again fell ill of a fever, and spent some weeks at Andilly with her
troop of brothers and sisters. But she could not shake off the sad
thoughts which were pressing on her, and was glad to go back to the
convent, taking with her little Marie Arnauld, then seven years old. The
winter passed before she could decide what to do, and her illness was
increased by the damp vapours arising from the ponds and marshes around
the abbey. She was worn out by thinking, and at length the prioress was
so alarmed by her appearance that she begged the abbess to do whatever
she thought right, as the sisters would submit to anything sooner than
see her in such misery.
The relief to Angélique's mind was immense, and she instantly called on
the whole community to assemble together. She then spoke to them,
reminding them of the vow of poverty they had taken, and showing them
how, if it was to be kept, they must cease to have possessions of their
own and share all things between them. When she had finished, a nun rose
up and silently left the room, returning in a few minutes with a little
packet containing the treasures by which she had set so much store. One
by one they all followed her example, and Angélique's first battle was
won.
* * * * *
In spite of the French proverb which says 'it is only the first step
which hurts,' the second step on the road to reform was the cause of far
more pain to Angélique, for she was resolved to put an end to the
practice of permitting the relatives and friends of the nuns free
entrance into the convent; and knew that her father, who during all
these years had come and gone as he wished, would not submit quietly to
his exclusion. Therefore she made certain alterations in the abbey:
ordered a foot or two to be added to the walls, and built a parlour
outside with only a small grated window, through which the nuns would be
allowed now and then to talk to their families.
All being ready, she again assembled the sisters, and informed them of
the new rule which was to be carried out, and when shortly after a
novice took the veil, and her friends were entertained outside the
convent, many voices were raised in discontented protest, and more than
once the murmur was heard, 'Ah! it will be a very different thing when
monsieur Arnauld comes.'
* * * * *
But it was not. Angélique never made one rule for herself and another
for her nuns, and by-and-by when her father's work was over in Paris,
and they all moved to Andilly, the abbess knew that her time of trial
had come. She wrote to either her mother or sister, madame le Maître,
begging them to inform her father of the new state of affairs; but this
they do not seem to have done. At all events, on September 24, 1609,
Angélique received a message from her father, saying that they would
arrive the next morning to see her.
Now the abbess of Port Royal was no hard-hearted, despotic woman,
delighting to display her power and to 'make scenes.' She was an
affectionate girl, easily touched and very grateful, and in her
generosity had striven to forget her father's double dealing in the
matter of her vows. That the coming interview would be a cause of much
pain to both she well knew, and she entreated two or three of the
nuns--among whom was her sister Agnes, who had resigned Saint-Cyr and
was now at Port Royal--to spend the night in praying that her
determination might not falter.
It was at the dinner-hour, about eleven o'clock, that the noise of a
carriage was heard in the outer court of the abbey. The abbess turned
pale and rose from her seat, while those of the sisters whom she had
taken into her confidence hastened away to be ready for the different
duties she had assigned to them. Angélique, holding in her hands the
keys of every outer door leading into the convent, walked to the great
gate, against which monsieur Arnauld, who was accompanied by his wife,
his son, and two of his daughters, was knocking loudly. He was not used
to be kept waiting like this, and did not understand the meaning of it,
and when the tiny window cut in the thick oak panels was suddenly thrown
open, and his daughter's face appeared, he asked impatiently what was
the matter that the gates were locked, and why she did not open them.
Angélique replied gently that if he would go into the parlour beside the
gate she would speak to him through the grating and explain the reason
of the gates being shut; but her father, not believing his ears, only
rapped the louder, while madame Arnauld reproached her daughter with
lack of respect and affection, and monsieur d'Andilly her brother called
her all sorts of names.
The noise was so great that it reached the refectory or dining-hall,
where the nuns were still sitting, and soon their voices were joined to
the clamour, some few upholding the conduct of their abbess, but most of
them condemning her.
