sumes the mark of innocence. And as Sire Robert was not learned in
such matters, he determined to take counsel with his priest.

Now one day when Catherine and Jeanne were at home spinning, they
beheld the Commander coming accompanied by the priest, Messire Jean
Fournier. They asked the mistress of the house to withdraw; and when
they were left alone with the damsel, Messire Jean Fournier put on
his stole and pronounced some Latin words which amounted to saying:
"If thou be evil, away with thee; if thou be good, draw nigh."[408]

[Footnote 408: _Trial_, vol. ii, p. 446.]

It was the ordinary formula of exorcism or, to be more exact, of
conjuration. In the opinion of Messire Jean Fournier these words,
accompanied by a few drops of holy water, would drive away devils, if
there should unhappily be any in the body of this village maiden.

Messire Jean Fournier was convinced that devils were possessed by an
uncontrollable desire to enter the bodies of men, and especially of
maidens, who sometimes swallowed them with their bread. They dwelt in
the mouth under the tongue, in the nostrils, or penetrated down the
throat into the stomach. In these various abodes their action was
violent; and their presence was discerned by the contortions and
howlings of the miserable victims who were possessed.

Pope St. Gregory, in his Dialogues, gives a striking example of the
facility with which devils insinuate themselves into women. He tells
how a nun, being in the garden, saw a lettuce which she thought looked
tender. She plucked it, and, neglecting to bless it by making the sign
of the cross, she ate of it and straightway fell possessed. A man of
God having drawn near unto her, the demon began to cry out: "It is I!
It is I who have done it! I was seated upon that lettuce. This woman
came and she swallowed me." But the prayers of the man of God drove
him out.[409]

[Footnote 409: Voragine, _La legende doree_, in the Festival of the
Exaltation of the Holy Cross.]

The caution required in such a matter was therefore not exaggerated by
Messire Jean Fournier. Possessed by the idea that the devil is subtle
and woman corrupt, carefully and according to prescribed rules he
proceeded to solve a difficult problem. It was generally no easy
matter to recognise one possessed by the devil and to distinguish
between a demoniac and a good Christian. Very great saints had not
been spared the trial to which Jeanne was to be subjected.

Having reci