Saint Radegund, Queen of France

The grace of the Holy Spirit began from that moment to act powerfully in her soul, and, although she was still only about ten years old, she was nonetheless perfectly enlightened regarding the duties of the Christian life and practiced its most pious exercises in an excellent manner. She was seen to be assiduous in her oratory, before a crucifix, sometimes reciting psalms and hymns in honor of God, sometimes meditating on the wounds and sufferings of her Savior, sometimes rising in contemplation of the greatness of the Divinity, and sometimes shedding tears for the spiritual and bodily miseries of her neighbor. She had such veneration for the holy altars that she would clean the footstool with her own royal hands, and, having gathered the dust into a handkerchief, she would carry it outside only with respect, as if that dust had contracted some holiness from having covered the floor of the sanctuary. Her charity for the poor was extreme: her palace served as an asylum for the sick, whom she bandaged herself and served in the baths whose use the Gallo-Romans had bequeathed to the Franks. All the money she received was used for alms; she lavished upon the poor, with her royal hands, a thousand cares of cleanliness and poured them cordial drinks to restore their strength upon leaving the steam baths. She distributed to the young children, whom she delighted in gathering around her, the dishes she took from her table; she had them participate in processions and pious ceremonies that she organized in the village. Such were the innocent and pious games of the young virgin who, queen by birth and later by marriage, constituted herself the servant of the poor in the very palace where she commanded as a sovereign. Such extraordinary conduct in a young princess stirred up some domestic persecutions for her, which Bishop Fortunatus does not explain; but she was so admired by the most enlightened people that, at the court of Clotaire and throughout the kingdom of Soissons, there was talk only of the rare virtues of Radegonde. This led the prince to resolve to marry her, although he had already had three wives who had given him several children, among others Caribert, Gontran, Chilperic, and Sigebert, who all reigned after him. Radegonde, having learned of his design, fled secretly from her palace of Athies, infinitely preferring the status of virgin and spouse of Jesus Christ to that of Queen of France and wife of an earthly king; but Clotaire, having had her arrested in a village that later bore the name of Sainte-Radegonde, had her brought to Soissons, where, despite all her remonstrances and prayers, he forced her to marry him. Bonfires were lit everywhere for such an advantageous alliance, and the people conceived great hopes that she would serve much to moderate the spirit of this prince, who was of a fierce temperament and still felt the barbarity of the early Franks. The queen alone could not be consoled to see herself engaged in the great world and in a court where innocence and piety were hardly held in honor. The thought of her first solitude, where she tasted the sweetness of paradise in rest, made her new dignity unbearable, and she would have gladly left it at any moment to shut herself in a cloister, had the king's authority not prevented her from breaking her chains and setting herself free.

The number of her officers and the splendor of her majesty did not prevent her from continuing the exercises of devotion and mercy that she had practiced since her childhood. She attended the holy mysteries and the offices of the Church with a marvelous piety that provided edification to the entire court. A portion of her morning and evening time was spent in prayer; she would even often rise from the table and leave her bed at night to apply herself to prayer, having previously obtained the King's approval. When he was absent, she used this opportunity to spend the greater part of the days and nights near Jesus Christ, and she was sometimes found in the morning, in winter, in her oratory or on the floor of her chamber, so numbed by cold that it was difficult to warm her by the fire. Her charity for the poor, far from diminishing, increased on the contrary; she never received any sum of money without first giving a tithe for their relief. What remained for her, after the indispensable expenses of her household, was for the churches, monasteries, hermits, and beggars. She often carried her alms herself; and when she could not carry them, she sent them by faithful persons who served as her mouth and hands. She was not content with giving money; she also had groups of poor people whom she maintained with all things, giving them food and distributing to them the linen and clothing that were necessary for them. Her charity even led her to have a hospital built in the town of Athies, where she had been raised, to perpetuate her good deeds there.

What is even more surprising is the rigor with which she treated her body in the midst of the pleasures of such a brilliant court. When they brought her a garment highlighted with gold and adorned with precious stones, if one of her ladies-in-waiting remarked that it was well-made and of great value, she would deprive herself of it for the love of God and send it to the nearest church to be made into altar frontals and ecclesiastical ornaments; she did the same with fine linens, laces, and cutwork of extraordinary beauty that her ladies-in-waiting presented to her, saying that it was much better to apply them to altar cloths and corporals for the use of the holy Sacrifice than to adorn a body that was destined to be food for worms. She lived in a continuous mortification of the senses and abstinence. While the King's table, where she ate, was covered with delicate dishes, she was usually served only vegetables. She observed all the commanded fasts with inexorable severity, eating only once a day and contenting herself with very light food. From the beginning of Lent, a holy nun named Pie would send her, in a sealed package, a hair shirt that she wore until Easter without taking it off day or night; and, after that time, she would send it back to her, also sealed, so that this penance could not be known by anyone. When any man of God came to the place where the court was, she would go to find him in the evening, and, despite his resistance, she would wash his feet with profound humility and serve him food and drink. The next day, she would come to find him again to converse with him about the contempt of the world, the desire for heavenly things, and the ways of perfection: for that was all that occupied her thoughts and was capable of giving her joy and consolation.

