the
abbesses were princesses, and several of these were of the
blood royal of France. In the abbey church were buried our
Henry II., Eleanor of Guienne, Richard Coeur-de-Lion, and
Isabella of Angoulême; their tombs are still shown, though
the abbey has become a prison, and its church a refectory.--
Ed.

Together with this change of life there was wrought also a great change
of heart, so that he now began to cast glances upon countenances which
aforetime he had looked at only as a duty; and, contemplating charms
which were rendered even more desirable by the veil, he began to hanker
after them. Then, to satisfy this longing, he sought out such cunning
devices that at last from being a shepherd he became a wolf, so that in
many a convent, where there chanced to be a simple maiden, he failed
not to beguile her. But after he had continued this evil life for a
long time, the Divine Goodness took compassion upon the poor, wandering
sheep, and would no longer suffer this villain's triumph to endure, as
you shall hear.

One day he went to visit the convent of Gif, (4) not far from Paris,
and while he was confessing all the nuns, it happened that there was one
among them called Marie Heroet, whose speech was so gentle and pleasing