Rosselina the Virgin

ON S. ROSSELINA THE VIRGIN, PRIORESS OF THE CARTHUSIAN ORDER,

NEAR LES ARCS IN PROVENCE.

A.D. MCCCXXIX.

HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.

Rosselina, Carthusian Virgin, near Les Arcs in Provence (S.)

BY THE AUTHOR D. P., FROM FRENCH MSS.

Preface on the Writers and Memoirs whence here gathered.

However austere and rigid the institute of the Carthusian Order is, not only throughout all Europe it found those who would embrace it with generous mind and constantly hold the men, The convents of Carthusian Virgins reduced to 5, but also women of virile mind, followers of perpetual silence and solitude, of virtues diametrically opposed to feminine infirmity. These when they sought directors of the same profession, and that procuration appeared very difficult, first indeed many of their convents being extinguished, and the reception of new ones prohibited, after the union of all the monasteries under one Head, the Prior of the Greater Charterhouse, made in the year MCL, gradually they were restricted to the number five, namely, of Prémol, Melan, Salettes, Bruges and Gosnay, which to this day persevere, tenacious of the first institute.

[2] Of those, which are either wholly extinguished, or translated to other Rules of the Carthusian convents, Cell of Robaud, with the body of the Saint, was ceded to the Minorites. in this

Commentary we must name first the House of S. Andrew of Ramieres, where it is believed B. Rosselina was received into the Order; and the House of Parvallon, where she began her Novitiate, both in the Orange diocese; the House of Bertaud, where having professed B. Joanna or Diana, Rosselina's perhaps aunt, gave a beginning to the Cell of Robaud; the House of Durbon, to which, the Bertaud house collapsing, those Sisters betook themselves. Finally the convent of Cell-Robaud, where Rosselina professed, and at length after having governed it for long died. But it itself was also abdicated in the XV century; and finally yielded to the Friars Minor Observants, with whom remains the custody of her until now incorrupt virginal body, together with the care of promoting her cult: which was translated in the year 1657. through which to this no small increment accrued, in the present century, when in its year LVII was made her new Translation, into a gilded chest and her own and splendid chapel, both procured at the expense of the most Illustrious P. Abbot Charles Villanovan, sprung from the same family from which she drew her stock.

[3] About to bring forth her Acts to this day, on which she is said there from time immemorial to have been venerated, I profess myself to have used memoirs, partly from Br. Francis Villanovan, ex-Provincial of the Observant Minors; partly from D. Chauvet, Professed of the Villanovan Charterhouse; and D. Trovillas, Prior of the Charterhouse of Bonpas near Avignon, gathered during the year MDCLXXXI and II, and transmitted to me, by R.P. Charles Faber our own, dwelling at Avignon. These three, had before their eyes the same authors, from whom in this century was written a more prolix Life; but never published in print: Acts from more recent French memoirs. such however that it seems rather a panegyric than a history; as clothed with circumstances of things and words, probably indeed devised in such a person, but resting on no certain account. D. John Chauvet, in the General Chapter of the year MDCLXVII elected Scribe, and for some years now deceased, from those notices which dwelling in the Verne Charterhouse he had begun to gather pertaining here, compiled for us a similar collection, at the same time; but with effort altogether dissimilar, and more useful to us. For he, with no account had of the aforesaid Life, tried all that he thought should be suggested, to establish by public documents: and therefore I have wished to adhere to him rather than to the two prior; from these I shall describe almost only the miracles, done after the Translation, of which the most certain witnesses could have been.

[4] I say meanwhile that of that more prolix Life and not greatly to be made of, the writers were two contemporaries of each other, who with consults shared in turn directed their study to the same argument: An anonymous Franciscan one, Writings of others on the same Saint. who besides the miracles, filling the number of more than fifty leaves of paper, extended the life into at least one hundred leaves, whose whole substance into nearly one leaf the above-praised Francis contracted for me. The other, D. Amabilis Professed of the Vernense Charterhouse, divided the Life into XV Chapters, which he lent to Br. Antony Trinquere de la Gresse Observant, about to give a panegyric Oration at the Translation of the Saint, in the year (as said above) MDCLVII, XXI October, on that of the Psalm V: "You shall not give your holy one to see corruption." It was then printed and sent to me under this title, "Triumph of Incorruptibility, over all that can corrupt the spirit, body, and manners of men": but I could not use it much, as also those which Honoratus Bouche in the History of Provence, in the year MDCLXIX published in two volumes wrote, leaning on the two above-praised authors Anonymous and Amabilis, because they have nothing which Chauvet and the aforesaid Francis do not relate more distinctly.

[5] Otherwise, although no more ancient writing now exists of the Life of S. Rosselina; A more ancient Latin Life is desired, there was not however lacking one who at one time wrote it more diffusely, perhaps in the same century in which she herself died, after the exaltation of the incorrupt body. For Chauvet, more diligent than others, among the ancient papers of the Verne Charterhouse, found one in Latin, with this clause: "All these things have been taken from the ancient manuscripts and monuments of our Order fol. 43, and from part 2 of her Life, namely of Rosselina, of whom also the miracle of breads changed into flowers was there read." Great indeed is the damage, which Chauvet imputes to the frequent fires of the Greater Charterhouse; as also a fuller collection of more recent miracles, and seems irreparable, since with so many years now elapsed, nowhere has an exemplar of that Life appeared. Wherefore what alone we can and have promised, this we approach, about to give thanks to whoever shall suggest more miracles from authentic Mss., about which Francis writes, that if they were all gathered, they would easily fill two grand volumes. But we have received from Br. Francis only eight or ten miracles, to be brought forth in the last chapter; which selected from so great a number do not extinguish but irritate the desire of more. Wherefore I would wish the Collector be asked, that either he himself, or any other for him not delay to send that fuller and authentic Collection, to be of use at least in the Supplement, of all the first half-year's Acts, The Blessed did not die around 1206, 11 June, to be composed after June is finished.

[6] The year and day in which the Saint died, were so unknown fifty years before this; that, when an Epigraph had to be subscribed to a new coffer, it was anticipated to one hundred twenty-three years, and is now read: "Here lies the body of the Blessed Rossolina, who died in the year 1206." Others extended longer than was right and noted the year 1336 or 37. The day XI June many also defined: which however was not of death, but of translation. or 29 Oct. With less foundation likewise some have taken XXIX October, because Arthur of Monasterio, in the Notes to his Franciscan Martyrology, treating of a certain B. Dulcelina, from whom the place, now commonly called of Our Lady of Robaud, had its beginning; admonishes this one to be distinguished from B. Rossolina, formerly Abbess of the monastery of Cella Robaudi, of the Cluniac Order, who flourished about the year 1206: where almost as many errors as words: nor yet anything about the day, on which this Blessed died: but neither in the Sacred Gynaeceum of the same Arthur (which is wonderful) any mention of the same Blessed, neither on that day in his repeated Notes on B. Dulcelina, nor another; that he seems to have wished abolished, what he had above written too rashly about Rosselina.

[7] So with sentences wavering, water would still stick with us, had not at length aid been brought by D. Leo le Vasseur and D. Charles le Couteulx, whom when in the year MDCLXII I had found in the Bourbon Charterhouse near Rouen, intent on collecting the universal history of their Order, and called thence to pursue what had been begun I understood them to dwell in the Greater Charterhouse; I asked their most Reverend P. Prior General Lord Innocent, to have communicated to me from them, whatever of more certain notice of B. Rosselina they had found. All however by most humane letters declared, how much our zeal for the honor of their Order is approved by them, far otherwise than some would wish, animated toward the work we pursue. But D. Charles, responding more particularly to the doubts proposed to him by me; that which regarded Chronology, thus solved. "It is most certain, that B. Rosselina, professed our Rule in the Charterhouse of Nuns of Bertaud; and thence to the government of Cell-Robaud was taken, but 1329 17 January. and at length abdicated, and in solitude died in the year MCCCXXIX, on day XVII January. These are proved from the Calendar of the House of Bertaud, in which from its foundation the Nuns described the deaths of their Sisters."

[8] Thus the two latest writers of the Ephemerides and Annals of the Order teach, The above-praised D. Leo has published, as he himself writes to me, Carthusian Ephemerides in two, but vast volumes in folio: in which, on individual days of the year, lives or brief elogia of the Carthusians are described. I scarcely doubt that also of the Carthusian Nuns, and so I presume the same things are there read, which D. Charles indicated. He moreover has almost alone completed the Notices of the Carthusian affairs in eighteen volumes in folio (which, together with the aforesaid Ephemerides we hope sometime to be brought to our Museum) and now writes the Annals of the Order, and has advanced the work even to the year MCCCCXVI, ingenuously acknowledging the errors of their predecessors, about B. Rosselina, God favoring about to bring the matter to its conclusion. I judge them so much the more eagerly to be expected, the more free from prejudices I see him to be, who thus writes to me in his given of 10 December 1691: "Your Theophilus Raynaud, in his Mystical Stylite, as you know, restored B. Rosselina to us; but he with others deceived by the Epitaph, marked the year MCCVI. That his little tractate Raynaud, most loving of the Carthusians, in our favor put together, from certain Mss. and especially from a certain very thick codex, embracing the History of our Order, written seventy years ago; but everywhere swarming with errors; into which he himself, following the faith of the Author, sometimes ran. The Mystical Stylite therefore should be cautiously read, and more cautiously cited."

[9] and others sometimes One example with good leave I here set forth. Point 10 §6 he writes, "Airaldus given Bishop of Maurienne from the year MCXLV to the year MCLXVII." The same things the Mss. have which your very R. Paternity praises in the life of S. Hugh of Grenoble: but how was Airaldus made only Bishop in the year MCXLV, who already sat in the year MCXXXIV, as our Guigo openly declares, in the Prologue to the life of S. Hugh? Indeed how can the same Airaldus be called a Carthusian monk, who in the same prologue is ascribed to another institute by these words? "Airaldus and Hugh, Bishops of Maurienne and Grenoble, of whom the prior by habit and regular life, but the latter from us a Monk etc." Therefore Airaldus should be restored to the Regular Canons. The Life of that S. Hugh Henschen edited and illustrated with notes on 1 April: where on the Prologue letter a from the Sammarthani he transcribes the same Anachronism, with the addition, that before the Episcopate this Airaldus was Prior of the Carthusian House of Portarum, and namely about Airaldus Bp. of Maurienne. which shall be corrected in the Supplement. For (as the unskilled in Historical matters consider) nothing will detract from the authority of our work, when it is shown something in it should be corrected; or we voluntarily indicate it to be noted by later diligence, what previously passed unobserved. Meanwhile I suggest, that in the very context perhaps which had to be illustrated, a fault lurks, and for "Ayraldus" should be read "Aycaldus", whom the Sammarthani place as the Carthusian Ayraldus's predecessor, known from public writings for the year MCXXV. He, before the Episcopate of Grenoble a Regular Canon, was for nearly thirty years a companion of the blessed man Hugh in handling ecclesiastical affairs: and so the Carthusian Ayraldus would remain; but he will not pertain to the Life of Hugh; such however will remain to the Life of S. Peter of Tarentaise VIII May, illustrated by the same Henschen. By shaking and reshaking namely

little by little the hidden truth is dug out: it does not at once give itself wholly.

