Catherine, Called Birdy: August–September

Since I had no breakfast, the smells made my mouth water and my stomach rumble like an ox-cart on a rutty road.

2ND DAY OF AUGUST, Feast of Saint Sidwell, virgin, who died when her jealous stepmother incited the reapers to behead her

Sometimes I feel that she is the child and I the mother, as I bathe her face and sing her songs and cajole her into eating just a bit of this meat or that cheese.

I used to think the saddest sight in the world was an eagle I once saw in a baron’s hall, wings clipped, chained to a perch from which it kept falling, flapping piteously until someone righted it again.

Here at the fair is a dancing bear, moth-eaten and scrawny, anxious only to be taken home and fed and not prodded and pinched to do silly tricks for fair-goers.

I can be sly and crafty and false with my father and my suitors, but I fear to fool with God.

25TH DAY OF AUGUST, Feast of Saint Ebbe, an abbess who allowed her nuns to spend their time weaving fine clothes, adorning themselves like brides, and neglecting vigils and prayers.

I am dispirited, downcast, and dejected.

I am dispirited, downcast, and dejected.

I am surrounded by unfeeling dolts and idiots.

The villagers brought in the last sheaf with their usual merriment and the whole village joined us for a harvest supper in the hall.

William Steward told me of an abbey west of here whose abbess keeps a menagerie—lions and wolves and eagles.

28TH DAY OF AUGUST, Feast of Saint Augustine of Hippo, who was a rake and a drunkard before he was touched by God and became a saint and a writer of boring holy books

We gathered nuts today—walnuts, chestnuts, hazelnuts, looking especially for the double nuts that protect against rheumatism and the spells of witches.

I tucked a sprig of mugwort in my shoe so I should not tire on the journey and set off for York.

“We are slim and supple dancing girls from some Saracen court where we bewitch the sultan with our beauty. Or I will ask my sons the king, the pope, and Saint Peter to help us...” and she was off somewhere on her own, no longer Ethelfritha but some personage of her own making.

“We are slim and supple dancing girls from some Saracen court where we bewitch the sultan with our beauty. Or I will ask my sons the king, the pope, and Saint Peter to help us...” and she was off somewhere on her own, no longer Ethelfritha but some personage of her own making.

I have girded my loins like a warrior from the Bible and am going forth to do battle with the enemy.

Such ado! I was kissed and slapped and lectured until my ears turned inside out.

He sent me an enameled brooch of a little bird with a pearl in its beak.