SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.
A DAY AT LULWORTH. [6]
The abolition of monasteries, which succeeded the former revolution in France, caused a fraternity of Trappists to seek refuge from the general persecution of religious orders under the protection of the proprietor of Lulworth Castle, on the coast of Dorsetshire; their patron being a rigid Catholic, and much governed by the priests. They had been established many years when I visited them; my curiosity being excited by the current reports of the severities to which their order subjected them in the habitual discipline of the convent. The day selected for the visit was quite in harmony with the objects in view; a cold, bleak, cloudy morning, which terminated in rain, without a single ray of the sun to enliven a December gloom. Mr., now Cardinal, Weld was paying his temporal and spiritual devotions at the Quirinal Palace and the shrine of St. Peter; but, in the absence of the family from Lulworth, his huntsman regularly exercised a small pack of harriers round the neighbouring hills among the goss covers, for the amusement of a few sportsmen and his own profit. Three of us proceeded one morning to enjoy our customary diversion; but the bleakness of the wind which swept the hills overlooking the sea induced the huntsman to keep the hounds at home, and we, in consequence, determined to make up for our disappointment by riding over to Lulworth. In summer, this little retired spot is an object of attraction, from its romantic cove and fine castle; while many parties, doubtless, are drawn there by the savoury idea of boiled lobsters, usually provided for their refreshment at the small public-house of the village; where "mine host" was wont to rivet the attention of the juvenile portions of his guests especially, while the older refused him not their ears, to tales of the castle and the convent, about which, as in most Catholic families of distinction, and among religious institutions, there hung a cloud of mystery, which the young votaries of worldly enjoyments love to penetrate.
Leaving our horses at the inn, we walked directly up to the convent situated a little way beyond the village, impressed with feelings which the stories we had heard unavoidably excited. Nor were these feelings diminished by the gloomy solitude and silence of the scenery around, interrupted only by the howling wind and the roaring of the waves, which beat against the precipitous rocks surrounding the cove, and sustaining the massive walls of the castle.
A plain white-washed building, with few and small windows, apparently created out of a barn or granary and an old farm-house, was encircled by a high wall enclosing also a muddy courtyard, and a garden destined to supply the fraternity merely with the necessary herbs and seeds on which the meagre-fed brethren were nourished. We lifted the heavy knocker of a rude door surmounted by a crucifix, and a lay-brother, resembling him represented in the Opera of the Duenna, answered our modest knocking. An order from "the family" was demanded; and for want of it we urged our special journey (about twenty miles), names, and rank; all of which was transmitted to the superior, while we remained some time unbidden in the courtyard, where the only sign of life was the deep barking of an old house-dog, who rivalled his human associates in misanthropy.
At length the creaking hinges of the door were heard again, and, with an injunction to be sparing of speech, we were bidden to follow the animated shadow which flitted in the owl-light before us, through various winding passages. Had I been alone, and had that crime which has lately so shocked humanity been then in existence, I think I should have "pulled in resolution," and told the miserable cicerone that I would call another time. But, as companionship imparts courage, on we went, filled with vivid recollections of Mrs. Radcliffe's romances, accompanied with an urgent curiosity also to see, for the first time, living monks and a real monastery. One of the former passed us in our way, clothed in the dingy habit of his order fastened round the waist with a twisted cord. He bowed as he passed; and we were told, in a whisper, that he was recently arrived; and from not associating with the rest of the brethren, and having a separate apartment, he was supposed to be a man of rank, known only to the superior, and concerning whom conjecture was rife, but no inquiry permitted. What this recluse really was my story will hereafter disclose.
The general furniture of the convent appeared to be neat and clean, but of coarse materials and rude construction, while its scantiness evinced either the penury of the institution, or the denial which formed part of the monastic discipline peculiar to the order of La Trappe. There might be a third explanation of the ill-lighted bareness of the walls and floors, together with the general aspect of privation and devotion, an explanation which occurred to us subsequently—there might have been studied effect and deception in their display before visiters.
