The years of his struggle with the monks of St. Gildas were not without their periods of relief. In the midst of his selfish preoccupation with his own tribulations his thoughts were distracted by solicitude for Héloïse. Héloïse, in the nunnery of Argenteuil, had led a life so exemplary that she had won universal esteem. But it happened, says Abélard, "that the Abbot of Saint-Denis had claimed, as a dependency formerly subject to his jurisdiction, the Abbey of Argenteuil, in which my sister in Christ, rather than my spouse, had taken the veil. Having obtained possession, he expelled the congregation of nuns, of whom my companion was prioress." When this happened Abélard bestirred himself to provide for Héloïse and her nuns, and at the same time to provide for the maintenance of religious services in his old temple of the Paraclete. He returned thither, and invited the nuns to come. He donated to them the oratory and its dependencies, and Pope Innocent II. confirmed the donation to them and to their successors forever. For some time Héloïse and her nuns endured great privations, for the Paraclete, after its abandonment by Abélard, had relapsed into the condition of a wilderness; "but," continues Abélard, "for them, too, the Lord, showing himself in very truth the Comforter, touched with pity and good-will the hearts of the people in the neighborhood. In one single year... the fruits of the earth multiplied around them more than I could have made them do had I lived a century... The Lord granted that our dear sister, who directed the community, should find favor in the eyes of all men: bishops cherished her as their daughter, abbots as their sister, laymen as their mother; all admired equally her piety, her wisdom, and her incomparably sweet patience." It has been doubted by some biographers whether Héloïse ever saw her lover after she took the veil. His language in the passage just quoted as well as that in the following would seem to leave no room for doubt that they met frequently at this time: "All their neighbors blamed me for not doing all that I could, all that I ought, to help them in their misery, when the thing would have been so easy for me to do, by preaching. Accordingly I made them more frequent visits, in order to work for their good." The voice of calumny, he continues, would not even yet be still; but, in spite of evil tongues, "I was resolved to do my best to take care of my sisters of the Paraclete, to administer their affairs for them, to increase their respect by my very bodily presence in such a way as to give me, at the same time, a better opportunity to look out for their wants." When or how often he visited the Paraclete we do not know; but in some of these visits Héloïse and Abélard must have met again.