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ST. ANNOFLEDIS

and yet she could look at it, even with her eye which was nearly blind. In this sun she saw events past, present, and future, and sometimes thoughts and motives. She first saw it while taking the discipline, and for the rest of her life it was always before her. She had frequent ecstasies, during which she was so insensible to all that went on around her, that her husband used to shake her and reproach her with falling asleep in the midst of her duties, and even at her prayers. She would never suffer any one to be spoken ill of in her presence, and always suggested excuses for those who had done wrong. She was zealous in the conversion of the wicked, therefore some who were pronounced hopelessly hardened were commended, in desperation, to her intercession. While obtaining of God the conversion of a sinner, she suffered great agony of body, as well as anguish of mind. Her charity included condemned criminals, whom she was sometimes successful in persuading to repentance and confession, after priests had been discouraged by their obduracy. She was much liked and respected for her piety and her gift of prophecy by Cardinal Fesch, Napoleon's uncle, by Marie Louise de Bourbon, queen of Etruria, by Cardinal Pedicini, and several other persons of much higher education and station than herself; but although she had taken alms when her family were at the verge of starvation, she would never accept from any of those exalted persons any favours or benefactions which would in the least degree raise her out of her humble state of life, and this was for two reasons: first, she wished to remain independent, to be always free to speak fearlessly and truly; secondly, she did not desire to place within reach of her children luxuries and leisure which they might miss when they were grown up. She feared for them idleness and love of pleasure; she thought that if they were lifted for a time out of the life of toil and privation to which they were born, and then dropped back into it, the remembrance of their temporary ease and luxury might become a temptation to them. She died in 1837. Her beatification took place in 1863, under Pius IX. Her husband, then a very old man, was one of the important witnesses on the occasion. Ho said that she was a very good woman; he as little suspected her of being a saint as of having ever sinned against him; he said he had always considered her a person of great virtues and an incomparable wife, but most of her extraordinary gifts and graces ho had only heard of since her death. She was a tertiary of the Order of the Trinitarians for the Redemption of Captives.

While her canonization was going on, in 1863, her Life was written by Dr. Luquet, bishop of Hesebon, and during that time sundry notices appeared in the Giornale di Roma and the Analecta Juris Pontificii, iii., iv. The author of Les Mystiques says that her reputation for sanctity and prophecy was such that she was the fashion among cardinals and prelates, and attained a degree of notoriety and the entrée to houses and society to which her position would not have entitled her. Dr. Luquet's little book is the chief authority for this article.

St. Annofledis, Dec. 1 and 7 (Agneflette, Lanofledis, Nofledis, Noflete). c. 655. Nun under St. Fara. Angels were heard singing at the moment of her death. Chastelain, Voc. Hag. Mabillon, AA.SS. O.S.B.

St. Anominata, V. M. Sister of St. Colomba of Evora.

Anonymous Saints. Besides the vast number of saints named in the various calendars of Christian Churches, a multitude of others are commemorated whose names are not presorved.

In the Roman Martyrology alone there are more than thirty-six thousand unnamed martyrs. Of these, a great number are women, who perished in the indiscriminate massacre of Christians by heathens, or of orthodox or Catholic Christians by heretics. When a whole family were massacred, the names of the men are often mentioned, while the wives, daughters, or companions who shared the martyrdom are commemorated, but not named. Thus we have, Feb. 15, St. Crato with his wife and family; Sept. 1, forty virgins are honoured at Heracles, disciples and