The devil, unable to suffer such heroic virtue, stirred up against her lords and ladies of the court, who pointed out to the King that he had not married a queen, but a nun and a hospital servant: what angered them most was to see her running to the common houses where the poor were received, dressing their wounds, gathering the wretched around her, and staying more willingly with them than in the circle of the princesses of the blood and other most considerable ladies of the kingdom. The King sometimes listened willingly to these complaints, particularly because it often happened that, when he asked for her for dinner or supper, he was told that she was occupied with her exercises of piety; but she easily appeased him, pointing out to him that, the poor being the members of Jesus Christ, she could have no occupation more noble and more salutary than to procure relief for them. If it happened that he said some harsh word to her, he would immediately excuse himself and make satisfaction for it by giving her sums of money or other gifts for the relief of the poor. She acquired so much credit over his mind that she easily obtained from him the pardon of criminals condemned to death, and he himself attributed to her merits and the strength of her prayers all the good successes that came to him in peace and war.

Thus God made known, through a great miracle, how agreeable her conduct was to Him, and in what esteem one should hold her virtue. One day when she was walking after dinner in her garden, in the city of Péronne, the prisoners, who were not far from the castle, being informed that she was there, cried out so loudly to implore her assistance that she heard them. She immediately asked what it was; but the officers, who knew her kindness, fearing that she would ask for the deliverance of these wretches, told her a lie, and told her that it was a group of beggars waiting for alms in the vicinity of the palace: she believed them, and, having given enough to satisfy these supposed poor, she retired to her oratory. However, the prisoners, seeing no help and not believing they had been heard, implored the assistance of heaven through the merits of the Queen: that very evening their irons broke, their prison opened, and no one could prevent them from leaving. They came immediately to the palace to thank Her Majesty, who exhorted them to live well and had the grace that had been granted to them in heaven ratified on earth.

Saint Radegonde lived in this way for five or six years in the company of Clotaire, cherished by this monarch, and honored by all the good people in his entire kingdom: but this peace changed all of a sudden; for the king, having caused the death, for we know not what whim, of the prince of Thuringia, the only brother of our Saint, saw that it would be too painful for her to remain with him. He therefore permitted her to retire to a monastery, as she had long wished. The cause of this separation could only be very distressing and very painful to Radegonde: the love she had for her brother made her lament his death, so tragic and so unjust; and the love she had for her husband caused her, moreover, extreme pain, knowing that he was guilty of the murder of this prince, whom such a close alliance should have made extremely dear to him. But this sadness was somewhat softened by the thought that this accident was the cause of her freedom and gave her the opportunity to leave the court and the world to converse no more but with Jesus Christ. She first came to find Saint Médard, Bishop of Noyon, to be saint Médard Bishop of Noyon who consecrated Radegund as a deaconess. g him to give her the habit and to receive her into the number of the spouses of her Savior: but, as this prelate had difficulty in granting her request, because the Apostle does not permit persons bound by marriage to untie themselves, and also because the lords who were at Noyon pointed out to him that he could not, without offending the king, deprive him of his spouse; this courageous queen, who was assured of her husband's consent, entered the sacristy, cut her hair herself, put on a nun's habit, and, in this state, returned to the church, where, addressing the holy bishop, she said to him: "Know, blessed prelate, that if you give way to human respect and the fear of men, and delay in consecrating me, the sovereign Shepherd will demand an account of my soul from you." Saint Médard, admiring her constancy and resolution, and no longer doubting that such a generous undertaking was inspired by God, laid his hands upon her head and received her into the number of the deaconesses. After this consecration, she gave to the church of Noyon the habit in which she adorned herself on days of greatest solemnity, with precious stones and other ornaments of great price. She made similar gifts to several monasteries that she found on the road to Tours, thus stripping herself little by little of all things to imitate the poverty of Jesus Christ.