[10] The same Charles concludes his observations on B. Rosselina with this judgment: as those free from prejudices, "Many things about our Rosselina are scattered among the Provençal commons, which have no mark of any antiquity or certain authority; if you except the miracle of the Roses, praised by serious Authors, and the incorruption of the body and eyes; of which our Dorlandus book 5 ch. 34, with name however kept silent: the rest, even transmitted by ours, let your Paternity hold suspect." But to this judgment I believe Charles would have wished excepted D. John Chauvet, a sufficiently sharp censor for legitimately separating the proved from the so unproved, a man, as is written to me by D. Leo, "born for the moderation of the whole Order, and most versed in the history of the Religion"; such also was he, whom in the year MDCLXII as scribe in the Greater Charterhouse we found; with the same as the rest ingenuousness confessing, that the anastasis of the condemned Canon was then doubtful to him, when namely, and intent on truth alone. he had not yet found stronger authorities for it: which then found he suggested to our John Columbus about to defend it, and gave me the occasion in the Propylaeum of May, on his behalf already long deceased to retract, what from his mouth at the Life of Ven. Dionysius the Carthusian by the way Henschen had indicated in March. So "day to day pours forth speech": nor do the Carthusian Fathers, men of most candid mind, consider it shameful that some of their things sometimes be doubted, until more certainly about them it is established. And let these things serve, lest anyone fear the offense of that sacred Order, from the following Treatise; when he shall see that in the defect of ancient notices I advance with suspended foot, to those things which the more recent alone suggest, about B. Rosselina.

CHAPTER I.

Family, parents, brothers, cousins, name of Rosselina, breads changed into flowers.

[11] The Villanovan family, which gave this beautiful flower to the Carthusian desert, From the old family of Villanova through the father is reckoned among the older Provençals; and is generally believed to have descended from Aragon, through a certain Romeus, brought thence; although others think the Aragonese Villanovans sprang from the Provençals. Another Romeus then flourished about the year MCCXLIV, named in the letters of Countess Beatrice, of which this beginning is generally read: "We Beatrice the young (for the mother, sister of Thomas Count of Savoy, was also called Beatrice) by God's grace Countess of Provence and Marchioness of Forcalquier, proceeding S. Rosselina, daughter and heir of D. Raymond Berengar, late Count and Marquess of Provence; with assisting and consenting us Romeus of Villanova and Albert Tarascon, administrators and guardians, given to us by Berengar." Thus the Genealogy of the Counts of Provence, from the year DLXXVII to the reign of Henry IV, deduced by Lord de Caplieres de Vauvennerguet Royal Counsellor, which Nicolas Pilleote then also translated into the French language. If with equal diligence the published Genealogy of the Villanovan Lords were held, which I understand was even then divided into many branches, and which they say with Francis de Villanova Baron of Flayosc deduced is preserved; we could perhaps define, whether and how nearly Rosselina is connected with the aforementioned Romeus. Now we cannot even establish this for certain, by what name her father and mother were called.

[12] The Minorite authors and D. Amabilis call the father Gaspar, but through the mother from another of Sabran, Marquess of Trans and Arcs (commonly des Trans and des Arcs), but the Mother Beatrice of Sabran. Chauvet judges greater faith should be given here, deservedly, to the most erudite man Peter Gassendi, Provost of the Digne Church; informed of the paternal family by the Baron of Flayosc; and of the Maternal, by the Illustrious man Nicolas Pereskius, and D. Polycarp Riviera: and therefore, in his opinion, calls the Father indeed Giraldus, son of Raymond: the mother, Burgola; who however by the Sammarthani Tom. 2 p. 56 is named Sibilla. More certainly about Rosselina's brothers, it is established, born from the same marriage; and likewise of the Saint's uncles, she had brothers, the Master of Rhodes, and the cousins sprung thence. The first of the brothers, the same restorer of Cell-Robaud, called Helion, Knight of Jerusalem, and in the year MCCCXV Bailiff of Manosque made a certain convention, praised by our John Columbus book 3 of Manosque n. 43; then in the year MCCCXX Prior of S. Aegidius and finally elected Master of his Order at Avignon, under Pope John XXII, in that supreme grade for XXV years with glory was engaged, and three others, distinguished men, and died MCCCXLVI, surviving by seventeen years his holy sister; about whom much in the Histories of Malta. The second brother of Rosselina, hitherto Anonymous to me and heir of paternal titles, made a line, whence to this day descend the Marquesses of Trans and the Barons of Arcs. The third was called Elzearius, from Canon of Fréjus and Marseilles made Bishop of Digne, in the year MCCCXXXIV, in which year he also consecrated the church of Cell-Robaud and died MCCCXLII. The fourth Hugo, in the Order of Minors of S. Francis held the Doctoral grade.

[13] Cousins: SS. Elzearius the Count, Of all these the mother, whether Beatrice, or Burgola, was daughter of Elzearius of Sabran, Lord of Uzès and Cecilia of Agoult: from whom born Hermengaldus, great Justiciary among the Neapolitans, from Laudune Alba received S. Elzearius, Count of Ariano and spouse of S. Delphina, by the testimony of Gassendi in the notice of the Bishops of Digne, where he treats of William, the other son of the aforesaid Elzearius and brother of Burgola, Bishop of that church from about the year MCCCXX to XXV. Cousins therefore were between themselves SS. Rosselina and Elzearius; but he younger than her, as first born in the year MCCLXXXVII, as on his day XXVII September will be more fully shown. The sister also of Burgola the elder Alizetta or Alayeta, was mother of S. Raynaldus Porcellettus, who from the year MCCCIII, and so before his uncle William aforesaid, was himself also Bishop of Digne, and perhaps older than him in age: for it is not new, that a nephew is found older than the uncle. I have called him Saint, because such by two and a half centuries he is called, since a chapel built by him is generally called of S. Raynaldus. and S. Raynaldus Bp. of Digne, There his monument and body were honored: which therefore by the Calvinists in the year MDLXII, together with the relics of other Saints, were scattered and burned, Gassendi testifies ch. 18, with one half-burned bone of him still surviving, and brought into the Treasury. The same also alleges the genealogy of the Porcelletti in Pereskius, in the Life of S. Elzearius by Raphael the Dominican, about the year MD written in French and dedicated to King Louis XII, where it is said this Raynaldus was a Saint and famous for miracles. Meanwhile unknown is the day on which he died, and therefore here it pleased to treat of him, as of another holy cousin of Rosselina.

[14] Rosselina's, I say, or Rossolina's, for both is found, The name Rosselina is in use in Provence in frequent use of the Provençals, is a feminine diminutive from Rossa, that is Rufa; not however from Rosa, as some think, who write Roselina; and to this allude the Hymns and Antiphons about her, when they call her "Rose without thorn." That this name was familiar for either sex throughout Provence, even from the XII century, Chauvet proves by examples. For in the year MCXCIII the Prioress of Cella was called by that name, who ceded to the Carthusian house of Verne all right, which she could have in its territory; and among the Toparchs of Bormes five Rossolini are found, of whom the last lived in the year MCCCCXXIV. Amabilis however, and Bouché and Trovillas following him, think she was called by her proper and baptismal name Joanna: but the name Roselina (for so they themselves write) was imposed on her by the use of the common people. But to affirm this Amabilis had no other reason, than that he had received a certain Catalogue of the Blessed of the Order from Pratomolli, in which Joanna is named, she is sufficiently distinguished from B. Joanna or Diana of Villanova, Professed of the House of Bertaud, whose body, fifty years after death, appeared most shining and persisting without any injury of age, as Theophilus Raynaud writes in the Triad of Patriarchs, where on S. Bruno; but he calls her Diana of Villanova (which the Catalogue, as a typographical error, corrects) and expressly distinguishes her from Rosselina, brought into the same Catalogue; so that Amabilis seems to have confused them only because he did not believe that from the same family and the same Order, two could have existed, to whom the same grace of incorruption had occurred. Rosselina herself must have been born about the year MCCLXIII, since she is said by authors to have died in the year MCCCXXIX, six or seven years more than sixty.

[15] Francis Villanovan, in the Epitome of the more prolix life, refers many notable things of her infancy and boyhood, and worthy of being strengthened by older testimony: namely, that her pregnant mother, when sometime before the image of the God-bearer, in the chapel of the Trans palace, more devoutly was praying, that she would take into protection that fruit of her womb; she understood that she would bear a Rose without thorns, certain presages of future sanctity: whose fragrance would fill the whole surrounding region, and whence she would be called Roselina: that her father, entering to see the little daughter recently born to him, found the chamber illustrated with heavenly light; that to suck the mother's breast, unless they were covered, she could not be brought; that the Bishop of Fréjus, about to confirm her at seven (William of Albussiac, others of Soshiac, this would have been) noted some preternatural brightness in her forehead; that at ten or eleven, having lost her mother, and committed to her uncles, she was placed in the monastery of S. Clara at Avignon, under the care of Lady Gerarda of Sabran, Abbess of that Convent. All these are probable, and could be believed received from an older Life by tradition, if not utterly unsupported things were mixed in: suppose, that then the widowed father, having vainly tried to persuade his daughter most honest nuptials, but mixed with unsupported things. to turn her from the purpose of entering a monastery, sent her to the house of SS. Elzearius and Delphina her uncles. For she was born before them, and would call them cousins not uncles.

[16] Let each one therefore think as he will of the well-born and educated girl of best disposition; Bearing breads to the poor, she shows them to the father turned into flowers: and to all virtue congruent to that age and kind as if made by nature; but what and how she did, I dare not affirm: I take one act only from the older Latin Life, in a certain fragment Ms. preserved and found by Chauvet, in these words. "When B. Rosselina was still a little girl, in the paternal house, and bound herself to the needy by charity, and frequented them more often with loving zeal her father not knowing; the servants of the house at length report it to their lord. The father investigates, prohibits, and threatens. But it happened, when once the poor cried out at the door of the rich, and no one was giving to them; and she had found some crusts of bread;

she hid them in her belly-pouch. But as she was going to the poor, she met her father: who with rigid face said to her: 'Halt your step, Rosselina: what do you bear in your sudarium?' To whom she: 'They are flowers and roses, my father.' 'I will see,' he said, 'I will see.' And behold, what to the eyes of the father were roses and flowers, were turned back into bread and delicacies in the refreshment of the poor."

[17] So celebrated has the memory of this miracle always flourished, that D. Amabilis could persuade himself and others, that on this occasion she began to be called Roselina, who from the baptismal font was called Joanna: another less probable account of the same miracle. then, because generally her pictures in Carthusian dress express her, with flowers and roses in her bosom; he believed it to have happened to her now a Religious; and the one who would have wished to detect and chastise the pious booty, unless God had hidden it by a miracle, to have been the Prioress; not however the father of her still living in the world. But this in no way stands, with the rigor of the Carthusian institute, according to which the distribution of alms at the door is committed to the Conversi and Donati, such as the monasteries of either sex have lay men and lay women. So far moreover is it, that nuns deputed to the Choir and to the more tranquil studies of Mary, have the faculty of going to the doors of convents for the cause of the poor; that the Customs of the Order, promulgated by Guigo the Great General, of which as new, then especially the observance flourished, Part 2 ch. 15 n. 12 expressly provide, that according to the same customs those going forth to walk should not carry victuals with them, even in view of piety and alms. Nor do the pictures stand in the way, that the miracle should be made in her childhood: for also S. Elizabeth Queen of Portugal, who after her husband's death took up the habit of S. Clara, is painted bearing in the bosom of her scapular flowers and roses, into which she showed the changed coins to her husband the King, not sufficiently approving her liberality toward the poor.

CHAPTER II.

