the people. Adjoining the church were the cloisters of the monks and
the Episcopal School, the infant university of Paris, over which the
Archdeacon of Paris, William of Champeaux, presided in scholastic
dignity and pride,--next to the bishop the most influential man in
Paris. The teachers of this school, or masters and doctors as they were
called, and the priests of the cathedral formed the intellectual
aristocracy of the city, and they were frequent visitors at the house of
Fulbert the canon. His niece, as she was presumed to be, was the great
object of attraction. There never was a time when intellectual Frenchmen
have not bowed down to cultivated women. Heloise, though only a girl,
was a queen of such society as existed in the city, albeit more admired
by men than women,--poetical, imaginative, witty, ready, frank, with a
singular appreciation of intellectual excellence, dazzled by literary
fame, and looking up to those brilliant men who worshipped her.

In truth, Heloise was a prodigy. She was vastly superior to the men who
surrounded her, most of whom were pedants, or sophists, or bigots;
dignitaries indeed, but men who exalted the accidental and the external
over the real and the permanent; men who were fond of quibbles and
sophistries, jealous of each other and of their own reputation, dogmatic
and positive as priests are apt to be, and most positive on points which
either are of no consequence or cannot be solved. The soul of Heloise
panted for a greater intellectual freedom and a deeper sympathy than
these priests could give. She pined in society. She was isolated by her
own superiority,--superior not merely in the radiance of the soul, but
in the treasures of the mind. Nor could her companions comprehend her
greatness, even while they were fascinated by her presence. She dazzled
them by her personal beauty perhaps more than by her wit; for even
mediaeval priests could admire an expansive brow, a deep blue eye, _doux
et penetrant,_ a mouth varying with unconscious sarcasms, teeth strong
and regular, a neck long and flexible, and shoulders sloping and
gracefully moulded, over which fell ample and golden locks; while the
attitude, the complexion, the blush, the thrilling accent, and the
gracious smile, languor, and passion depicted on a face both pale and
animated, seduced the imagination and commanded homage. Venus Polyhymnia
stood confessed in all her charms, for the time triumphant over that
Venus Urania who m