The Abbey of Poissy has been rendered famous by old authors as a place
of pleasure, where the misconduct of the nuns first began, and whence
proceeded so many good stories calculated to make laymen laugh at the
expense of our holy religion. The said abbey by this means became
fertile in proverbs, which none of the clever folks of our day
understand, although they sift and chew them in order to digest them.
If you ask one of them what the /olives of Poissy/ are, they will
answer you gravely that it is a periphrase relating to truffles, and
that the /way to serve them/, of which one formerly spoke, when joking
with these virtuous maidens, meant a peculiar kind of sauce. That's
the way the scribblers hit on truth once in a hundred times. To return
to these good recluses, it was said--by way of a joke, of course--that
they preferred finding a harlot in their chemises to a good woman.
Certain other jokers reproached them with imitating the lives of the
saints, in their own fashion, and said that all they admired in Mary
of Egypt was her fashion of paying the boatmen. From whence the
raillery: To honour the saints after the fashion of Poissy. There is
still the crucifix of Poissy, which kept the stomachs warm; and the
matins of Poissy, which concluded with a little chorister. Finally, of
a hearty jade well acquainted with the ways of love, it was said--She
is a nun of Poissy. That property of a man which he can only lend, was
The key of the Abbey of Poissy. What the gate of the said abbey was
can easily be guessed. This gate, door, wicket, opening, or road was
always half open, was easier to open than to shut, and cost much in
repairs. In short, at that period, there was no fresh device in love
invented, that had not its origin in the good convent of Poissy. You
may be sure there is a good deal of untruth and hyperbolical emphasis,
in these proverbs, jests, jokes, and idle tales. The nuns of the said
Poissy were good young ladies, who now this way, now that, cheated God
to the profit of the devil, as many others did, which was but natural,
because our nature is weak; and although they were nuns, they had
their little imperfections. They found themselves barren in a certain
particular, hence the evil. But the truth of the matter is, all these
wickednesses were the deeds of an abbess who had fourteen children,
all born alive, since they had been perfected at leisure. The
fantastic amours and the wild conduct of this woman, who was of royal
blood, caused the convent of Poissy to become fashionable; and
thereafter no pleasant adventure happened in the abbeys of France
which was not credited to these poor girls, who would have been well
satisfied with a tenth of them. Then the abbey was reformed, and these
holy sisters were deprived of the little happiness and liberty which
they had enjoyed. In an old cartulary of the abbey of Turpenay, near
Chinon, which in those later troublous times had found a resting place
in the library of Azay, where the custodian was only too glad to
receive it, I met with a fragment under the head of The Hours of
Poissy, which had evidently been put together by a merry abbot of
Turpenay for the diversion of his neighbours of Usee, Azay, Mongaugar,
Sacchez, and other places of this province. I give them under the
authority of the clerical garb, but altered to my own style, because I
have been compelled to turn them from Latin into French. I commence:--
At Poissy the nuns were accustomed to, when Mademoiselle, the king's
daughter, their abbess, had gone to bed..... It was she who first
called it /faire la petite oie/, to stick to the preliminaries of
love, the prologues, prefaces, protocols, warnings, notices,
introductions, summaries, prospectuses, arguments, notices, epigraphs,
titles, false-titles, current titles, scholia, marginal remarks,
frontispieces, observations, gilt edges, bookmarks, reglets,
vignettes, tail pieces, and engravings, without once opening the merry
book to read, re-read, and study to apprehend and comprehend the
contents. And she gathered together in a body all those extra-judicial
little pleasures of that sweet language, which come indeed from the
lips, yet make no noise, and practised them so well, that she died a
virgin and perfect in shape. The gay science was after deeply studied
by the ladies of the court, who took lovers for /la petite oie/,
others for honour, and at times also certain ones who had over them
the right of high and low jurisdiction, and were masters of everything
--a state of things much preferred. But to continue: When this
virtuous princess was naked and shameless between the sheets, the said
girls (those whose cheeks were unwrinkled and their hearts gay) would
steal noiselessly out of their cells, and hide themselves in that of
one of the sisters who was much liked by all of them. There they would
have cosy little chats, enlivened with sweetmeats, pasties, liqueurs,
and girlish quarrels, worry their elders, imitating them grotesquely,
innocently mocking them, telling stories that made them laugh till the
tears came and playing a thousand pranks. At times they would measure
their feet, to see whose were the smallest, compare the white
plumpness of their arms, see whose nose had the infirmity of blushing
after supper, count their freckles, tell each other where their skin
marks were situated, dispute whose complexion was the clearest, whose
hair the prettiest colour, and whose figure the best. You can imagine
that among these figures sanctified to God there were fine ones, stout
ones, lank ones, thin ones, plump ones, supple ones, shrunken ones,
and figures of all kinds. Then they would quarrel amongst themselves
as to who took the least to make a girdle, and she who spanned the
least was pleased without knowing why. At times they would relate
their dreams and what they had seen in them. Often one or two, at
times all of them, had dreamed they had tight hold of the keys of the
abbey. Then they would consult each other about their little ailments.