S. Rosselina's entrance into the Order, and transition to the House of Cell-Robaud, before in favor of B. Joanna or Diana, ceded to the Nuns of the House of Bertaud.

[18] Francis Villanovan the Minorite, Fifteen years old she obtains the faculty in his Memoirs Ms. or rather epitome of the more prolix Life, asserts, that at fifteen Rosselina was again more vehemently pressed by her father and kindred, to dismiss the purpose of more religious life, embrace the offered nuptials; and in that conflict she used the counsel and aid of D. Bruno, Prior in the Charterhouse of Montrieux, that she might bend her father to her vows. He adds moreover, that he through him somewhat softened; finally gave full consent to his daughter, at the persuasion of the Bishop of Orange: who having visited the thresholds of the Apostles returning to his diocese, passed by Trans, lodging with Rosselina's father. (Josselinus this would have been, of the Order of Minors, who from the year MCCLXXII to LXXXII held that Episcopate) — the same is said also to have persuaded, of going to the Carthusian nuns, that she should be entrusted to him to be led to the monastery of S. Andreas of Ramiriis, between Orange and Vaison (which Francis and Chauvet assert was then of the Carthusian Order, although now it has changed its institute) — and consequently he narrates, how being there Rosselina set over the kitchen, forgot the dinner to be prepared for the community for the day of S. Bruno; until, the Offices finished, returning from the church, and as if roused from a deep sleep, hastened to the kitchen: but finding it cold, as she had left it the day before, gave herself to prayer, and soon saw all the dishes prepared. Finally there professed the same Francis writes: and there lived, until her brother Helion, declared Prior of S. Aegidius, founded the monastery of Cell-Robaud, of which she was the first Antistita constituted by Roso the General of the Order.

[19] But many things in this context waver. For neither do the Carthusian Nuns acknowledge Abbesses, but Prioresses; at S. Andrew of Ramiris, nor was Helion the founder of the monastery; nor did the place first accrue to the Order then: and the Lady de Chabrillan, Abbess of that Andrean Monastery in the year MDCLXXXI, asked whether anything was known there about B. Rosselina, responded; that having surveyed the whole archive of the monastery, she had found nothing else, than that the Saint was a novice at Parvallon, not however also professed; but by the wars the virgins of that sacred place being dispersed, she betook herself to Arcs to her paternal home; where also she is believed to have died. To this makes what Chauvet observes, that in the use of the Carthusians of that age was, what is now abrogated, that even to the monasteries of men were received some Prebendaries, by the same reason perhaps by which among the Benedictines Recluses, never conversing with men except through a little window, and themselves receiving the sacraments through the same little window: and such Chauvet judges B. Columba to have been, whose body famous for many miracles is venerated at Gonfaron, a place about three leagues distant from the Vernense Charterhouse, the convent of Arcs and the city of Fréjus. I would wish to know on what day that Blessed can be referred; or at least, having received a relation of her miracles, and a more distinct notice of her cult, that I might be able to join her to this B. Rosselina: about whose first stay at Parvallon I can say one thing, that whether the Parthenon there was depending on Gamiriensis, which now has ceased or has changed its institute together with the larger monastery; or rather Parvallon placed far away, or whether the Convent of men, and Parcus-Vallonis (for so I think it can be rendered in Latin), by others simply called of Vallonis, one of the first fifteen Houses, which under one general Head first took up the union, the Ordinaries releasing them from their Jurisdiction. Whatsoever, I say, was the place in which she took the habit, or even in still secular habit remained for probation B. Rosselina; I think there was no other cause for her so far departing from the natal castle of Arcs, where there was already held a Parthenon of the Carthusian institute, under the regime of B. Joanna or Diana, than that she desired to live far from the paternal home, and from the conversation of brothers and kindred; but by what chance or counsel, before the probation time was completed there, she was compelled or led to come to Cell-Robaud, I do not presume to define by divining.

[20] whence she returned to the Convent of Cell-Robaud. This place of Cell-Robaud (in the topographical tables Salenbaut, but commonly according to Bouché also Sallobran) is situated between the castles, called of Arcs and of Trans, of the Fréjus diocese; and was first so called from the hermitage of a certain pious man, who was called Robaud. In this place was afterwards constructed a Charterhouse of Nuns, under the title of S. Catharine, and surnamed as before Cell-Robaud. This Charterhouse the Lords of Arcs founded, from whom Lord Helion of Villanova arose, who was great master of Rhodes... as is seen in the Chronicle of the Knights of S. John of Jerusalem. Therefore the Lords of Arcs founded this Charterhouse in favor of S. Rosselina. Thus far the parchment of the Vernense Charterhouse, found by Chauvet and written from monuments older than the XVI century. In this parchment the first numbers of years being expunged, new ones and those erroneous Chauvet noted to have been substituted by a more recent hand; and so the magistracy of Jerusalem of Helion is referred to the year 1223; but the construction of the aforesaid Charterhouse to 1227, Here from the year 1200 there was a church, in which numbers there is at least an error of one century. The occasion of the error Chauvet judges to have arisen from this, that above the stone of the choir of the same church, even after the renovation made in the XIV century, remained the note of the year MCC in which namely it was first built or consecrated * V Kalends of June.

[21] depending on the Subripensian Abbess, This being supposed it can be said, that Cell-Robaud (which perhaps in the XII century exercised an eremitical life near Arcs) was erected into a monastery, and the church consecrated in the year already said, for Nuns, from the Abbey of S. Peter of Sub-ripae (commonly Sobrives) led there; what of whose Order and Rule they were then is uncertain, the conjectures vary in Chauvet. These however there is no need to pursue, but rather to understand, when and how the same place passed to the Carthusian Nuns. The following instrument will teach this, but in the year 1260 ceded to the Carthusians, the House of Bertaud, of this tenor. "In the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ, in the year of his Incarnation MCCLX, XI April, Indiction III. Be it known to all viewing this writing, that we India, Abbess of the monastery of S. Peter of Subripis of the Gap diocese, attending to our church of B. Mary of Cell-Robaud, situated in the Fréjus diocese, which is known to be subject to our monastery, under the pretext of poverty or want, destitute of regular observance, which in it formerly was wont to flourish not slightly; and desiring to reduce the same to its ancient state, that the regular institutes may be observed in it; and since this through us cannot conveniently be done, because our own faculties do not suffice, and the said church is too remote from the said monastery.

[22] Therefore we, aforesaid India Abbess, of our spontaneous will, not compelled, neither by guile nor fear induced, with the consent, counsel, and will of our Convent, the consent of the whole convent and of the Bishop of Gap. namely of our Ladies and Sisters, Mathilda Sacristan, Bertrauda of Roccabruna, Aulai of Trans, Aicelena, Bertrauda of Marseille, Folcolina, Ebincusarda of Marseille, Mœ...Ebincusarda Prioress of the said Church, Beatrice, Baudoina; and with the consent of the venerable Father D. Otho Bishop of Gap our Diocesan, we give or confer and perpetually concede to be had our aforesaid church of B. Mary of Cell-Robaud, with all its appurtenances, namely tithes, first-fruits and oblations, lands cultivated and uncultivated, meadows, woods, or defenses, the Procurator Br. Durandus accepting, and the house with all rights, both corporeal and incorporeal pertaining to the said church, to the honor of God and his glorious Mother, to the Carthusian Order, and specially to the house or monastery of Bertaud of the above-said Order and to Br. Durandus the Cleric, Procurator General of the aforesaid house of Bertaud, present and receiving, in the name of the said house, the aforesaid church etc.

[23] Retaining however in the said church and its appurtenances five Tours solidi, every year on the Nativity of the Lord, to us and the monastery in perpetuity to be brought, paid, and yielded, in the name of pension or census: This being expressly and specially settled, that if in any way it should happen that the said monastery of Cell-Robaud should not pay the said census of V solidi for two or three years or more; not on this account would it fall into forfeiture, nor would anything of the aforesaid or of the underwritten be infringed; but only would it be bound to pay the census of the time then past, with the expenses, damage and interest: likewise that on account of the said retention of the census of V solidi, under an annual pension of 5 solidi the monastery of S. Peter of Subripis should not be able nor ought to have anything beyond the said census in the said monastery of Cell-Robaud etc. Saving what has been done about the two Ladies, to whom, as long as they shall live, the said monastery of Cell-Robaud ought to provide in necessities. Of which church, things, and rights

and aforesaid all and single, saving the said census, we divest ourselves and our monastery etc., and invest in perpetuity the said Durandus, and with the burden of supporting the remaining two Sisters there: in the name of Elizabeth the Prioress and of the Convent of the monastery of Bertaud etc. We renounce the Law saying, donations can be revoked for certain causes of ingratitude etc., likewise the benefit of restitution in full etc., and the exception of guile, fear etc., with the most sacred Gospels bodily touched.

[24] Which donation we aforesaid Br. Durandus, in the name of our House of Bertaud aforesaid and of our Carthusian Order, receive; and of instituting a monastery there: and by the special mandate of D. Elizabeth, Prioress of our aforesaid house of Bertaud etc., we and the aforesaid house oblige and promise to you Lady India Abbess, in our name and that of our monastery etc., in the said church to build and construct a monastery, in which Nuns and Ladies of our Carthusian Order may be able to be and lead a regular life: and to you and your monastery to pay and render the said pension or census of V Tours solidi, preserved and retained by you, in the above-said church, in the aforesaid form and manner etc. Done at the aforesaid monastery of Subripis, in the church of S. Peter, in the presence of the underwritten Witnesses, specially called and asked for this; namely Durandus Maurini Chaplain of the said monastery, Antonius the Deacon, John Garcini, James Arnaudi, Arnulphus, Pontius, Yvandus. In testimony of which thing we aforesaid Abbess have ordered our seal to be placed on this Charter, and supplicating we ask our venerable Father, D. Otho Bishop of Gap, our Diocesan; and Lord Bishop of Fréjus, in whose diocese the said church of Cell-Robaud is situated, to the present Charter the seal of the Chapter of Fréjus, for greater firmness and testimony of the deed done, and their seals to place."

[25] This instrument produced Chauvet asks, what moved the abbess, to transcribe Cell-Robaud to the House of Bertaud: and judges, that S. Rosselina's father procured this, which is thought the Lords of Arcs took care of in favor of his sister or aunt, B. Joanna or Diana Villanovan above mentioned, then holily living in the aforesaid House of Bertaud; whom, on the occasion of this new foundation at Cell-Robaud, he wished to make nearer to himself. Certainly, that she did not die in the House of Bertaud, seems to follow from the fact, that neither there is the body, nor in the house of Durbon, to which the Bertaudine Nuns migrated in the year MCCCCXLV; doubtless transporting with themselves rather her sacred body, in favor of B. Joanna or Diana translated there. after fifty years from her death found incorrupt, if she had died with them; than to transmit it to Cell-Robaud, where it is now had the old tradition of the place. By probable conjecture however it shall be said, that Diana or Joanna ruled the new house at Cell-Robaud as Prioress, and lived until about the year MCCXCV, and to her then in the Priorate succeeded Rosselina, now more than thirty, and apt for rule by the Constitutions of the Order. Diana's or Joanna's body, if after fifty years from death it was found incorrupt, could have been found in the XIV century inclining to the middle, but then so involved in the ruins of the church, that hitherto it could not be found.

CHAPTER III.