Devotion to the great Saint Martin, whom all of France honored at that time with a particular cult, led her to take the path to his sepulcher. She also enriched it with very precious gifts, and she spent a few days there in sentiments of extraordinary piety: for she was seen at the door of the church, sometimes with her face pressed against the ground, sometimes with her cheeks and eyes bathed in tears, and, if she advanced toward the sanctuary, it was with such respect and humility that one could not sufficiently admire her faith and fervor. From there, she went to Candes, where Saint Martin died; then to Chinon, where she led, for some time, a retired and religious life. Finally, she went to Saix, near Loudun, in Poitou. However, the king, touched by regret for having lost a wife of such great merit, resolved to make her return; the rumor even spread that he was coming to fetch her himself at Saix. Radegund, frightened, retreated into the church of Saint-Hil aire, in Poitiers City where the saint settled and lived as a recluse. Poitiers, and wrote to her husband to leave her her freedom. According to the prophecy of the blessed John, a recluse of Chinon, the fasts and prayers of our Saint obtained that God would change the heart of Clotaire. This prince even permitted her to build in Poitiers, according to her request, a monastery for women and a church with a college of priests to serve it (544-559). Such was the origin of the famous monastery of Sainte-Croix and the church of Sainte-Radegonde.

It required no less a pen than that of the learned and Venance Fortunat Poet and bishop who bore witness to the charity of Saint Airy. pious Venantius Fortunatus to describe the heroic actions of piety and mercy and the surprising austerities of this solitary queen since her retirement from the court. He says himself that one could not understand where she obtained the abundant and infinite alms that she distributed. As she was never without someone asking her for something, whether to help a sick person, to clothe a poor person, to ransom a captive, to deliver a prisoner, or to feed a widow or an orphan, so she was never without giving. She kept an open table every day for the poor: while she lived only on vegetables, she fed them richly, giving them good soup and well-seasoned meat. Twice a week, on Thursday and Saturday, she applied herself to the relief of infirm and sick women and girls, and it was a surprising thing to see her comb them, dress their wounds herself, and place her royal hands on their scabs and ringworm to work for their healing. When she had rendered them such a disgusting office of charity, if she saw that they had bad clothes, she had them changed and dressed them in brand new ones; then, having first washed her hands, she gave them water to wash and had them sit at her table, where she served them, standing and fasting, three kinds of dishes, not relying on anyone, neither to bring the plates, nor to cut the bread and meat, nor to give them drink. If there was among her troop of poor people someone crippled in their limbs, she carried the spoon or the morsel to their mouth. For Sundays, which are the days destined for divine worship, when the poor were assembled, she contented herself with offering them a drink once, and, leaving the rest to be done by one of her daughters, she withdrew to continue her prayers; after which she gave dinner to the ecclesiastics, whom she received with an honor proportionate to their dignity. The lepers, who were in great number at that time, did not cause her any horror. When they signaled their arrival, she sent to know how many they were, and, having had bowls, cups, and knives prepared for them in equal number, she had them enter secretly into a room destined to receive them. There, full of fervor, she washed their faces with hot water, she dressed their spoiled and infected wounds with her own hands, and, if they were women, she made no difficulty in embracing them and giving them the kiss of peace. Then, she had them eat, serving them herself what had been prepared for their nourishment. Finally, they did not leave without having received money and clothes from her truly royal munificence. She usually had only one daughter as a witness to such a marvelous action; for, as much as she felt an inclination to do good, so much did she have an aversion to the esteem and honor of men, which were capable of robbing her of the merit of her good works.

However, God often showed through miracles how much her charity was pleasing to Him, for, when she had blessed a vine leaf, which her daughters made her do under the pretext that they needed it, it was enough to heal a sick person given up by the doctors; and for an incurable wound, one applied this leaf to the ailment. When one had received a candle from her hand, nothing else was needed to chase away the most malignant fevers than to light it near those who were tormented by them; health followed her everywhere, and, when she came to visit the sick, the fruits and preserves she brought them were so salutary that one immediately saw their illness diminish.

Her severity toward herself equaled her gentleness and mercy toward her neighbor. Venantius Fortunatus informs us that, since she had been consecrated by Saint Medard, she made it a law never to eat meat, fish, fruit, or any other delicate thing, but only herbs and vegetables. She did not drink wine either, but only water and at most perry. The bread she ate was only of barley or rye; she ate it only four times a week during Lent, and at that time, she ground the grain herself from which this bread was made. She also applied herself, in a spirit of religion, to shaping the wax that was to serve for the altar and to baking the hosts that were to be used for the oblation and consecration at Mass.

When her convent was finished and she had assembled a numerous company of holy girls who wished to imitate her example, she set a day to enclose herself with them. There was so much eagerness to see her enter this blessed tomb, where she wished to die while still alive, that the streets and windows not being spacious enough to contain everyone, some were seen even on the roofs. She first gave an example of humility that has almost no equal; for although all sorts of reasons seemed to demand that she be the abbess of this new monastery, of which she was the founder and mother, she nevertheless never wished to take this title, but named another abbess, who was Agnes, a very holy nun to whom Fortunatus addresses several of his verses, whether to thank her for the eggs and milk she had sent him, or to present to her also flowers and fruits from her garden: the flowers for the decoration of her church, and the fruits for the consolation of her daughters. The holy Queen, having given her the title of superior, stripped herself in her hands of all that remained of her riches, and also submitted her own person to her, in order to live in perp etual Agnès First abbess of the monastery of Sainte-Croix. poverty, chastity, and obedience, which are the virtues from which the religious life draws its luster.