One had scratched her finger, another had a whitlow; this one had
risen in the morning with the white of her eye bloodshot; that one had
put her finger out, telling her beads. All had some little thing the
matter with them.
"Ah! you have lied to our mother; your nails are marked with white,"
said one to her neighbour.
"You stopped a long time at confession this morning, sister," said
another. "You must have a good many little sins to confess."
As there is nothing resembles a pussy-cat so much as a tom-cat, they
would swear eternal friendship, quarrel, sulk, dispute and make it up
again; would be jealous, laugh and pinch, pinch and laugh, and play
tricks upon the novices.
At times they would say, "Suppose a gendarme came here one rainy day,
where should we put him?"
"With Sister Ovide; her cell is so big he could get into it with his
helmet on."
"What do you mean?" cried Sister Ovide, "are not all our cells alike?"
Thereupon the girls burst out laughing like ripe figs. One evening
they increased their council by a little novice, about seventeen years
of age, who appeared innocent as a new-born babe, and would have had
the host without confession. This maiden's mouth had long watered for
their secret confabulations, little feasts and rejoicings by which the
nuns softened the holy captivity of their bodies, and had wept at not
being admitted to them.
"Well," said Sister Ovide to her, "have you had a good night's rest,
little one?"
"Oh no!" said she, "I have been bitten by fleas."
"Ha! you have fleas in your cell? But you must get rid of them at
once. Do you know how the rules of our order enjoin them to be driven
out, so that never again during her conventional life shall a sister
see so much as the tail of one?"
"No," replied the novice.
"Well then, I will teach you. Do you see any fleas here? Do you notice
any trace of fleas? Do you smell an odour of fleas? Is there any
appearance of fleas in my cell? Look!"
"I can't find any," said the little novice, who was Mademoiselle de
Fiennes, "and smell no odour other than our own."
"Do as I am about to tell you, and be no more bitten. Directly you
feel yourself pricked, you must strip yourself, lift your chemise, and
be careful not to sin while looking all over your body; think only of
the cursed flea, looking for it, in good faith, without paying
attention to other things; trying only to catch the flea, which is a
difficult job, as you may easily be deceived by the little black spots
on your skin, which you were born with. Have you any, little one?"
"Yes," cried she. "I have two dark freckles, one on my shoulder and
one on my back, rather low down, but it is hidden in a fold of the
flesh."
"How did you see it?" asked Sister Perpetue.
"I did not know it. It was Monsieur de Montresor who found it out."
"Ha, ha!" said the sister, "is that all he saw?"
"He saw everything," said she, "I was quite little; he was about nine
years old, and we were playing together...."
The nuns hardly being able to restrain their laughter, Sister Ovide
went on--
"The above-mentioned flea will jump from your legs to your eyes, will
try and hide himself in apertures and crevices, will leap from valley
to mountain, endeavouring to escape you; but the rules of the house
order you courageously to pursue, repeating aves. Ordinarily at the
third ave the beast is taken."
"The flea?" asked the novice.
