what class of churchmen these personages are chosen, for there is a mystery attending their origin, and the circumstance of their being stationed in these convents, which Rome does not suffer to be penetrated: I have heard it said that they are men of great note, and perhaps, of too high ambition in the Catholic Hierarchy, who, having fallen under the grave censure of the Church, are banished for fixed periods to these distant monasteries. I believe that the term during which they are condemned to remain in the Holy Land, is from eight to twelve years. By the natives of the country, as well as by the rest of the brethren, they are looked upon as superior beings; and rightly too, for nature seems to have crowned them in her own true way.
The chief of the Jerusalem convent was a noble creature; his worldly and spiritual authority seemed to have surrounded him, as it were, with a kind of "Court," and the manly gracefulness of his bearing did honor to the throne which he filled. There were no lords of the bedchamber, and no gold sticks and stones in waiting, yet everybody who approached him looked as though he were being "presented"—every interview which he granted wore the air of an "audience;" the brethren, as often as they came near, bowed low, and kissed his hand, and if he went out, the Catholics of the place that hovered about the convent, would crowd around him with devout affection, and almost scramble for the blessing which his touch could give. He bore his honors all serenely, as though calmly conscious of his power to "bind and to loose."
