Page:Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk (Truslove & Bray).djvu/63

59 the Convent. On one side is marked a double cross (thus, + + ) and on the other I.H.S. Such a band is called a scapulary, and many miracles are attributed to its power. Children on first receiving the communion are often presented with scapularies, which they are taught to regard with great reverence. We were told of the wonders effected by their means, in the addresses made to us, by priests, at catechism or lectures. I will repeat one or two of the stories.

A Roman Catholic servant woman, who had concealed some of her sins at confession, acted so hypocritical a part as to make her mistress believe her a devote, or strict observer of her duty. She even imposed upon her confessor so that he gave her a scapulary. After he had given it, however, one of the saints in heaven informed him in a vision, that the holy scapulary must not remain on the neck of so great a sinner, and that it must be restored to the church. She lay down that night with the scapulary round her throat; but in the morning was found dead, with her head cut off, and the scapulary was discovered in the church. The belief was that the devil could not endure to have so holy a thing on one of his servants, and had pulled so hard to get it off, as to draw the silken thread with which it was tied, through her neck; after which, by some divine power, it was restored to the church.

Another story. A poor Roman Catholic was once taken a prisoner by the heretics. He had a sainte scapulaire on his neck, when God, seeing him in the midst of his foes, took it from the neck by a miracle, and held it up in the air above the throng of heretics; one hundred of whom were converted, by seeing it thus supernaturally suspended.

I had been informed that there was a subterraneous, passage, leading from the cellar of our Convent, into the Congregational Nunnery; but, though I had so often visited the cellar, I had never seen it. One day, after I had been received three or four months, I was sent to