From the first year she was in this monastery, she spent Lent in incredible austerity; for, to exceed her previous rigors, she ate bread only on Sundays, and on other days she lived only on mallows and raw roots, without oil or salt. She also drank only water, but in such small quantity that she was in a state of continual thirst, which she suffered with joy in honor of the thirst that Our Lord endured for us on the tree of the cross.

VIES DES SAINTS. — TOME IX.

During other Lents, the only softening she allowed herself was to taste bread on Thursdays and Sundays. For the rest of the year, she relaxed some of this great rigor; but if one excepts the octaves of Easter and solemn feasts, her fasting was continuous. The bed where she slept was meant more to torment her than to give her rest. Being a nun, she had no other mattress than a little ash covered with a hairshirt. Her sleep lasted hardly more than an hour. She was always the first in the choir to sing the praises of God, and was the last to leave, after a long prayer that continually inflamed her with a new fire of divine love. The hairshirt was her ordinary garment, and when she had worn out the one that the blessed John of Chinon sent her, she always managed to procure others, which she wanted to be of the prickliest kind. But, not content with the pain caused by this rough garment, she further afflicted her delicate body with chains and belts with iron spikes that she tightened so strongly on her skin that they often caused her great wounds. It even happened once that one of these chains having sunk deep and the flesh having grown over it, she had to have an incision made around her body to pull it out, which caused her to shed much blood and endure extreme pain. Her fervor led her to a much more surprising penance, which we do not propose as a model to be imitated, but as a subject of astonishment and admiration. Having had a copper plate made on which the image of Our Lord and the instruments of his Passion were engraved, she put it in the fire, and, when it was all red, she pressed it onto her body in two different places, thus making herself suffer what the tyrants, in the first centuries, made the martyrs suffer. Another time, in Lent, her ardor for suffering being unable to be satisfied by the severity of her abstinence and fasting, nor by the intolerable thirst that burned her tongue, nor by the pricks she received from the hog bristles with which her flesh was bristled, nor by the wounds that her spiked chains made, she undertook to roast her body, so as not to be exempt in this life from the pain of fire. She therefore had a brazier full of burning coals brought to her, and, having thrown out the coals, she applied the burning copper to her limbs: the horror of such a torture made one shudder. Large holes were made in it, the burning of which she endured with invincible patience, without bothering to soothe it with remedies; and, if the corruption that set into these new wounds and which caused blood and pus to flow from them in abundance had not forced her to uncover them, one would never have known anything of such a terrible mortification.

We do not doubt that the reader will be seized with astonishment upon seeing such a great queen treat herself in such a severe, or, to put it better, such a cruel and inhuman manner: but he will be no less astonished when he considers the practices of humility to which she lowered herself to make herself the last of all the sisters: she swept the monastery in her turn, she carried wood to the kitchen and stoked the fire there, sometimes taking pleasure in letting herself be burned; she also did her week there like the other nuns, during which, not wanting to be relieved, neither by the sisters nor by the servants, she washed the herbs herself, put the pot on the fire, prepared the soups, served the vegetables she had prepared out of obedience, cleaned the dishes, and did not shrink from even viler offices. The great Venantius Fortunatus does not blush to say that she often cleaned and greased the shoes of her sisters, and that she took it as her perpetual office to keep the most filthy places of the convent clean. He adds that she was like the perpetual nurse, not content with assisting the sick in her turn, but rendering them the most painful services at all times: which she did while fasting, without ever complaining and with a smiling face that marked the satisfaction she took in such humiliating tasks.

The richer she had been in the world, the poorer she wanted to be in the cloister, in imitation of her sovereign Master who, being infinitely rich in eternity, made himself poor in time for our love. The same Fortunatus and the virgin Baudonivia, who gave us her life, both remark that she took such heart in the virtue that she willingly wore only vile and worn-out clothes and that she sometimes used old scraps to make the garments she needed. Her purity was admirable; she had been so detached from all the pleasures of the flesh and she possessed chastity to such an excellent degree that there are few virgins whose spirit and heart are as pure as hers. One saw in her a concert of all the other virtues, we mean: gentleness, modesty, simplicity, patience, joy in adversities, prudence, assiduity in prayer and other practices of devotion, and zeal for the glory of God. As she slept little, she was always occupied with divine things. After the contemplation of our mysteries, the reading of the Holy Scriptures was her element and her life; the sisters took pleasure in helping her in this exercise, and they often experienced that if her body, exhausted by vigils and work, let itself fall into sleep, her heart remained always awake, following this word of the Bride: "I sleep and my heart watches," since, when they interrupted their reading, she immediately begged them to continue it. The love she bore to these new plants that composed her community was admirable; she often said to them: "You are my dear daughters, you are my light, my rest, my happiness, and my life; let us work so diligently in this world that we may receive the eternal reward in the other; let us seek God in the simplicity of our heart, let us serve him with faith, with confidence, and with fear; let us love him with all our strength and all the affections of our soul; finally, let us behave in such a way that we may say to him on the day of his judgment: Render to us, Lord, what you have promised us, because we have done what you have commanded us." Often also she explained to them with much light and unction the words of the psalms or the gospels that had been read, which was of great profit to all this congregation of brides of Jesus Christ.