"Certainly the flea," replied Sister Ovide; "but in order to avoid the
dangers of this chase, you must be careful in whatever spot you put
your finger on the beast, to touch nothing else.... Then without
regarding its cries, plaints, groans, efforts, and writhings, and the
rebellion which frequently it attempts, you will press it under your
thumb or other finger of the hand engaged in holding it, and with the
other hand you will search for a veil to bind the flea's eyes and
prevent it from leaping, as the beast seeing no longer clearly will
not know where to go. Nevertheless, as it will still be able to bite
you, and will be getting terribly enraged, you must gently open its
mouth and delicately insert therein a twig of the blessed brush that
hangs over your pillow. Thus the beast will be compelled to behave
properly. But remember that the discipline of our order allows you to
retain no property, and the beast cannot belong to you. You must take
into consideration that it is one of God's creatures, and strive to
render it more agreeable. Therefore, before all things, it is
necessary to verify three serious things--viz.: If the flea be a male,
if it be female, or if it be a virgin; supposing it to be a virgin,
which is extremely rare, since these beasts have no morals, are all
wild hussies, and yield to the first seducer who comes, you will seize
her hinder feet, and drawing them under her little caparison, you must
bind them with one of your hairs, and carry it to your superior, who
will decide upon its fate after having consulted the chapter. If it be
a male--"
"How can one tell that a flea is a virgin? asked the curious novice.
"First of all," replied Sister Ovide, "she is sad and melancholy, does
not laugh like the others, does not bite so sharp, has her mouth less
wide open, blushes when touched--you know where."
"In that case," replied the novice, "I have been bitten by a male."
At this the sisters burst out laughing so heartily that one of them
sounded a bass note and voided a little water and Sister Ovide
pointing to it on the floor, said--
"You see there's never wind without rain."
The novice laughed herself, thinking that these chuckles were caused
by the sister's exclamation.
"Now," went on Sister Ovide, "if it be a male flea, you take your
scissors, or your lover's dagger, if by chance he has given you one as
a souvenir, previous to your entry into the convent. In short,
furnished with a cutting instrument, you carefully slit open the
flanks of the flea. Expect to hear him howl, cough, spit, beg your
pardon; to see him twist about, sweat, make sheep's eyes, and anything
that may come into his head to put off this operation. But be not
astonished; pluck up your courage when thinking that you are acting
thus to bring a perverted creature into the ways of salvation. Then
you will dextrously take the reins, the liver, the heart, the gizzard,
and noble parts, and dip them all several times into the holy water,
washing and purifying them there, at the same time imploring the Holy
Ghost to sanctify the interior of the beast. Afterwards you will
replace all these intestinal things in the body of the flea, who will
be anxious to get them back again. Being by this means baptised, the
soul of the creature has become Catholic. Immediately you will get a
needle and thread and sew up the belly of the flea with great care,
with such regard and attention as is due to a fellow Christian; you
will even pray for it--a kindness to which you will see it is sensible
by its genuflections and the attentive glances which it will bestow
upon you. In short, it will cry no more, and have no further desire to
kill you; and fleas are often encountered who die from pleasure at
being thus converted to our holy religion. You will do the same to all
you catch; and the others perceiving it, after staring at the convert,
will go away, so perverse are they, and so terrified at the idea of
becoming Christians."
"And they are therefore wicked," said the novice. "Is there any
greater happiness than to be in the bosom of the Church?"
"Certainly!" answered sister Ursula, "here we are sheltered from the
dangers of the world and of love, in which there are so many."
"Is there any other danger than that of having a child at an
unseasonable time?" asked a young sister.
"During the present reign," replied Ursula, raising her head, "love
has inherited leprosy, St Anthony's fire, the Ardennes' sickness, and
the red rash, and has heaped up all the fevers, agonies, drugs and
sufferings of the lot in his pretty mortar, to draw out therefrom a
terrible compound, of which the devil has given the receipt, luckily
for convents, because there are a great number of frightened ladies,
who become virtuous for fear of this love."
Thereupon they huddled up close together, alarmed at these words, but
wishing to know more.
"And is it enough to love, to suffer?" asked a sister.
