254 THE MAGIC OP JEWELS AND CHARMS
some
wonderful cures are said to have been accomplished by its aid. Sceptics
will be inclined to attribute such cures to the influence of
suggestion, while Catholics will see in them a proof of the power of
the saint's intercession on behalf of those who repose their trust in
her. St. Anthony is usually appealed to for success in difficult
enterprises, and more particularly for the discovery of lost articles.
Here the belief in the successful intervention of the respective saints
is more generalized and appears to have grown up independently of any
event chronicled in the legends, but these instances are quite
exceptional.
An
exceedingly beautiful jewelled medallion said to have been given by
Pope Paul V, in 1614, to the Archbishop of Lisbon, Don Miguel de
Castro, shows in the centre the figures of the Virgin and Child,
surrounded by a setting of old Indian, table-cut diamonds. The
archbishop donated this to the Church of St. Antonia da Se, sometimes
called the "Royal House of St. Antonio," for this church was built on
the site of the house in which dwelt the parents of St. Anthony, Don
Martin de Bulhoes and Dona Teresa de Azavedo, and in which the saint
was born on February 6, 1195. At his baptism he was given the name
Fernando, but later he changed this to Antonio. The great Lisbon
earthquake of 1755 completely wrecked this church, but the high altar
wherein the medallion had been placed escaped comparatively unharmed,
and the jewel was found by some peasants, who later sold it to the
family of Machados e Silvas, in whose private chapel it reposed until
within a few years.
The
shrine of St. Anne de Beaupré may be seen in the Basilica of Beaupré,
about 20 miles distant from Quebec. It stands on the site of a small
wooden sanctuary erected about the middle of the seventeenth century by
some Breton mariners who, when in imminent danger of shipwreck while
navigating the St. Lawrence, made a vow to build a chapel to