Since then, the holy Queen, wishing to enrich her church with some holy relics, sent the priest Réovale to Jerusalem to obtain from the patriarch a portion of the remains of the blessed martyr Saint Mamas. The patriarch received her envoy with honor; but, so as not to do anything without being assured of God's will, before dismembering the holy body, he ordered a public prayer in his church. After three days, he celebrated Mass, and, accompanied by a large assembly, he raised his voice and said to him, in perfect confidence: "I beseech you, blessed Confessor and Martyr of Jesus Christ, if Radegund, who has sent to us, is a true servant of Our Lord, to make it known to us by some external sign, and to find it good that we give her a portion of your relics as she wishes and as she has asked us to do." All the people answered Amen. At the same time, he had the reliquary where this precious treasure was enclosed opened, and, approaching his hand to each limb, he asked the Saint within himself which one he wished to give. He thus touched all the fingers of the right hand; but, when he reached the little finger, he had barely touched it when it detached without difficulty; which showed the merit of the blessed queen, and that God granted her this finger of his Martyr. It was brought to Poitiers with suitable devotion and solemnity, while continually singing divine praises. Radegund, for her part, received it with an inexpressible piety, and, in thanksgiving, she spent the following seven days with her daughters in fasting and continuous prayers.

Her devotion not yet satisfied, she wished to have a portion of the wood of the True Cross; but as it was necessary to send to Emperor Justin the Younger for this, and not believin g she should do so wit bois de la vraie Croix The cross upon which Jesus Christ was crucified, the central object of the feast. hout the consent of the king, who was then, for Poitou, Sig ebert I, one of Justin le jeune Byzantine emperor who ordered the translation of the relics of Nilus. the children of Clotaire, her husband, she wrote to him and begged him to find it good that, for the salvation of all France and the prosperity of his kingdom, she might procure from the emperor the inestimable treasure of the Savior's cross. The king highly praised her zeal and gave her all the permissions she wished for this. Thus, having chosen persons of singular prudence and piety, she sent them to Constantinople to the emperor to represent her desire and to beg him not to refuse France a portion of this wood which had been on Calvary for the salvation of the whole world. This prince, who could not be unaware of her merit, as much because of her great reputation and that of the late King Clotaire I, her husband, as because some of her relatives, after the ruin of the kingdom of Thuringia, had taken refuge in Constantinople, liberally granted her what she asked. Empress Sophia, a very pious princess, contributed not a little to resolving him to act in this way. Thus, he sent to Radegund a piece of the True Cross, enriched with gold and precious stones, with many other relics of the Saints, and a book of the Gospels covered in gold and adorned with several precious stones. We noted, on the day of the Invention of the Holy Cross, that, in the distribution of this sacred wood that took place in Jerusalem to save it from the power of the Barbarians, three pieces had been brought to Constantinople, in addition to a piece that was given in particular to the emperor who reigned then. It must be believed that the one Justin sent to Saint Radegund was one of these four pieces, or, if you wish, a portion of one of the four, since it may be that four pieces had been cut into several parcels. The joy of the blessed Queen, upon receiving this piece of the True Cross, the first to have been brought to France, was incredible. She did not doubt that God had a particular love for her, since He shared with her this wood, which was the instrument of the salvation of the entire human race. She added to it other holy remains that she had sent to be sought throughout the Orient, and, when reliquaries had been prepared to place them with honor, she asked the bishop of Poitiers, Meroveus, to perform the ceremony of the translation. But this prelate, who, for we know not what whim, did not have for her and her daughters the same affection that Saint Pient, his predecessor, had had, refused to do so; and, instead of rendering this duty to these august relics, he went off to his country house. Saint Radegund, unable to suffer this contempt, wrote about it to the king, who ordered Saint Euphronius, archbishop of Tours, to travel to Poitiers and give the holy Queen the satisfaction she desired. Saint Euphronius did so, and placed the relics in the church of her monastery, which changed the name of Saint Mary, which it bore previously, to that of the Holy Cross. Saint Gregory of Tours describes this whole event in his History of the Franks, Book IX, Chapter XI.