S. Rosselina's profession, consecration, manual exercise, and prelature.

[26] Rosselina is asserted to the Carthusians, Bouché, in the History of Provence Tom. 2 p. 341, writes, that two illustrious Orders contend about S. Rosselina, of which she is; namely the Carthusian and the Cistercian: and although he confesses, that in Cell-Robaud there exists a most ancient picture, in which the Religious of this place are represented in white habit, he denies however that hence the dispute can be decided, because the habit of each Order is almost the same. But how almost the same? When the Cistercian Nuns use a cowl closed everywhere (to say nothing of the black under-scapular, of which scarcely anything appears in those cowled) but the Carthusians, in place of the cowl are clothed with a scapular, indeed most wide, but yet open at the elbow and sides, but below the kidneys having two large bands, by which the anterior part is connected to the posterior on each side, and so represent Rosselina all the pictures in various convents: about which asked by D. Charles the Ven. P. Emmanuel van El Prior of the Marseille Charterhouse, also from her pictures, and Visitator of his Province, wrote, that none at all is found without the bands: "And the same affirm," says Charles, "many other Priors, ascending to this house mother of the Charterhouses, from various Provinces through the year." And truly in our Annals I will prove, that the use of the Bands was granted to our Nuns in the year MCCXCI: although long before Rosselina, the Carthusian, at the beginning did not use bands, and therefore could before have been painted without them: but such a picture, indeed any, which could be presumed to refer the lineaments of her living, Charles judges nowhere to exist: wherefore I have not taken care to have any of them expressed in this place.

[27] Indeed I do not see, what foundation the Cistercians can pretend, but no Cistercian author ascribes her to his own. for ascribing S. Rosselina to their own; unless perhaps the Abbey of S. Andrew of Ramiriis, where she is wrongly said to have taken up the Religious habit, was of the Cistercian Order, about which nothing yet is established for me. But that this be so, such a controversy does not seem to flourish or to have flourished sometime outside Provence. For neither have I found any Cistercian author, who would name her; and Claudius Chalemot, who most recently wove the series of the Saints and Blessed and illustrious persons of that sacred Order, nowhere mentions her; but evidently proves her Carthusian the instrument of the above-said cession, by which if it existed, the dispute would be ended Bouché himself acknowledges, Therefore under the Carthusian Rule finding the mention of it in the Sammarthani. But it exists, as we have seen. Of these Carthusians moreover the discipline, from that which is now held, was once somewhat different; and great labor was needed, that according to the decrees of the Council of Trent, they should take up perpetual Enclosure and common life, accustomed previously privately in each one's cell to eat, and in any week with their Vicar to go out for a walk, through the solitude in which their houses were founded; or even through suburban fields, if the house was within a place encircled with walls: for which "spatiamentum" (as they called it) now is granted to them some common conversation after refection. Thus to me Chauvet.

[28] Yet there ought to be no doubt, that the discipline was most severe, when Rosselina subjected herself to it; whose pious exercises and individual virtues I do not here presume to note minutely, professed at sixteen, destitute of ancient documents. One thing however I would say; that she was at least sixteen years old, when she professed solemn vows in the Order, as the Statutes require: which also prescribe, that no one is to be consecrated before the twenty-fifth year. Chauvet adds, that that consecration is made with great solemnity by the Diocesan Bishop, who in the year MCCLXXXVIII (in which Rosselina is judged to have had the required age) was Bertrand de Fabari, and in the year 1288 consecrated, from about the year MCCLXXX to MCCXCIX, Bishop of Fréjus, according to Antelmius in the Chronological Nomenclature of the Bishops of that diocese. The Diocesan moreover places a black veil on the Virgin to be consecrated; and over it a crown of flowers, common to all consecrated Virgins in the Order; so that its cause in the images need not be sought from the miracle of flowers. Moreover the Bishop inserts a ring on the finger of one so consecrated: without which she would never dare to appear; she can however be deprived of it together with the veil, for a time, or even in perpetuity, on account of some delict. So in the decrees of the year MCCCCXXV it is prescribed to the Prioress of Pratomolli, that she should take from Sister Joanna of S. Genesius the veil and ring, since without the license of the Order she had resumed what had been taken from her.

[29] Further since the custom of the Order is, that those who are sound of body, the hours, free from public prayer in choir, and private within the cell, she perhaps occupied with writing the hours free from prayer, should expend on some manual work, to which also the Constitutions order that suitable instruments be provided for each; Chauvet asks in his Annotations, what was Rosselina's exercise; and judges it was the writing of sacred books; since this before the invention of the typographic art was common to most, not only to men, but also to women. Worthy indeed of relation are what the book of Customs of Guigo, ch. 28, has. "If the Brother is of another art than scribal (for almost all whom we receive, if it can be done, we teach to write) he shall have the suitable instruments of his art. But for writing, a writing-desk, pens, chalk, two pumices, two horns, one scalpel for scraping parchments, two razors or shavers, one purificatory, one awl, lead, ruler, post for ruling, tablets, stylus." But the reason Guigo gives for such a custom; since it was common almost throughout the Order, "And because with the mouth, we cannot preach the word of God, with the hands we preach. For as many books as we write, so many we seem to make for ourselves heralds of truth; hoping from the Lord reward for all, who through them have either been corrected from error, or have advanced in Catholic truth; for all also, who have either been pricked with the consciousness of their sins and vices, or kindled to the desire of the heavenly fatherland." In this indeed the Nuns were by no means tardy, the choir books and others suitable to their uses prove, to be seen to this day in their convents of Pratomolli and Melan; which to be written by a feminine hand the errors prove, also to the Nuns. familiar to that sex, less made for keeping orthography: so at the end of the Responsory, "Prudent virgins," somewhere is found written: "They went out to meet the Ponsus and Ponsa," omitting S, which the common Provençal language omits.

[30] Made Prioress about 1300 This exercise therefore was also of S. Rosselina, as one nobly educated and instructed, anyone can easily presume, not as easily prove; and much less other things, more proper to her, not only as a Carthusian, but as a Saint. More certainly and more distinctly I believe was known, what Francis writes of the Prelature of the Robaudine monastery, given to Rosselina by Bosone the General of the Order. He bore that supreme magistracy of his Order, from the year MCCLXXVIII to MCCCXIII; Since therefore the Statutes forbid a Prioress to be elected, who has not exceeded the year XL of age, or at least XXX; there is no cause why we should say Rosselina was made Prioress long before the year MCCC. Perhaps also her aunt Diana or Joanna Rosselina did not immediately succeed, but with some other unknown to us intervening.

[31] The year therefore, in which Rosselina assumed the rule of the House, doubtless much deprecating and preferring to be subject, I do not define: but three most illustrious things during her time happened, here necessarily to be referred: of which, although ancient testimonies are not alleged to me, she restores the monastery in the year 1320 yet I can scarcely doubt that they were established at some time by sufficiently certain relation. The first is, that her

brother Helion, when he was Prior of S. Aegidius, in favor of his sister, caused her monastery to be restored in the year MCCCXX; whence to him the name of Founder fell. The occasion of the restoration however, in the epitome of the more prolix Life, Francis describes for us as follows. To Helion departing for Rhodes his holy sister had foretold, that he would fall into the hands of the Saracens, and would be wondrously freed by them. He, having experienced in fact the truth of the earlier prophecy fulfilled, through her brother bound by a vow to it, hoped also that the other would be fulfilled by her prayers, and bound himself by a vow of building a new monastery: but on the next night he was snatched from captivity sleeping, and saw himself deposited in that place near Arcs, where to this day there remain traces of a Cross, there erected by him in everlasting memory.

[32] on account of the miraculous liberation from Turkish captivity: Nothing indeed is impossible to God, nor does what is here narrated seem rare, the frequent liberations of this kind, which by such a miracle are known to have been performed from our Acts; most famous is also the history of the Image of Liesse near Laon, which it narrates, together with three captives and Ismeria daughter of the Sultan, from Egypt translated there in one night, in the time of Baldwin II King of Jerusalem, almost two hundred years before these. The matter however Chauvet holds suspect of fabulousness; and rightly indeed, if the old Ms., which on that matter D. Amabilis alleges, as in the year MDCLIX still existing in the sacrarium of S. Catharine, is itself what Chauvet says he afterwards saw, containing a wholly different benefit, which to D. Helion now master of the Order, happened on another occasion. But who would believe D. Amabilis, a religious man certainly, to have wished to feign things read to himself which he had not read? Could not Chauvet have found another instrument than that which Amabilis had seen? But what is objected to him about the silence of the Chronicles of the Order, is of no moment with me: since the authors who can come under the name of Chroniclers, Bosius, Balduinus, Gussancurtius, about which it seems without cause to be doubted. and any others who wrote within these hundred years first, nor allege any older chronicles which they followed; and so besides public instruments, drawn from the archives of the Houses of the Order, they had nothing whence they would compile the history, except writers of sacred wars, who never professedly speak of the Knights of S. John of Jerusalem, but as their deeds were woven into more universal history.

[33] John 22 in the year 1323 unites the church of S. Martin to Cell-Robaud The second worthy of relation benefit, which at Cell-Robaud under the Priorate of the Saint happened, is that Pope John XXII, in his VIII year, on the Kalends of December, being at Avignon, that is in the year of Christ MCCCXXIII, notably relieved the indigence of the monastery, by uniting to it the rural Priorate of S. Martin in the Arcs territory: of which indult and union there still exists this kind of Brief: "John servant of the servants of God, to our beloved in Christ daughters and the Convent of the monastery of Cell-Robaud, accustomed to be governed by a Prioress, of the Carthusian Order of the Fréjus diocese, health and Apostolic Blessing. The gracious benignity of the Apostolic see, prudent Virgins, who, renouncing carnal allurements and despising the vanities of this world, dedicating their virginity to the Son of the Virgin, prepare themselves with lit lamps to go to meet the Spouse, is wont to follow with so much more propense study of charity, as on account of the fragility of sex, with greater suffrage it provides for them indigent. and in the year 1228 grants Indulgences for the day of Dedication. Indeed your need and that of your monastery, so weighed down with the want of temporal things, that of its incoming and accruing revenues you cannot conveniently sustain yourselves, as formerly while we acted in lesser, presiding over the rule of the Fréjus church, not without compassion we learned; with the eyes of piety beholding, and wishing for the more useful relief of such necessity, to provide for you and the same monastery some subsidy, that you may better and more quietly about the feet of the Lord, in the height of contemplation be able to live, we unite and apply the rural church of S. Martin of Arcs of the Fréjus diocese etc. to you and the said monastery: notwithstanding etc." The third Benefit, obtained under the rule of S. Rosselina to the House of Cell-Robaud is, that the other Brother of the Saint Elzearius Bishop of Digne, in the year MCCCXXVIII on day V June, from the same Pope John sought notable Indulgences for the church of Cell-Robaud, on the anniversary of the Dedication, namely Pentecost and its Octave: which matter excited a huge concourse of peoples there, and then was continued even to the present day: for in the year MCC, in which the first dedication made the stone, to be read above the door of the choir, still testifies, on V Kalends of June Pentecost was kept, as Easter was kept on V Ides of April.

CHAPTER IV.