At this point monsieur Arnauld, seeing that Angélique would not give
way, bethought him of a trick by which he could gain a footing inside
the walls. If, he said, Angélique had lost all sense of duty and
obedience to her parents, he would not suffer his other children to be
ruined by her example, and Agnes and little Marie must be given up to
him at once. No doubt he reckoned on the great door being opened for the
girls to come out, and that then he would be able to slip inside; but,
unfortunately, Angélique knew by experience of what her father was
capable, and had foreseen his demand. She answered that his wishes
should be obeyed, and seeking out one of the sisters whom she could
trust, gave her the key of a little door leading from the chapel outside
the walls, and bade her let Agnes and Marie out that way. This was done,
and suddenly the two little nuns were greeting their father as if they
had dropped from the skies.
At length understanding that neither abuse nor tricks could move
Angélique, monsieur Arnauld consented to go to the parlour, and there a
rush of tenderness came over him, and he implored her to be careful in
what she did, and not to ruin her health by privations and harsh
treatment. Angélique was not prepared for kindness, and after all she
had undergone it proved too much for her. She fell fainting to the
ground, and lay there without help, for her parents could not reach her
through the grating in the wall, and the nuns, thinking that monsieur
Arnauld was still heaping reproaches on her head, carefully kept away.
At last, however, they realised that help was needed, and arrived to
find their abbess lying senseless. Her first words on recovering were to
implore her father not to leave that day, and the visitors passed the
night in a guest-room which she had built outside the walls, and next
morning she had a long and peaceful talk with her family from a bed
placed on the convent side of the grating.
[Illustration: She fell fainting to the ground.]
In the end the abbot of Citeaux gave permission for monsieur Arnauld
still to inspect the outer buildings and gardens, as he had been in the
habit of doing, while his wife and daughters had leave to enter the
convent itself when they wished. But this was not for a whole year, as
madame Arnauld in her anger had sworn never to enter the gates of Port
Royal, and it was only after hearing a sermon setting forth that vows
taken in haste were not binding that she felt at liberty once more to
see her daughter.
* * * * *
The income left by the founder of Port Royal was very small--about
240 l. a year--little enough on which to support a number of people and
find work for the poor, though, of course, it could perhaps buy as many
things as 1,200 l. a year now.
When Angélique first went there as abbess, monsieur Arnauld, who managed
all the money matters, paid all that seemed necessary for the comfort of
his daughter and the nuns. But after the day when she closed the gates
on him Angélique would no longer accept his help, as she felt she could
not honestly do so while behaving in a manner of which he disapproved.
So she called together her little community, and they thought of all the
things they could possibly do without. The masks and the gloves had
already been discarded, and there seemed to be nothing for the sisters
to give up, if they were to help the sick people and peasants who
crowded about their doors, but their food and their firing. Not that she
intended to support anybody in idleness; Angélique was far too sensible
for that. She took counsel with her father, and found work for the men,
and even the children, in the gardens and lands belonging to the abbey.
Their wages were small, but each day good food was prepared in the
kitchens--Angélique had no belief in bad cooking--and was wheeled out by
the sisters in little carts as far as the garden walls, where the
workmen could eat it while it was hot. Then some of the children or
women were employed as messengers to carry bowls with dinners to the old
and ill. Of course some of these were in the abbey infirmary, and were
looked after by the nuns, and especially by Angélique, who took the one
who seemed to need most care into her own room, while she slept on the
damp floor--for half the sickness at Port Royal was due to the marshes
that surrounded it. If it happened that she had her cell to herself,
there was no fire to warm her, yet she often got up in the night to
carry wood to the long dormitory where several of the nuns slept, so
that they, at least, should not suffer from cold.
All the daily expenses she saw to herself, as debt was hateful to her,
and she and the sisters denied themselves food and wore the cheapest and
coarsest clothes, not for the sake of their own souls, but of other
people's bodies.
* * * * *
In many ways, though she did not know it and certainly would have been
shocked to hear it, Angélique resembled the Puritans, whose influence
in England was daily increasing. She had a special dislike to money
being spent on decorations and ornaments in churches, or in embroidered
vestments for priests, and never would allow any of them in her own. She
also invented a loose and ugly grey dress for the girls to wear who
desired admission to the convent, instead of permitting them to put on
the clothes they had worn at home, as had always been the custom. The
first to wear it was her own sister Anne, who after leading the gay life
of a Parisian young lady for a year, at fifteen resolved to abandon it
for ever and join her three sisters at Port Royal.