"Oh, yes!" cried Sister Ovide.
"You love just for one little once a pretty gentleman," replied
Ursula, "and you have the chance of seeing your teeth go one by one,
your hair fall off, your cheeks grow pallid, and your eyebrows drop,
and the disappearance of your prized charms will cost you many a sigh.
There are poor women who have scabs come upon their noses, and others
who have a horrid animal with a hundred claws, which gnaws their
tenderest parts. The Pope has at last been compelled to excommunicate
this kind of love."
"Ah! how lucky I am to have had nothing of that sort," cried the
novice.
Hearing this souvenir of love, the sisters suspected that the little
one had gone astray through the heat of a crucifix of Poissy, and had
been joking with the Sister Ovide, and drawing her out. All
congratulated themselves on having so merry a jade in their company,
and asked her to what adventure they were indebted for that pleasure.
"Ah!" said she, "I let myself be bitten by a big flea, who had already
been baptised."
At this speech, the sister of the bass note could not restrain a
second sign.
"Ah!" said Sister Ovide, "you are bound to give us the third. If you
spoke that language in the choir, the abbess would diet you like
Sister Petronille; so put a sordine in your trumpet."
"Is it true that you knew in her lifetime that Sister Petronille on
whom God bestowed the gift of only going twice a year to the bank of
deposit?" asked Sister Ursula.
"Yes," replied Ovide. "And one evening it happened she had to remain
enthroned until matins, saying, 'I am here by the will of God.' But at
the first verse, she was delivered, in order that she should not miss
the office. Nevertheless, the late abbess would not allow that this
was an especial favour, granted from on high, and said that God did
not look so low. Here are the facts of the case. Our defunct sister,
whose canonisation the order are now endeavouring to obtain at the
court of the Pope, and would have had it if they could have paid the
proper costs of the papal brief; this Petronille, then, had an
ambition to have her name included in the Calendar of Saints, which
was in no way prejudicial to our order. She lived in prayer alone,
would remain in ecstasy before the altar of the virgin, which is on
the side of the fields, and pretend so distinctly to hear the angels
flying in Paradise, that she was able to hum the tunes they were
singing. You all know that she took from them the chant Adoremus, of
which no man could have invented a note. She remained for days with
her eyes fixed like the star, fasting, and putting no more nourishment
into her body that I could into my eye. She had made a vow never to
taste meat, either cooked or raw, and ate only a crust of bread a day;
but on great feast days she would add thereto a morsel of salt fish,
without any sauce. On this diet she became dreadfully thin, yellow and
saffron, and dry as an old bone in a cemetery; for she was of an
ardent disposition, and anyone who had had the happiness of knocking
up against her, would have drawn fire as from a flint. However, little
as she ate, she could not escape an infirmity to which, luckily or
unluckily, we are all more or less subject. If it were otherwise, we
should be very much embarrassed. The affair in question, is the
obligation of expelling after eating, like all the other animals,
matter more or less agreeable, according to constitution. Now Sister
Petronille differed from all others, because she expelled matter such
as is left by a deer, and these are the hardest substances that any
gizzard produces, as you must know, if you have ever put your foot
upon them in the forest glade, and from their hardness they are called
bullets in the language of forestry. This peculiarity of Sister
Petronille's was not unnatural, since long fasts kept her temperament
at a permanent heat. According to the old sisters, her nature was so
burning, that when water touched her, she went frist! like a hot coal.