S. Rosselina's virtues and pious death: elevation of the incorrupt body: eyes separately preserved.

[34] Rosselina's private virtues, Thus far I have brought out those things, which from ancient monuments could be more certainly gathered, about the public Acts of S. Rosselina: to which should be added what D. Charles asserts, doubtless found in the authentic Registers, that before her death she sought and obtained Mercy, that is absolution from office, thereafter to live for herself and God in Solitude, as the Carthusians love to speak. About the private virtues of the same Saint and graces divinely granted to her, the Epitome of Francis has a few things, not unworthy of credit, and which it is scarcely credible that the author whom he contracted gratuitously devised. "Frequent," he says, "to her was it to put to flight demons with the sign of the Cross; sometimes she passed whole weeks without food; she had sleep circumscribed to three or four hours; she warned her own again and again, to dread these words, 'I do not know you'; that they might merit to hear, 'Come to me.'" Frequent revelations, She often asked what was needed to attain salvation; and responded: "To know oneself." Conversations with others she began with "Come Creator," and finished with "Hail star of the sea." On days on which she had communicated, she received nothing besides bread, and that often sprinkled with ash, with a little and poorly seasoned vegetable. Her slight faults she avenged with most sharp scourges, so that the running Religious women, excited by the violence of the strokes, had necessity to restrain her, praying with tears, that she would spare her sufficiently lacerated flesh. A whole book would be needed, to write all her revelations and visions; once however she beheld Christ, with whole body lacerated; and asking the cause, understood it was the Albigensian heresy. Curing lepers assiduously, she also sucked the pus from the wounds, and so cured them. When she inspected the secrets of hearts more frequently, no one dared, except confessed of sins, graces gratis given. if perhaps he was conscious to himself of some graver, to come into her conversation. Most desirous of suffering much, she said, if she had ever passed a day without molestation, she feared some great evil.

[35] Finally her niece called to her, Margarita Villanovan, she indicated, that the time of her near death was revealed to her; Death foreknown she separates them, and afterwards having exhorted all her sisters to the last, to place confidence in the Lord, she was seized by a fever; and betook herself into her cell, and lay on straw. With the disease daily growing worse, having confessed the sins of her whole life, she sought the Indulgences imparted to her by Pope John XXII for such an article to be expended on her; and to be fortified with the sacred Viaticum of the Lord's Body; which most humbly received, she was rapt into a profound ecstasy, which lasted almost a whole day. Returned from this to her own senses, she asked her niece, not to desert her in this article; and sought extreme Unction; after which she said farewell to her Sisters. Asking also the Confessor himself, that for a time he leave her solitary, she retained with her alone her niece Margarita. While she was intent on prayer, she merited to hear this voice; "Farewell, sister, I go to my Creator": and at the same time saw coming into the cell S. Bruno, with Saints Hugh of Grenoble and Hugh of Lincoln the Bishops, clothed in Carthusian habit, and bearing thuribles: whom the God-bearer following, and with the God-bearer and her other Patrons standing by, with the Son in her arm, signaled to S. Bruno, to order the cell to be incensed. Which when S. Hugh of Lincoln had done, and at the same time the bed of the lying sick woman; the demon was permitted to approach, and to declare what in Rosselina he could reprove. He confessed no other thing, than that once after noon she had taken some rest. Then the God-bearer ordered to proceed, and the bride to be brought into the Son's chamber. At which words, with "Thanks be to God" said, the venerable Mother expired.

[36] The year Chauvet notes MCCCXXXVI or rather XXXV because, she expires in the year 1329 17 January. he says, in this year the dead are wont to be announced in the following year. Whatever may be, that both in the year and in the day XI June Chauvet was deceived, Charles le Couteulx proves, by the old Necrology of the House of Bertaud found; in which the sisters, from the beginning of their foundation, wrote the names of the deceased; among them they also noted the name Rosselina, as Professed with themselves, deceased XVII January MCCCXXIX: which is also confirmed, he says, from the Acts of the General Chapter held in the same year. Arthur of Monasterio in the sacred Gynaeceum, when he had at his own judgment read the day XIX October as that of B. Dulcelina to be referred, buried at Marseille next to her brother Hugh Bishop of Digne, deceased in the year MCCLXXXV, admonishes another to be from B. Rosselina. But he is not therefore to be judged (as some have understood) to have wished to refer Rosselina to that day; and as he would have wished it, he would not find faith without proof.

[37] worthy of Mary's presence in that article, Chauvet, sharp enough censor of those things which anciently written he does not find, judges the aforesaid vision of sister Margarita to be the more probable, that the Carthusian Virgins, daily reciting the Office of the Blessed, at every Hour are wont to add this pious clause:

Through your Virgin Son, Through the Father, through the Paraclete, Be present at our death, And fortify our departure.

for which the Carthusians ask six times daily: What therefore on any day eight times Rosselina was wont to seek, this Chauvet judges that she really obtained; since by so many examples it is established, that the most holy Virgin very often showed herself spectable to clients, invoking her in the hour of death. The men do this, privately in their cells: but on account of the nocturnal fears, to which some Nuns are subject, the General Chapter of the year MDCLXXVII left to the liberty of each, either in the cell to perform Matins of the Blessed, or in the church; where if several then be found, they may together recite them in a low voice, in the manner in which the Statutes prescribe Vespers to be said, on the day of Good Friday; but afterwards silence there shall be strictly kept. After Matins also, those who wish in the church to perform Prime and Mass of the Blessed, may, in the manner which for Matins of the Blessed is prescribed. Thus far the words of the decree, under the office of the Blessed. to which only from Chauvet's annotations I would add, that that Mass is not Sacrificial, but performed without paraments and Canon. Which matter as generally less known I have wished here to indicate, for the cause of erudition rather, than that I firmly believe it pertains to Rosselina, as long as it is not shown

such a use among the Carthusians has flourished from of old.

[38] Nothing was changed in the body through death, Further the niece Margarita, as she saw the holy aunt to have expired, with a cry raised called out the others, awaiting the exit outside. Who when they saw the cadaver of the dead, in venerable appearance, the eyes fixed on heaven, in no way obscured: and the remaining beauty of the whole face, and the body tractable through all members, were sufficiently amazed; they composed it on a bier, on the morrow to be committed to burial. But since the same death, at the same article, through all villages and towns surrounding, the infants had published, by crying out, the people run gathered by the voices of infants; "The Saint is dead"; immediately a concourse of neighbors to the monastery was made. To whose importunity desiring to look at and touch, that satisfaction be done; continuously for a whole three days the sacred body had to be left there: and during that time very many miracles are said to have been performed, since even the sole touch of the bier cured diseases, raised contracted, illumined the blind. and the same body on the third day is buried, Chauvet adds, that he has a list of miracles, both old and recent, all of which turn around miraculous cures: but until they are exhibited to us, we cannot divine, whether any of them are so ancient, that they can be believed done in those first days. The three days passed however the body is said to have been buried in common manner, in the cloister cemetery, where the dead were generally buried: why not next to her kinswoman and in the Priorate her predecessor Diana or Joanna, deceased nineteen years before?

[39] The first benefit of the now deceased Rosselina toward her dear Cell-Robaud, can be estimated the perfection of the new church and its dedication, made by the above-mentioned Brother of the Saint Elzearius Bishop of Digne, after the dedication of the new church in the year 1334 in the year MCCCXXXIV, in the month of June, under the title of S. Catharine of Mount Sion, or rather (as I judge) of Mount Sinai; from which thereafter it was called of S. Catharine. Easter fell in that year on XXVII March, Pentecost on IV June, and its Octave on day XI: at which occasion, if we believe Rosselina's body was dug up, on account of the preceding miracles; and because it was found whole, in the Octave of the new dedication it was translated; we should not have to seek far the reason, why on day XI June her cult is continued. The memoirs, which D. Trovillas, elevated 11 June. Prior of Bonpas near Avignon, collected, from the old monuments of Cell-Robaud, they say to have, that a certain heavenly fragrance, continually emanating from the humble sepulcher of the holy Mother, moved the Religious women, urgently asked by the people, that with the license of the Ordinary (this would have been Bartholomew Grassi, from the year MCCCX to MCCCXL Bishop of Fréjus) they should have the place opened. Others add, that the consent of the Roman Curia was required, then residing at Avignon, with its Pontiff, who then still was John XXII, not deceased till IV December in the year already said. And he perhaps committed the matter to Hugh de Sabran, kinsman of the Saint, then perhaps residing in that Curia: whence because in the year MCCCLX he was promoted to the Episcopate of Marseille, to be held only for one year; he is said to have been present at the aforesaid Translation as Bishop of Marseille Hugh, by prolepsis, very familiar to notices received by tradition. Generally however the Translation is said to have been made about the year MCCCXLIV, which by the difference of one decade not great, has proceeded from ignorance of the year of death, now first brought to light.

[40] Chauvet further testifies (as I have hinted above) that he saw in the Sacrarium of S. Catharine an old manuscript, [She being invoked is liberated from danger her brother Helion Master of the Order,] in which was narrated, how the above-mentioned brother of the Saint, Helion, Great Master of the Order of Jerusalem, some years after her death, in a certain perilous conflict with the barbarians, fearing lest by their multitude the paucity of his be routed; with the patronage of his holy Sister invoked, brought back victory over them. The same Chauvet also judges, that that Master, by similar right could have referred as obtained by her prayers the success, which in the year MCCCXLIV he had, in wresting Smyrna from the Turks, and preserving it afterwards against Tamberlane Leader of the Tartars; as Balduinus refers in the Maltese History book 2 ch. 3, and Gussancurtius in the Martyrology of the Maltese Tom. 2 p. 245. By such and other benefits, the Provincial Nobles of each Order, and chiefly the Villanovans and Sabranenses, could have been moved, that they should take upon themselves to ask and promote her canonization at the Apostolic See, and occupies Smyrna in the year 1344. then still residing at Avignon; nor would I believe the zeal of the holy cousins of Rosselina, Elzearius and Delphina, to have been lacking; although the matter perhaps did not wholly succeed.

[41] The same who brought out the holy body, Hugh, is also believed, on account of special admiration of the eyes, Eyes still whole separately preserved: so bright and lively so many years after death, as if they lived, to have taken them out from the head, with cruel (so to speak) piety; and to have enclosed them in a peculiar reliquary, to be preserved in the sacrarium, where they could always be seen, and provide faith of the integrity of the rest of the body, enclosed within the chest, not so easily openable; wherefore I asked them to be delineated for me; and I received this their form, but without the form of the reliquary, that outside it they might appear more distinctly.

Our Theophilus Raynaud, in the Triad of Patriarchs, where he speaks of S. Bruno and his Order Point 9 §3: "With what colors," he says, "shall I give to be seen the most outstanding marks of sanctity, which in B. Rosselina Nun of this institute have shone?... they testify how chastely the Blessed used them, Her sacred body, so long after death, today perseveres uncorrupt, and altogether is illustrated by many miracles, which to recount one by one the reckoning of the institute does not allow. But that, as much as I wish, obscure to no one, it is not permitted to dissemble. The eyes of the holy maiden, taken out from their little places, and preserved separately in a pyx, with a rare miracle equally flourish, and with lively light strike those looking, as when the Virgin was alive; whereas in others the eyes of the deceased first languish and fall. Why this grace to the eyes of the holy Virgin was repaid by God, may be conjectured from the eye of Louis Bishop of Châlons; whom against the impure Queen, voluntarily ravishing men, defiled by no impure sight, God preserved whole and inextinguishable after death."

