604 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



contemplating his " great and wonderful treasure, more precious 

 than all the gold in the world," when it struck him that the chest 

 in which the relics were contained was quite unworthy of its con- 

 tents ; and after vespers he gave orders to one of the sacristans to 

 take the measure of the chest in order that a more fitting shrine 

 might be constructed. The man, having lighted a wax candle 

 and raised the pall which covered the relics, in order to carry out 

 his master's orders, was astonished and terrified to observe that 

 the chest was covered with a blood-like exudation (loculum rnirum, 

 in modum humore sanguineo undique distillantem) , and at once 

 sent a message to Eginhard. 



Then I and those priests who accompanied me beheld this stupendous miracle, 

 worthy of all admiration. For just as when it is going to rain, pillars and slabs 

 and marble images exude moisture, and, as it were, sweat, so the chest which 

 contained the most sacred relics was found moist with the blood exuding on 

 all sides. (Cap. ii, 16.) 



Three days' fast was ordained in order that the meaning of the 

 portent might be ascertained. All that happened, however, was 

 that at the end of that time the " blood," which had been exuding 

 in drops all the while, dried up. Eginhard is careful to say that 

 the liquid " had a saline taste, something like that of tears, and 

 was thin as water, though of the color of true blood," and he 

 clearly thinks this satisfactory evidence that it was blood. 



The same night another servant had a vision, in which still 

 more imperative orders for the removal of the relics were given ; 

 and, from that time forth, " not a single night passed without one, 

 two, or even three of our companions receiving revelations in 

 dreams that the bodies of the saints were to be transferred from 

 that place to another." At last a priest, Hildfrid, saw, in a dream, 

 a venerable white-haired man in a priest's vestments, who bitterly 

 reproached Eginhard for not obeying the repeated orders of the 

 saints, and upon this the journey was commenced. Why Egin- 

 hard delayed obedience to these repeated visions so long does not 

 appear. He does not say so in so many words, but the general 

 tenor of the narrative leads one to suppose that Mulinheim (after- 

 ward Seligenstadt) is the " solitary place " in which he had built 

 the church which awaited dedication. In that case all the people 

 about him would know that he desired that the saints should go 

 there. If a glimmering of secular sense led him to be a little 

 suspicious about the real cause of the unanimity of the visionary 

 beings who manifested themselves to his entourage in favor of 

 moving on, he does not say so. 



At the end of the first day's journey the precioxis relics were 

 deposited in the church of St. Martin, in the village of Ostheim. 

 Hither a paralytic nun (sanctimonialis qucedam paralytica) of the 