Furthermore, God showed, through great miracles, the authenticity of the holy relic; the nun Baudonivia, who was present, assures that, by its virtue, the blind recovered their sight; the deaf, their hearing; the mute, their speech; the lame, the use of their legs; and all kinds of sick people, perfect health; thus everyone blessed the queen, who had procured for Poitiers a source of so many goods. As she knew how one must behave with great princes, she sent the priest Réovale again, with an honorable company of clerics and laymen, to the emperor, to thank him for the rich gifts with which he had favored her. On the return, their vessel was tossed for forty days by such a furious storm that they believed themselves at every moment about to be shipwrecked. The sailors protested they had never seen the like, and made them lose all hope. When they expected nothing but to be swallowed up, they had the inspiration to recommend themselves to our Saint. They cried out then: "O most pious Queen Radegund, who have compassion on all those who have recourse to you, assist us in such a pressing danger, where we are only for having obeyed you, and do not suffer us to perish in the waves of this merciless element." They had no sooner finished these words than a dove, appearing on their vessel, flew three times all around, as if to honor the mystery of the most Holy Trinity; at that very hour, the storm ceased; and calm having succeeded it, the vessel was out of all peril. Baudonivia says that this miracle was performed by means of three feathers of this dove, which one of the passengers devoutly plunged into the sea, and which were since distributed to various churches: we have had notice from Poitiers that they are not in the abbey of the Holy Cross.

Besides this zeal of Saint Radegund to enrich her church with precious relics, she took care to procure for it the benevolence and protection of the kings of France, her stepsons, and of the bishops of the neighboring provinces. She wrote for this to one and all, and she always obtained favorable responses. She wrote to a council assembled at Tours, where were the glorious bishops Euphronius of Tours, Praetextatus of Rouen, Germanus of Paris, Felix of Nantes, Domitian of Angers, and Domnolus of Le Mans, who wrote in her favor a very beautiful letter that Gregory of Tours has given us in its entirety, in Book V of his History, Chap. XXXIX. Moreover, she spared nothing to maintain or restore peace between the four children of her husband: Charibert, Chilperic, Sigebert, and Gontran, who each reigned over a quarter of the Frankish empire, and who often had great disputes among themselves. She also applied herself to a host of good works for the glory of God, for the relief of the provinces, for the assistance of the poor, for the help of the churches, and for the ruin of impiety and all kinds of vices, often employing in these negotiations of charity the great Venantius Fortunatus, one of the first men of his century. Indeed, he himself testifies that he had made many journeys to the kings of France and the holy bishops, by her order, and that he had traveled, for her service, the provinces that are watered by the Meuse, the Moselle, the Aisne, and the Seine. We have many letters in verse that he wrote to her, or that he wrote in her honor, and even some where he takes her name and makes her speak herself. He composed, to satisfy her devotion toward the Cross, those admirable hymns that the Church sings in the week of the Passion and in the solemnities of the Invention and the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, which begin with these verses: Vexilla regis prodeunt. — Pange lingua gloriosi. — Lustris sex qui iam peractis.

After so many brilliant actions, Our Lord, wishing to reward the faith and labors of His servant, let her know in a visit that the time of her deliverance was near. He appeared to her in the form of a young man of incomparable beauty, who wished to offer her some holy and innocent civilities. She repelled him without recognizing him; but he said to her: "How is it, Radegund, that you repel me, you who have such a desire to possess me, who seek me with so many tears and sighs, and who exercise such rigors upon your body to make yourself more worthy of me? Know that you will be one of the richest precious stones of my diadem." It is said that he then had his foot on a stone and that he imprinted it so strongly upon it, that the mark remained there. One still showed, in the time of Father Giry, that is to say in the 18th century, this stone with this sacred vestige, which was called the Pas-Dieu: it was there that the rector of the University came every year to deliver a harangue to the abbess of Sainte-Croix. Our Saint saw well that her Beloved wished to call her to Him. She prepared herself for this final hour with all the fervor that one can conceive in a soul that lives only for heaven. Having fallen ill, she had the sacraments administered to her, which she received in a very pious and very edifying manner. Her daughters all fell into tears, and one cannot even read the account that Baudonivia gives of their groans and complaints without being moved to weep. Indeed, they were losing a lady who had protected them with her authority, a mother who had raised them with marvelous charity and tenderness, and a Saint who had edified them by an infinity of good examples. But she consoled them herself and encouraged them to vigorous perseverance. Finally, she happily rendered her soul to God under the reign of Clotaire II, son of Chilperic, and grandson of Clotaire I, her husband, on August 13, 587.