It is possible that monsieur Arnauld may have regretted his hastiness in
forcing Angélique and Agnes to become nuns when he saw one daughter
after another following in their footsteps. Anne he had expected to
remain, for she was full of little fancies and vanities, and he could
not imagine her submitting to the work which he knew the abbess loved.
He would have laughed sadly enough if he could have seen how right he
was. On the first night that Anne slept in the abbey, she laid a cloth
on a table in her cell, and tried to make it look a little like the
dressing-table she had left in Paris. Angélique happened to pass the
open door on her way to the chapel, and, smiling to herself, quietly
stripped the table. Some hours later she went by again, and over it was
spread a white handkerchief. This she also removed, but, leaving Anne to
apply the lesson, she did not make any remark, and sent her to clean out
the fowl-house.
* * * * *
By this time the eyes of the world had been turned to Port Royal, and to
the strange spectacle of a girl who, possessed of every talent which
would enable her to shine in society, had deliberately chosen the worst
of everything, and had induced her nuns to choose it too. Possibly the
quiet and useful life led by the Port Royal sisters may have made the
gaieties and disorders of the other convents look even blacker than
before; but however that may be, when Angélique was about twenty-six a
most difficult and disagreeable piece of work was put into her hands.
The king, Louis XIII., a very different man from his father, Henry IV.,
had determined to put an end to the state of things that prevailed, and
resolved to begin with Maubuisson.
Now nobody had ever attempted to interfere with madame d'Estrées, who
was still abbess, and when the abbot of Citeaux, her superior, informed
her that in obedience to the king's commands he proposed to come over
and inspect Maubuisson, she was extremely angry. Without caring for the
consequences, she locked up in a cell two monks who had brought the
message, and kept them without food for some days; after which she
roughly bade them return whence they came, and thought no more about the
matter.
For two years the affair rested where it was; then the king again turned
his attention to Maubuisson, and wrote to the abbot of Citeaux inquiring
why his previous orders had not been carried out, bidding him send an
officer at once and obtain an exact report of the conduct of the nuns
and the abbess.
The commissioner, monsieur Deruptis, arrived with three or four men at
Maubuisson, and congratulated themselves when they found the doors flung
wide and they were invited to enter.
'The reverend mother is too unwell to see anyone to-day,' said the nun
who admitted them, 'but she has prepared rooms in the west tower for
your reception, and to-morrow she hopes to be able to speak with you
herself.' So saying she led them down several passages till she reached
a little door, which she unlocked, and then stood back for them to pass
in. As soon as they were all inside, making their way up the corkscrew
stairs, she swung back the door, and before the men realised what had
happened they heard the key turn in the lock.
For four days they were kept prisoners, with nothing to eat but a very
little bread and water; while every morning the commissioner was
severely flogged till he was almost too weak to move. At length, driven
to desperation, he and his companions contrived to squeeze themselves
through a narrow window, and returned dirty and half-starved to the
abbot.
Powerful as the abbess might be, even her friends and relations thought
she had gone too far, and they were besides very angry with her for
allowing her own young sister, who was a novice in the convent, to be
secretly married there. They therefore informed the abbot of Citeaux
that as far as they were concerned no opposition would be made, and he
instantly started for Maubuisson, sending a messenger before him to tell
the abbess that he was on his way. For all answer the messenger came
back saying that the abbess would listen to nothing; but the abbot, now
thoroughly angry, only pushed on the faster, and thundered at the great
gates. He hardly expected that madame d'Estrées would refuse to see him
when it came to the point, but she _did_; he then, as was his right,
called an assembly of the nuns, and summoned her to attend. Again she
declined; she was ill, she said, and could not leave her bed; so, fuming
with rage, he went back to Paris and told the whole story to the king.
