Stockton Herald, South Durham and Cleveland Advertiser. — 1883-07-28 (Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, England)

JOAN GARI, THE HERMIT OF MONSERRAT. Joan Gari was a hermit of Monserrat in the ninteenth century, who had a great repute for sanctity and purity and devotion to Santa Cecilia. Naturally, Joan Gari prided himself upon his sanctity, and God determined to put it to proof. There reigned at that time at Barcelona Count Wilfredo el Velloso, the father of a beautiful and -charming daughter, who, for the secret purposes of the Divine will, was afflicted with a malign spirit, which, it was declared, would not depart out of her and leave her in health except at the mandate of Joan Gari. And it was necessary that the maiden should seek the holy man alone in the mom). tam n where he abode. Count Wilfredo, moved by his affection, and against all the dictates ci prudence, consented to this pilgrimage of his blooming daughter. She departed to the moun. tam, and never returned. Many years elapsed before her fate was known to the count. The hermit had received her, dishonoured her, murdered her to conceal his crime, and buried her body in a crevice in the rocks. Overcome at last by remorse, Joan Geri threw himself at the feet of the image of the Virgin, and begged her pity and help. In order to get an indulgence for his sins he made a journey to Rome, and the Pope absolved him on condition that he should expiate his crime by becoming a beast like Nebuchadnezzar, and roaming about on all fours. This Gari did faithfully for six years, crawling about the rocks on his hands and knees, exposed to the ele. ments, foraging for his food like an animal in the thickets, until he became a hairy, en. mentionable monster of the forest. One day in the year 894 Count Wilfredo, with a troop of attendants, went forth to hunt in the wilds of Monserrat. His; companions, beating about in the wilderness, routed out a nondescript monster, who permitted himself to be taken alive into the presence of Count Wilfredo. The count was much amused with this capture, and determined to take him as a trophy to Barcelona, whither Geri was nothing loath to go, as he was determined to suffer in silence all the punishment that God and the count might inflict. He was taken to Barcelona, and exhibited as a real monster of the forest. And there God at last saw and accepted the penitence of Gari. One day, when the count had a great feast, he ordered the monster to be brought into the banquet ball, in order to entertain his guests with the uncouth curiosity. But lot while they made merry over him at the feast, God spoke out of the heavens, and said, "Arise, Joan Geri I God has pardoned thy sins." All heard the voice, but could hardly believe what they heard. But Geri, emboldened by the heavenly aid, arose and stood upright, and prostrating himself at the feet of the count, confessed all. And Count Wilfredo, who declared that it did not become him to withhold a forgiveness that God had granted, pardoned him on condition that he should lead them to the grave of the murdered girl. This Geri did, and when they stood by the grave of his victim, to! grace succeeded grace. Requikla awoke from her long and tranquil sleep in the arms of Mary the Mother of God, and rose up radiant, and kissed her wondering father. Like a true woman as she was, her first petition to her father was that he should forgive her destroyer, and the next was that she should be allowed to consecrate herself to the service of the Holy Virgin, at this very shrine, in the shadow of which she had been dishonoured, murdered, buried, and resurrected after a sleep of seven years. So Requilda became a nun, and Joan Gari crawled, I suppose, into his hole, where he ended a life which diffuses a sanctity over all this region. Whether be is, as I have read, the most beantifnl exemplar of all the virtues, the reader must judge. It seems to me that he missed some of them. What they were his image is perhaps intended to represent him as enquiring, in his phrenological attitude of studying his own skull.—Atlantre Monthly.  A