The Bishop of Poitiers, Merovech, was then away from the city, and there was no appearance that he would return in time to render her the final duties. They therefore went promptly to Tours to pray to Saint Gregory, who was then archbishop, to come as soon as possible to bury her. He says saint Grégoire Historian and bishop, primary source for the narrative. himself in his book on the Glory of the Confessors, ch. CVI, that he found her in the coffin with a face so beautiful and so radiant that it surpassed the beauty of roses and lilies; that two hundred nuns surrounded her, most of whom were from the first houses of the kingdom, and some even princesses of the blood and daughters of kings; that their cries and lamentations were extreme, and that it seemed that they had lost everything in losing this excellent mother. He could not help but mingle his tears with theirs: however, he did what he could to console them, and, as the place where the Saint had wished to be buried was not yet blessed, he presumed upon the kindness of the diocesan bishop and blessed it. After which, he had her holy body carried and buried it there with much solemnity amidst the sighs and groans of the whole city. Several great miracles were performed at her sepulcher even before it was covered and closed: for Saint Gregory had this deference for the bishop of the place, to leave it uncovered, so that he would have the honor of completing such an august ceremony. Abbot Abbon was cured there of a toothache that had brought him to the brink of death. A blind man recovered his sight there, and two possessed women were delivered from the power of the demon.

## CULT AND RELICS.

The body of Saint Radegund, buried in the church she had built outside the city walls and in the land adjoining the monastery of Sainte-Croix, was found intact in 1412. During the Norman invasions, around the middle of the 10th century, the entrance to the vault was walled up and the tomb ceased to be visited. In 1612, it was rediscovered by the abbess of Sainte-Croix, Béliarde. Upon the opening of the tomb in 1412 by Simon de Cramaud, Bishop of Poitiers, at the request of John, Duke of Berry, Count of Poitou, this prince obtained one of the Saint's rings, that of a wife; as for that of a nun, he could not have it, the Saint's hand having withdrawn of its own accord. In 1562, the Calvinists burned the Saint's body in the nave of the collegiate church of Poitiers and seized the vermilion crown and the gold ring. Catholics, mixed in with the devastators, managed with great difficulty to save some bones which were handed over to the Canons, who had them verified. They were enclosed in a lead casket (1565) and placed in the tomb, the fragments of which were brought together and added as they are seen today.

In 1569, a battle took place on the plains of Montcontour and near the town of Airvault; in 1885, a peasant discovered in the same battlefield a gold ring that had belonged to Saint Radegund. On the bezel of the ring shines the name of the queen formed of Latin letters intertwined and cast into one another (the U has been replaced by a V): RADEGNDIS. Below the inscription is a small Greek cross such as one finds on the obverse of coins of the first and second race. This ring must be the one that Saint Medard had blessed for Radegund when she received the veil and the hairshirt from the hands of the holy Pontiff in Soissons. It is known that this queen wore two rings at the same time, that of a wife and that of a nun, as was noted in 1412 at the opening of her tomb. The ring of which we have just spoken was sold for fifty francs to a goldsmith in Airvault, from where it unfortunately passed into the hands of Mr. Fillon de Fontenay, who keeps it as a simple amateur, jealous of an object he knows very well to be very authentic, and which he only wants to keep so as not to fuel the superstition of the nuns on his own initiative.

In 1792, the monastery of Sainte-Croix was invaded by the revolutionaries who demanded everything of value; the nuns finally obtained permission to keep the relics of their holy foundress. This is how they preserved a considerable portion of the skull, an arm bone nine and a half centimeters long, from which a length of an inch and a half was removed to be distributed in fragments to various parishes. The portion of the skull has since been enclosed in an oval-shaped silver box and sealed with the bishop's seal after verification; the arm bone is kept in a very clean reliquary. A small piece of the shroud, which still shows the trace of fire, has been added to this relic, as well as a lock of beautiful blonde hair which, according to tradition, belonged to the Saint. The nuns of Sainte-Croix, who, dispersed by the Revolution, reunited in 1808 and cloistered themselves again in 1837, still possess a copper cross of Greek shape: it was, it is said, an instrument of piety and mortification for Saint Radegund; today it is an instrument of miraculous healing. The buildings of the monastery of Sainte-Croix have been sold; part serves as a bishop's palace, the church is demolished. The nuns live in the deanery of Saint-Pierre. As for the church where Saint Radegund was buried, rebuilt several times, it is still standing. The Saint's tomb is in the sanctuary, where pilgrims pray at every hour of the day. Thus, miracles continue there.

The Church of Poitiers celebrates the feast of Saint Radegund on August 13, under the double rite of the first class for the city of Poitiers, of which she is the patroness, and under the double rite of the second class for the diocese, with an octave.

At Saint-Vandrille, canton of Caudebec, arrondissement of Yvetot, Saint Radegund is honored with a very special cult. All year round, a pilgrimage is made to the church of Saint-Vandrille in honor of this crowned Saint. But it is especially on the Fridays of the month of May that pilgrims abound; they have a gospel read at the church to Saint Radegund and all the Saints, then they go to bathe at the fountain of Caillouville, where the image of the Saint is still found in the midst of several others.