[42] Three successive Louis the Châlons Church had, of whom the first surnamed of Bar, of altogether royal blood and outstanding virtue, by both title is much praised, both in his Epitaph, which was placed for him about the year MCCCCXXX at Verdun where he was buried; and by those who wrote about Cardinals: for he had been created such from the year MCCCXCVII. But in no one hitherto have I been able to find this about the eye, either his own, or of one of the two successors in the Châlons See: I believe however Raynaud asserting it, and perhaps an eyewitness. But much more certainly I believe, about the eyes of Rosselina, because Chauvet in the notes from an eyewitness, refers their integrity still in this manner, [the truth of the miracle being explored by the King's Physician in the year 1670.] "Twelve or thirteen years ago, that is about MDCLXX, when in this Arquensian convent I dwelt for the first time, for the cause of visitation coming to me an honest citizen of Aix, by name Artaudus, within my cell the image of S. Rosselina seen, said; not long ago led by devotion he had gone to Arcs, where the aforesaid eyes were shown to him; and he who was showing them, asked, whether in each of their angles he saw twin punctures. To which when he answered they were sufficiently conspicuous, but the cause of them he would willingly hear; those Fathers said, that in the year MDCLX in the retinue of the most Christian King, honoring Provence with his presence, was his physician: who to see those eyes ran to Arcs; and when he could not be persuaded that they were living and natural eyes, he was permitted to take experiment of the truth, with that needle which to that he was pulling out; whence those punctures remained."

CHAPTER V.

The various fortune of the House of Cell-Robaud, through which it at length came to the Observants, who in the year 1657 made a solemn translation of the Body.

[43] The Nuns at Cell-Robaud The frequent wars, which after Rosselina's death, and the departure of the disciples instituted by her, supervened these regions; and the license of country habitation, which the House endowed with that sacred treasure enjoyed; made it so, that the more important other and more diligently to be preserved, the rigor I say of the first discipline, gradually weakened; and at length wholly so failed, that the disobedient daughters were removed from the care of the Order. They had in the year MCCCCXIV a Rectrix with a Vicar, as is understood from the decree, by which Mercy is denied to them, or the faculty of withdrawing from office: in the year 1414 still having a Rectrix and Vicar of their Order, and at the same time it is ordained, that Cell-Robaud, together with the Houses of Bertaud and Pratomolli, be inspected by the Visitators of the Province. But in the year MCCCCXVI the Fathers of the General Chapter so establish: "Let Mercy not be made to the Rectrix of Cell-Robaud: and we absolve D. John Malinis from the Office of Vicariate of the same, and we appoint D. Stephen Scaron Vicar of the same." This man could, having ten years before performed the same Vicariate, and at the same time the office of Convisitator, have led back the wandering by his prudence, if they had been corrigible in any way: but when this did not succeed to him, taken away thence, he was made in the year MCCCCXIX Prior of the Charterhouse of Montrieux, of which he was Professed: "But about the deed of Cell-Robaud," says the Chapter, "it is committed to the visitators, that they have to dispose." But in the following year mercy is made to the Vicar of Cell-Robaud; and about dismissing or not that House, it is committed to the Prior of Verne: at whose relation, in the year MCCCCXXI, by him abdicated in the year 1421 it was established, that he and the Prior of Montrieux, with certain things pertaining to divine cult received to themselves, in the name of the Order renounce the rule of that House, which thereafter in the Capitular Acts is nowhere named, except that in the following year to the Prior of Montrieux it is commanded, that he expedite to the Prior of Verne, of the goods which he holds from the House of Cell-Robaud one chalice, a painted tablet on which is the Pieta (that is the God-bearer holding her dead son in her lap) one floral cope, and a red or white chapel, and one Breviary, by which name that a Missal is understood Chauvet has no doubt, who gathered all these things, from the Capitular Acts.

[44] They handed themselves to the Lerinenses; The same from his manuscript of the Vernense Charterhouse confirming the aforesaid, thus proceeds: "That monastery persevered under the Brunonian jurisdiction until the year MCCCCXXI, under the disposition of the Province. For it is found in the Charters of the General Chapter, that that House defected from our Order after the year of the Lord MCCCCXX or XXI: whence the Nuns handed themselves under the rule of the Lerinensian Monks, not distant from each other more than ten leagues. Nor did they long persevere under their rule; for, on account of pertinacity and disordered mind, they were rejected by the aforesaid Lerinensian Fathers, that they should go away on their way, and dismissed under the power of the Diocesan Bishop." Thus far that Ms. There is one who says they were dismissed by the Lerinenses after nine years vainly spent on their cure,

and the Bishop then diocesan (John Bellardus this was, from the year MCCCCXXIII to LI Bishop of Fréjus) tried through ministers sent by him, to reduce them to pristine discipline: but they profiting nothing he dissolved the Convent, and sent all back to paternal houses. But who would believe that the Bishop could do this? Therefore more probably others hold, that with the kingdom of France torn by civil war, then through wars dispersed, and the Burgundians and English holding almost the whole, after John Duke of Burgundy was perfidiously killed, whom his son Philip was avenging and Charles VII the author of the deed he was holding closed in everywhere, and excluding from succession of the realm; they hold, I say, that through those troubles Provence was devastated, and the monastery of Cell-Robaud, first deserted by the Nuns dispersed elsewhere (who however were not permitted to take with them the sacred body of S. Rosselina) then almost utterly destroyed; and the sacred pledge wrapped in those ruins lay hidden, until peace was reformed with the Burgundian, the sacred body they hid: and the English driven from all Aquitaine and Vasconia, after the 50th year of the century, the place was somehow restored; but the body of Rosselina remained hidden, the elders dying, who had buried it in earth, when they took flight thence.

[45] Then truly the abbreviator of the more prolix Life Francis writes to have happened, that with the Chaplain of the place celebrating Mass, which by the indication of a blind man illumined was found a blind man being there present, at the Elevation cried out: "Behold the place where the body of B. Rosselina lies hidden; I myself see it." At this voice and the sudden illumination of the blind man, with all crying out "Miracle," the Chaplain ordered, that the Mass finished, in that place be dug, which the illumined blind man was showing: and the holy body was found, as it was before, whole, together with other Relics likewise buried, which still are preserved in the Sacrarium. But the holy Body itself, fittingly enclosed in a wooden gilded chest, seems then to have been placed in the chapel next to the choir, where it stood at the time of the most recent translation, of which presently below. The Vernense Ms., with no mention made of this restoration and finding, the narration above dropped thus proceeds: "And then (that is after the care of the disobedient Nuns was dismissed by the Lerinenses) with wars succeeding, that monastery is almost utterly destroyed: together with the place is handed over to the Observant Minorites, and so the revenues of the whole House returned to the first Lords of Villanova, Lords of Arcs: who after much time, with conscience instigating, called the Reverend Fathers of the Observance of S. Francis, that they should inhabit this House; and in the church of S. Catharine, in which lies the most holy body of the most blessed Virgin Rosselina incorrupt, they should serve God..." But at the end of the same Ms. is added: "All these things from the old manuscripts and monuments of our Order fol. 43 have been taken, and from the second part of her Life (that is of Rosselina), are established. Of the Charterhouse in the year of the Lord 1227." Where the obvious error of the transcriber Chauvet rightly argues: nor do I doubt that 1527 was originally written, which would have been the year of the epistle given from the Charterhouse, narrating all these, and at the same time indicating, that there still was there the Life of the Saint, which we vainly require.

[46] in the year 1501, The correction Gonzaga proves, in the book on the Origin of Seraphic Franciscan Religion, where enumerating that Convent as the twentieth of the Province of S. Louis, after certain things about its first founders, thus writes: "In the year of the Lord MDI, under Pope Alexander VI and Louis XII King of France, at the request of the most pious Louis of Villanova Marquess of Trans, the Nuns were translated into the place of Trans, the said supreme Pontiff consenting, as is established from the transumpt under the year of the Lord MCCCCXCIX, VII Kalends of October; and another, under the year of the Lord MDIV; and the Friars were introduced. The church is consecrated under the name of S. Catharine of Mount Sion and of B. Rosselina, formerly Abbess of the said monastery, whose body whole and odoriferous is preserved with great honor, although she has not been canonized." Thus he, calling Abbess rather Sinai, from today's use of the Observants, who according to the institute of the Carthusians should be called Prioress; because the Antistites of the Clarissans are called Abbesses. He teaches us in that place that the Nuns were not utterly extinguished, but translated elsewhere, I know not under whose rule (unless perhaps Franciscan) of profession, after they ceased to be held Carthusian.

[47] by Louis Marquess of Arcs. The author of the Nuns to be translated and the Friars to be introduced Louis, on account of great power, surnamed Louis the Great and the Great Marquess, is found to have been altogether Toparch of seventy places; of which whether any once were of the monastery, I do not know; certainly none returned to the Convent, except the ground, on which he, between the church somehow surviving and the ruins of the old monastery, with slight work, according to the manner of the Franciscan Observance, was built. For the Friars, about ten, who dwell there partly live on alms, partly on certain things, in grain and other species accustomed to be given by the Lords of Arcs, partly on what is by chance sought out. He who visited the place in the year MDCXIV, by mandate of the Prior of the Greater Charterhouse, found the body, placed on the altar in a gilded little chest; within which through certain glass panes it was thus beheld, that yet some corruption around the mouth appeared. The Place is inspected in the year 1614: The same describes the most pleasant place; which on one side has the borough of Arcs near it, at the distance of only half a league; on the other a valley, divided into five or six villages, and watered with a fishy river. The place is furnished with beautiful gardens and fountains; and is distant two leagues from Draguignan, a notable town, but three from the house of Montrieux, to whose direction it was subject, when the family of Carthusian virgins was first instituted at Cell-Robaud: for the Vernense Charterhouse, distant only six leagues, which afterwards seems to have been wont to provide a Vicar to the sacred Virgins, was not built until the time of S. Rosselina.

[48] likewise in the year 1644 In the year MDCXLIV the Prior of Montrieux and Visitator of the Province, went to the same place; and by an Epistle, given XV June, wrote almost all the same things; testifying, that he had found there still the ruins of some old monastery, of which however no part can be wholly discerned, since all things have been reformed to the use and manner of the Observant Friars; the church alone he says retains its old form, and shows that it was of the Nuns; but ruinous, and gaping with many chinks: where is a chapel to the right of the major altar, above whose altar extends a little chest, equal to her length, when the body was found, not wholly entire. of wood, with three glass panes at the head, at the feet, and in the middle perspicuous, otherwise very cheap, since the panes are held by paper alone glued. But the Marquess of Arcs was said to be preparing a new one of silver. "Through those glass panes first," says the Visitator, "is seen the whole head, not like that of other dead, but covered with flesh, dried however; and it sufficiently appears, to lie separate, not cohering with the rest of the body: but this from the head to the shins is covered with an old and fine shroud: but no part of it is seen except the shins, still whole and covered with their dried flesh, around the feet however on this side and that perforated, not without note of some corruption. Under that shroud the whole body indeed was said to be, but I could not persuade myself of this; when I saw around the middle all things more depressed, than that I should believe the whole body to be beneath. But they showed me separately the eyes, to the stupor of those looking entire, within a silver figure about one foot high. But great is the devotion of the neighbors toward the Saint: and recently the Marchioness of Arcs, from her castle, although a solid half-league distant, went there on foot through a novena."