We entered the refectory and the dormitory, neither of which bore any sign of luxury, nor even of ordinary comfort. The needful repose of man seemed scarcely provided for in the one, nor the "creature comforts" in the other. Meat was forbidden, except when prescribed for the health of the inmates. Vegetable broth, bread, and water, formed, we were told, the chief resources of the culinary department of the convent; and, in the very act of enjoying these, around the disconsolate-looking table, the superior was accustomed to remind the brotherhood occasionally during the repast not to indulge the appetite for food, so as to divert their thoughts for an instant from heaven. This spiritual memento was introduced by the rap of a stout oaken-stick upon the table; when instantly, every hand raised to the mouth was arrested and held still where it was, until a second rap permitted it to proceed in its carnal office, the interval being employed in silent ejaculation to the Deity, or perhaps, with some, in "curses not loud but deep" against the inexorable superior, who so compelled them to mortify a not unnatural desire.
In the dormitory a similar mortification nightly awaited the unconscious sleepers, although "upon uneasy pallets stretching them," in the occasional tinkling of an obtrusive bell, that peremptorily hurried them from their recumbent position to the cold stones of the chapel, where on bended knees they were obliged to pray and meditate.
From the refectory and the dormitory we were conducted to the chapel, with renewed injunctions to ask no questions while there, and to preserve the strictest silence. Here we found about thirty, I think, of the brethren, in their coarse black habits and cord belts, with rosary, shaved crowns, and fixed eyes; some kneeling, and others prostrate upon the stony floor,—picturesquely grouged, à la Rembrandt, about the steps of the altar and other parts of the chapel. All were silent and motionless, and regarded our intrusion no more than if they were so many marble statues. Some of the monks were old and haggard, and others young and better conditioned than might be conceived of men fed, or rather starved, as they were represented to be. Their features appeared generally to be coarse and vulgar. The chapel itself was perfectly plain, and unadorned but by a few of the customary figures and paintings, representing disgusting situations of saints and martyrs under voluntary torture and privation. Lamps that "shed a pale and ineffectual light," crucifixes, and images of the Virgin and Son, were duly scattered about the niches of the chapel.
From the chapel we were conducted to the superior's room, a small scantily-furnished apartment, with however an appearance of greater comfort than elsewhere about the building, from the presence of a plain chair and table, some religious books, a cot, and a little fire. The superior himself possessed somewhat more of the aspect of a gentleman than the rest of the brethren, as well as the dim light of a lamp allowed us to observe his figure; of which certainly, whatever might have been his mode of living, rotundity formed no such feature as I have seen among the jolly monks in Spain and Portugal. He related to us the habits of his order, from which we learnt further particulars than had been related by the cicerone. Silence seemed to be the rule of the establishment during the whole twenty-four hours, the exceptions being very few: one of the brethren, we were told, had never been known to speak for about thirty years, in accordance with a vow, and was supposed to have become dumb.
When one monk met another, the salutation was limited to this simple expression—"Brother, we must die." And lest this fact should not have been sufficiently kept in recollection, a grave was constantly open in the burying-ground at hand, the digging of which was a source of bodily exercise and recreation to the brethren; a new one being always made when a tenant was found for that which already gaped to receive him.
I need scarcely observe, that from the rigid silence vowed and practised, the order of La Trappe includes no females in its over-zealous ordinances. The only books allowed those who could read were Missals and the Bible, which were constantly in their hands.
Medical aid was not denied, when occasion required it, from one qualified to practise among the Weld colony in the village, who of course was no heretic; but the ordinary management of the materia medica, furnished by the garden, rested with such of the fraternity as were gifted in the art of healing.
In addition to all the mortification of the flesh pointed out to us, we were given to understand that the twisted cords around the waist were frequently employed in self-inflicted scourgings at the altar, to which the superior exhorted the brethren as a penance for past, and humiliation for future, sins; a ceremony which, by all accounts, was in some instances unjustly taken out of the hands of the public executioner, while in others, perhaps, the cord might not at all have been misapplied if its adjustment to the neck, instead of the waist, had been anticipated by the same functionary. —Metropolitan.