There are sisters who have accused her of secretly cooking eggs, in
the night, between her toes, in order to support her austerities. But
these were scandals, invented to tarnish this great sanctity of which
all the other nunneries were jealous. Our sister was piloted in the
way of salvation and divine perfection by the Abbot of St. Germaine-
des-Pres de Paris--a holy man, who always finished his injunctions
with a last one, which was to offer to God all our troubles, and
submit ourselves to His will, since nothing happened without His
express commandment. This doctrine, which appears wise at first sight,
has furnished matter for great controversies, and has been finally
condemned on the statement of the Cardinal of Chatillon, who declared
that then there would be no such thing as sin, which would
considerably diminish the revenues of the Church. But Sister
Petronille lived imbued with this feeling, without knowing the danger
of it. After Lent, and the fasts of the great jubilee, for the first
time for eight months she had need to go to the little room, and to it
she went. There, bravely lifting her dress, she put herself into a
position to do that which we poor sinners do rather oftener. But
Sister Petronille could only manage to expectorate the commencement of
the thing, which kept her puffing without the remainder making up its
mind to follow. In spite of every effort, pursing of the lips and
squeezing of body, her guest preferred to remain in her blessed body,
merely putting his head out of the window, like a frog taking the air,
and felt no inclination to fall into the vale of misery among the
others, alleging that he would not be there in the odour of sanctity.
And his idea was a good one for a simple lump of dirt like himself.
The good saint having used all methods of coercion, having
overstretched her muscles, and tried the nerves of her thin face till
they bulged out, recognised the fact that no suffering in the world
was so great, and her anguish attaining the apogee of sphincterial
terrors, she exclaimed, 'Oh! my God, to Thee I offer it!' At this
orison, the stoney matter broke off short, and fell like a flint
against the wall of the privy, making a croc, croc, crooc, paf! You
can easily understand, my sisters, that she had no need of a torch-
cul, and drew back the remainder."
"Then did she see angels?" asked one.
"Have they a behind?" asked another.
"Certainly not," said Ursula. "Do you not know that one general
meeting day, God having ordered them to be seated, they answered Him
that they had not the wherewithal."
Thereupon they went off to bed, some alone, others nearly alone. They
were good girls, who harmed only themselves.
I cannot leave them without relating an adventure which took place in
their house, when Reform was passing a sponge over it, and making them
all saints, as before stated. At that time, there was in the episcopal
chair of Paris a veritable saint, who did not brag about what he did,
and cared for naught but the poor and suffering, whom the dear old
Bishop lodged in his heart, neglecting his own interests for theirs,
and seeking out misery in order that he might heal it with words, with
help, with attentions, and with money, according to the case: as ready
to solace the rich in their misfortunes as the poor, patching up their
souls and bringing them back to God; and tearing about hither and
thither, watching his troop, the dear shepherd! Now the good man went
about careless of the state of his cassocks, mantles, and breeches, so
that the naked members of the church were covered. He was so
charitable that he would have pawned himself to save an infidel from
distress. His servants were obliged to look after him carefully.
Ofttimes he would scold them when they changed unasked his tattered
vestments for new; and he used to have them darned and patched, as
long as they would hold together. Now this good archbishop knew that
the late Sieur de Poissy had left a daughter, without a sou or a rag,
after having eaten, drunk, and gambled away her inheritance. This poor
young lady lived in a hovel, without fire in winter or cherries in
spring; and did needlework, not wishing either to marry beneath her or
sell her virtue. Awaiting the time when he should be able to find a
young husband for her, the prelate took it into his head to send her
the outside case of one to mend, in the person of his old breeches, a
task which the young lady, in her present position, would be glad to
undertake. One day that the archbishop was thinking to himself that he
must go to the convent of Poissy, to see after the reformed inmates,
he gave to one of his servants, the oldest of his nether garments,
which was sorely in need of stitches, saying, "Take this, Saintot, to
the young ladies of Poissy," meaning to say, "the young lady of
Poissy." Thinking of affairs connected with the cloister, he did not
inform his varlet of the situation of the lady's house; her desperate
condition having been by him discreetly kept a secret. Saintot took
the breeches and went his way towards Poissy, gay as a grasshopper,
stopping to chat with friends he met on the way, slaking his thirst at
the wayside inns, and showing many things to the breeches during the
journey that might hereafter be useful to them. At last he arrived at
the convent, and informed the abbess that his master had sent him to
give her these articles. When the varlet departed, leaving with the
reverend mother, the garment accustomed to model in relief the
archiepiscopal proportions of the continent nature of the good man,
according to the fashion of the period, beside the image of those
things of which the Eternal Father had deprived His angels, and which
in the good prelate did not want for amplitude. Madame the abbess
having informed the sisters of the precious message of the good
archbishop they came in haste, curious and hustling, as ants into
whose republic a chestnut husk has fallen. When they undid the
breeches, which gaped horribly, they shrieked out, covering their eyes
with one hand, in great fear of seeing the devil come out, the abbess
exclaiming, "Hide yourselves my daughters! This is the abode of mortal
sin!"
