For, said the holy man, woman is impure, and the mere mark of her footsteps is an infectious pollution.
Now Smaragdus had been guest-master for five years, when a stranger knocked at the door of the monastery. It was a man who was still young; his habiliments were magnificent, and he retained a remnant of pride; but he was pale and emaciated, and his eyes were inflamed with a restless melancholy.
“Brother guest-master,” said this man, “conduct me into the presence of the holy abbot Onophrius, that he may assoil me, for I am a prey to a mortal ill.”
Smaragdus, having begged the stranger to seat himself upon a stool, informed him that Onophrius, having reached his hundred and fourteenth year, had, in view of his approaching end, gone to visit the caves of the Holy Anchorites, Amon and Orcisus.
At this news the visitor sank down upon the stool and hid his head in his hands.
“I can no longer hope for healing, then,” he murmured.
And raising his head again, he added—
“It is the love of a woman that has reduced me to this miserable state.”
Not till then did Euphrosine recognize Count Longinus. She feared that he likewise might recognize her. But she soon reassured herself, and was seized with pity to see him looking so cast down and discomfited.
After a long silence, Count Longinus exclaimed—
“I would fain become a monk to escape from my despair.”
Then he told the story of his love, and how his betrothed, Euphrosine, had suddenly disappeared; how for eight years he had sought her and failed to find her, and how he was consumed and wasted with love and grief.
She answered him with a gentleness that was heavenly.
“My lord, this Euphrosine, whose love you so bitterly deplore, was not worthy of so much love. Her beauty was not so precious, except in the ideal you yourself have formed of it; in truth, it is vile and contemptible. It was perishable, and what remains of it is not worth a regret. You believe yourself unable to live without Euphrosine, and yet, if you should happen to meet her, you might even fail to recognize her.”
Count Longinus answered not a word, but this speech, or possibly the voice in which it was pronounced, made a happy impression on his soul. He departed in a more tranquil mood, and promised to return.
And indeed he did return, and being desirous of embracing the monastic life, he asked the holy abbot Onophrius for a cell, and made a gift to the monastery of all his possessions, which were immense. This was a source of great satisfaction to Euphrosine. But some time after this her heart was overwhelmed with a still greater joy.
It was in this way. A beggar, bending beneath the weight of his satchel and having only sordid rags to cover his nakedness, came to ask a morsel of bread from the charitable monks. In him Euphrosine recognized Romulus, her father; but pretending not to know who he was, she made him sit down, washed his feet, and set food before him.
“Child of God,” said the beggar, “I was not always a penniless wanderer such as now you see me. Once I possessed great wealth and a very beautiful daughter, who was also very prudent and very learned. She unravelled the enigmas propounded in the public competitions, and on one occasion even received from the magistrates the papyrus crown. I lost her—I lost all my possessions. I am consumed with regret for my daughter and my wealth. I had above all things a bush full of birds which, by a marvellous contrivance, sang as though naturally. And now I have not even a mantle to cover me. Nevertheless, I should be comforted if before I die I might see once again my well-beloved daughter.”
As he concluded these words Euphrosine threw herself at his feet, and said through her tears—
“My father, I am Euphrosine, your daughter, who one night fled from your house. And the dog did not bark. Your pardon, my father. For I have not accomplished these things except by the permission of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
And after she had recounted to the old man the manner of her flight, disguised as a workman, to that very house where she had since passed eight peaceful years in hiding, she showed him a mark she had upon her neck. And by this sign Romulus recognized his daughter. He embraced her tenderly and bathed her in his tears, marvelling at the mysterious workings of the Lord.
And for this reason he resolved to become a monk and to take up his abode in the monastery of the holy abbot Onophrius. With his own hands he built himself a cell of reeds next to that of Count Longinus. They chanted the psalms and cultivated the ground. During the hours of rest they conversed upon the vanity of earthly affections and the riches of this world. But Romulus never disclosed anything to anybody concerning his wonderful recognition of his daughter Euphrosine, thinking it much for the best that Count Longinus and the abbot Onophrius should learn the details of her adventures in Paradise, when they would have attained a full understanding of the ways of God. Longinus never knew that his betrothed was close beside him. All three lived for several years longer in the practice of all the virtues, and by the special favour of Providence they all three fell asleep in the Lord almost at the same time. Count Longinus passed away first. Romulus died two months later, and St. Euphrosine, after she had closed his eyes, was during the same week called to heaven by Jesus Christ with the words: “Come, my dove.” St. Onophrius followed them to the tomb, to which he descended full of merits in the hundred and thirty-second year of his age, on the holy day of Easter, in the year 395 after the incarnation of the Son of God. May the Archangel St. Michael make intercession for us! Here end the acts of St. Euphrosine. Amen.
Such is the narrative of George the Deacon, written in the Laura on Mount Athos at a period which may vary from the seventh to the fourteenth century of the Christian era. As to this I waver, since it is a matter of great uncertainty. This narrative is now for the first time published; I have the best of reasons for being sure on this point. I should be glad to have equally good reasons for thinking that it deserved to be put forth. I have translated with a fidelity which has doubtless been only too perceptible since it has infected my own style with a Byzantine stiffness the inconvenience of which seems to myself almost intolerable. George the Deacon told his tale with less gracefulness than Herodotus, or Plutarch even. So that one may perceive by his example that periods of decadence are sometimes less impregnated with charm and daintiness than is the common opinion nowadays. This demonstration is perhaps the principal merit my work can claim. That work will be criticized vigorously, and no doubt questions may be put to me to which I may find it difficult to reply. The text which I have followed is not in the hand of George the Deacon. I do not know if it is complete. I foresee that lacunæ and interpellations will be pointed out. Monsieur Schlumberger will hold in suspicion various formularies employed in the course of the narrative, and Monsieur Alfred Rambaud will question the episode of the old man Porou. I reply beforehand that, having but a single text, I could do no other than follow it. It is in very bad condition and hardly legible. But one is bound to declare that all the masterpieces of classical antiquity in which we take such delight have come down to us in the same condition. I have excellent reasons for believing that in transcribing the text of my Deacon I have made tremendous blunders, and that my translation teems with misconceptions. Possibly even it is nothing but a misconception from beginning to end. If this should not appear so patently as one might fear, it is because invariably the most unintelligible text has some sort of meaning to him who translates it. Were this not the case, erudition would cease to have any reason for continued existence. I have compared the narrative of George the Deacon with the passages in Rufinus and St. Jerome relating to St. Euphrosine. I am bound to say that it does not altogether agree with them. It is doubtless for this reason that my publisher has inserted this learned work in a light collection of tales.
SCHOLASTICA
