“I think, because every woman longed for the glory of being the mother of the Messiah.”
“True. Therefore, Christ being come, that reproach is done away. Let each woman choose for herself. ‘If a virgin marry, she hath not sinned.’ Nevertheless, ‘she that is unmarried thinks of the things of the Lord, that she may be holy, body and soul.’”
“Father, do you wish me to be a nun?”
“Never!” hastily answered Bruno. “Nay, my Beatrice; I should not have said that. Be thou what the Lord thinks best to make thee. But I do not want to be left alone again.”
Beatrice’s heart was set at rest. She had terribly feared for a moment lest Bruno, being himself a monk, might think her absolutely bound to be a nun.
They soon reached the Franciscan Convent. The Abbess, a rather stiffly-mannered, grey-haired woman, received her young guest with sedate kindliness, and committed her to the special charge of Sister Eularia. This was a young woman of about twenty-five, in whose mind curiosity was strongly developed. She took Beatrice up to the dormitory, showed her where she was to sleep, and gave her a seat on the form beside her at supper, which was almost immediately served. Beatrice noticed that whenever Eularia helped herself to any thing edible, she made the sign of the cross over it.
“Why dost thou do that?” asked the young Jewess.
“It is according to our rule,” replied the nun. “Surely thou knowest how to cross thyself?”
“Indeed I do not. And I do not see why I should.”
“Poor thing!—how sadly thou lackest teaching! Dost thou not know that our Lord Christ suffered on the cross?”