The voyage was favorable, the vessel touching at many places of classic interest. When they finally reached Salamines in the Island of Cyprus, what was her joy on finding her venerable friend, St. Epiphanius, waiting on the shore to receive her, happy in being able to return the hospitality he had enjoyed under her roof in Rome three years before.
The Island of Cyprus was filled with monasteries and convents founded and protected by Epiphanius, which were a great attraction to Paula. Holy hymns were sung where Venus but lately had reigned supreme; and the grave of the holy patriarch Hilarion stood near the ruins of the ancient temple of the heathen goddess.
After leaving Cyprus, Paula went to Antioch. There Jerome and the priests and monks who had accompanied him from Rome were awaiting her with Paulinus, the bishop. They wished to detain her; but since her feet had touched land her ardor to reach Jerusalem had so increased that nothing could stop her. To follow the footsteps of Christ, to see where his precious blood was shed, then to visit the anachorites of the desert, such was Paula's thought. Eustochium and her companions shared this desire. No time was lost. A caravan was organized, Jerome and his friends on dromedaries, Paula and her suite on asses, and they began their journey together. The road from Antioch to Jerusalem was long and fatiguing for women so delicately bred. A journey in those days was full of perils of which we now have no idea. But Paula was indefatigable, deterred by no dangers and complaining of no inconveniences, as she crossed the icy plains at this most trying season of the year. St. Jerome tells of the cities that she saw, and of the emotions that she felt as her knowledge of Scripture and of holy books brought up recollections and associations either of Jewish or of Christian history wherever she went. Besides, Jerome was there, with his prodigious memory and knowledge, to throw light on every step.
As Paula approached Jerusalem, her soul was more deeply moved, than it had yet been. The view of the landscape around the city was desolate, even as early as the fourth century. She entered by the Gate of Jaffa, also called the Gate of David and the Gate of the Pilgrims. The proconsul of Palestine had sent an escort to meet her, to receive her with honor; but with that sentiment which later made Godefroi de Bouillon refuse to wear a golden crown where God had worn one of thorns, Paula refused to lodge in the palace offered for her convenience, and she and her whole suite staid at a modest dwelling not far from Calvary; then she started at once to visit the Holy Places. Who can describe her feelings as she entered the church of the Holy Sepulchre? In the fourth century, the stone which closed the entrance to the tomb of our Lord was still to be seen by the faithful pilgrims. To-day it is covered by a monument of marble. As soon as Paula saw it, with great emotion she embraced it; but when she entered into the sepulchre itself, and went up to the rock on which had laid the body of our Lord, she could no longer restrain her tears, and, falling on her knees, sobbed and wept abundantly. All Jerusalem saw these tears, and were edified at the great piety of this noble Roman lady, the daughter of the Scipios.
St. Jerome tells us that, while she was in Jerusalem, "she would see everything," and that "she was only dragged away from one holy place that she might be taken to another."
After having visited Jerusalem, the pilgrims travelled all over the Holy Land, commencing with Bethlehem and Judea, then visiting Jericho and the Jordan, Samaria and Galilee as far as Nazareth, and finally, reorganizing the caravan, they set out for Egypt; not, however, before paying a visit to Melanie, in her convent on the Mount of Olives, whence they returned to Jerusalem.
Paula would now have fixed herself at Bethlehem but for this longing to visit the fathers of the desert. They started on this, the longest and most fatiguing part of their journey, and were sixteen days in going from Jerusalem to Alexandria. This city was the Athens of the East. In such an atmosphere of learning, there had been great intellectual development among the Christians, and the school of Christian philosophers of Alexandria was renowned throughout the world. This was what detained Paula and Eustochium, and particularly Jerome, some time at Alexandria, where they were received with great hospitality by the bishop, Theophilus. But even the most interesting studies could not make Paula forget the principal object of her voyage to Egypt, and her desire to see and to know the ascetics, that wonderful class of men, who voluntarily exiled themselves from the world and from all human ties, and astonished mankind by incredible austerities, and by consecrating their lives entirely to spiritual things and to a future existence. At this time the number of these anachorites had so multiplied, that it was said that in Egypt the deserts had as many inhabitants as the cities. Monastic life was then in all its glory. The great anachorites, Paul, Antony, Hilarion, and Pacomius, were dead; but their disciples lived, as celebrated as themselves. A great work of organization had been accomplished among them. The first men who came to the desert lived alone in caves or cells, each following his individual inspiration. Paul had lived forty years in a grotto, at the entrance of which was a spring and a palm-tree, drinking the water of the spring and eating the fruit of the tree, being his only nourishment. Antony's life had been more extraordinary still. But when the number of the hermits increased, they felt the necessity of community life being established, and the cenobites began to take the place of the anachorites, though there remained many of the latter, dividing, as it were, the hermits into two kinds, the Anachorites and the Cenobites. Large convents spread out along the banks of the Nile to the furthest extremity of Egypt.
It was not easy to visit these establishments. In going there, many years before, Melanie and her companions had been lost for five days, and their provisions being exhausted they had nearly died of hunger and thirst in the desert. Crocodiles, basking in the sun, had awaited with open jaws to devour them, and numberless other dangers had beset them.