in a nunnery, which was devoured by a wolf.[20] curious how soon the mediæval clergy began to imitate their pagan predecessors in parodying religious subjects and forms, of which we have one or two very curious examples. Visits to purgatory, hell, and paradise, in body or spirit, were greatly in fashion during the earlier part of the middle ages, and afforded extremely good material for satire. In a metrical Latin story, preserved in a manuscript of the eleventh century, we are told how a "prophet," or visionary, went to Heriger, archbishop of Mayence from 912 to 926, and told him that he had been carried in a vision to the regions below, and described them as a place surrounded by thick woods. It was the Teutonic notion of hell, and indeed of all settlements of peoples; and Heriger replied with a sneer that he would send his herdsmen there with his lean swine to fatten them. Each "mark," or land of a family or clan, in the early Teutonic settlements, was surrounded by woodland, which was common to all members of the clan for fattening their swine and hunting. The false dreamer added, that he was afterwards carried to heaven, where he saw Christ sitting at the table and eating. John the Baptist was butler, and served excellent wine round to the saints, who were the Lord's guests. St. Peter was the chief cook. After some remarks on the appointments to these two offices, archbishop Heriger asked the informant how he was received in the heavenly hall, where he sat, and what he eat. He replied that he sat in a corner, and stole from the cooks a piece of liver, which he eat, and then departed. Instead of rewarding him for his information, Heriger took him on his own confession for the theft, and ordered him to be bound to a stake and flogged, which, for the offence, was rather a light punishment. [20] On the character of the nuns among the Anglo-Saxons, and indeed of the inmates of the monastic houses generally, I would refer my readers to the excellent and interesting volume by Mr. John Thrupp, "The Anglo-Saxon Home: a History of the Domestic Institutions and Customs of England from the fifth to the eleventh century." London, 1862. [21] These will be found in M. Edélestand du Méril's Poésies Populaires Latines antérieures au douzième siècle, pp. 275, 276. [22] This, and the metrical story next referred to, were printed in the "Altdeutsche Blätter," edited by Moriz Haupt and Heinrich Hoffmann, vol. i. pp. 390, 392, to whom I communicated them from a manuscript in the University Library at Cambridge. _Heriger illum jussit ad palum loris ligari, scopisque cedi, sermone duro hunc arguendo._