[49] These things he: the same things almost to us, especially about the eyes, seen also by him, asserted at Lyon, P. John Columbus, distinguished writer of our Society, in the year MDCLXII. A decade earlier Charles of Villanova the Abbot, In the year 1652 a new chest was ordered to be made, and own brother of the Marquess of Arcs Anthony, had ordered a new chest gilded everywhere, and shining with three crystals in front, to be made: but so good a will hitherto has lacked its effect, as I have not long ago learned. The same then had laid the foundations of a new chapel: which while it was being built, and then a chapel, it happened to the writer of the memoirs often alleged Chauvet, then still secular, what about himself he himself narrates in the same memoirs: "I was going," he says, "in the year MDCLV, in the month of July or August, in the company of John Dominic Itherius Bishop of Glandeves, from Nice to Toulon, together with other distinguished persons, to greet Duke Vendôme the elder, thence about to cross into Catalonia, to whom we had decreed to offer our services, and at the same time with him to make sail. And when at first light (for avoiding the heat, in that season of year most fervent), we were passing through Arcs, and were only one cannon shot distant from the convent; I felt myself halted, and solicitously asked in what place we were, and what was that House which we were seeing: but no one being found who would teach the desired, I wished to turn my horse there. But the Bishop, seeing us to stop, nor understanding what this meant to me, with horse turned back came to us; and hearing what was delaying us; said, it was a convent of the Observants, nor added anything else about the holy body, which otherwise in the quality of Commissary (for he had been of the Franciscan Order) he had visited: which one wishing to visit, was grieved at being hindered; but having understood how much I desired to turn aside there for the cause of prayer, he prohibited; saying, that at so untimely a time the Religious should by no means be disturbed: and because he feared lest I should there cling longer, with the servants now gone before he was unwilling to ride alone, with himself he drew me thence; and so I was deprived of the sight of the holy body, which not even hitherto, after twenty-seven years now passed, have I merited to see. But often that case I have brought back to memory, having embraced the Carthusian Order two years later: yet to have had life preserved by the Saint he related: nor do I doubt, that the Saint herself hindered, that I should not ascend the ship with the rest, of whom very many perished, in a grave conflict against the Spanish fleet."

[50] The new chapel which I said being completed, and very well adorned, a solemn Translation was decreed, to be made on day XX of the month of October. But on the day before that day, says in one of his epistles! in the year 1657 the body to be brought into the same, Francis Villanovan, "the body with its chest was taken by mandate of the Guardian from the altar, on which it rested, nothing dissimilar to a living person; as Br. Francis Gervasius the Lay, present there, a religious worthy of credit, told me, whom I received to the Order, and frequently led around as companion. He moreover asserted, that when the chest taken from the altar was remaining in the Choir, he often lifted one of her arms, and turned it to the right and left, without any difficulty at all." But what was done further on the next day, the following authentic instrument will indicate. "Not without a great sacrament of the first parent, the founded protoplast Adam in the Damascene field, was thence translated into the Paradise of pleasure, that there a life alien from the injury of time, with body unpolluted, of a more entire soul..."

with undivided affection, he should auspiciously pass. So divine Providence also decreed, that the most blessed Rosselina, sprung from the most ancient and most illustrious stock of the Villanovan Gens of Marquesses of Trans and of Arcs, is found with arms still movable: of an unstained soul the unstained body: which for four centuries now by miraculous protection, from so long-lasting traction of time devouring all things, uneaten, nowhere eroded, in a certain chapel of this church and convent of S. Catherine of Cell-Robaud, next to the choir of the same church constructed on the right, was preserved lying not with all and due decency, in a little chest placed above the altar, until to another more convenient and more honest tomb, certainly in Paradise after the example of the first Parent about to enjoy its beatitude, it should be transferred.

[51] and by the Fathers of the Provincial Chapter We therefore Br. John Jourdain, Jubilate Lector and senior Father of the Province, Guardian of the great convent of Toulouse, and over this Province of S. Louis with plenitude of power Visitator and Commissary General; Bonaventura Crye, Provincial Minister; Matthew Ricaud, General Definitor and royal Preacher; Francis of Villanova Custos of Custodes; Francis Gnesdan ex-Provincial; Antonius Pecqui Definitor; Antonius Coreu, Sebastianus Bernardi, and Paulus Rossillon, actual Definitors of the aforesaid Province, in this aforesaid convent gathered for celebrating the provincial chapter, having seen both the aforesaid church, with great expenses of the most illustrious Lord Charles of Villanova the Abbot, in all things pertaining to the greatest devotion, repaired and adorned; and also the chapel, equipped with the greatest ornaments within and without; at the request of the most Distinguished and most noble Lord Antonius of Villanova, Marquess of Trans and des Arz by the instance of the said most illustrious Lord Abbot his brother, in the better way, form, and kind, by which we can and ought, we attest, to all and each whom it concerns or may concern, that in the celebration of the said chapter, namely Sunday October twentieth, day 20 Oct. in the year from the restored world one thousand six hundred fifty-seven, with the sacred Mass mystery sung and solemnly celebrated by R. very Father Commissary Crye the Provincial Minister, with the venerable Fathers Antonius Brunet Secretary of the Province, and Honorato Aymard Guardian of la Motte assisting him; and a panegyric oration held and pronounced from the pulpit, completed with all numbers of eloquence, on the most Blessed Rosselina, by the Venerable Father de la Greffe Guardian of the Convent of Limosin, with peoples flowing from everywhere whom the church could in no way contain; with the RR. very and Vener. Fathers and Brothers walking processionally and with the greatest veneration; and dressed and mitred in Levitical habit, the RR. very Fathers Francis Gnesdan ex-Provincial, Joseph Bournin, Andrew Baldovin, solemnly carried away senior Father of the Province; and also Francis of Villanova Custos of Custodes; from the aforesaid chapel, in which it was previously preserved, with the applause and acclamation of the bystanders everywhere resounding, with the LL. Marquess of Trans and des Arz, and his dearest wife D. Gabriela of Castellana present, D. Charles de Villeuve the most illustrious Abbot, the Villanovan family present and many other Lords and Ladies sprung from the same family, it was translated, with the four aforesaid RR. very Fathers bearing, to the aforesaid chapel, newly constructed by the above-named most illustrious Abbot, and reposed at the horn of the Gospel of the altar of the same chapel; far more convenient for the devotion of the people, there to await the last consummation of all things, and the last remuneration of its stupendous body, to the greater glory of God, the greater honor of our Order and of this Convent, and the greatest ornament of the aforesaid most noble and most ancient family.

[52] "And that to all may be established about the aforesaid Translation, this authentic testimonial instrument we have judged to draw up, and to fortify by our manual sign, and the matter is authentically consigned: on the day and year as above. In this convent of S. Catharine of Mount Sion. Br. John Jourdain, General Commissary; Br. Bonaventura Crye, Provincial Minister; Br. Francis of Villanova, Custos of Custodes; Br. Francis Gnesdan, ex-Provincial; Br. Antonius Coreu, Definitor; Br. Pecquius, Definitor; Br. M. Ricaud, general definitor; Br. Paulus Rossillon, Definitor; Br. Sebastianus Bernardi, Definitor." Thus far that instrument, in which, since besides the Marquesses and the brother Abbot, are said to have been present many Lords and Ladies, sprung from the same Villanovan family; it becomes probable that among them too was, the Bp. of Apt was also present. whom Chauvet expressly notes, Modestus Villanovan, the Marquess's own elder brother, from a Minorite Observant Bishop of Apt: and that many things were done there then, of which we require a more distinct relation. Francis of Villanova, then Custos of Custodes, named in the foregoing instrument, does not seem to be the same, but rather some kinsman of him, who wrote the Epitome of the life and miracles which we use, twenty-five years after this act. For he nowhere in his letters, of which I have several, mentions the Translation as made before him; but in one of them above mentioned, mentions a Companion, formerly admitted by him to the Order, who was present; and who exploring the arm, moved it wherever he pleased: and in the same Epistle adds, that from that time the chest is preserved covered with a fine shroud. The mode and form of it R. P. Prior of the Marseille Charterhouse sent, delineated by a certain kinsman of his a Priest of our Society (as you see here) together with the figure of the eyes, exhibited above, and with an Epigraph, enormously erring in the year of death, but indicating how confused was the notice of matters relating thereto then among the inhabitants of the place.

CHAPTER VI.

Some miracles, performed by S. Rosselina after the Translation of the Body.

[53] The Marchioness of Arcs, The panegyric sermon, recited in the aforesaid solemnity, is held printed, as I have said in the previous Comm., and dedicated to D. Gabriela du Mas of Castellana, wife of the Marquess Antonius Villanovan, and Baroness of Allemagne, another calls her Viscountess, or even Countess of Allemagne. She is praised there, as a worthy daughter of a most holy mother, who with the message remitted to all earthly affections, for the glory of God and the salvation of neighbors, having undergone many journeys, and various monasteries founded, closed her life at Paris in the exercise of holy profession. But Francis Villanovan, in a private epistle, more distinctly calls her Foundress of the Capuchin Nuns at Marseille and Paris; a worthy daughter of a holy Mother, who having imitated S. Delphine's institute, renounced all goods; and living by begging for some time, was held mad, and from the very Parisian convent which she had founded driven out, and again more honorably received, expired there with as great opinion of sanctity, as the Life testifies, written by a certain Capuchin Father. The daughter of this one therefore the Marchioness, no less heir of maternal virtues than of titles, and very devoted to S. Rosselina, with notable affection toward S. Rosselina, wholly wished that the Panegyric above-praised be printed. But how and with what success her sister acted, that she might obtain some part of the holy body; the same Francis, in his French epitome, thus describes, together with other wonders, following the foregoing Translation.

[54] coming to the body, with the sister and brother of the Marquess, The noble Lady Gabriela of Castellana, Viscountess of Allemagne, wife of the Noble Antonius Villanovan of Bullerii, Marquess of Trans and of Arcs, came one day to visit S. Rosselina's body, together with the noble Ladies, Anna Villanovan, sister of the Marquess, wife of D. Francis de Roze Marquess of Fois and Vitre: in whose company also came D. Arnaldus Villanovan, Toparch of Revest. They came moreover with this intention, that they should satisfy the aforesaid Marchioness Anna, desiring to transfer some particle of the holy body to Vitre. They decreed however to cut off the smallest toe of the left foot: that this might be permitted them without witnesses, under the pretext of longer prayer to be made there, they asked the Friars to withdraw, suspecting nothing of the kind. But as soon as they had withdrawn, the chest opened, the Marchionesses approached to execute the pious theft: and D. Arnaldus, with scissors received from the woman of Trans, cut off the designated toe. Then truly the sky was suddenly obscured, provides them the opportunity to cut off one finger: thunder roared, lightning flashed, so that the whole town of Arcs seemed about to perish, and on account of the density of the fog one could not see another. Astonished at these things with the aforementioned Toparch came upon the pious sisters the Guardian, admonished by divine inspiration that something out of common order was being done; and at once ordered the sacred Eucharist to be exposed, against the so formidable tempest, before all the Religious, called to deprecate. At this prayer a little light shone forth; and the aforesaid noble persons were found, in the same place where they had been dismissed, but immovable is held with the same. not able to bear a foot thence. The Guardian therefore asked, what was holding them so bound there; and what they had done, from their confession marveling he learned; and with grave voice: "May the Lord pardon you," he said, "this rashness: if you had opened your counsel to me, I would have sent to D. Bartholomew de Camelin, Bishop of Fréjus, who could have permitted it to you. Now however absolution must be sought from Rome: meanwhile that she should place the cut finger in its place, and all suffer some punishment. he commanded the Marchioness of Vitre. Although she at once obeyed, yet she did not bear the deed unpunished: for her two more outstanding carriage horses perished, and she herself a little after suffered the abortion of twin twins, deprived of life and baptism she grieved, and the danger of death scarcely escaped: some time then elapsed, the Toparch of Revest was miserably killed; and the Marchioness of Trans, lost her children.