Saint Radegund is honored as the second patroness of Grenois and Perroy, in the diocese of Nevers. This last parish possesses a portion of the Saint's relics. In the parish of Pazy, there is a fountain that bears her name and to which the sick go in devotion.

Saint Radegund is also the object of a very special cult in the diocese of Soissons. The church of Missy-Sainte-Radegonde (Missiacum or Miciacum ad sanctam Radegundim), also called Missy-sur-Aine, consecrated under the name of the pious queen, possesses one of her relics, which was given to it by John, Duke of Berry, Count of Poitou and governor of the Île-de-France, at the request of the Archbishop of Reims. This relic, provided with its authentic documents, was still preserved in 1563 in a gilded wooden hand held by two angels. The pilgrimage, opened each year on Easter Day, is closed on the fourth Sunday following by a solemn procession to which a very large number of pilgrims usually come. Saint Radegund is invoked particularly for the healing of scabies, leprosy, and ulcers. Those who are afflicted with these kinds of ailments have the devotion of washing themselves in the water of the fountain of Sainte-Radegonde. Their faith has been rewarded more than once by true miracles.

The cult of Saint Radegund, which has spread from one end of Europe to the other, is quite widespread in the Santerre, the eastern part of Picardy, because this holy queen was raised there and spent eight years of her life there.

The hospital that has just been rebuilt in Athies and which has about five thousand livres of income is a transformation of the old royal house inhabited by Saint Radegund.

The side portal of the church, classified as a historical monument, dates from the 13th century and offers remarkable sculptures from that religious era. It is in the process of restoration and will be dedicated to Saint Radegund, whose main acts of charity will be rediscovered on a medallion placed at the top of the pediment. Father Courtin, parish priest, chose the holy queen as patroness of the Mutual Aid society of which he is the head, for the workers of the local sugar beet factories.

The village of Sainte-Radegonde is one of the fifteen communes in France that bear the name of this Saint. It is two kilometers from Péronne and fifty-two from Amiens. Its population is three hundred and seventy-four inhabitants; its church was formerly on one of the ditches of the advanced works of Péronne; but it was destroyed in 1536, during the siege that this valiant city forced the imperial forces to lift; it was transported, by order of Louis XIII, into the fields at a suitable distance from the fortifications, in a place where, according to pious traditions cited by a contemporary ecclesiastic who is an authority in archaeology and history, the young princess had fixed a goal and a station for her frequent walks in the vicinity of Péronne and had had an oratory built. It contains two rather old and rather curious paintings whose subject has not yet been precisely determined, an old statue of the Saint in semi-religious and semi-royal costume, and a modern painting by a local painter, representing her in the exercise of works of charity. In addition, a reliquary contains one of the arms of Saint Radegund; it was saved during the dark days of the Terror from revolutionary desecration by a pious family of this village, one of whose members we know is still alive, who has transmitted to us some of these precious details. Before '95, people went on pilgrimage to this church to invoke the royal Saint there specifically, and to ask God, through her intercession and the touching of her relics, for the healing of scrofula and various skin diseases, as attested by an inscription recorded on a section of the wall of the chapel which is particularly dedicated to her, in addition to the whole church.

Cartigny, seven kilometers from Péronne and fifty-five from Amiens, populated by eight hundred and sixty-three inhabitants, is under the invocation of Saint Radegund; to the right of the choir is her chapel in which is her statue which represents her dressed as an abbess of Sainte-Croix of Poitiers.

The name of Saint Radegund is also that of Drioncourt, seven kilometers from Péronne, eight from Roisel, the chief town of the canton, and fifty-seven from Amiens, and whose population is four hundred and thirty-nine inhabitants.

In Amiens, in the enclosure of the old abbey of Saint-Jean, Premonstratensian Order, towards the Hautoye, a fountain bears, as does an island of the Somme, the name of Sainte-Aragone, by corruption of Sainte-Radegonde. The sick drank water from this spring in the hope of being cured of their ailments. When the abbey church was rebuilt in the city, a chapel of Saint Radegund was placed against the choir grille.

To complete this biography, we have used the History of Saint Radegund, by Mr. Édouard de Fleury; the Saints of the Church of Poitiers, by Father Auber; the Lives of the Saints of Poitou, by Ch. de Chergé; the Annals of the diocese of Soissons, by Father Pocheur; the Hagiology of Nivernais, by Mgr Cromier; the Churches of the arrondissement of Yvetot, by Father Cocket; and especially local Notes provided by Messrs. Congnet, of the chapter of Soissons, A. Gore, correspondent of the Ministry of Public Instruction, Fine Arts, etc., and Auber, historiographer of the diocese of Poitiers.