¹ The blessed virgin Osmanna, sprung from an illustrious and royal stock of the Irish, believed in the Lord’s commandments with a silent heart from childhood; and, proven like choice gold, when her parents — being pagans — compelled her not to believe the Christians, she stubbornly resisted, saying: “Why, senseless people, do you compel me — a worshipper of God — to bow my head to your mute idols, which can neither harm nor help, and bid me practise profane rites?” Hearing this, her parents were amazed, and said one to another: “What shall we say of her, now so utterly opposed to our faith?” And when at last they saw that the blessed virgin would not be separated from the way of truth, they wished to give her in marriage to a certain nobleman, that she might give herself to joy and hold the Christians in hatred. She, perceiving this, left her parents and her country and, taking her maid named Aclitenis with her, crossed the sea into a forest beside the river Loire, remote from human habitation, and made a little house of leaves and boughs, and took the roots of herbs and the leaves for food, and made herself clothes of rushes and longer herbs.

² After this, when a certain huntsman of the bishop was pursuing a boar with a multitude of dogs, the boar came to blessed Osmanna’s dwelling and prostrated itself at her feet as though begging for mercy. And when the huntsman, coming up, wished to kill it with his knife, no blade of a sword could penetrate its hide. Seeing this, he went to the bishop and, declaring that he had been deluded by the virgin’s magic art, hastened to relate all that he had seen.

³ As the bishop went there with a great throng, the holy virgin was found by them praying, prostrate before the Lord. And when they saw her detesting all sorcery and the worship of idols and casting insults upon the unbelieving people, the bishop addressed her thus: “I believe that you, O virgin, are above all obedient to God’s baptism and believe the Christians and the prophets without ceasing.” As soon as she heard this, she said that she desired nothing in the world more than baptism. Then the bishop, rejoicing at her answer, said: “Temple of God, Osmanna, to God and his angels and archangels and to all who love God you shall be a friend, receiving the laver of regeneration.” And when the holy virgin was being made a catechumen, a certain blind man received the light of his eyes. And the bishop entrusted to her a certain husbandman, who should build her a garden from which the virgin might have food to eat.

⁴ Seeing this, the devil appeared to the husbandman one morning, saying: “Man, what do you seek, or whom do you serve? What profit do you gain from your lady? If you will obey me, I will give you gold and silver and whatever your soul desires.” And he said: “If I knew these things to be true, I would obey you and believe you.” These things said, the tempter drew near and kissed the husbandman, praying that each would give faith to the other, and advising him to provoke his lady to anger by frequently casting insults at her. And so, when they had parted, kissing one another and saying that on the following day they would see each other by the spring flowing from it not far away and speak together again, as soon as the husbandman returned home, vexed by the evil spirit, he began to lose his sight. And when he could not see the sacred virgin as she wandered through the house, he began to cry out and say: “My lady, I have been deluded by a wicked man, and before your sight I confess that I have sinned grievously.” She, moved by pity, said to him: “Renounce the most evil dragon that goes about the world, seeking whom it may devour, that the Lord Jesus Christ may have mercy on you.” He answered: “Blessed virgin, I believe that by your merits and prayers I am to be freed from the wicked one.” Then she, pouring out prayers to God, restored him perfectly to health.

⁵ To a certain mute girl she restored speech, and to various infirmities she applied healing by her merits.

⁶ A son of the king of Spain, named Eclotomus, distributed to the poor the things that were needed, and loved Christ and all Christians from childhood. His mother Aphronisia, who was a pagan, seeing this, said to him: “If you worship Christ any more, you shall die by death before tomorrow.” He, hearing this, moved with anger, returned curse for curse to his mother, and for this at once lost his speech together with his sight. But his mother, from grief for her son, was so dismayed in mind that she turned to madness. Meanwhile a certain priest named Remigius, coming from the parts where Saint Osmanna dwelt, said to them: “If you were willing to do what I teach, I could be of help to you.” The king said to him: “If you can confer health on my wife and son, I shall make you bishop of my land, or at least a sharer in half my kingdom.” The priest answered: “If you are willing to go with your wife and son to the holy virgin Osmanna, through her mediation you shall rejoice in your former health restored to both.”

⁷ And so, as the king hastened with his wife and son and a great retinue to the virgin’s place and greeted her, the holy virgin said: “What do you seek?” And when they had said that they sought nothing but the health of those whom she saw tormented — as soon as this was said, health was restored both to the queen and to her son. Resplendent, then, with these and many other miracles, the blessed virgin Osmanna at last happily departed to Christ, on the fifth of the Ides of September.

A Story #

¹ A man of the Lord named Eutices — as Vincentius says — when the course of his life was run, breathed out his spirit amid the brethren standing around him. And when his disciples were preparing his funeral rites, he sat up alive, saying: “Thanks be to God. Know that in these forty years I do not remember having taken food on a single day unless I had first wept. But today, my grief lifted, God has comforted me and granted me a place of rest among the choirs of angels.” And saying this, he rested in peace.

² One night, when the herdsmen of the horses of Odo, the Cluniac abbot, had fallen asleep, and a certain brother remained awake in prayer, a thief came and, seizing a horse, mounted it and fled; but the same brother chose to lose the horse rather than break the silence. When morning came, they saw the thief from afar sitting upon the horse, stuck fast in one place. The herdsmen seized him and sent him bound to father Odo, who ordered five silver shillings to be given to him, saying that it would be unjust to dismiss him without a worthy wage, since he had endured much labour through the space of the whole night.