[55] Two false Observant Brothers, Spanish by nation, received in hospitality at S. Catharine's, entered counsel, how they might carry S. Rosselina's head into their own region. They rise therefore in the middle of the night between the eleventh and twelfth hour, and secretly leaving their cells descended into the church, and began to break the cover of the chest, that they might open it by force. While they tried this, the Saint appeared to one of the household servants, by name Petrus Teneron of Carles, and asleep said to him: "Go and see what is being done about me." Awakened he thought whether perhaps he had forgotten to give fodder to the horses; but while he was deliberating with himself, uncertain whether that vision had been true or false, and proceeds to the stable; he saw through the window of the church such light kindled within the chapel of S. Anthony of Padua, as if the whole church were burning. When he had come to the said chapel, he found there those two guests; of whom one was holding the open bag; the other had his hands within the chest, about to extract from it the holy Head. Reprehended therefore for the attempted sacrilege, he compelled them to desist from their attempts, and admonished the Guardian about the whole matter: who having vehemently rebuked them dismissed them, and afterwards made the chest more firmly closed. From that time I believe it was done, that some corruption is noted around the lips, a Rib was nevertheless taken away as if by that rash touch irreverently compressed, as the Prior of Bonpas asserts was related to him by the Observants. Chauvet in his memoirs notes, that something similar was attempted by a certain Observant, of the very Arcs convent

inhabitant: to whom it succeeded, that from the same sacred body he took a rib unobserved. But when then having gone to Rome, he sought the faculty of retaining it with himself, he bore a repulse; and was ordered to consign it to R. Father Broyer, performing there some public office (we found in the year MDCLXI at Rome the Agent of Flanders, it yields to the Villanovan Charterhouse. and Procurator in the cause of the Canonization of the Gorkum Martyrs); he moreover judged it fitting, that to the Villanovan Charterhouse that Relic be given, where it is still preserved; but so, that on its account no concourse, no feast be made, publicly or privately. I return to the Epitome, and the few more recent miracles which are there narrated.

[56] D. Andreas Bajoly, when he was in the forest of Tavers of the Calianense territory in Provence, in the service of his Majesty; and there for ships and triremes to be constructed was taking care that material be cut, and was visiting the carters, who were carrying wood through the highest ridge of a certain rough and pathless mountain; By the impetus of a falling beam he came as far as the middle of it, through certain harsh paths and near precipice; and heard the crash of a certain great beam, twenty quintals long, and falling straight toward him. This noted, he indeed took flight as he could, and commended himself to God and S. Rosselina. Meanwhile that great mass, faster than a cannonball, reached him; and so passed through, that it lacerated the brims of his cap, scraped his face, took him by one of the shins and bore him to the edge of the precipice, almost driven into a precipice, under which the river Siagne flows; it left him however above a certain bramble, with broken shin no less afflicted, than horror-struck at the sight of the abyss, gaping beneath to the depth of twenty lances. In this so deplorable state, far from all presence of men, he again invoked S. Rosselina; at the voice of the no less miserable lamenting came forth a certain woman, though shin broken he is wondrously preserved. dwelling in the forest; and consoling him, sought from the woodcutters some who would carry the prostrate man to her hut. There healed when he had returned to health, he took care to do nothing earlier, than to visit his liberator's chapel; where in sign of received grace he left his cap, pierced in many places, and the under-arm supports, on which he had leaned during the time of his cure.

[57] D. John Majolus, citizen of Arcs, had a little daughter of one year, sufficiently well, a girl having lost her eyes first and dead, receives life and sight: whom a supervening pain of the eyes within a few days made blind, and quickly even led to death. The mother, who then lay on the bed, herself suffering a grave infirmity, having invoked the aid of God and S. Rosselina added a vow, that if the Saint should restore the daughter alive to her, she would lead her to the presence of the holy body, with due thanksgiving: which she also did, when the little infant received life and sight.

[58] At Fréjus a certain father, knowing the miracles which God was working through the Saint, this likewise a blind boy. vowed to lead his son, whom he had blind, to the same, and to take care that a novena of Masses be said at Rosselina's sepulcher. But on the fourth day of such a novena, at the very elevation of the sacred Host, the boy cried out, that he was seeing. Asked further what he was seeing; "I see," he said, "the most holy Sacrament, which the Priest holds taken in his fingers." Then truly all who were present cried out, "Miracle": and from that hour the boy used perfect sight.

An epileptic by the vow of parents dead, D. Gaspar Guiraldus citizen of Trans had a little son six months old, or at most one year; who when he was suffering from epilepsy, and from frequent spasms repeatedly was bruised, was approaching the doors of death. In that state when the afflicted mother could not bear to see her son, she proposed to come to the body of S. Rosselina, and there to seek remedy for so great evil, either by health, or by quick death. They come therefore to the convent of S. Catharine she herself and her husband, take care that Mass be said in honor of the Saint: is raised free from that evil: which finished the little infant expired, before they had crossed the wall, led around the gardens. They therefore began to return home with this intention, that they should take care to have him buried as soon as possible. But God, who knows to strike and to heal, quickly heard his Saint. And when the sad parents, one quarter of a league from there, had reached Gabra, which is the estate of Lord Marquess; he awoke as if from sleep who had been dead: and thereafter restored to health, never further suffered the incursions of so troublesome a disease.

[59] Honoratus Bovier of Arcs had made a vow in honor of S. Rosselina that some Masses be procured, if his little son, whom he grieved to be sick in danger, were preserved alive to him. The vow made for the son neglecting to fulfill, The boy preserved quickly recovered; but the father forgetting the vow, did not even then return to memory of it, when he suddenly saw the little one extinguished, some time after the received health. A graver blow was needed, to shake off the ungrateful torpor. His wife then pregnant, brought forth a fetus, but by the judgment of all dead. This seen Honoratus first remembering the deed otherwise, is compelled to repeat it in the danger of his wife miscarrying, and the unfulfilled vow, with contrite heart doubled it; promising besides to visit the body of the Saint, if to that new creature the grace of life and baptism should fall. Nor in vain: for with an unexpected smile the boy declared himself to live, nor did the father delay to fulfill his vow for him.

[60] A rustic of Arcs about seventy years old, had ascended a ship, for the cause of seeking food for himself and his children; a shipwrecked rustic is preserved, when an immense tempest arising broke the mast, struck off the rudder, dashed the ship itself against a rock. The Captain with certain chief leaped into the skiff, the rest as each can seek safety: the rustic alone, with two others, remaining in the ship, now gaping with large chinks and drawing water, began to be the author to his companions, that they should invoke S. Rosselina, whom he said in his country was succoring many. But it seemed to them an importunate counsel, with death now imminent, unless each consulted otherwise for himself. He alone therefore invokes the Saint, and saw a rope placed near him: which seized, he escaped safely, not knowing himself by what reason: and coming to the church of S. Catharine, there in monument of received grace he left the aforesaid rope, the instrument of his salvation.

[61] And a Soldier invoking the Saint in similar danger, Blasius le Blanc, in the year MDCLXXI, was being carried in one of the ships of the Royal fleet, gone out of Constantinople with favorable wind; when a vehement tempest fell on the sea, and lasted from XV January to VI February: when S. Rosselina caused it to cease; appearing to him invoking. Wherefore Blasius coming to Arcs appended there the series of the deed, described in French rhyme, in this sense almost. "Among so many noble soldiers and those famous for warlike deeds, who with great voices cried, 'Succor, O Mary, and give us life in the sea': I said, 'O Fathers, who dwell at S. Catherine's, beseech for us S. Rosselina': and... we made our vows to her, that we might be able to come to Malta with prosperous wind, and the other ports thereafter. Let us therefore set out, to venerate her, and to demonstrate to all the people through this miracle, with what great prerogative this Saint flourishes with God. From day XV January until VI February the waters were so troubled, that the sky nowhere appeared serene, from when we had departed from Zacynthus, an excellent city and island, pertaining to the Venetian Dominion. For as we were approaching the God-bearer of S. Lampadusa, who loves the ship's salvation he celebrates in common verse, so the sea became horrible, that the navarchs, having no hope in their art, committed the ship and sails to fortune. Hence great and small, with voices raised to heaven, were commending their souls to the eternal Father, and praying that he have mercy on us. In such state one who had seen us, would have been almost dead himself from fear. Meanwhile I one evening, placed below at the prow, and sitting on a certain warlike engine, slept a little; and seemed to myself to behold a girl, wholly beautiful and splendid, with shining eyes, of youthful age, a virgin finally such, of whose form I think nothing can be compared. By this sight wondrously refreshed, I cried out, 'O S. Rosselina, have mercy on us.' The ship was being carried through the vastest waves, and was seeking some port; when at length we saw the flame-vomiting top of Mount Etna, and the Catanian port under it, where with the ship led under the fortifications of the place, on the feast of the God-bearer Virgin, the wind began to be mitigated; whence with good hope of better fortune, we turned the ship, and within four days landed at Malta; singing alertly, 'Te Deum laudamus,' and the Hymn of S. Rosselina, which begins, 'Hail virgin spouse of Christ.' Now therefore as many as desire to sail through the sea, this Saint should be prayed to by you, that she bring the help which she brought to us in this happy journey, freeing us from pestilence and shipwreck."

[62] Behold the very Hymn itself.

Hail virgin, Spouse of Christ, Rosselina, who were Rule of the nuns: Hymn of the same. You shining gem of virtues, Glittering vessel of graces, Companion of the Angels. You were full of merits, And at the same time of the gifts Of God, O most pious: That you might buy the precious Pearl, you gave life And temporal goods. You are the rose without thorn, O blessed Rosselina, Co-reigning in the fatherland: Now in this necessity We pray, by your piety Aid us, O Lady. Pray Christ the redeemer, That he may give us after labor The eternal joys of heaven.

℣ Pray for us, blessed Rosselina, ℞ That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

LET US PRAY.

God who have adorned Blessed Rosselina with the gift of virginity and Religion, grant propitious; that all who implore her aid, may obtain the salutary effect of their petition.

ANTIPHON.

Under the wings of your protection we flee, O Blessed Rosselina, that you may extend our prayers to the sight of the Most High, and in our necessities defend us with singular protection. ℣ Pray for us etc. That we may be worthy etc.

LET US PRAY.

Almighty everlasting God, who make Blessed Rosselina to shine forth with virtues and the privilege of miracles; grant we pray, that with her merits supporting, made possessors of our vows, we ourselves also may merit to be associated.

[63] Receive also the Litanies, there set forth on a tablet:

ANTIPHON.

Hail Virgin Rosselina, little plant of Paradise; Rose truly without thorn, Lily without spot; Taught in the discipline of Christ, shining torch of the world; Workshop of graces, noble disciple. You by regular doctrine, Rule of nuns, Now hold near the Spouse, the tabernacles of heaven. Happy Virgin, Rosselina, Be to us medicine, remove dangers; And incline the Spouse to us, that he spare our offenses; And grant that we may enjoy divine things, after these chains of flesh, With you happy Rosselina, by his face forever.

℣ Pray for us. ℞ And worthy.

LET US PRAY.

Almighty everlasting God, who Blessed Rosselina, your virgin, wondrously here fragrant with the perfume of all virtues, make to shine forth by the operation of miracles; grant propitious, that we be so aided by her merits and intercession, that as possessors of pious...

vows fulfilled, may from all dangers be delivered, and merit to rejoice in everlasting blessedness in her happy fellowship, through Christ Our Lord etc.

June II: 12. June