The Childhood of the Influential Women from the Past. Rupert Sargent Holland

which told her that though she was to lead a different life from her friends she must do her work among people and not alone in the wilderness, and bade her go home before her father and mother should think she was lost.

      When she had heard this counsel Catherine rose and went out of the cave. She looked back along the path by which she had come; it seemed a long way home to Siena and she felt tired and warm. She sat down on the bank of the brook and ate some of the bread she had brought with her and then fell asleep. When she woke she was rested, and jumping up hurried back to the road so that she might reach the gate by sunset. She came to the city walls in time to pass through the gate just before the guard closed it for the night, and went straight on to her father's house. Fortunately her parents had not been worried by her absence, supposing she had been spending the day at her sister's.

      Giacomo Benincasa and his wife Lapa had had thirteen children, and they did not suspect that their youngest daughter Catherine was in any way different from her sisters. They knew she was a very quiet girl, rather shy, fond of going to the great Cathedral on top of the hill and of talking with any nuns or friars whom she met. She was pretty, with long brown hair that many people admired, and they expected to marry her to the son of some one of their well-to-do friends. The other girls had all been married early, according to the Italian custom of those times, and Catherine was barely twelve years old when her father and mother began to consider what favorable marriage they might make for her. Her mother urged her to give more attention to her dress, to take more care in arranging her hair, to wear some jewelry she had bought for her, and to go about more with boys and girls of her own age. But Catherine did not want to do any of these things. She became more shy than ever, and when she met any of her father's young apprentices she turned and ran away as fast as she could. The mother knew that Catherine was devoted to her older sister Bonaventura, and begged her to try to persuade Catherine to do as other girls did. Bonaventura talked to her little sister, and finally Catherine agreed to wear brighter and more becoming dresses and to rub certain oils into her hair to give it a peculiar light golden color which was then considered more beautiful than the natural dark shade. But it was only a few weeks before Catherine decided that these changes were all vanity, and went back to her old quiet dresses and simple way of wearing her long hair.

      Now the good dyer and his wife realized that their little daughter was peculiar, and they went to Father Thomas della Fonte, a friar preacher who knew Catherine well, and begged him to talk to her. Father Thomas spent an afternoon with her, and to him the girl opened her heart and told of the vision she had seen and of her wish to become a sister of one of the religious orders of the church. He saw that her mind was set upon this wish, and did not try to dissuade her from it. "My dear daughter," he said, "I believe you have chosen the better part, and may our Lord give you grace to follow it. And now if you think well to follow my counsel, I would advise you to cut off your hair, which will prove to your parents that they must give up all hopes of your marriage, and will also save you the time that must needs be spent upon its care and adornment."

      Catherine decided to take his advice at once, and so that same evening she locked herself in her room and cut off all her hair. In order to hide what she had done she covered her head with a coif, which was sometimes worn by grown women but never by girls as young as she. Next morning at breakfast her mother saw the coif and stared at her. "Why have you that on your head?" she asked in surprise. Catherine murmured some answer which her mother could not understand. Madame Lapa stepped forward and seizing the white headdress pulled it off. She saw that Catherine's beautiful hair was gone, and she gave a cry of anger which brought the rest of the family into the room. They were all indignant, and her father and brothers spoke harshly to her. "Your will must be curbed," said Giacomo. "You shall not do whatever you wish, no matter how absurd it may be, and so bring scorn upon all of us. You must do as your sisters have done."

      Catherine appealed to her brothers. "I have no wish to anger any of you," she said. "I care nothing what you do with me, nor would I be a charge to any of you. I will live on bread and water and never ask anything better if only I may be let to live in peace without thought of other people."

      Giacomo, however, would not yield to what he considered her caprices. His wife and sons agreed that Catherine was both obstinate and foolish and must be taught to do as she was told. Giacomo said, "I know what's the cause of this trouble. You have too much time to spend on your knees in prayer and you go to your room and think of strange things when you should be with the others. Hereafter you shan't have any room of your own, and you shall do the housework to keep from dreaming all day long."

      His order was carried out. To show Catherine how little they thought of her fancies Madame Lapa dismissed the kitchen-maid, and Catherine was made to take her place and do all the household drudgery. Each of the family took every possible opportunity to reproach her for her obstinacy, and her father and mother talked to her by the hour at a time, seeking to bring her to what they considered a more sensible state of mind.

      Catherine went about the housework faithfully. During the day she would occasionally find a chance to rest for a time in her brother Stephen's room while he was away, and at night she would sleep wherever she could find a bed. Often she simply curled up in a chair in the living-room. Through all this hard treatment she was patient and uncomplaining, until finally her sweetness and constancy began to amaze her parents and lead them to believe that perhaps she was different from other girls and must be allowed to follow her own path. Once they had reached this conclusion Giacomo called the family together and told them that although he and his wife had hoped that Catherine would marry as her sisters had, they saw that she had set her heart on the life of a nun, and that henceforth she was to do as she wished.

      In that age hardship and privation were usually considered necessary to goodness. Catherine was so intent on meriting the virtue which her visions had seemed to predict for her that she allowed herself no comforts. More than that she made herself endure many hardships. She took for her room a small cell under her father's house, lighted by only one window. Her bed was made of a few planks with a log of wood for a pillow. Here she felt herself to be as much alone as though she were a hermit in the woods, and here she spent hours in meditation and in reciting long prayers. She wore rough clothes and she gradually trained herself to do with very little sleep and almost no food. She got to the point where she allowed herself only a half hour's sleep at a time and could live on a little bread, some raw herbs, and a cup of water. She had been very strong, but this severe way of living told greatly on her health.

      Her mother, however, was much disturbed at these hardships which Catherine insisted on imposing upon herself, and tried to win her to a more healthful life. She begged her to give up her hard wood bed and sleep with her. Catherine did not want to vex her by refusing, and agreed to this, but as soon as her mother was asleep she slipped out of bed and stole down-stairs to her own chamber. She was back again before her mother woke. After a night or two of this Madame Lapa discovered the ruse, and begged Catherine to stay in bed with her. Thereupon the girl arranged two pieces of wood under the sheet so that she would have to lie on them, thinking she would discipline herself in this way. It was evident that she would have her own will, and so at last her mother gave in. "Daughter," she said, "I see well it boots not for me to strive with you any longer. It is but time wasted. Go your way and rest at whatever times and in what manner you will."

      Catherine was so determined to imitate the early saints of the Church, who had in many cases seemed to win virtue by the pains they endured, that she now took to beating herself with rods and wearing a sharp-pointed chain underneath her dress. She did all these things in the hope that she might one day be considered worthy to join the order of Sisters of the Blessed Dominic.

      These new hardships were too much for her strength and she became ill. Her good mother, more disturbed than ever, insisted on taking her daughter to the baths of Vignone, which were famous for the healing effect of the sulphur in the water. On the very first day Catherine placed herself under the spout where the sulphurous water came scalding hot into the bath, and standing there suffered silently greater pains from the hot water than she had been able to inflict upon herself at home. Madame Benincasa, upbraiding her daughter for what seemed to her the sheerest madness, brought her back to Siena, and there Catherine, worn out and only a shadow of her former strong self, took to her bed for a time.

      While she was still