nuns at Argenteuil, not far from Paris,
where she herself had been brought up and educated as a young girl.
I had them make ready for her all the garments of a nun, suitable
for the life of a convent, excepting only the veil, and these I
bade her put on.

When her uncle and his kinsmen heard of this, they were convinced
that now I had completely played them false and had rid myself
forever of Heloise by forcing her to become a nun. Violently
incensed, they laid a plot against me, and one night, while I, all
unsuspecting, was asleep in a secret room in my lodgings, they
broke in with the help of one of my servants, whom they had bribed.
There they had vengeance on me with a most cruel and most shameful
punishment, such as astounded the whole world, for they cut off
those parts of my body with which I had done that which was the
cause of their sorrow. This done, straightway they fled, but two of
them were captured, and suffered the loss of their eyes and their
genital organs. One of these two was the aforesaid servant, who,
even while he was still in my service, had been led by his avarice
to betray me.

CHAPTER VIII

OF THE SUFFERING OF HIS BODY--OF HOW HE BECAME A MONK IN THE
MONASTERY OF ST. DENIS AND HELOISE A NUN AT ARGENTEUIL

When morning came the whole city was assembled before my dwelling.
It is difficult, nay, impossible, for words of mine to describe the
amazement which bewildered them, the lamentations they uttered, the
uproar with which they harassed me, or the grief with which they
increased my own suffering. Chiefly the clerics, and above all my
scholars, tortured me with their intolerable lamentations and
outcries, so that I suffered more intensely from their compassion
than from the pain of my wound. In truth I felt the disgrace more
than the hurt to my body, and was more afflicted with shame than
with pain. My incessant thought was of the renown in which I had so
much delighted, now brought low, nay, utterly blotted out, so
swiftly by an evil chance. I saw, too, how justly God had punished
me in that very part of my body whereby I had sinned. I perceived
that there was indeed justice in my betrayal by him whom I had
myself already betrayed; and then I thought how eagerly my rivals
would seize upon this manifestation of justice, how this disgrace
would bring bitter and enduring grief to my kindred and my friends,
and how the tale of this amazing outrage would spread to the very
ends of the ear