This was the reason that Madame Eglentyne got into the register.  In the Middle Ages all the nunneries of England, and a great many of the monasteries, used to be visited at intervals by the bishop of their diocese—­or by somebody sent by him—­in order to see whether they were behaving properly.  It was rather like the periodical visitation of a school by one of Her Majesty’s inspectors, only what happened was very different.  When Her Majesty’s inspector comes he does not sit in state in the hall, and call all the inmates in front of him one after another, from the head mistress to the smallest child in the first form, and invite them to say in what way they think the school is not being properly run, and what complaints they have to make against their mistresses and which girl habitually breaks the rules—­all breathed softly and privately into his ear, with no one to overhear them.  But when the bishop came to visit a nunnery, that is precisely what happened.  First of all, he sent a letter to say he was coming, and to bid the nuns prepare for him.  Then he came, with his clerks and a learned official or two, and was met solemnly by the prioress and all the nuns, and preached a sermon in their church, and was entertained, perhaps, to dinner.  And then he prepared to examine them, and one by one they came before him, in order of rank, beginning with the prioress, and what they had to do was to tell tales about each other.  He wanted to find out if the prioress were ruling well, and if the services were properly performed, and if the finances were in good order, and if discipline were maintained; and if any nun had a complaint, then was the time to make it.

And the nuns were full of complaints.  A modern schoolgirl would go pale with horror over their capacity for tale-bearing.  If one nun had boxed her sister’s ears, if another had cut church, if another were too much given to entertaining friends, if another went out without a licence, if another had run away with a wandering fluteplayer, the bishop was sure to hear about it; that is, unless the whole convent were in a disorderly state, and the nuns had made a compact to wink at each other’s peccadilloes; and not to betray them to the bishop, which occasionally happened.  And if the prioress were at all unpopular he was quite certain to hear all about her.  ’She fares splendidly in her own room and never invites us,’ says one nun; ‘She has favourites,’ says another, ’and when she makes corrections she passes lightly over those whom she likes, and speedily punishes those whom she dislikes’; ’She is a fearful scold,’ says a third; ’She dresses more like a secular person than a nun, and wears rings and necklaces,’ says a fourth; ’She goes out riding to see her friends far too often,’ says a fifth; ’She-is-a-very-bad-business-woman-and-sh
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