After certain forms of law had been gone through, which took a little
time, the Parliament of Paris issued a warrant for the seizure of the
abbess, and for her imprisonment in the convent of the Penitents in
Paris. On this occasion the abbot took a strong body of archers with
him, but wishing to avoid, if possible, the scandal of carrying off the
abbess by force, he left them at Pontoise. He went alone to the abbey,
and for two days tried by every means he could think of to persuade the
abbess to submit. But she only laughed, and declared she was ill, and at
last he sent for his archers and ordered them to force an entrance.
'Open, in the king's name!' cried their captain; but as the doors
remained closed, he signed to his men to force them, and soon two
hundred and fifty archers were in the abbey, seeking its abbess. During
the whole day they sought in vain, and began to think that she was not
in the house at all; at length a soldier passing through a dormitory
noticed a slight movement in one of the beds, which proved to contain
the rebellious abbess. The man bade her get up at once, but she told
them that it was impossible, as she had hardly any clothes on. The
soldier, not knowing what to do, sent for his captain, who promptly bade
four archers take up mattress and abbess and all, and place them in the
carriage which stood before the gates.
In this manner, accompanied by one nun, madame d'Estrées entered the
convent of the Penitents.
* * * * *
It is very amusing to read about, but at the time the affair made a
great noise, and the other abbesses who were conscious of having
neglected their vows had long felt very uneasy and watched anxiously
what would happen next. Of course, Maubuisson could not be left without
a head, and as soon as the abbess was removed, the abbot summoned the
nuns before him and informed them that they might choose which of three
ladies should take the place of madame d'Estrées. One of the three was
madame de Port Royal.
The 'ladies of Maubuisson,' as they had always been called, trembled at
the thought of what they might have to undergo at the hands of
Angélique, yet they liked still less the other abbesses proposed. In the
end it was she who was appointed, and a fortnight later arrived at
Maubuisson with three of her own nuns, one being her young sister Marie.
Some of the Maubuisson nuns remembered their new abbess quite well, when
she had lived amongst them nearly seventeen years before. These she
treated with the utmost consideration, for she knew it was unreasonable
to expect them to give up all at once the habits of a lifetime, and she
thought it wiser to gain permission to add thirty young novices to the
community whom she might train herself. To these girls she taught the
duties performed by her own nuns, and herself took part in carrying wood
for the fires, keeping clean the chapel and other parts of the abbey,
washing the clothes, digging up the garden, and singing the chants, for
she had been shocked by the discordant and irreverent manner in which
the services were conducted. She even allowed her novices to wait on the
older nuns, replacing their own servants.
For a year and a half Angélique struggled patiently to soften the hearts
of the Maubuisson 'ladies,' but without success, and her courage and
spirits began to fail her. Then, in September 1619, an event occurred
which, unpleasant though it was, brought her back to her old self, and
this was the sudden return of madame d'Estrées.
At six o'clock one morning the late abbess, who had managed to escape
from the convent where she had been imprisoned, unexpectedly appeared as
the nuns were on their way to church, having been let in secretly by one
of the sisters.
'Madame,' she said to Angélique, 'I have to thank you for the care you
have taken of my abbey, and to request that you will go back to yours.'
'There is nothing I long for more, madame,' replied Angélique, 'but I
have been placed here by the abbot of Citeaux, our superior, and I
cannot leave without his permission.' Upon this madame d'Estrées
declared that she was abbess and would take her proper position; but
Angélique, merely asserting that the king and the abbot had placed her
there, and there she must stay, walked calmly to her own seat, while
madame d'Estrées, not having made up her mind what to do, went off to
see her own nuns, who seldom were present at the early service.
By command of Angélique, everything went on as usual in the abbey,
except that the keys of all the doors had been given up to her. But
after dinner, to her great surprise, the chaplain came to her and
informed her that it was her duty to give way to force, and that if she
did not do so quietly the armed men whom madame d'Estrées had left
outside the walls would thrust her out. The abbess replied that she
could not forsake her charge; but she had hardly spoken when, to her
amazement, five soldiers with naked swords advanced towards her, and
threatened her with violence if she did not do as they wished. But no
Arnauld ever submitted to bullying, and Angélique repeated her words,
and said that nothing but force could make her quit her post.