The mother of the novices, giving a little look between her fingers,
revived the courage of the holy troop, swearing by an Ave that no
living head was domiciled in the breeches. Then they all blushed at
their ease, while examining this habitavit, thinking that perhaps the
desire of the prelate was that they should discover therein some sage
admonition or evangelical parable. Although this sight caused certain
ravages in the hearts of those most virtuous maidens, they paid little
attention to the flutterings of their reins, but sprinkling a little
holy water in the bottom of the abyss, one touched it, another passed
her finger through a hole, and grew bolder looking at it. It has even
been pretended that, their first stir over, the abbess found a voice
sufficiently firm to say, "What is there at the bottom of this? With
what idea has our father sent us that which consummates the ruin of
women?"
"It's fifteen years, dear mother, since I have been permitted to gaze
upon the demon's den."
"Silence, my daughter. You prevent me thinking what is best to be
done."
Then so much were these archiepiscopal breeches turned and twisted
about, admired and re-admired, pulled here, pulled there, and turned
inside out--so much were they talked about, fought about, thought
about, dreamed about, night and day, that on the morrow a little
sister said, after having sung the matins, to which the convent had a
verse and two responses--"Sisters, I have found out the parable of the
archbishop. He has sent us as a mortification his garment to mend, as
a holy warning to avoid idleness, the mother abbess of all the vices."
Thereupon there was a scramble to get hold of the breeches; but the
abbess, using her high authority, reserved to herself the meditation
over this patchwork. She was occupied during ten days, praying, and
sewing the said breeches, lining them with silk, and making double
hems, well sewn, and in all humility. Then the chapter being
assembled, it was arranged that the convent should testify by a pretty
souvenir to the said archbishop their delight that he thought of his
daughters in God. Then all of them, to the very youngest, had to do
some work on these blessed breeches, in order to do honour to the
virtue of the good man.
Meanwhile the prelate had had so much to attend to, that he had
forgotten all about his garment. This is how it came about. He made
the acquaintance of a noble of the court, who, having lost his wife--a
she-fiend and sterile--said to the good priest, that he had a great
ambition to meet with a virtuous woman, confiding in God, with whom he
was not likely to quarrel, and was likely to have pretty children.
Such a one he desired to hold by the hand, and have confidence in.
Then the holy man drew such a picture of Mademoiselle de Poissy, that
this fair one soon became Madame de Genoilhac. The wedding was
celebrated at the archiepiscopal palace, where was a feast of the
first quality and a table bordered with ladies of the highest lineage,
and the fashionable world of the court, among whom the bride appeared
the most beautiful, since it has certain that she was a virgin, the
archbishop guaranteeing her virtue.
When the fruit, conserves, and pastry were with many ornaments
arranged on the cloth, Saintot said to the archbishop, "Monseigneur,
your well-beloved daughters of Poissy send you a fine dish for the
centre."
"Put it there," said the good man, gazing with admiration at an
edifice of velvet and satin, embroidered with fine ribbon, in the
shape of an ancient vase, the lid of which exhaled a thousand
superfine odours.
Immediately the bride, uncovering it, found therein sweetmeats, cakes,
and those delicious confections to which the ladies are so partial.
But of one of them--some curious devotee--seeing a little piece of
silk, pulled it towards her, and exposed to view the habitation of the
human compass, to the great confusion of the prelate, for laughter
rang round the table like a discharge of artillery.
"Well have they made the centre dish," said the bridegroom. "These
young ladies are of good understanding. Therein are all the sweets of matrimony."
Can there be any better moral than that deduced by Monsieur de
Genoilhac? Then no other is needed.
_________
-THE END-
Balzac's short story: The Merry Tattle Of The Nuns Of Poissy
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