While this conversation was going on the novices, terrified at what
might be happening to their abbess, crowded round in order to protect
her. They were all very much excited, and when madame d'Estrées, who had
entered also, happened to touch Angélique's veil, one of the young nuns
turned to her and cried out indignantly:
'Wretched woman! Would you dare to pull off the veil of madame de Port
Royal?' and snatching the veil which the abbess had put on her own head,
she tore it off and flung it in a corner.
'Put madame out,' said madame d'Estrées, turning to the gentlemen with
her, and Angélique, who did not resist, was at once thrust out of the
door and into a carriage that was waiting. In an instant the carriage
was covered with novices as with a swarm of flies. The wheels, the
rumble, the coach-box, all were full of them; it was astonishing how
they got there in their heavy, cumbrous clothes. Madame d'Estrées called
to the coachman to whip up the horses, but he, perhaps enjoying the
scene, replied that if he moved he was certain to crush somebody. Then
Angélique left the coach, and the novices got down from their perches
and stood around her.
Finding that this plan had failed, madame d'Estrées ordered one of her
lackeys to stand at the gate of the abbey and to allow Angélique, her
two sisters, and the two Port Royal nuns to pass out, but no one else.
She herself took hold of Angélique, who was nearly torn in half between
her friends and enemies, and pulled her out of the gate, all the novices
pressing behind her. The moment the rival abbesses had passed through a
strong young novice seized hold of madame d'Estrées and forced her to
the ground, keeping her there until every one of her companions was on
the outside. It was in vain that the lackey tried to stop them.
'If you attempt to shut that door we will squeeze you to death,' cried
they, and each in turn gave the door behind which he stood a good push!
At length they were outside, and were walking quietly down the road to
Pontoise, where they took refuge in a church, till the inhabitants,
hearing of their arrival, placed all they had at their disposal.
Great was the indignation of the king and the abbot when, next morning,
a letter from mère Angélique informed them of what had happened.
Instantly a warrant was issued for the arrest of madame d'Estrées, and a
large body of archers was sent off post-haste to Maubuisson in order to
carry it out. But the abbess had received warning of her danger, and was
not to be found, though her flight was so hurried that on searching her
rooms the captain discovered several important papers that she had
left behind her. Her friend, madame de la Serre, took refuge in a
cupboard, which was concealed by tapestry, high up in a wall. The dust
seems to have got into her nose, and she sneezed, and in this manner
betrayed herself to the archers who set a ladder against the wall, which
the lady instantly threw down. The captain then levelled his pistol at
her, and bade his men put up the ladder again.
[Illustration: The archers set a ladder against the wall, which the lady
instantly threw down.]
'I will shoot you if you do not surrender,' he said, and as she was sure
he meant it, she gave herself up.
When all was quiet in the abbey, the archers mounted their horses and
rode to Pontoise, and under their protection Angélique and her nuns
walked back to Maubuisson at ten o'clock that night, escorted by the
people of Pontoise, and lighted by a hundred and fifty torches borne by
the archers. For six months a guard of fifty remained there, but when
madame d'Estrées was at last captured and sent back for life to the
Convent of the Penitents, at the request of Angélique they returned to
their quarters, and she was left to manage the nuns herself.
The last year of her residence at Maubuisson was, if possible, more
unpleasant than the rest had been, for the title of abbess was given to
a lady of high birth whose views were far more worldly than those of
Angélique. She was very angry at the presence of the thirty poor nuns
who had been added to the community, and declared she would turn them
out. So Angélique begged them to come with her to Port Royal, small
though her abbey was, and had them taken there in a number of carriages
sent by madame Arnauld.
* * * * *
After this Angélique, or some of the nuns chosen by her, was often sent
to reform other convents, and very hard work it was. She had, besides,
her own cares at Port Royal, for the abbey, always unhealthy, was made
worse by overcrowding and underfeeding, and the income and the
dormitories which had been held sufficient for sixteen now had to do for
eighty. A low fever broke out, of which many died, and soon it became
clear that the rest would follow if they did not leave. At length, at
the entreaty of her mother, Angélique applied for permission to move
into Paris, where madame Arnauld had taken a house for them.